New Home

–is the new home of Ruminating Out Loud.

.

Media Metamorphosis

Just watch. You’ll be amazed by the transformation that is taking place in the media landscape in such a short span of time with little fanfare or attention.

Epigenome

Incredible!

In Honor Of Senator Kennedy

In honor of Senator Edward M. Kennedy, I’ll re-post and share a poem I wrote a while back, In the Sense of Time. As he said it best, the dream will never die… He lives on in the dreams he birthed and in the dreams he fulfilled.

In the Sense of Time

In the sense of time I die

I die cell by cell

And piece by piece

Destined for a life mortal

In war and peace.

Yet I breath

Knowledge I absorb

Expressions of self

In spite of death.

In the sense of time we die

Yet dreams of a preacher

Live on to see

A destiny fulfilled

A changed generation

And a nation perfected.

The hope distilled

Of pain and despair

Seeing no end

Lives on to inspire

Elevating a son

Of a mother single

A bearer of light

A hope-vessel half-full.

In the sense of time we die

Dreams live

But you and I.

.

Impressive High-speed Robot Hand

Do you want to know how far robots have come towards rendering us almost replaceable? Check out this video showing Ishikawa Komuro Lab’s high-speed robot hand performing incredible acts of dexterity and skillful manipulation. Indeed, an impressive demonstration of advances in robotics and A.I.

Ramadan Kareem!

President Obama continues to extend the unclenched fist forward to improve relations with the Muslim world by building on the Cairo speech and extending best wishes to Muslim communities here in the U.S. and around the world. A smart strategy of forging good relations based on respect and understanding.

Multiverse?

Dr. Michio Kaku discussing about the universe…

He Did It Again!

Just look at the distance between him and the rest of the field at the finish line…

Alone

Hands tied together, he looked up

As if to beg for a sliver of hope

Mercy maybe to a life short lived

Looked down to see the suffering and misery

To find, the hands which were thought to be tied

Free, but crippled and incapable of reach

For the hope dangling upfront to silence the hungry mind

He sensed, though, without letting go off the inflated ego

That which tied the hands so as to hide

In the arm pit, deceiving the passersby and self

Denying much needed linkage, belonging, and meaning

Being among those who care with stretched out arms

Reaching for contact like a branch of a conifer tree

Spreading out and together growing forward…

Basked in sweet and agony, he sat upright

Upon the the realization he, too, has really become inanimate

Just growing and being, like the branch soon to be detached

Off the tree, left to rote on the ground

Where am I? He asked with no being near to respond

Even the room seemed like a grave; echoless and dark

Quiet, distant, alone; is it the essence of being, the meaning of creation?

With a sudden shock of death, he awoke again

To realize all that was just a dream, or so he thought.

He could see the old lady, gracefully aged sitting next to a son

He also heard the cry of a baby and the soothing of a mother’s sound

He felt comforted, he thought he wasn’t alone

Then, a rude awakening besets drenching him in more sweat

He was really alone, he concluded, having estranged from parents

And left his beloved now miles away; receding by the minute

Hands tied, can’t bridge the distance left behind

He awoke again, his hands reflexively reaching out and desperate

Stretched out to shake and hug; to rub and massage; to hold

“Well, hello!” the old lady sounded; “what is the matter, son?”

He could sense the roughness of a life hard-lived, and the warmth

As she held and pressed, life and hope into this inanimate vessel

He begged for this to never end, never to wake or sleep

“Thanks, mom!” He blurted out, while admiring the rising sun at the horizon.

Health Care Reform 101

Here is a distilled (<1000 words!) version of all the issues concerning the health care reform debate via Alec MacGillis of The Washington Post.

Spreading the Cost Saving Reform

The crux of the matter about health care reform is that something needs to be done to address the exploding cost of care, which is incommensurate to the quality of care provided and makes the U.S. an outlier among all the nations. Atul Gawande et al. discuss this in a recent article. Here is an excerpt:

“We have reached a sobering point in our national health-reform debate. Americans have recognized that our health system is bankrupting us and that we have dealt with this by letting the system price more and more people out of health care. So we are trying to decide if we are willing to change — willing to ensure that everyone can have coverage. That means banishing the phrase “pre-existing condition.” It also means finding ways to pay for coverage for those who can’t afford it without help.

Both of these steps stir heated argument, not to mention lobbyists’ hearts. But what creates the deepest unease is considering what we will have to do about the system’s exploding costs if pushing more people out is no longer an option. We have really discussed only two options: raising taxes or rationing care. The public is understandably alarmed.

There is a far more desirable alternative: to change how care is delivered so that it is both less expensive and more effective. But there is widespread skepticism about whether that is possible.

