by the meltingpot: Reining in my stream of ideas to a desired target.

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Indeed, what is at work in the recent return of realism is the revenge of geography in the most old-fashioned sense. In the 18th and 19th centuries, before the arrival of political science as an academic specialty, geography was an honored, if not always formalized, discipline in which politics, culture, and economics were often conceived of in reference to the relief map. Thus, in the Victorian and Edwardian eras, mountains and the men who grow out of them were the first order of reality; ideas, however uplifting, were only the second.
And yet, to embrace geography is not to accept it as an implacable force against which humankind is powerless. Rather, it serves to qualify human freedom and choice with a modest acceptance of fate. This is all the more important today, because rather than eliminating the relevance of geography, globalization is reinforcing it. Mass communications and economic integration are weakening many states, exposing a Hobbesian world of small, fractious regions. Within them, local, ethnic, and religious sources of identity are reasserting themselves, and because they are anchored to specific terrains, they are best explained by reference to geography. Like the faults that determine earthquakes, the political future will be defined by conflict and instability with a similar geographic logic. The upheaval spawned by the ongoing economic crisis is increasing the relevance of geography even further, by weakening social orders and other creations of humankind, leaving the natural frontiers of the globe as the only restraint.
So we, too, need to return to the map, and particularly to what I call the “shatter zones” of Eurasia. We need to reclaim those thinkers who knew the landscape best. And we need to update their theories for the revenge of geography in our time.
Here is the link for the whole write up.

Now at 2nd place

My view is that relations between countries in the coming decades are most likely to reflect their cultural commitments, their cultural ties and antagonism with other countries rather than other factors. Quite obviously, power will continue to play a central role in global politics, as it always does. But usually there is something else behind conflicts. In the 18th century in Europe, the issues to a large extent involved questions of monarchy versus the emerging republican movements, first in America and then in France. In the 19th century, it involved states identifying themselves through nationalism. In the 20th century, ideology came to the fore, largely, but not exclusively, as a result of the Russian Revolution. We had fascism, communism and liberal democracy competing with each other. Well, that’s pretty much over. Liberal democracy has come to be accepted, in theory at least, around the world, if not always in practice. So the question really is what will be the central focus of global politics in the coming decades? My argument remains that cultural identities, antagonisms and affiliations will not only play a role, but play a major role in relations between states. The full interview is here.

This is the 3rd

Every citizen in the City of Richardson will be able to access 756 Kbps of internet connectivity for free, from anywhere in the city. They will be able to access the internet from their homes, schools, restaurants and parks using standard wi-fi connections which are now installed on almost every notebook computer. That is almost as fast as many so-called high speed broadband connections that one pays dearly for today, and several times faster than the various hotspots at your local coffee shops. And I should note that the tax-payers of the City of Richardson are not paying one penny for this, and in fact are going to see additional revenues as a benefit. ... At the beginning of this letter, I suggested that this would be one of the fastest worldwide rollouts of a technology ever seen. It was just 20 years ago that the first cellular systems were being built. The rollout for mesh wireless systems is going to make that look slow. There are several reasons I make this assertion. But they all center on the facts that installing mesh systems will be cheaper and easier than any previous system and the economics in both the developed and especially the developing world will be so radically compelling. Throw in the fact the any astute politician will want to be at the front of this parade (They will all want to say, "I was the man who helped bring free internet to everyone!") and the groundwork is laid for rapid deployment. In Richardson and elsewhere, MeshLinx is offering the basic infrastructure for free. This avoids all the time consuming, political budget battles in the cities. When a service is offered for free, much of the mandated competitive process is eliminated. Next is the low cost of installation of the system. As noted above, Richardson is a city of roughly 100,000 people living in 27.4 square miles. It will "only" cost about $2,000,000 today to lay the wireless blanket I mentioned above. It will cost a great deal less in the future, as MeshLinx is building the pods at a pace of 100 a month today. The maximum output of the US pilot assembly line is 500 a month. When the demand exceeds this (and it will in a very short time) discussions have been held to move volume production to China. Of course, the world will need tens of millions of pods. The cost for a pod will be a fraction of today's cost, with that installation number for a city like Richardson soon being half (or less) the cost of today. What does that $1 or 2 million get you? The infrastructure to be an internet connection, telephone, security, entertainment provider and a whole lot more company. As noted, it will get cheaper as the number of pods being made each month rises, thus lowering their costs dramatically. This technology does have scale. The cost of physically putting up a pod is not a large part of the equation, as you simply need to run a power line, attach a few bolts to a mount on the side of a building or light pole and then off to the next point. Think about the 40,000 homes and businesses in Richardson. If and (hopefully) over time when 10% decide to pay $50 a month for 10-20 Mbps high speed internet access you could see a revenue of $2.5 million a year just from internet access. Now add in all the other income possibilities (phone, entertainment, security and don't forget advertising revenue on the free service!). Think about your town or country. What would service like this be worth? If you are a small city that does not have high speed connections available, how many businesses that could bring jobs do not come your way because they need reliable communications for their work and their employees? If you are in a developing country, where internet access is difficult and expensive, it will open whole new vistas. Couple that with the various programs which want to give cheap laptops to kids in poor countries, and you could see significant social progress in a generation. Here is the link.

