Dates and Debates

Yes - Happy Ramadan to one and all. I pray that everyone gets blessed with patience. Lots of it!

New Ramadan, new people, same debates. Calculation vs. Sighting, Local vs. global, 8 vs. 20 - you know what I mean…

IMHO - we have strong opinions on either side for the local versus global moon-sighting. Both have been ratified as genuinely correct, and yet we have all the time in our lives to debate the superiority of one over the other. I think the ego of the community leaders greatly overweighs the need of unity in the land. This is a simple agreement that can be decided upon at the city level, and we stick with it. Leaders should only implement it, focusing their energies on other debates.

Two extremely simple solutions stand out -

The-voting-solution: Come Muharram, all the muslims in the city cast their ballot whether they want a local or global sighting, and we accept the opinion of the masses. Breakaway splinter masjids - who don’t appreciate the unity of the land - in my opinion, don’t accept the ruling of unity in Islam and there is something wrong with them, that only some strange force can impart unto them. May the force be with the united mass.

Ding-dong-solution: Even=global, odd-numbered-year=local. Publish and accept. You happy this year, I happy next year, Islam always happy, unity always at the forefront.

Bind your self. Give your bayah. Pledge your allegiance. But don’t waste precious time explaining the superiority of your opinion.

Retaining a Developed World Status

I am trying to answer the question – what constitutes a third world country or the milder version “a developing economy”, and especially what led it into being a developing country. Specifically was India, at the turn of the 20^th century, a developed country or a developing country?

My understanding is that when the East India Company started trading, India was a developed country, where finished products were available for trade resulting in revenue and capital for further development (economic or military). However the industrial revolution in Europe far outpaced the production capacity of India, not matching the finesse of Indian artistes. On the whole it was cheap, people could afford more of what Europe produced and local industries got destroyed in the process. A little arm-twisting from the now British shareholders over the spineless manipulative rajas and maharajas, no doubt, helped in a wider adoption, and subsequent transformation of India as an excellent base of raw supplies. People were exploited for their raw supplies and squeezed to produce more, but was the economy of India still a powerhouse, if we add all the revenues created from the individual provinces etc? I believe it was a great economy but with unequal distribution and welfare. Considering that to be the case, I think that the fall from developed to developing, came about with independence, and the realization that India has lots of raw supplies but no useful method and process of materializing on this treasure. It took India a good 50 years to realize its potential, getting manufacturing knowledge established for profit, getting manufacturing infrastructure in place, and for knocking on some certification agency for a “developed  country” status.

India = USA 

East India Company/British = China 

20^th Century = 21^st Century 

Rajas/Maharajas = Senators/Congressmen

Independence -> dreadful wait

50 years for India = ?? years for USA 

Moral of the story – Manufacturing knowledge is paramount to success.

PopTech

An hour for myself is currently a luxury. An hour for myself watching TV is pandora. An hour for myself watching TV with a program dedicated to poptech - pure ecstasy (wanted to write priceless, but lets keep that cliche for later).

Poptech is all about visionaries, unpolluted by corruption, extending and redefining what is possible and who gets to decide it. This episode was aired on our local klru channel. Let it be about rewiring nervous systems to cross the boundary into electrical circuits (an obvious instant technology steriod), or social technology for making a village producers and maintainers of their own solar power (Bunker Roy), or just rebuilding in the face of natural disaster (Architecture For Humanity). Actually the last speaker for AFH mentioned a classic statement about how you can get 50 people who will live and breathe the project for the price of one Halliburton engr!!

Poptech is a must see/watch/browse because it is positive, because it liberates your mind. It is as if someone has enlightened you to be more active in that one hour. I am just rediscovering the joy of finding more positiveness on the never ending internet.

Yes - and one speaker obviously was about photography. For the uninitiated visit the following links for Paris and Dubai.

