Quick notes: Fighter shortfall, Amazon subsidy...

• Fighter shortfall to worsen during NDA's term: The IAF will have 2 or 3 fewer squadrons in 2020 than  in 2014,.  



• Silence of the lambs: Why Trinamool MPs didn't speak on triple talaq bill in Lok Sabha. pSecular games: Trinamul rally of Hindu priests



• Pro-booze govt: Uttarakhand amends excise rules to allow bars near highways 



• Subsidized by taxpayer: For every Amazon package it delivers, the Postal Service loses $1.46

Why is the United States Post Office, which is losing many billions of dollars a year, while charging Amazon and others so little to deliver their packages, making Amazon richer and the Post Office dumber and poorer? Should be charging MUCH MORE!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 29, 2017




• Micro-grids are the future: A network of about 20,000 homes with solar panels and energy-storage batteries lets its members buy and sell excess energy to each other.




• No point taking calcium and vitamin D supplements: "Vitamin D is synthesized in the skin in response to ultraviolet-B radiation in sunlight, and dietary sources of vitamin D are limited". Exercising out in the sunshine should provide a person with all the vitamin D they need.



• Battle against smog: Beijing’s improving air quality stands in stark contrast to India’s capital New Delhi, where pollution has steadily become worse over the past few years, and is now well above Beijing‘s.



• How to Be a Better Person? Be Empty.

Quick notes: Science of learning, Flipkart's weapon...

• The new science of learning: The best way to learn is taking a mixed up approach to practice. “The ultimate crime is practicing the same thing multiple times in a row”.



• AI and a decade of data: Flipkart's answer to Amazon.



• Chinese Innovation: AG600 Kunlong, the impressive amphibious plane/maritime patrol flying boat.



• India's deadly coal-power plants: Loss of $4.6 bn & 115,000 deaths.



• UPA-3: scary.

If and when a Congress-led khichdi coalition govt ever comes to power at the centre, it will show BJP leaders zero mercy--exactly the opposite of what BJP is showing Congress

— Minhaz Merchant (@MinhazMerchant) December 21, 2017




• Extra Virginity: The Sublime and Scandalous World of Olive Oil



• Tasty and healthy: “Mustard oil also works well as an antibacterial, antiviral and antifungal agent and can help fight bacterial infections in the digestive system.”  Incorporating mustard oil into your daily diet is known to protect against heart disease. The oil is rich in monounsaturated fats and polyunsaturated fats, both of which help lower bad cholesterol and raise good HDL cholesterol hence maintaining one’s cholesterol balance.



• Chandro Tomar: At 84, the world's oldest female sharpshooter doesn't miss 

Beyond reason

“Neodämmerung” from Matrix Revolutions

• असतो मा सद् गमय ।
  तमसो मा ज्योतिर्गमय ।
  मृत्योर्माऽमृतं गमय ॥
  From the unreal (delusion) lead me to the real (truth).
  From the darkness lead me to the light.
  From death lead me to immortality. -- Brihad Aranyaka (1.3.28)



• विद्यां चाविद्यां च यस्तद्वेदोभयँ सह ।
  अविद्यया मृत्युं तीर्त्वा विद्ययाऽमृतमश्नुते ॥
  Pursuing both Vidya and Avidya, he overcomes death by transcending them -- Isha Upanishad (11)   .. (pursuing Vidya alone leads to pride/delusion)



• यस्मिन् द्यौः पृथिवी चान्तरिक्षमोतं ।
  मनः सह प्राणैश्च सर्वैः ।
  तमेवैकं जानथ आत्मानमन्या वाचो ।
  विमुञ्चथामृतस्यैष सेतुः ॥
  In him are woven the sky and the earth and all the regions of the air.
  And in him rest the mind and all the powers of life.
  Know him as the One and leave aside all other words.
  He is the bridge of immortality -- Mundaka Upanishad (2.2.5)



• इन्द्रियेभ्यः परं मनो मनसः सत्त्वमुत्तमम् ।
  सत्त्वादधि महानात्मा महतोऽव्यक्तमुत्तमम् ॥
  Beyond the senses is the mind, and beyond the mind is reason, its essence. Beyond reason is the Spirit in man, and beyond this is the Spirit of the Universe, the evolver of all. -- Katha Upanishad (6.7)