Yes, many European health systems have done it, but we are not Europe. And evidence that places like the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota or the Cleveland Clinic are doing it is likewise dismissed because their unique structures (for example, their physicians work on salary rather than being paid for each service) make them seem as far from Middle America as Sweden is.

Yet in studying communities all over America, not just a few unusual corners, we have found evidence that more effective, lower-cost care is possible.”

Please refer also refer to another informative article by Gawande in which the issue of cost/quality disparity across regions is discussed.

Getting Universal Coverage Will Be A Major Achievement

Granted it would be great to have a bill that will magically half the cost of health care, to the level other industrialized nations spend per capita, and still provide universal coverage. It would be great if we could simply control the exploding cost that is pacing to bankrupt our country. It would be great if we can ensure that a great nation like ours ensures that no single citizen is made to suffer for the lack of health care. It becomes quickly apparent that addressing all the issues concerning health care reform at once is no small matter in the current dysfunctional political and sensationalist media climate. As indicated in a previous post, I believe President Obama is poised to get a significant health care reform in place. Such a reform may not satisfy the aspiration of  liberals. It surely will not satisfy the conservatives who are bent on seeing him fail at the expense of what is best for the country or even those who oppose him on the grounds of principle. James Kwak gives a good synopsis of the coverage vs. costs balance that will be hard to strike in crafting a reform and expresses a similar sentiment as above by suggesting that even providing universal coverage will be a major achievement.

“Looking further down the road, though, perhaps a bill that provides universal coverage but falls short of “bending the curve” would still be a major achievement for the American people. Not only would it address one of the most embarrassing features of our society, but it would only increase the pressure to do something about costs. Today our health-care system adapts to rising costs by shifting the pain onto the unemployed and the poor. Universal coverage would make rising costs a shared national problem.”

The Price of Modernity?

The concept of friendship is one that is being loosely applied in the advent of virtual inter-connectedness that social media is affording. However, is modernity stealing the honesty and intimacy out of relationships and filling the void with superficial means of interaction? Is the essence of friendship being lost? What does friendship mean and what purpose does it serve? Those are the type of questions that are discussed in this article at Boston Globe. My take on the proliferation of social media and its impact on real (in the sense of non-virtual) interpersonal relationships can be found here.

“A growing body of experimental evidence suggests that, on the whole, we know significantly less about our friends, colleagues, and even spouses than we think we do. This lack of knowledge extends far beyond embarrassing game-show fodder – we’re often completely wrong about their likes and dislikes, their political beliefs, their tastes, their cherished values. We lowball the ethics of our co-workers; we overestimate how happy our husbands or wives are…

Whatever the cause, such findings challenge our idea of what friendship is. Friends and spouses are people to whom we are supposed to be able to confide anything – we draw support and a sense of well-being from the thought that our friends know us better than anyone else in the world, and like us nonetheless. Instead, it appears that there are whole regions of our personalities that they miss entirely, and we do the same with them.

The problem, Flynn says, is that interacting with people and sharing experiences with them doesn’t necessarily translate into knowing lots of things about them. The main hurdle is the way we talk to those we’re close to: our conversations are usually meant not so much to gather information as to establish rapport and to bond – in short, to make friends. And we do that by focusing on areas of agreement and avoiding topics that might cause friction. Our natural tendency toward comradeship makes us, ironically, leery of learning too much about the people we’re befriending.

The intriguing part of this article is that there may actually as much of a benefit from the allusions of friendship as there is from real and intimate ones. I find it hard to believe.

Indeed, according to Michael Norton, a psychologist who teaches at Harvard Business School, simply believing we have lots of close friends brings the same benefits as actually having them. In other words, if someone’s ignorance of one of his “friends” extends so deeply that he’s not actually aware that the person doesn’t like him, he may be better off for it. Even befriending entirely fictional people seems to do some good – a paper published last year by researchers at the University of Buffalo and Miami University found that television characters actually function as “social surrogates” for viewers, and watching a favorite show can be an effective way to alleviate loneliness.

Even in a close and strong relationship like a marriage, a certain amount of blindness may help. While the idea remains controversial, some researchers argue for the value of so-called positive illusions, the rosy image that some people hold, despite the available evidence, about their romantic partners. The psychologist Sandra Murray at the University of Buffalo has found that couples that maintained positive illusions about each other tended to be happier than those that didn’t.

Something similar may be at work in close friendships. And, according to Dunning, a slightly different form of social illusion may also arise. People naturally seek out those they see as most like them, and a falsely inflated sense of similarity may only further cement friendships.

In other words, one of the nicest things a friend can do is let us misunderstand them just a little.

“If you don’t know everything about someone else, you still enjoy the time you spend with each other,” says Delia Baldassarri, a sociologist and assistant professor at Princeton who has studied people’s perceptions of their friends’ political attitudes. “In certain ways, you may even enjoy it more.”