A Doctor's Perspective to the Healthcare System Overhaul

It makes me sick to think that I cannot practice medicine the way medicine is meant to be practiced: with care, quality and timeliness. Financially I feel deprived and it disgusts me that so much money goes to pay medical malpractice premiums and tails, and that our livelihoods are at risk as we are considered lottery tickets, by society, in general.

Most of the health care dollar goes to administrative costs for health insurance companies, with a large part going to the salaries and bonuses of their executives. That money should be meant for patient care. Little of the health care dollar even goes to pharmacies and hospitals, much less to the physicians. Doctors get far less of the healthcare dollar than do the executives of the insurance companies, yet without us they would be out of a job. Once we actually get reimbursed, we have our medical school loans and ever rising business costs to pay for with our ever decreasing earnings.

Now the current administration wants to decrease payments even further in order to “save” the health care system. We already know that a number of capable people are leaving our profession, or declining the arduous journey to become an American trained physician; not to mention the huge number of our friends (including me) who don’t want their own children following in our footsteps. How sad is it when we don't want our own progeny to follow us all because we are treated like thieves, or thugs, as children who cannot govern ourselves. This attitude in our society towards physicians is doing nothing but creating a loss of quality of well trained physicians.

There are close to 1 million physicians in the country and around 25 million people in the health care industry. They don’t treat or care (for) about the patients. Our patients suffer as physicians must see more patients every year just to make the same amount (or often less) money than last year; physician burnout is a well documented and a worrisome trend in our profession. This can affect our ability to properly formulate patient care. With the addition of paperwork and increased regulations put upon us by the state and federal governments, we have even less quality time for ourselves and our families. Not to mention the trauma of malpractice issues, that have taken the creativity out of patient care…resulting in the increase cost of healthcare.

In addition we need to deal with ugly politics of hospital administrators who can, just for unfriendly facial grimaces, suspend us and report us to the National Practitioner Data Bank, thus irrevocably ruining our careers, well before any investigation or fair hearing is called. We work our butts off to get top grades in college, to get into medical school, and then residency programs, where we often worked 100 or even 120 hours a week, for what? So should we give up nights, weekends, holidays, birthdays, anniversaries and even the birth of our own children to practice the vocation to which we were drawn upon? And even then, how are we treated? We are considered the vilest criminals, cheats and depraved practitioners with no sense of integrity or consciousness, only out to harm those we have struggled so long to serve. If we are so bad, so vile and so depraved, shouldn't we let our patients get treated by these lawmakers, advisors, politicians, and administrators who are trying to ‘save the health care system.

Quality of care suffers more when we spend less time checking our patients. This extra work is forced upon us when insurance companies like Medicare and Medicaid, constantly refuse to pay us in a timely fashion for our time and effort. And, when we do see patients, our clinical acumen is stifled as we must follow a cookbook approach to patient care. Yet what am I to do when 25% to 50% of my procedures, which are 'authorized' by insurance companies, are not compensated because, although authorized, they are not covered benefits. Insurance companies have no incentive to provide better care if it in turn we take good care of a patient, if good care may extend life expectancy.

It is time that we (physicians) stand up for our cause. We live in the land of the free and home of the brave. But we are passively giving up our noble lives as physicians, without liberty to practice as we should, and without the freedom to stop the government and the insurance companies from turning us in to hourly workers, but rather into the true professionals we believe we are. Perhaps we can show the country that we are worth more than a co-payment; that physicians are the real heroes for society; and that our profession is needed, our services are required, and our practice is a calling to be respected, not a trade that is to be negotiated to the lowest bidder.

I am inviting you to join my cause to ‘Save Future of Health Care’. We want our services to be adequately reimbursed, we want less paperwork, we want less money going into the hands of insurance companies and administration costs and we want medical malpractice reform, with caps on all damages, so that we can practice without the fear of needless and unwarranted lawsuits. We want the National Practitioner Data Bank reformed so entries are made after all administrative remedies have been executed, so due process is given to all physicians and that all entries are reviewed by an independent board of physicians without any ties to the accusing hospital, state, or local medical societies prior to submission. And we want proper compensation for services that pay us enough to manage our practices and allow us a living that compensates us for our years of study and training.

