Funding Cuts May Sink Japanese Whaling Industry « ecorazzi.com :: the latest in green gossip - Really good news from the recession. This report talks of how the Japanese whaling industry has, for very long, been subsidised by the Govt. in an effort to "preserve traditions". Presently reeling under low demand, worldwide pressure and uneconomical returns, the whaling industry's funding might be up for a very critical review and funding cuts as Japan's government seeks to weather the 2008 recession. Here's hoping that the fund cuts go through! Yaaay! I can almost hear the humpbacks and minke's breaching and singing with joy and relief!

My brand-new Cowon A3( in a manner of speaking, at least) is hardly a month old and it has already flashed a WSoD at me. :(:(:(
I found quite a few forums which discussed this error - looks like quite a few others have faced it - and they have suggested a few remedies, one of the most quixotic of which was to just let the A3ś battery drain out, not use it for a week and try again. Another suggested remedy admonished me not to try to charge the device via USB while at the same time trying to access data on a computer. So, I will just have to wait,now, for my AC charger - the earliest I can get it is in December.

At this point, with the unit absolutely unresponsive AND the AC charger half a planet away, it does not look like I have any choice at all. Crossing fingers - hereś hoping leaving it alone for a week works!

I just read this article about the effects of human decimation of large herbivores on the symbiotic relationship between acacia trees in Africa and a species of ant that nest in them. The ants protected the trees from the ravages of elephants by swarming onto them whenever they tried to feed off the tree. In return, they harvested nectar and built secure nests within the tree's thorns. Now, however, with most large herbivores decimated by hunting and poaching, the acacias are no longer under threat. Consequently, they reduce the resources they expend to maintain their force of protective ants:nectar production is cut down and lesser thorns are produced, reducing the number of ants that can be supported on a tree. As a result, their symbiotic bodyguards are leaving...and a non-symbiotic species is invading the acacias to reside there. These new species attract a wood-boring termite which feeds on the acacias themselves, leaving the non-symbiotically-protected trees, even though they no longer suffer the depredations of herbivores, growing sickly and stunted. Read more about it here.

The admittedly devastating act of overhunting herbivores seems to have far-reaching effects on every part of the savanna, an ecosystem taht, on the surface at least, would seem far less intricately inter-related and interwoven than a rainforest. The  web of organisms in every ecological niche is stunning in its complexity and also, sobering in how easily it can be disturbed - we still have much to learn and the sad part is we may be running out of time before we destroy everything.

Yaaaay! Just read this blog by a Time reviewer imploring HBO to pick up Game of Thrones for telecast, if only as a mini-series. I can't wait to see the works of G.R.R.Martin ( hailed as the modern Tolkien) on screen. Gray characters -check, abrupt turnarounds - check, lack of deus ex machina for primary characters to escap every situation - check! What more can one ask for in a classic fantasy series that is labelled fantasy but only deals peripherally with magic and more with courtly intrigues and the failings of mankind? Do the right thing, HBO! :) Please! :)

I have always read, been told of and heard of a supposedly self-evident maxim to be followed in life: " Aim for the stars and you might land on Earth", or words to that effect. Being a bit of a slacker myself and also believing in the sanctity of one's quality of life as opposed to mindless career goals, I never really bought into the whole idea. I was especially put off since it also seemed to advocate aiming for the best and then consoling oneself with an A for effort if things didn't work out as planned.

However, today, I read this article about a 17 year-old boy aiming to beat the world record for youngest solo circumnavigator ever.  17 and already sailing around the world, solo! Now, I don't know if he was coerced into taking on such an arduous task but this is rarely something that one can be pushed into. And the joy and sense of achievement that come through in his words belie any objection he may have had to undertaking this task. This begs the question: Is the maxim I stated in the previous paragraph true, then? Maybe so, especially since the kid also crossed the Atlantic solo at 14. Gods above! Talk of overachieving. :) Still, such drive only comes with interest, enthusiasm and encouragement - all of which the kid seems to have had in spades. It just goes to show, in the debate of nature versus nurture, how very often nurture trumps all and maybe even determines nature for succeeding generations.

On a more personal note, if the maxim is true, that would be a rather rude reality check for me. I have always believed in doing just enough to get by - sailing past with flying colours lost its allure long ago.  I wonder, though, how many opportunities I might have lost, or even, to paraphrase Capt.Jack Sparrow,  " waved at as they passed by", taking no action to haul myself up or across. Maybe it is time I woke up and showed some passion in life. If not, I face the rather bleak prospect of becoming, very soon, a mindless drone in the IT factory - disposable, undervalued and rarely fit for anything else. I owe it to myself and to amma's memory!  Forget changes of course - what is called for is a full-scale paradigm shift.

This is easier said than done, of course. After much thought, especially given my woeful record on fulfilling resolutions, I have decided on the follwing: Over the next six months, I shall try to fashion a course for my life - an overall plan rather than a detailed blueprint - and see if I can't effect a turnaround, however partial, by Dec 2009. An exacting challenge, for sure, but equally essential, too! Here's to me in Dec, charintg and following a new course in life!
 

