Field versus Farm in Warangal; Bt Cotton, Higher Yields. and Larger Questions
A recent survey article by Glenn Stone
The Anthropology of Genetically Modified Crops
Earier articles available at http://anthropology.artsci.wustl.edu/stone_glenn and for discussion of some of his earlier articles by Andrew Leonard see The Napster pirates of transgenic biotech How genetically modified cotton escaped Monsanto's control in India, with a little help from Robin Hood
P.S. I just noticed that Glenn Davis Stone has a blog. Here is a recent post
GM Eggplant and Ayurveda in India
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Sunday, June 26, 2011
Scary story
by Marcia Angell, ex-editor of the New England Journal of Medicine, linked in several blogs (see, in particular, the comment by Felix E F Larocca MD which gives several more references):
The Epidemic of Mental Illness: Why?
The Illusions of Psychiatry
P.S. Daniel Little comments on the above articles Mental illness, big pharma and agent-based simulation.
Related In Medicine, New Isn’t Always Improved
The Epidemic of Mental Illness: Why?
The Illusions of Psychiatry
P.S. Daniel Little comments on the above articles Mental illness, big pharma and agent-based simulation.
Related In Medicine, New Isn’t Always Improved
Saturday, June 25, 2011
Women and collective intelligence
From Defend Your Research: What Makes a Team Smarter? More Women
"The finding: There’s little correlation between a group’s collective intelligence and the IQs of its individual members. But if a group includes more women, its collective intelligence rises."
via Mind Hacks post A dose of female intelligence
The original article:
Evidence of Collective Intelligence in the Performance of Human Groups
"The finding: There’s little correlation between a group’s collective intelligence and the IQs of its individual members. But if a group includes more women, its collective intelligence rises."
via Mind Hacks post A dose of female intelligence
The original article:
Evidence of Collective Intelligence in the Performance of Human Groups
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
The Telegraph reviews "River of Smoke"
River of Smoke by Amitav Ghosh: review:
"His taste for obscure words aside, Ghosh can be a rather ponderous storyteller. Far too much of the book is taken up by windy letters from an English painter. But there are some nice comic touches, mainly involving characters talking pidgin English, and moments of real lyricism.
Best of all, Ghosh, through the depth of his research, lightly worn, has captured the many cross-currents of a fascinating historical period."
His "In an Antique Land" is one of the best books I read and I liked much of his non-fiction that I read. But I thought that his "The glass Palace" is a soap opera and this type of historical fiction seems to be a bit of cop out, which does not allow much discussion. I think that I will skip this book.
"His taste for obscure words aside, Ghosh can be a rather ponderous storyteller. Far too much of the book is taken up by windy letters from an English painter. But there are some nice comic touches, mainly involving characters talking pidgin English, and moments of real lyricism.
Best of all, Ghosh, through the depth of his research, lightly worn, has captured the many cross-currents of a fascinating historical period."
His "In an Antique Land" is one of the best books I read and I liked much of his non-fiction that I read. But I thought that his "The glass Palace" is a soap opera and this type of historical fiction seems to be a bit of cop out, which does not allow much discussion. I think that I will skip this book.
Dreaming of cancer
Recently on the way back from USA I was stuck in San Francisco airport for two nights, the first night because I did not check the times carefully and the second night because of United Airlines computer problems. It gave me chance to finish Siddhartha Mukherjee's excellent book " The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer" and now I imagine that I have precancer conditions. May be I will give up smoking now. In any case, I am back home to celebrate my 70th birthday today.
Friday, June 17, 2011
Kuffir on farmers
Kuffir wonders how farmers in India survive when the returns are so low:no mantras or miracles will work here . More in the Indian Farmers website linked in the article.
Thursday, June 09, 2011
A comment in the post 'Academic Writing' by Amitava Kumar
From a comment in Academic Writing:
"A couple of years ago, I sent this as a puzzle to my colleagues in a course with a reading from Partha Chatterjee:
“The illusion of normative values is consistent with the legitimation of the nation-state. The logic of civil society carries with it the ideology of agency. Rival conceptions of collective identity have become implicated in rival claims to autonomous subjectivity, and the reification of capitalist hegemony opens a space for the historicization of the nation-state. The emergence of history as such functions as the conceptual frame for the politics of power.”
One or two sentences are from Chatterjee’s Nationalist Thought. The rest are generated from the U of Chicago Automatic Sentence Generator. No one guessed the auto-generated part correctly."