The Innocent Look of Happiness

There is humor and then there is a light hearted happiness, more like a sense of relief, relaxing your eyes, replenishing your soul and registering that moment in the book of unforgettable memories, creating a desire to revisit it time and again, simultaneously cheering you up for having lived that moment but longing to live it again. It matters not, if all the people stamped into that scene are around you right now, but the essence of that moment, the ether that accompanied it is irreproducible. Attachment to the event location is transitory, stressing the fact that the location wanted you to enjoy the moment then, but will not make any attempt to rewind to that point again.

Why this? why now? Returning home - I heard the chatterbox in her elements explaining the wondrous day spent at home, clockwork redefined, all excitement gears synched up with shaft of an ever peaceful world.

And no I don’t understand her gibberish baby talk.

Between Cisco and Sujood

There is such a serious pursuit for corporate acceptance, that I have been quite disconnected with my soul talk. Imam Suhaib Webb, imho, has such a marvellous personality that you can joke on serious topics with him and yet return with valuable insight. He has many lectures and audio clips on his website, but something that captured my attention is the following two part series, titled Between Cisco and Sujood.

Part 1 || Part 2
Reading time = approx 30 mins

Part 1 is very relevant to muslims everywhere, whereas part 2 is US specific in a few ways. Part 1 took me back to my first hand experience of muslims giving up work, applying undue burden to the family, all in the name of Islam.

Enjoy the posts.

Blogging

Never Before Have So Many People With So Little To Say Said So Much To So Few

(From my Doctor's Calendar)

A standstill

sleep -> wake -> eat -> drive -> work -> eat -> work -> doze -> break-> work -> drive -> play -> eat -> play -> work -> sleep

+ 5 breaks for prayers

- blog

- exercise

- read

- tv

- facebook/orkut/phone calls

= recession 

(maybe)

Palestine

Any report of the carnage in Palestine by me would mean hate towards the oppressor and guilty by association to former world war perpetrators - so instead the reason why I think the oppressor is wrong - 

http://washingtontimes.com/news/2009/jan/14/when-israel-expelled-palestinians/

Should Rang De Basanti have been banned for glorifying the terrorists in Indian history?

Of life and management

"You cannot be a manager - unless you see your team as a bar chart of productivity and deadlines"

Management principles aside, I find a big need to classify every aspect of my every day life. Ok - it may be a stretch but it is possible. Add to this the aspect of "lists" and you will know what happens daily.

Reach the office - there is always a list of deliverables - classified according to priority. List of data to be collected from juniors and classifying the data into more useful indicators for higher-ups or general external visibility. The days of the month decide a list of chores/payment schedules - again with a priority. Wife dear has a list for you with obvious must-haves and can-do-withouts. Darling daughter has a single item list - play with no obvious priority except the highest - coming to the point that the simplest life have the most fun.

But lists have their own charm. 10 things that you didn't do last year, or 4 movies that could be better with kanta behn, 5 gizmos for the next 5 years - How often have we been so attracted (or distracted) by these titles!! Forbes seems to have made its fortune from these lists!! 

Classifying is a whole different art altogether and there does not seem a general consensus on it. Websites seem to be the best examples of classifying and depending on whether you see chess as a sport or academic exercise, you will realize that the your own classification depends a lot on the websites you visit. For example - "Britney crashes Chevy Volt and survives" - is this an Auto section headline or the Entertainment gossip section? Only way that classification in your life will survive is by a general buy-in from above. You know what i mean?!! If not then next time dont ask your spouse before heading to the store ;).