Health Care Reform Is Coming!

For all the hoopla and shameless hypocrisy of the opponents of health care reform, major change is on the way. And there is nothing the other side can do about it. Just look at this nice summary from Ezra Klein about what is already agreed upon and other pertinent issues.

“Here are the things that, broadly speaking, legislators agree about: insurance market reforms, including community rating, guaranteed issue, an end to rescission, an end to discrimination based on preexisting conditions, and an individual mandate. Subsidies for low-income Americans. Delivery system reforms. Health insurance exchanges. An expansion of coverage to about 95 percent of legal residents. Prevention and wellness policies. Retaining and strengthening the employer-based insurance market. Creating some kind of incentive for employers to offer, and keep offering, health benefits. Expanding Medicaid to about 133 percent of poverty.

Here are the things that legislators disagree about, but are discussing, and will probably figure out: whether subsidies should reach 300 percent of poverty or 400 percent. Whether there should be an employer mandate or something milder. Whether medium-size employers should be eligible to enroll in the health insurance exchanges. Whether health reform should cost $1 trillion over 10 years or $1.4 trillion over 10 years. Whether it should be paid for through new taxes on the wealthy or a change to existing tax subsidies in the health-care system.

Here are the things legislators don’t agree about: whether we should have a public option that is open only to the minority of Americans on the exchanges or a co-op option. How to handle abortion. How to handle geographic disparities in insurance costs.

Here are the things that aren’t under consideration but are alive in the public debate: socialized medicine. Euthanasia. Government-driven rationing. Death panels. Illegal immigrants.”

If President Obama succeeds in getting a bill that consists of even the items which legislators agree about, that will be an enormous accomplishment. I suspect that the president and his team are fully aware of the difficulty in instituting the needed reform all at once due to the gridlock of partisan politics. The pragmatism with which they operate and the laws of incremental returns dictate that the approach of “putting points on the board,” as Rahm Emanuel would put it, is one to go for. In fact, all the discussion about the public option could simply be a way of setting a high and, most likely, politically untenable bar by which most other measures can be compared. If they could achieve it, it would be great. If the outcome is setting up a co-op option in addition to instituting all those other significant reforms, that will still be a major victory. The president has stated time and time again that he intends to provide the same kind of health insurance choice the federal employees get. Here is what he promised:

If you’ve got insurance through your employer, you can keep your insurance. We estimate we can cut the average family’s premium by about $2,500 per year. If you don’t have health insurance, then we’re going to provide you the option of buying into the same kind of federal pool that both Sen. McCain and I enjoy as federal employees. We’re going to make sure insurance companies can’t discriminate on the basis of pre-existing conditions. We’ll negotiate with the drug companies for the cheapest available prices. We are going to invest in information technology to eliminate bureaucracy and make the system more efficient. We’ve got to put more money into preventive care. (Source: 2008 third presidential debate against John McCain Oct 15, 2008)

It looks to me that he is going to accomplish nearly all that he has set out to incorporate into the reform. By letting go of the public option and bracing insurance co-ops, as they are inclining to do, they will come across as having compromised while accomplishing the main objective of empowering citizens with the means to come together and wield bargaining power over insurers.

9.58: Lightning Bolt Strikes Again!

Simply Supernatural!

Fractal Dendrites on Ice

Here is another glorious manifestation of fractal geometry to go along with a previous post on fractals in nature. This time it is dendrites in the cracking pattern of a sheet of ice.

Here Comes the President!

You had to know President Obama was simply not going to allow the opponents of health care reform continue to spread lies and scare people in an effort to throttle this necessary and much too delayed effort at change. This is the kind of inspired, passionate, and reasoned argument, which he has shown to be capable of time and time again, that will win the day no matter the scale of spread of misinformation from the other side. Good job, Mr. President! Keep up the good fight!

Health Care: Canada versus the United Kingdom

Nate Silver has a great demonstration of and comparison between health care systems in Canada and the U.K., both of which are frequently vilified by the opponents of health care reform here in the U.S. Enjoy!

The Problem with Recommender Systems

Here is a recommender system that is clearly broken. Six to seven years back I purchased a book on graduate schools from Amazon. You can then imagine my surprise when I keep getting this type of solicitation to buy more of the same. Don’t they understand that this is a type of commodity you use at most once and over a very short period of time? Doesn’t it occur to them that I may be out of graduate school by now? You would think this is straight forward. But, apparently not to whoever setup this personalized recommender system for Amazon.

The problem with recommender systems

The Essence of Viral

The essence of viral spreading of information is one that can surprisingly be explained by quantum mechanical concepts, as discussed in a previous post, “Why Some Ideas Go Viral and Others Do Not.” Now, here comes a real world example, in fact one of ROL’s own escapade into the viral realm thanks to “The Little Imperfections.”