"A couple of years ago, I sent this as a puzzle to my colleagues in a course with a reading from Partha Chatterjee:
“The illusion of normative values is consistent with the legitimation of the nation-state. The logic of civil society carries with it the ideology of agency. Rival conceptions of collective identity have become implicated in rival claims to autonomous subjectivity, and the reification of capitalist hegemony opens a space for the historicization of the nation-state. The emergence of history as such functions as the conceptual frame for the politics of power.”
One or two sentences are from Chatterjee’s Nationalist Thought. The rest are generated from the U of Chicago Automatic Sentence Generator. No one guessed the auto-generated part correctly."
M.F. Husain RIP
One of India's most famous artists, MF Husain, has died in hospital in London aged 95 after years of self-imposed exile. For 15 years, I used to see his paintings almost daily in TIFR, Bomay (now Mumbai).
Monday, June 06, 2011
Saturday, June 04, 2011
Farmer Networks in Mexico
From Farmer Networks Hold Key to Agricultural Innovation in Developing Countries, Study Finds:
"In Yaqui Valley, credit unions hold sway among the majority of farmers, McCullough said. In addition to providing loans, crop insurance, fertilizer and seed, credit unions have taken over the government's role in providing technical expertise and management advice.
Valley growers also have a long history of working with the Mexico-based International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center, a world-renowned agricultural research center known by its Spanish acronym, CIMMYT.
But interviews conducted for the PNAS study revealed that most farmers take their cues from local credit unions and not from experts at CIMMYT. As an example, McCullough pointed to a collaborative effort between CIMMYT scientists and farmers to develop a nitrogen diagnostic tool that reduces fertilizer use without sacrificing crop yields.
The device, which gives real-time readings of nitrogen levels in the soil, proved early on that it could save farmers 12 to 17 percent of their profits. Yet most farmers rejected the new technology until CIMMYT researchers finally convinced credit union officials that it was a worthwhile investment.
"The most successful innovations that have been adopted by farmers in the Yaqui Valley have come from collaborations among researchers, farmers and local establishments, like the credit unions," McCullough said. Because of their considerable influence among farmers, credit unions should be included in any effort to effect environmental change in the region, she added."
"In Yaqui Valley, credit unions hold sway among the majority of farmers, McCullough said. In addition to providing loans, crop insurance, fertilizer and seed, credit unions have taken over the government's role in providing technical expertise and management advice.
Valley growers also have a long history of working with the Mexico-based International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center, a world-renowned agricultural research center known by its Spanish acronym, CIMMYT.
But interviews conducted for the PNAS study revealed that most farmers take their cues from local credit unions and not from experts at CIMMYT. As an example, McCullough pointed to a collaborative effort between CIMMYT scientists and farmers to develop a nitrogen diagnostic tool that reduces fertilizer use without sacrificing crop yields.
The device, which gives real-time readings of nitrogen levels in the soil, proved early on that it could save farmers 12 to 17 percent of their profits. Yet most farmers rejected the new technology until CIMMYT researchers finally convinced credit union officials that it was a worthwhile investment.
"The most successful innovations that have been adopted by farmers in the Yaqui Valley have come from collaborations among researchers, farmers and local establishments, like the credit unions," McCullough said. Because of their considerable influence among farmers, credit unions should be included in any effort to effect environmental change in the region, she added."
Wednesday, June 01, 2011
Last interview with Syed Saleem Shahzad
Splits in Pakistan's Military Over New Agreement to Cooperate with US
Syed Saleem Shahzad, A Pakistani journalist and correspondent of Asia Times, who was killed between May 29 and 31.
Syed Saleem Shahzad, A Pakistani journalist and correspondent of Asia Times, who was killed between May 29 and 31.
Salim Durrani wins C.K. Nayudu Award
Salim Durrani the only Test cricketer to have been born in Afghanistan wins C K Nayudu Award lifetime achievement award for his contribution to Indian cricket A first person account and When Salim Durrani did a Shane Warne .... Ramachandra Guha on Salim Durrani's background and career.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Atul Gawande's commencement address at Harvard Medical School.
Cowboys and Pit Crews is the talk of town according to Lyla.
Monday, May 30, 2011
Two on Australian political leaders
John Quiggin on May 19 Turnbull for PM
Michael Pascoe today Lucky country out of luck with its leaders
Michael Pascoe today Lucky country out of luck with its leaders
Sunday, May 29, 2011
New experiment on Casimir effect
From First Observation of the Dynamical Casimir Effect :
""One of the most surprising predictions of modern quantum theory is that the vacuum of space is not empty. In fact, quantum theory predicts that it teems with virtual particles flitting in and out of existence."