Hilarious Tamil Horses

Live Free or Cry

The little life form in my house - besides cheering one and all - has been very effective in exploration and living life on own terms. Let it be chewing all the DVDs and other things that cannot be described but can be effectively classified as toys, or pulling strings and sheets to the floor, or frantic scramble to anyone with a phone in hand, life is always free. I believe you probably already understand the Cry part of the title. Whatever be the activities pursued, it always interests me to see that the shortest path to anything is the one that cuts everything in between. Parents can be scrambled over, suitcases can be climbed (and then toppled), toys can be shoved aside but that thing that has caught her interest has to be pursued. I wonder why we ever spent time trying to understand the Postman's algorithm or the shortest path algorithms.

That brings me to the next interesting point - Raising the Bar. Yes - this seems like the most apt description of parents trying to salvage everything by keeping it a little higher than the baby's reach. But as we can see this will be an iterative process as Ms-want-it-all comes up with new access mechanisms.

And So it is

Taking a trip to India always generates writing material. No matter how the wind blows there are always interesting developments that meet the eye. Malls springing up and monopolistic laws have assured that Reliance has become the indian avatar of Walmart - all their petro-comm rupees are subsidizing food prices to kill local sellers is just one example. But there were some more interesting observations such as - 

• Niqabs = Piety? Niqabs are the dress where only the eyes are uncovered in a women's dress. Muslim girls are stepping up to their teachers/parents and requesting them for niqabs, with an explanation demonstrating absolute divine need. However teachers are now realizing the ulterior motive of hidden identity unlimited mazaa. Hey you dont always find non-muslims requesting niqabs in stores -- or do you?
• 
  
• Goonda raj and sophisticated goonda raj aka politicians and industrialists resp. Blatant show of power and abuse are rampant. The civics syllabus in school needs to be revised for the monetary compensation given to politicians. I came across a case of a telecom company giving a 7 figure bribe to lay its broadband line in a residential neighborhood to the incumbent corporator. For the general good of the people this is a small amount. The general attitude was that of live and let live - judge the good and bad with the current age not the 60 year old constitutional law.
  
• 
  
• Me first - Imagine a one lane uphill road with a cyclist straining himself to proceed. In India you have to imagine a car driver right behind this cyclist blasting his horn on the cyclist. Then imagine a bullock cart heaving itself across a traffic light (even a color blind animal was following the traffic lights), and then imagine a couple of motorbikes that cannot understand the same simple concept, avoid a near-hit, and cause the bullocks to grind their hooves into the tar for some rash motorists. No order no discipline all chaos.

No bloody-american-bashing-indians but an undeniable visible trend.

OBAMA BHANGRA PARTY

South Asians for Obama Arizona

Invite you to join us for the…

OBAMA BHANGRA PARTY

with

Obama Campaign Representative

Honorable -------- Arizona State District 10 Representative

On Monday 3^rd November

National Treasure... sorry Debt

.. Time to start using HEX instead....

Can we expect a movie on the same lines of National Treasure with that one-eye-on-one-dollar now representing something new?

community generated media

One of the good things from 2007 was the appearance of digg.com, a community oriented portal to allow sharing of news that you would not see unless you are an ardent follower of Oddly Enough on reuters. At the start this was a healthy break-away from slashdot and the forum-oriented discussions.

Gradually this has become a lazy-man's disgruntling site. If you dont like GWB click here and voila you have a sense of contributing to dissent. All bull and no effect is my opinion. If you dont like big oil dirtying the coast of alaska, then by digging one opinion is not going to change a thing; you have to get out and show strength in numbers - something like the hispanic population challenging illegal immigration in Phoenix, with mexican flags outnumbering the star spangle 10:1. Cops could not arrest these who were proudly displaying their crime, so just imagine what the effect would be when you are opposing something legally. That reminds me of the other time folks here were oppsing a trans-texas highway - their opposition was planned for Saturday when the government offices are closed, the governor and mayor are probably hunting some lame ducks with the veep, and the sound of gun-shots is far louder than the people's voice.