Below is a plot of weekly visitor count to this information domain, which I call Mount Little Imperfections. Here are a few observations that I find to be interesting:

1. It is evident that in a short few weeks, the visitor count exploded by ~ 2000% from the previous baseline at its peak.
2. The rate of decline from the peak takes place at a much slower pace than the rise. I believe this is the essence of what makes a give information viral.
3. The after effect of a viral incident results in a shift of the baseline of regular visitors (by ~ 300%). This goes to show why viral marketing works. That is, even in the after glow of a viral incident, there is a measurable effect in popularizing a given brand.
4. There is a discernible pattern to how a viral idea spreads. As can be seen, the rise and decline of the frequency of visitors viewing the “The Little Imperfections” post evolves in a weekly cycle. The number peaks on Mondays and declines successively throughout the week until the arrival of the next Monday. Empowered with this kind of data, one can identify the particular mode of transmission of information and  target it accordingly. In this particular case, it appears that the discovery of the post is made sometime over the weekend, then it is invariable shared via email. Most people connect back to the internet in a serious way, most likely, when they show up for work on Monday. It appears the viewer count for this post is the smallest on Saturdays for the most part. May be fewer people are plugged in on Saturdays than any other day of the week. It is remarkable how this cycle repeats itself without fail.

There you have it; the working of viral spreading of information in theory and practice.

Mount Little Imperfections

Modern Day Conservatism

Here is an intriguing quote:

“The modern conservative is engaged in one of man’s oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.” – JK Galbraith

The Epitome of Hypocrisy

Working to address the inefficiency, waste, and unsustainable cost in the dysfunctional health care system (if there is one) is hard enough a task to bring about reform without having to deal with such hypocrites. How do they sleep at night?!

Happy National Relaxation Day!

I bet you didn’t know August 15th is a special day unlike any other. Yes, it marks the National Relaxation Day. It says a lot about the breakneck speed at which our everyday life unfolds for us to need a reminder to take time and relax. In any case, if you are not the relaxing-type and have no ideas as to what to do on this very day, here are some ideas, courtesy of eHow:

1. Take the whole day or part of the day off if possible. Sleep late. Lounge around the house. Just enjoy a lazy day.
2. Read a good book. Watch a movie or TV marathon of something you really enjoy.
3. Spend the day in a place that is tranquil and relaxing. Suggested places: a lake, the beach, the mountains, or a quiet cafe.
4. Spend time relaxing on your deck or patio.
5. Let voice mail take your calls. Let your e-mails wait until tomorrow. Take a technology break. Revisit your connection with silence and with nature.
6. Visit a spa. Enjoy a massage. Relaxation day is on a Saturday this year. Enjoy a weekend retreat in a serene place. Pamper yourself on relaxation day.
7. Do not cook on relaxation day. Order delivery food or dine out. Take a break from ordinary, daily housework and yard work.

What is Happening to Us, America?

What is happening to us, America?

Unable to listen, screaming at each others’ throat

Quick to affirm our rights, in a shouting match of sound bites

Denying the right of others, are we growing intolerant of the other

Who appears foreign, forgetting that this land we call home

Is a gift to all, to the peasant off the boat generations ago

To the immigrant of tomorrow disembarking of a Boeing plane

None owning her, a gift to the freedom seeker

In search of justice, equality, and opportunity.

Birthers of those who landed on her a long time ago

Why can’t they care for the new in rememberance of the old

The toil and persecution, the hunger and oppression they fled

That which is evident in the torment of of waterless eyes

Lifeless skin, barely hiding the bone – crushed by the weight of pain

Of the novice eager to belong and take a bite of burger

Founding a new and promised destiny to the next generation may be.

Why don’t we awake in awe of the privilege

That which our forefathers died for in order for us to bask

In the entitlement fight of the land.

Let us remember and celebrate, the gift of care and nurture

That this land gave to the slaves and slave masters alike

To the protestant and hungry, fleeing the oppression of bigotry

To the Holocaust survivor that found a safe home

The political refugee who found respite from having to look over his shoulder

To the woman made to live in a subhuman and subservient order

Coming home to a land, where her fight for civil rights

Would awaken a peoples’ conscious, mobilizing a nation.

Imperfect she may be, but malleable always

Willing to be shaped, by the blood and tears

Of those who choose to partake in the arching of her destiny

Towards a beacon of hope and a promise land for the free.

Fulcrum of Love

At the fulcrum, hangs the balance between I and we

Defining the equilibrium of love and belonging.

Does she worry about asserting of her right

Or her happiness, her body, or her income

All used to define the essence of an independent woman

Does he care just about his needs

Gratification of self, stroking of ego

Being the center of attention, effusion of machismo.