• यदा पञ्चावतिष्ठन्ते ज्ञानानि मनसा सह ।
  बुद्धिश्च न विचेष्टते तामाहुः परमां गतिम् ।
  भिद्यते हृदयग्रन्थिश्छिद्यन्ते सर्वसंशयाः ॥
  When the five senses and the mind are still. And reason itself rests in silence, then begins the Path supreme -- Katha Upanishad (6.10)



• भिद्यते हृदयग्रन्थिश्छिद्यन्ते सर्वसंशयाः ।
  क्षीयन्ते चास्य कर्माणि तस्मिन् दृष्टे परावरे ॥
  And when he is seen in his immanence and transcendence, then the ties that have bound the heart are unloosened. The doubts of the mind vanish, and the law of Karma works no more -- Mundaka Upanishad (2.2.8)





asato ma sad gamaya (2)
tamaso ma jyotir gamaya
mrtyor mamrtam gamaya

vidyam cavidyam ca yas tad vedobhayam saha
avidyaya mrtyum tirtva
vidyayamrtam asnute

yasmin dyauh prthivi cantariksam otam manah saha pranais ca sarvaih tam
evaikam janatha atmanam anya vacah vimuncatha amrtasya esah setuh

indriyebhyah param mano
manasah sattvam uttamam
sattvad adhi mahan atma
mahato vyaktam uttamam

yada pancavatisthante
jnanani manasa saha
buddhis ca na vicestate
tam ahuh paramam gatim

Ya ya ya ya yada yadaya
Ya ya ya ya yada yada yada yada
Yada yada yada yada yada

bhidyate hrdayagranthis
chidyante sarvasamsayah
ksiyante casya karmani
tasmin drste paravare

<>

From the unreal (delusion) lead me to the real(truth) (2)
From the darkness lead me to the light
From death lead me to immortality.

He who knows both knowledge and action,
with action overcomes death
and with knowledge reaches immortality.

In him are woven the sky and the earth
and all the regions of the air,
and in him rest the mind
and all the powers of life.

Know him as the ONE
and leave aside all other words.
He is the bridge of immortality.

Beyond the senses is the mind,
and beyond the mind is reason, its essence.
Beyond reason is the Spirit in man,
and beyond this is the Spirit of the Universe,
the evolver of all.

When the five senses and the mind are still,
and reason itself rests in silence,
then begins the Path supreme.

So on and so forth
So on and so forth
So on and so forth

And when he is seen in his immanence and transcendence,
then the ties that have bound the heart are unloosenend,
the doubts of the mind vanish,
and the law of Karma works no more.

The Matrix Wiki

Quick notes: Gwadar's future, Iran's rise...

• China in Gwadar: Indigenous residents’ fear of becoming a minority is inevitable with Gwadar’s population expected to jump more than 15-fold in coming decades. China will receive 91% of revenues until the port is returned to Pakistan in four decades’ time.



• China's AI awakening: China’s AI push calls for homegrown AI to match that developed in the West within three years, for China’s researchers to be making “major breakthroughs” by 2025, and for Chinese AI to be the envy of the world by 2030. 



• Is Iran the Mideast's new superpower? “For stopping ISIS in Afghanistan, the best alternative is the Taliban, so it is easy for Iran to support the Taliban. The Taliban hung them, ISIS people, out on trees for weeks, and no one was allowed to take them down, When Iran hit them strongly, [the ISIS fighters] moved to the east.”  That narrative is borne out by a map used by Afghanistan’s intelligence service. It shows ISIS emerging at points along Iran’s border in 2014-15, and then shifting east toward Pakistan’s border. “It’s a smart policy, to be honest,” says a Western official in Kabul.



• France wants parental permission for kids under 16 to go on Facebook: "Exploiting human psychology by feedback loops, driven by dopamine and 'social validation'."
  



• Christian Nationalism: White Evangelicals voted en masse for Roy Moore in Alabama, to no one's surprise



• India better be cautious: Uber accused of espionage, hacking and bribery in bombshell letter



• Gabriella Burnel: Promoting Sanskrit

Quick notes: Hybrid planes, Spewing power plants...

• Hybrid electric plane: The turbine powering the generator will run on jet fuel and provide power for the electric engine. Any excess power from the generator will be stored in banks of batteries in the fore and aft holds with the stored energy to be used during take-off and landing... Very much like the Serial Hybrid architecture in Chevy Volt.





• Surround Delhi with a deep ring of forests: Not only will this modify the weather within the city, but the forest will absorb a major portion of airborne dust from across the Thar Desert and from Pakistan. Without afforestation, even if you take all cars off road, it would just scratch the surface of Delhi's smog.