Some other time we will cover how the other extreme of burning buses/and public property is also senseless.

New School Year

Walking into my workplace today, I was caught up in a strange nostalgia never experienced for atleast 15 years. Strange as it may seem, these thoughts took me back to the start of every school year at Vincents, and simultaneously encouraging me to take time off to write something on this oh-so-neglected-blog. Just like a new school year you realize that mr. bench-sharer has left the school and there is someone new instead. So yes, a few links on this page are now owned by not the people I know, and yes it will be on my list somewhere to honorably remove all references.

Walking into my workplace today, I had to hunt down my new cubicle moving aisle to aisle, just like the old days of moving from notice-board to notice-board finding your new division and whether other men-at-arms had made it as well. There was more then - everything from our football team having a chance to win, or whether we had the talent to make it through the 4x4 relays that were atleast 7 months away. After you brave the confusion regarding the line in the morning assembly, you find your place in the classroom and the teacher that you will have to face for the rest of the year. In much the same manner, the cubicle and aisle are new, the desk is lower than my knees right now and the remaining folks in my aisle are on vacation of MIA.

That should explain why I am distracted and posting things on my blog, knowing fully well that a crunch time is expected in two weeks, and then I will need another "event" to drag me back to blogging.

Good Measures Half Date at a time

Helping and Contributing to make this world a better place -

Can your dollar give you contentment?

Can your dollar make someone else happy?

Evolution or not

Darwin was an interesting guy and wrote that excellent book that spoke about species in general. I have to admit that evolution exists and also in humans. One classic example can be observed in the weapons of war used by (lets not go too far in history) the mughals. Each sword weighs a ton, indicating that they were well built and had a height that was bigger that the people of today. So I will say that humans in their evolution have actually decreased in size over the years.

As an electronic engineer, we have studied the marvels of the atom and the electron but have never seen these particles yet we believe in it. So it would be apt for us to believe that no rosetta stone is necessary for us to prove conclusively of some tree swinging ancestor(astgh). However there is a big difference in saying that the species of cats exists in many different forms, and the species of goats exist in multitude countries and that saying that once upon a time the cats and goats were partners in crime. (To me it seems straight out of Disneyland).

Similarly every animal had its evolution- some died, some were killed, and man brought others to extinction. (Forget the next generations - I ask you - why did the cheetah disappear from India when man could have prevented it.) But what is the relation between an ant and an elephant to a scorpion - there is no rosetta stone and no link whatsoever. So I conclude that Darwin was right in evolution of species but that was individually. And if I look back at the life of Darwin, I am all the more convinced that his study was based on winches with varying beak sizes and not a relation between winches and seals etc.

And speaking of the Creator - His creations extend way beyond our imagination. If you work with the complexity of ASICS, you will understand that emulating a section of the P4 takes a million dollar box with 128 million ASIC gates. Now the best supercomputer uses 128K+ processors and cannot yet come even close to the complexity of the brain. So sbh I can only marvel at the creator. And lets extend this to beyond living organisms - can we explain why sea water and river water taste different though they mix freely? And the biggest non-explanation I have ever received - Can you explain life that arises in the womb? Darwin cannot explain that and nor can some atheism manual.

I am a muslim and nearly all my references come from the Quran. Taking the historical age of its relevation and its authenticity, I am marvelled at the miracles that were mentioned in it and seeing it confirmed in the years since then, only reaffirms my belief in God. There is harmony between the Quran and modern science. Allah does not tell you how to solve calculus and to program in C, but surely he has bestowed you with a beautiful mind and spirit that enables you to do so.

A student might be deceived by the accuracy of mathematics and then generalize and consider all the subjects included in philosophy, including metaphysics, to be as accurate. I pray to God to guide you to the right path to protect from knowledge that is of no use to you.

http://www.miraclesofthequran.com/scientific_index.html
http://www.youngmuslims.ca/online_library/books/towards_a_sound_awakening/ch1p3.htm