In the celebrated self reliance gained, at the expense

Of the lost interdependence of nurture

The feeding of care and compassion for the other

His hunger hers, her pain and joy always his

The lever tilting at the fulcrum towards me and I

Away from we, dissolving the bridge

Destroying love and care, exchanging  caress for self.

A Golden Glory

They claim thousands of years of glory

A civilization unlike any other

The foundation of humanity and being

Philosophy, architecture, art and history

But, where is civilization now

In a population, tied down to the barrel of a gun

Where is the glory now

In the millions of people suffering everyday

Poor, sick, illiterate, and hungry

Where are the marvels of architecture

In the home-less, destitute and lonely

For all the claims of ancestry to the glorious generation

Of vast wisdom, anarchy besets in the land

Steeped in the thousands of years of history

Where the force of military is used to silence the mass

To kill the innocent, to spread hateful ideology

Where is the golden glory of humanity

In the suffering of mothers and baby

Raped to death by the merciless children no less

Turned into killing machines fueled by

Guns and dope delivered for a profit that builds

An oasis of life nurturing and plenty

To children of arms dealer, the corrupt politician

And the drug lord, squeezing humanity out of the land.

In all the despair and imperfection there lies and example

A union of many bound together by a common destiny

Of immigrants: European, African, Asian, and Latino

From east to west north and south

Black, white, red, and brown; together as one

Protected by rule of law with unalienable rights

With a military standing guard of a nation

By the people, for the people, and of some people

A proud institution of protection and defense

With a might of destruction unparalleled

A testament to the perfect balance of power

Between professionalism and passion of voices

Striving to affirm their right; yearning to be heard.

Hubble’s Gift to Humanity

Songs That Heal

U.S.A.: The Outlier in Health Care Expenditure

In a previous post, a comparison of per capita spending and life expectancy for some of the developed countries in the world was compared. In it, the incommensurate cost to the quality of care being delivered to the population was discussed. Then (at the beginning of the year), the post was more of an exercise in the sharing of information. There is a new found urgency nowadays in ensuring that relevant information is shared and spread given the significant amount of attention the issue is getting from lawmakers and the population at large. It is instructive to take a look at yet another graph that highlights how much of an outlier the U.S. is in comparison to other nations of the world in terms of health care expenditure.

Transitions

Transitions (08/09)

Ill

Feeling ill, dysfunctional and sick

Lack of interest reaching the peak

Like a fruit wasting away; nearing harvest pick

Uncovered by fashion, which normally sleak

Hiding the rote, masking the stink

Frustration, disgust, and hate; piled like a rick

All matters of cure, unable to break

The vicious cycle, stuck in a wreck

Soul dripping away, essences of being leak

Left a flying zombie, fur seals in Raikoke.

Flying Thoughts

Like a bird in the sky

With wings spread out to fly

My thoughts sit above clouds

Textured and smooth, fluffy and light

Separating earthly life from heavens

Entrapped in a thin can

With a comfort of air conditioned home

Bound to a seat, in a moment of liberation.

Oh! The cruelty of creation

Delivering Adam and Eve to a land

Dry and sea forever tethered

To the ground incapable of flight

Forever looking up, pleading to heavens

Above, as if living and world that is flat

But, to the omni present blanket clothing the planet

All around the globe, a tapestry of clouds and dreams

Telegraphed upward in seeking and servitude sent.

There, on the planet live, with the vastness of ego

Paralleling the grandiosity of universe beyond

Left to fight for resources finite

In a mission of self-destruction.

Up here, thousands of feet in the sky

There are no gun shots, screams and disorder

All beings and thing aligned in one purpose

Driven journey, anxious to arrive at a destination

Clouds and dreams outside, dispersing in agreement

As if eager, to let go of unwelcomed guest

To the marching forward of the can

Pacing to return, in obedience of creation.

Hourglass

Speckles of sand flow

From one side to the other

In obedience to gravity

Marking the timeless evolution of time

In symbolism of a body figure sculpted at the waist

Into a proportion of man-made beauty.

The narrowness of the neck dictates

The flow of time in the hourglass

Separating the present from the past

Or is it a testimony to the depravity of delight

In the fullness of body and waist

Manifest in the religiosity of diet.

The bifrication of of purpose distinctly evident

While the diameter of the neck serves

To mark the passage of time infinite

That of the inward pulled and strapped

Serves only to please a fleeting standard

In vanity, of beauty and perfection misplaced.

Rollercoaster

The ups and downs rendered in formation

Like a marching band befitting of a dawn

The oneness of rhythms and the imbalance of movement

Up and jumpy, happy and limitless at once

Down and thumping, deafening and hardened in instant.

Where is the sigh when it is sought

Where is the melody when one dances

Fickle it is flowing between fingertips

Tangible in the wetness of skin left behind

But, echoless chamber filled with screams.

