Predicting the future - Dilbert

“The Dilbert Principle: People are idiots.”

Just finished reading Scott Adams - Dilbert - 'Predicting the future', wherein he predicts the future about varied things using humorous logic. The context is mostly set in Dilbert's office space and talks how we would finally harness the stupidity around us. Does make your mind tingle even though its a light read. This smart fellow is ranked 21 in the global ranking of business thinkers.

The last chapter of this book is totally different in that he keeps humor aside for a moment and questions the various explanations of stuff around us and introduces to an interesting concept called affirmations. I had to re-read this chapter thrice to get the gist of these things ; quite thought provoking.

Double Slit Experiment - Basically showed the interference of light waves when passed through a sheet with two slits. Initially demonstrated in the 19th century, Scotts version talks about the interference getting affected when we start to record things. Wish I could see this in action/video.

Affirmations - This one is interesting. This talks about how you could achieve nearly anything if you write down your need 15 times on a piece of paper everyday. It does not matter if you believe in it. But as per Scott, it would finally just work out! Weird. You might want to check out the chapter on affirmations in his book "God's Debris"

I think he is making an Induhvidual out of me!

Weather man

Its getting hotter by the day, but what got my attention was the weather forecast for Bangalore City in 'The Hindu' newspaper today (Page 3). It went "A fresh cool morning. A bright sunny day...." for today and "A charming morning. A dry sunny day. The clear night is likely to be comfortable." for tomorrow.

I dont know why, but I like this guy. He sounded just out of England and different.

Tom - 'Morning old fruit. What a charming morning.
Charles - 'Morning young Tom. It indeed is sweet. A perfect day for scroll by the woods.
Nitin - Easy for you blokes; I have to catch the Infy bus at 7!

Revisiting Malayalam

For all Keralites ('mallus') lost in the routines of life in a different culture, my best advise is to keep in touch with the malayalam'ness ('malayalitham') by reading the numerous malayalam books and short stories. Not knowing where to buy good malayalam literature out of Bangalore, it was a pleasure to see the book seller on train. I presume this guy works for DC/Current books directly as he did not look like the normal vendors you see on the Indian trains.

For better or worse, I studied Malayalam only until my 4th standard and thereafter it was just Hindi, Sanskrit and English as languages while at the Naval Public School. Of the three books I bought, the stories by M.T Vasudevan took me over completely. The description of emotions and the narrative writing of the day to day life was just at its best. There were more than one instance wherein I re-read the stories just out of sheer joy in reading them. These guys rock.

Effectively, this means I have more Malayalam writings to catch up; the ones I left behind since my school days. Here are the sites I now frequent :

http://www.dcbooks.com/
http://puzha.com/
http://indulekha.com/

Any good suggestions on books and writers are seriously welcome.