• Pollution from power plants: The worst of this pollution runs from north of Patna in the state of Bihar to south of Raipur in the state of Chhattisgarh.




• BJP feeds the hostile media: Modi govt spent Rs 3,755 crore on publicity blitz - 1,656 crore on electronic media and Rs 1,698 crore on print media. The govt's allocation for pollution abatement in the last three years has been only Rs 56.8 crore.



• Marxist-Leninist-Maoist: Left alliance sweep Nepal elections, Oli set to return as Nepal PM



• Oneness:




• Satya Nadella's off-break: Microsoft's Redmond campus to have a cricket field.



• You are being programmed: Facebook and others had succeeded by exploiting a vulnerability in human psychology... Facebook lies about its ability to influence individuals based on the data it collects on them.



• Sri Rama Setu is man-made:

Are the ancient Hindu myths of a land bridge connecting India and Sri Lanka true? Scientific analysis suggests they are. #WhatonEarth pic.twitter.com/EKcoGzlEET

— Science Channel (@ScienceChannel) December 11, 2017

Quick notes: Indian drones, Microwave weapon...

• Drone from Indian Start-Up! Could achieve an altitude of "at least 65,000 feet". NewSpace Research and Technologies did all research and development in-house, which is being validated by Boeing.



• Microwave weapon: The U.S. has microwave weapons that could dismantle North Korean missiles by firing microwave energy to interfere with ground controls and power circuits within the missiles themselves.



• Israeli startup helping bring kirana stores online: Seemba is a mobile phone-based platform that helps businesses build their websites, giving the country’s 51 million kirana stores an online identity through a website.



• “It was all theater”: Pentagon-backed Kurdish commander confirms U.S. made secret deal with ISIS to let thousands of fighters flee Raqqa... Russia has long accused the U.S. of being supportive of ISIS and other jihadi groups



• You remember more of what you read out loud: Hearing your own voice boosts the likelihood that it will stick to your memory. This trick can be used not just by students but adults and seniors working on recall



• Sand to soil: China's success in reversing desertification.




• A legitimate Tesla rival: The Jaguar I-Pace signals the beginning of the end of Tesla’s hegemony in the premium, high-performance electric vehicle market.



• A world with fewer cars: Volkswagen thinks its ride-sharing electric minibus will take 1 million cars off the road



• Future generation: Babies' brains at risk from toxic pollution



• Religion in politics :

As long as the law differentiates you based on your religion it is suicidal not to mix religion and politics because you then expose yourself to tyranny. https://t.co/3T9OyvMdZL

— MyIndMakers (@myindmakers) December 7, 2017

Quick notes: Real-life-Mowgli, Brown cloud...

• Two-year-old Samarth Bangari: Meet real-life Mowgli, darling of monkeys, from village near Dharwad



• Asian Brown Cloud? European Space Agency's Sentinel-5P captures dense carbon monoxide cloud over India and China. Carbon monoxide displaces oxygen in the blood and deprives the heart, brain, and other vital organs of oxygen.




• Harmful "vegetable" oils: Why you should avoid consuming new age oils -- Canola, Corn, Soybean, Sunflower and Safflower. The best part is that none of these “vegetable” oils is vegetables and all, with the exception of coconut oil, are extremely dangerous for you. 



• Cow manure to fuel: Toyota plant to produce 1.2 tons of hydrogen fuel per day and 2.35 megawatts of electricity -- all from cow manure ... Perfect for India!



• Congestion charges: London traffic model in New Delhi soon?



• Pedal Power: Ola begins offering a bicycle-sharing service



• Amazon tax: "Since 2008 Walmart has paid $64B in corporate income tax, while Amazon has paid $1.4B. This is despite the fact that, in the last 24 months, Amazon has added the value of Walmart to its market cap. The most uncomfortable question in business, in my view, is how do we pay our soldiers, firefighters, and teachers if a firm can ascend to $460B in value (#5 in the world) without paying any meaningful corporate taxes" -- Prof Scott Galloway is renowned for his marketing acumen and having accurately predicted that Amazon would buy Whole Foods.



• Solar fires – DC arc faults: Why you should avoid cheap Chinese solar inverters.



• Dharmic foundation at home:

I was reading about Akhila or Hadiya's father's story after #LoveJihad news.
He became a Communist, then Rationalist and then Atheist.
She probably missed a strong Dharmic foundation at home (my guess). pic.twitter.com/qpkLR6ikJo

— Kiran Kumar S (@KiranKS) December 3, 2017