Of morality and law

Moral indignation, howsoever strong, is not a valid basis for overriding individuals’s fundamental rights of dignity and privacy.

- Delhi high court in a judgment decriminalizing homosexuality

Logical extension of this line alone would make the world a much better place.

Cat’s Cradle

“Tiger got to hunt, bird got to fly;
Man got to sit and wonder ‘why, why, why?’
Tiger got to sleep, bird got to land;
Man got to tell himself he understand.”

-Kurt Vonnegut, Cat’s Cradle

Lucky Ali

Perhaps no other music is as intertwined with my childhood as Lucky Ali’s. I don’t know what it was; his voice; that middle-east instrument I can’t put a name on; or those awesomely deep lyrics. He was my favorite for such a long time, looking back now, I can’t remember when that ceased to be. I don’t listen to him nearly as often now, and frankly, I am not a big fan of his later albums (fourth on, I think). Occasionally though, I look up his songs up on youtube, and it was a nice surprise seeing that he replies to some videos posted and that he has his own channel. It’s a nice warm feeling having your childhood favorites around. Good times!

Google reverses the arrow of time

Obviously, still in beta.

Random

1. On Bohmian mechanics.

2. Innate beat induction in humans.

3. Correlation between IQ and cognative biases.

4. A letter that I too would like to see.

5. Theodosius Dobzhansky on evolution.

O Me! O Life!

O Me! O life!… of the questions of these recurring;
Of the endless trains of the faithless—of cities fill’d with the foolish;
Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?)
Of eyes that vainly crave the light—of the objects mean—of the struggle ever renew’d;
Of the poor results of all—of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me;
Of the empty and useless years of the rest—with the rest me intertwined;
The question, O me! so sad, recurring—What good amid these, O me, O life?

Answer.

That you are here—that life exists, and identity;
That the powerful play goes on, and you will contribute a verse.

- Walt Whitman

Doing Charles Ponzi proud

By and far, in today’s regulatory environment, it is virtually impossible to violate rules, and this is something that the public really doesn’t understand. If you read something in the newspaper and you see somebody violate a rule, you say, “well they are always doing this”, but it is impossible for a violation to go undetected, certainly not for a considerable period of time.

- Bernie Madoff in October 2007

Calling a spade a spade

The fine print is hilarious (click on the image to read). But of course it’s all true.
Source: Boing Boing

This is how close the jerks are

A prank call. Someone please get them a functional caller ID. Christmas present, anyone?

The answer?

Operation Wrath of God.

“The aim was not so much revenge but mainly to make them [the militant Palestinians] frightened. We wanted to make them look over their shoulders and feel that we are upon them. And therefore we tried not to do things by just shooting a guy in the street – that’s easy … fairly.”

I am not a big fan of the name but they could have been on to something here, in terms of creating a fair deterrent. Still too weak, maybe, but realistically, there is no strong deterrent. Perhaps it just seems good considering the dismal range of options at hand; among which, the stupidest would be the one involving  large scale mobilization of troops to the border. Which is also why it is the most likely choice. One can only hope that this time it will be different.