Tuesday, February 02, 2021

Reining in my stream of ideas to a desired target.

Today is 'Day for conservation of Lakes'.

How the word,'Paat',comes to denote a lake sets me into a thinking spree.

We have so many words that are too difficult to decode.But that does not intimidate me.

Decoding such words,in course writing my monograph,actually brings me joyous moments.

How could not anybody feel joyous when he/she can find answers to such questions (listed below) in course of writing a monograph?

--Everybody is shouting from the rooftop that we have a 2000 years old history.But how can it be possible when we do not have even a name for our homeland?

--Again,everybody is glowing with super pride declaring that we have such a rich heritage of art and culture.But how can it possible when we do not have proper words to denote arts and literature?

In the course of writing my monograph,I am successful in finding the answers to these questions.

As a corollary to this,I also think that I finally can put my fingers on what actually constitute the Meitei national character.

Reading between the lines,one can see that my intention is to hint that these stuff situate so near to us that it is difficult for us to find them.We have been looking at some distances for so long that thses stuff seems navigate themselves under the radar of our society.

Let's start with 'Literature'.

1) 'Lei' is tongue,which makes utterance intelligible to us.

2) 'Lei-e' is blood and flesh edition of 'Lei',that is,'word'.(I try applying the same set of rules to decode 'wahei'--it comes to mean 'anti-thesis'--I'm still trying to understand how we come to use a word meaning 'anti-thesis' to denote the term 'word').

3) 'Lei-e-lik' is a sentence.

4) 'Lei-e-lik-mai' ('Lamai' might be a corrupted form of this) is a page.

5) Going further with our flow of deduction,'Lei-e-lik-mai-lik' should mean a book.

6) But 'Lailik' is book.

7) In several previous posts dealing with prophesies,we had discuused 'Lai' as to mean blood and flesh edition of 'La'.So,'Lai'denotes essence,substance or skillfulness in their sublimes states.So, in the context of 'Lailik',we can say that it is the 'lik' of those which are thoroughly peer-reviewed.

8) Then,the logical step is to come to 'Lairik epa'--to write a book.

9) In my monograph I actually need a diagram to fully interprete 'Epa'.Reproducing that portion here in this blog is not possible at the moment.So,I would come straight to that deduction of mine.

'Epa' means the process or activity of reining in the flow of ideas to a pre-determined or desired target.

9) we all know that 'Lailik' and 'Epa' are closely connected with literature but they are,in themselves, do not denote literature.

10) In my monograph,I make use of 'Fa'(in sync with 'Epa') to come a near a term capable in denoting literature.

11) 'Fa' is a root word suffused with sexual allegory.It means both vagina and clitoris at the same time.

The supreme beauty comes from its ability to represent both the organs at the same time.Because it enbles 'Fa' to denote both beginning and end at the same time.

In our context,we feel like entering a bubble where we can feel both the beginning of a story and climax of it itself,that too,in a fleeting moment.

To put it with a romantic twist,we start with love at first sight,trying to locate ourselves inside a mutually comfortable zone,getting to know one another,intimacy--this part is the start of a story.

Then,a lot of drama should intervene before coming to actual love making.Of seeking consent and predictably, not getting it.The heartburn.

To make the story short,can we take the pang of child birth as a supreme anti-climax?

Of course,we have the climax of everlasting beauty in bringing forth a new living being in this world.

12) The common usages are:'Fuba' comes from the allegory of the penetrative force of a love making--'Fee' is the existential exhibition of two threads in action--'Fungka' is the room where one stone is struck with another,bringing forth a spark and then, a fire.

!2) I'm trying to make sense of an 'Epa' suffused with all the shades of nuances of 'Fa'.

13) The actual term I propose is 'facha-e-pee',where 'Cha' is nutrient,energy or motion.(To make it more clear,I do it in this way--'Fa-cha-epa-e.I also want to note that in performing the above exercise I consistently try to banish my emotion and only follow the logical flow. By this,I mean to underline that I do not give any thought to the possible acceptance or rejection of my proposed term by our society--I just try to do my duty as the logical flow dictates it).

by the meltingpot

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Now at 2nd place

This is the 3rd