Where is the engine that could

Pumping more vivacious spirit than just blood

Without fail, day in day out without effort.

Why is humanity the combined sum of parts

Of limbs farflung and lungs charcoaled by smoke

Of flesh weak and enslaved of craving and addition

Of brain and heart like a hardened brick, fearing and knocking

All that is foreign, destroying the other and losing

Self with every chipped corner of fortitude and empathy.

Priceless!

This is the kind of priceless picture that really says more than a thousand words.

As the president said: “I do so recognizing that change cannot happen overnight. No single speech can eradicate years of mistrust, nor can I answer in the time that I have all the complex questions that brought us to this point. But I am convinced that in order to move forward, we must say openly the things we hold in our hearts, and that too often are said only behind closed doors. There must be a sustained effort to listen to each other; to learn from each other; to respect one another; and to seek common ground.”

Well, the listening has began. That by itself is no small achievement!

Members of Hamas, wearing masks to conceal their identity, watch President Obama's speech at their training base in the Gaza Strip.

Parallel Universes

They ask why; why are you not jovial?

Alone, pensive, and distant

They ask why; why are you so banal?

Small, shallow, and trite

Their wills live on parallel universes

Governed by rules disparate and diverging

Unbeknownst to them the gulf widens

Like the parting of the sea, only to come

Together at last up on the awakening

On the emotional journey bridging the divide

The essence of completion in the co-joining

Of the complementary universes; through time warps.

Genetics, Intelligence, I.Q., and Success

What do Asian-Americans, Jews and West Indian blacks have in common? Well, these groups are considered to be relatively successful in the U.S. Nicholas D. Kristof provides, yet again, another insightful opinion piece on the connection (or lack thereof) between genetics, intelligence, I.Q., and success. He debunks the myth of the connection between genetics and intelligence (and success) by contrasting the experience of these genetically disparate groups of people.

“Asian-Americans are renowned — or notorious — for ruining grade curves in schools across the land, and as a result they constitute about 20 percent of students at Harvard College.

As for Jews, they have received about one-third of all Nobel Prizes in science received by Americans. One survey found that a quarter of Jewish adults in the United States have earned a graduate degree, compared with 6 percent of the population as a whole.

West Indian blacks, those like Colin Powell whose roots are in the Caribbean, are one-third more likely to graduate from college than African-Americans as a whole, and their median household income is almost one-third higher.

These three groups may help debunk the myth of success as a simple product of intrinsic intellect, for they represent three different races and histories. In the debate over nature and nurture, they suggest the importance of improved nurture — which, from a public policy perspective, means a focus on education. Their success may also offer some lessons for you, me, our children — and for the broader effort to chip away at poverty in this country.”

Truth Telling: A Pragmatist’s Foreign Policy

Many things can be said of the speech (I would say it is more of a lecture and a lesson in smart diplomacy than a speech) President Barack Obama gave to the Muslim world in Cairo, Egypt. One thing is certain; the president believes in truth telling and partnership built on mutual respect and appreciation. Below is the speech. Enjoy!

“Goodbye Art”: Jimi Hendrix on Fire

Here is a fascinating video of art by Phil Hansen. Enjoy!

Flying White House Over New York City

Here is a picture of the flying White House gracing the New York City sky.

Hawt Post

The Little Imperfections has become a Hawt Post. Thanks to all visitors who have found it to be interesting enough to be shared with others. Keep spreading the good message…

Curated Information: The Next Big Thing?

That is what Wolfram|Alpha hopes to get to. The brainchild of Mathematica and other projects, Stephen Wolfram, is aiming at delivering a more relevant and accurate  information than current day search is not capable of achieving , according to a reporting by The Independent and Wolfram’s blog. Frequenters of this space know that I have a strong desire for seeing information being made more useful. The observation that the explosion of content that is being rapidly added into the already vast Null Information was begging for the delivery of service that can accomplish what the Wolfram Alpha is presumed to be capable of; that is, making progress “towards what many consider to be the internet’s Holy Grail – a global store of information that understands and responds to ordinary language in the same way a person does.” That way quantity of information becomes irrelevant. Quality as measured by relevance will be king. Indeed, the idea of incorporating the old and the new guard is what I find to be striking about the promise of this service. The internet provides an easily malleable platform that can bring to bear diverse sets of resources to partake in instant and collaborative sourcing of information. At the same time, there is the age old model of value of information being tailored by the origin. Expertise had and continues to have a role to play. I believe the tackling of the Null Information is one that will require the division of labor in evaluating and pricing, if you will, information. To that end, the folks at Wolfram Alpha seem to get it. They hope to leverage the knowledge of the experts in curating information. In this type of environment, where the old and the new are harmoniously integrated, the notion of publishing will continue to evolve and thrive. The other interesting evolution is in the ability of machines to interact with humans. Humanities attempt at taking baby steps towards broad proliferation of artificial intelligence lives on…

An excerpt of The Independent report:

The new system, Wolfram Alpha, showcased at Harvard University in the US last week, takes the first step towards what many consider to be the internet’s Holy Grail – a global store of information that understands and responds to ordinary language in the same way a person does.