So begin Christopher Wilson from Chalmers University in Sweden and friends in their marvellously readable paper about a rather extraordinary piece of science.
This maelstrom of quantum activity is far from benign. Physicists have known since 1948 that if two flat mirrors are held close together and parallel with each other, they will be pushed together by these virtual particles.
The reason is straightforward. When the gap between the mirrors is smaller than the wavelength of the virtual particles, they are excluded from this space. The vacuum pressure inside the gap is then less than outside it and this forces the mirrors.
This is the static Casimir effect and it was first measured in 1998 by two teams in the US.
But there is another phenomenon called the dynamical Casimir effect that has never been seen.
It occurs when a mirror moves through space at relativistic speeds. Here's what happens. At slow speeds, the sea of virtual particles can easily adapt to the mirror's movement and continue to come into existence in pairs and then disappear as they annihilate each other.
But when the speed of the mirror begins to match the the speed of the photons, in other words at relativistic speeds, some photons become separated from their partners and so do not get annihilated. These virtual photons then become real and the mirror begins to produce light.
That's the theory. The problem in practice is that it's hard to get an ordinary mirror moving at anything like relativistic speeds."
(via Rajeev Ramachandran's google reader)
""One of the most surprising predictions of modern quantum theory is that the vacuum of space is not empty. In fact, quantum theory predicts that it teems with virtual particles flitting in and out of existence."
So begin Christopher Wilson from Chalmers University in Sweden and friends in their marvellously readable paper about a rather extraordinary piece of science.
This maelstrom of quantum activity is far from benign. Physicists have known since 1948 that if two flat mirrors are held close together and parallel with each other, they will be pushed together by these virtual particles.
The reason is straightforward. When the gap between the mirrors is smaller than the wavelength of the virtual particles, they are excluded from this space. The vacuum pressure inside the gap is then less than outside it and this forces the mirrors.
This is the static Casimir effect and it was first measured in 1998 by two teams in the US.
But there is another phenomenon called the dynamical Casimir effect that has never been seen.
It occurs when a mirror moves through space at relativistic speeds. Here's what happens. At slow speeds, the sea of virtual particles can easily adapt to the mirror's movement and continue to come into existence in pairs and then disappear as they annihilate each other.
But when the speed of the mirror begins to match the the speed of the photons, in other words at relativistic speeds, some photons become separated from their partners and so do not get annihilated. These virtual photons then become real and the mirror begins to produce light.
That's the theory. The problem in practice is that it's hard to get an ordinary mirror moving at anything like relativistic speeds."
(via Rajeev Ramachandran's google reader)
Saturday, May 14, 2011
Travelling for a while
Off to USA tomorrow to attend a conference in honour of a collaborator on the occasion of his 65th birthday; a person who reminds of K.L. Krishna who retired from Delhi School of Economics a few years ago. Will use this opportunity to visit a few friends and relatives on the east coast.
Some science links, May 14th
Razib Khan responds to Edge question 2011 WHAT SCIENTIFIC CONCEPT WOULD IMPROVE EVERYBODY'S COGNITIVE TOOLKIT? with a quote from John Ioannidis "There is increasing concern that most current published research findings are false....."
With that proviso here are some research reports that I found interesting.
Blind fish in dark caves shed light on the evolution of sleep (via 3quarksdaily)
Why sons inherit their mother’s curse.
Artificial Grammar Reveals Inborn Language Sense, Study Shows
Language Log in Let me count the ways has a quote of Cosma Shalizi which echoes Razib Khan's worries: "While perhaps not a truly epic fail, this is not a creditable performance. The paper probes a hugely complex tangle of issues relating individual minds, communication, social norms, artistic expression, social change and cultural transformation. There is no shame in not unraveling the whole snarl at once, but between the incompetent data analysis, the failure of logical imagination, and the deep misunderstanding of how works of art are made and used, it does nothing to advance our knowledge of anything."
With that proviso here are some research reports that I found interesting.
Blind fish in dark caves shed light on the evolution of sleep (via 3quarksdaily)
Why sons inherit their mother’s curse.
Artificial Grammar Reveals Inborn Language Sense, Study Shows
Language Log in Let me count the ways has a quote of Cosma Shalizi which echoes Razib Khan's worries: "While perhaps not a truly epic fail, this is not a creditable performance. The paper probes a hugely complex tangle of issues relating individual minds, communication, social norms, artistic expression, social change and cultural transformation. There is no shame in not unraveling the whole snarl at once, but between the incompetent data analysis, the failure of logical imagination, and the deep misunderstanding of how works of art are made and used, it does nothing to advance our knowledge of anything."
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