'Deep Rifts' Or 'The Humanity Of It All'... Part 1

A friend of mine was curious about the 'Deep Rift' that has been cooking in the atheist-skeptic blogosphere for about a year now, culminating in the Twitter storm over the FTBullies hashtag. I offered to make a timeline with bullet points. Little did I know that chronicling those cataclysmic events was going to be such a monumental task, requiring the last drop of my Google-Fu and reading/listening comprehension. Anyhoo, I must admit it was eeriely fun revisiting those events, and consequently, wondering anew how, atheist-skeptic or not, we all are subject to the very human foibles and frailties of ego, prejudice, presumptions, and sadly, blind irrationality. Vraiment, the humanity of it all!

Disclaimer: Although I shall try to be an unbiased as possible in preparing this chronicle, I find myself sympathetic towards Rebecca Watson and her fellow skeptics in this matter. YMMV, of course. Also, L-O-N-G-read!!!

Help a blogger in need: Appeal re-plug

Towards the middle of last month, I had issued an appeal to all sane and rational folks in and around London, UK; the goal was to help a fellow skeptic and blogger in dire straits. I had said (among other things) in that post:

Seriously, why do bad things happen to good people? Late last night I got to know about the impending misfortune of someone I've known for quite some time. Well, not 'known' known, but this is a much-respected Skeptic blogger based in the UK, whose excellent posts, reasoned, analytical and well-researched essays - on various pseudoscientific modalities (Steelclaws on Snake Oil) as well as on Biblical errancy (A Plague of Mice) - have given me countless hours of thoughtful pleasure.

And now, for reasons fathoming which is beyond my human capabilities, this person is in danger of being rendered homeless.

An Appeal To Sane Folks in London, UK

Seriously, why do bad things happen to good people? Late last night I got to know about the impending misfortune of someone I've known for quite some time. Well, not 'known' known, but this is a much-respected Skeptic blogger based in the UK, whose excellent posts, reasoned, analytical and well-researched essays - on various pseudoscientific modalities (Steelclaws on Snake Oil) as well as on Biblical errancy (A Plague of Mice) - have given me countless hours of thoughtful pleasure.

And now, for reasons fathoming which is beyond my human capabilities, this person is in danger of being rendered homeless; the eviction notice is due to take effect on the 16th instant.

Musings on some oddly secular...

I am in a weirdly reminiscent mood this morning, dunno why. My final five years of schooling was with an institution run by monastic members of a Hindu missionary organization in India. Now, when I can look back rationally and dispassionately at those years - and am able to discern and discount the subtle and overt attempts at religious indoctrination - I am conscious of a few interesting ideas that I had picked up on the way, ideas that seem to have influenced my way of thinking greatly over the years. Even though I am an Atheist, and extremely skeptical of religious ritualistic mumbojumbo, I am not ashamed to declare that some of these ideas came from early Hindu philosophy, dating back to some four thousand odd years ago. Perhaps those were simpler times, perhaps those were indeed wise folks... Those certainly were times way, way before a philosophy was corrupted and subverted into an '-ism', the rabidly irrational and superstition -laden face of Hinduism that gradually took over India, the country as well as popular psyche. Sigh. I am going to share two such ideas, extremely secular despite their religious context, contained in few lines of verses, or as they are known, shlokas.

Android n00b rubbing shoulders with a spanking new ASUS Eepad Transformer Prime

I was angling for an Android device for the longest time in a Mac/PC household. Having played with my wife's iPad2, I wanted the device in a Tablet form factor. I have always had a soft spot for ASUS as a technology company, and the specs of the ASUS Transformer Prime TF-201 looked highly promising; so, armed with the tax return, I took the plunge. Newegg.com (bless its soul!) delivered the device in three days flat, and having charged it the mandatory 8+ hours, I am now playing with it.

Time for an "Occupy Science" in India?

Yes. Yes!! Oh, yes! This was my reaction while reading a commentary in April 12's Nature.

In a policy commentary article titled Bold strategies for Indian Science (Nature 484, 159–160;12 April 2012), Gautam Desiraju, a professor of Chemistry in the prestigious Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, and the current president of the International Union of Crystallography, held forth forcefully on what he thought were the bottlenecks that seem to be holding back the progress of Indian science. I found much to agree with.

Underfunding of Basic Sciences in Arab world: does religion play a role?

Today's Nature Middle East published an interesting and thought-provoking commentary from Dr. Nidhal Guessoum, an astrophysicist and professor of physics at the American University of Sharjah, United Arab Emirates, entitled: Does the Arab world (not) need basic science?

The accompanying blurb nicely summarizes the main argument in the commentary.

The Arab world cannot afford to ignore curiousity-driven basic research in favour of applied research, if the different states hope to produce an enlightened science culture at home.