Although the system is still new, it has already produced massive interest and excitement among technology pundits and internet watchers.

Computer experts believe the new search engine will be an evolutionary leap in the development of the internet. Nova Spivack, an internet and computer expert, said that Wolfram Alpha could prove just as important as Google. “It is really impressive and significant,” he wrote. “In fact it may be as important for the web (and the world) as Google, but for a different purpose.

Tom Simpson, of the blog Convergenceofeverything.com, said: “What are the wider implications exactly? A new paradigm for using computers and the web? Probably. Emerging artificial intelligence and a step towards a self-organising internet? Possibly… I think this could be big.”

Wolfram Alpha will not only give a straight answer to questions such as “how high is Mount Everest?”, but it will also produce a neat page of related information – all properly sourced – such as geographical location and nearby towns, and other mountains, complete with graphs and charts.

The real innovation, however, is in its ability to work things out “on the fly”, according to its British inventor, Dr Stephen Wolfram. If you ask it to compare the height of Mount Everest to the length of the Golden Gate Bridge, it will tell you. Or ask what the weather was like in London on the day John F Kennedy was assassinated, it will cross-check and provide the answer. Ask it about D sharp major, it will play the scale. Type in “10 flips for four heads” and it will guess that you need to know the probability of coin-tossing. If you want to know when the next solar eclipse over Chicago is, or the exact current location of the International Space Station, it can work it out.

Dr Wolfram, an award-winning physicist who is based in America, added that the information is “curated”, meaning it is assessed first by experts. This means that the weaknesses of sites such as Wikipedia, where doubts are cast on the information because anyone can contribute, are taken out. It is based on his best-selling Mathematica software, a standard tool for scientists, engineers and academics for crunching complex maths.

“I’ve wanted to make the knowledge we’ve accumulated in our civilisation computable,” he said last week. “I was not sure it was possible. I’m a little surprised it worked out so well.”

Winning Hearts and Minds

There is a lot that has been said about what the U.S. needs to do or not do to win the over the hearts and minds of locals in either Afghanistan or Iraq. I believe it ultimately boils down to the alignment of ambitions and goals; to get locals to realize that you’re on their side. The following photograph distills the essence of that connection. We just need to replicate the experience shared between this soldier and the Afghan man millions of times over. It can be done!

An Afghan man gives tea to a U.S soliders of 3rd Brigade, 10th Mountain Division patrol during a search operation to hunt members of Taliban in Nerkh district of Wardak province in west of Kabul, Afghanistan, Friday, May 1, 2009.(AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool)

Yes You Can!

When you think the odds are stacked up against you, when you feel like giving up, when the going gets really tough; just watch this and be inspired.

An Experiment in Mass Song Destruction?

You be the judge.

Apparently “13,500 people spontaneously sang Hey Jude together in Trafalgar Square. Everyone involved arrived thinking they could be dancing – no-one had any idea how the event would unfold.”

The Art of Building a Successful Social Site

An insightful and impressive information on the ingredients necessary for the making of a successful venture in the social media space. It is regarding Stack Overflow, a free question and answer site built by developers for developers that has fostered a strong and committed online community in under one year. It was founded by Joel Spolsky and Jeff Attwood in an attempt to fill in a void that is not successful exploited by search engines. It is the perfect example of a service built to expand reaches in the vast and largely unexplored Null Information. Below is an excerpt from the article:

Why Search Engines are Failing when it Comes to Collaborative Sites

According to Spolsky, there are certain reasons why search engines are failing when it comes to Q&A sites, and they are the same issues Stack Overflow is trying to solve.

1. Sign-up scams: Sites that a search engine may send you to where you must first sign up and pay, if you want an answer.
2. Register: A “road bump” that many sites have, and one Spolsky thinks reduces participation dramatically
3. Wrong answers: When searching for highly technical questions, a search engine may send you to a forum that has multiple answers. If you are unsure which answer is the correct one, you waste too much time working through the wrong ones.
4. Obsolete results: Google, for instance, will oftentimes give an older page priority. In turn, the page you are served is often outdated and no longer relevant.

How did Stack Overflow address this issue? By applying and implementing what they call “The Nine Building Blocks of Social Engineering” in an effort to create a site that was anthropologically correct and would encourage people to behave in a way that would work.

Below is a talk given by Joel Spolsky on this issue:

Extreme Nature

Magnificence is the only way to put. Below is an example of photographs taken during the collusion of extreme forces of nature. The one shown “here in the form of a bolt looking to lock horns with lava issuing from Mount Rinjani in Indonesia. When volcanic gasses and materials are thrust high into the air, lightning can be triggered inside the ash clouds. Yet despite the fact that such electrical activity frequently accompanies large eruptions, and have done so at least 150 times in the past two centuries, these spectacular natural light shows are not clearly understood.“

Carbon Nanotube Lamp

It was only a matter of time before we saw this development. NewScientist resports (World’s tiniest lamp spans quantum and classical physics) about the worlds first incandescent lamp that made using a carbon nanotube filament.

The smallest ever incandescent lamp, made using a single carbon nanotube, has been created by physicists in the US. At 1.4 micrometres long and just 13 nanometres wide, the filament is invisible to the naked eye until it is switched on.

Chris Regan’s team at the University of California, Los Angeles attached a palladium and gold electrode to each end of the carbon nanotube, which spans a tiny hole in a silicon chip and is held in a vacuum.

When electricity runs along the nanotube it heats up and begins to glow, releasing millions of photons every second, of which a few thousand reach the eye. “That makes the light relatively easy to see,” says Regan. “Your eye is nearly single-photon sensitive.” But it would make a poor reading lamp, he jokes.

Visitor Explosion!

Not long after my previous post stating that the number of visitors coming through this information domain has passed 10,000, I am now back to report to you that ROL surpassed more than 21,000 visitors mark! Below is a comparison of the graph then and now…

Now:

weekly visitor count for Ruminating Out Loud

Then:

weekly visitor count for Ruminating Out Loud

Mine That Bird, The Overlooked Underdog, Wins Kentucky Derby

LOUISVILLE, KY - MAY 02: Jockey Calvin Borel atop Mind That Bird crosses the finish line to win the 135th running of the Kentucky Derby on May 2, 2009 at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Kentucky. (Photo by Jamie Squire/Getty Images)

Here is the the story of this “stunning upset” win according to SI:

There have been plenty of long shots to win the Kentucky Derby, most recently Giacomo at 50-1 in 2005. But Mine That Bird (who also went off at 50-1) is one of the most obscure of them all — certainly more than any horse in recent memory. Sold as a yearling for the bargain-basement price of $9,500, the colt began his racing career in Canada, then, after a brief stop in Southern California — where he stayed long enough to finish dead last in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile — he moved on to New Mexico. His home track is Sunland Park, 1,500 miles west of Churchill Downs. Mine That Bird’s last start was in the Sunland Derby, which isn’t even a graded-stakes race (he finished a weakening fourth).

He made it to Louisville on the back of a trailer pulled by his trainer, the laconic Bennie (Chip) Woolley Jr. – a trip that Woolley estimates took “about 21 hours.” Mine That Bird does have some class in his bloodstream. His papa is 2004 Belmont winner Birdstone, who spoiled the Triple Crown bid of Smarty Jones, and his grandsire is 1996 Derby winner Grindstone. Grindstone beat the Bob Baffert – trained Cavonnier by a nose. Mine That Bird beat Baffert’s Pioneerof the Nile by 6 3/4 widening lengths, the largest margin since Assault won by eight in 1946.

Now contrast that with the inside analysis at The Online wire by Phil Simms, which in an article posted online on April 30 detailed the likelihood that this long-shot upset would come to pass.

Mine That Bird needs to run a perfect race to beat the favored Kentucky Derby contenders thus his odds are worthy if you look for a huge payout.

Currently this horse is listed amongst the 4 biggest underdogs out of the 2009 Kentucky Derby odds at 50/1 and really deserves to be the biggest underdog considering how slow he’s ran in recent races.

That being said, there are a few reasons for optimism if you are looking for an incredible Kentucky Derby payout with this horse.

First off, he has drawn the #8 spot in the Kentucky Derby post positions and that should help him out quite a bit.

He’s had nothing but failure when placed on the outside and has never shown the ability to come in high and get himself involved in a race. It’s just not his style at all.

He needs to get in on the rail early and hope for the best.

Another benefit is that he has one of the likely fast starters next to him at #9 in Join In The Dance with another fast starter, Regal Ransom, at #10.

If this horse is going to have a chance to spoil many people’s 2009 Kentucky Derby picks, he’ll have to get out ahead and to do that, he’ll need to be pushed from another horse in the Kentucky Derby lineup.

If he had been lined up outside, this guy would have no chance at all to finish in the top 10 spots but I like where he got put and he’s really in a best place scenario with this Kentucky Derby lineup.

It’s going to take nothing but perfection to be in the top 3 for Mine That Bird but at least everything is set up perfectly to give him a chance at the massive upset.