Finally, after ordering this, I can begin to play the greatest RPG ever created. D&D, here I come!

I just hope I can rope in enough interested souls - N is in, for sure. We'll have to do some recruiting, which shouldn't be too hard, considering that the game is quite engrossing and promises loads of fun.

Gizmodo is running an excellent series on tech from 30 years ago - 1979 to be precise - and how much, or how little, it has changed since. This covers both technological and sociological changes, in terms of both impact and usage patterns. Fascinating and brings back such fond memories.....The article is here.

Written as part of this series, the article on the best Lego sets in history was lots of fun to read and still has me drooling. I need to get myself some Lego sets. :)

On a different note, I wonder why Lego, or some local variant of it, never took off in India. I'm sure that, given the ingenious nature of most of our populace, the endless vistas of possible constructions offered by a Lego set would have fascinated people and been an enduring part of our childhoods, like it is abroad. Food for thought, for sure.

In the company of my better half, I watched an interesting Kannada play tonight at Rangashankara - "Leelanta", a play dealing with the final moments of Krishna's life.  More about the play's production details here.

Although it changed some well-known facts about Krishna's death ( for instance, Krishna was depicted as being shot in the chest rather than on the foot, as legend has it), the interactions of the three main characters onstage - Krishna, Arjuna and Jara, the hunter who fires the fatal arrow - were not only spot on but also profound and revealing.

For instance, Krishna is depicted as a callow, aging patriarch who, unable to see his Yadava clan self-destruct and powerless to stop it, seeks refuge in the forests around Dwaraka.He is but a shadow of his former self though his words are those of Krishna in his pomp. This dichotomy between Krishna's idea of himself and reality is best brought out in the scenes with Jara. After shooting Krishna by mistake, Jara offers to apply some soothing herbs to Krishna's chest to stem the flow of blood and allow him to live, at least until the sent-for Arjuna reaches the forest. Krishna refuses and attempts to push the hunter away but is so feeble that he only succeeds in further weakening himself. Truly a great fall for a once-great man!

While all this is going on, Krishna gives us the background of the curses plaguing his clan: from Gandhari who, after finding that all her 100 sons were massacred, cursed Krishna's clan to extinction 36 years after the war; and from Kanwa rishi who, displeased by a trick played by some Yadava boys on him ( involving dressing one of them up as a girl) curses the crossdressed boy to give birth to an iron pestle which would destroy the Yadava clan. Fearing the prophecy, Krishna instructs the pestle so born to be powdered and cast into the sea. 36 years later, during a quarrel on the shore, some grass uprooted by a Yadava becomes a pestle and he uses it to kill his adversary. This sets off a feud which ends in Yadava men slaughtering each other on the shore using the grass-pestles, thus bringing the prophecy to fruition.

Arjuna is depicted as a loyal friend who is, nevertheless, wary of approaching or touching Krishna in his final moments; this was mainly due to his fear of a mishap befalling himself engendered in him by Narada who, accosting Arjuna on his way to meet Krishna, warns him to stay away from Krishna's touch. Torn between his duty to Krishna, his friend and mentor, and his cognizance of the fact that Narada would rarely issue such a warning without due reason, Arjuna, helpless to ease his friend's pain or comfort him, rages at Jara and repeatedly avoids a rapidly weakening Krishna's attempts to touch or hug him.

Jara the hunter is a frank, forthright man who, far from being awed by Krishna, accepts that he shot Krishna by accident and proceeds to try and soothe his pain. He refuses to get fazed when Arjuna threatens to wreak vengeance on him, raising the spectre of Ekalavya as his inspiration and laughing off the threats of both Arjuna and Krishna as those of old men living in their past glories.

One of the most interesting characters in the play, he questions first Krishna, and then Arjuna, about how they could stand by or participate in the flagrant violation of Dharma, all the while claiming to be its greatest protectors? Krishna, and then Arjuna, are challenged by Jara to provide an explanation for their complicit roles in the burning at the stake of a Brahmin who dared to question the Pandavas about the legality of Bhima's win over Duryodhana. Krishna even went so far as to convince other Brahmins to denounce the rebel and had him burned at the stake, with all the Pandavas mutely, nay even happily, watching on. Arjuna is then questioned as to how he could stand by and mistake Ekalavya's burning desire to show Drona his prowess as any form of guru bhakthi rather than a class-triumph. This is what led to Drona asking for Ekalavya's thumb as guru dakshina. Far from giving it happily, Ekalavya, trapped by circumstance, accedes and fades away from history. Arjuna, through his inaction and childish envy, is just as complicit as Drona in Ekalavya's doom.

Krishna also has a sinister reason to want so badly to embrace Arjuna. During the Kurukshetra war, to strengthen Arjuna, Krishna grants him a considerable portion of his own strength to bolster him. It is to achieve the return of this strength, to rejuvenate his own failing powers, that Krishna, the eternal schemer, calls on Arjuna, with sweet words initially and then, as his life force ebbs away, with increaing desperation, evidenced by his feeble but nearly-successful attempts to grab Arjuna in his arms. Finally, after he sees Krishna lying motionless and assumes him to be dead, Arjuna approaches him. Krishna, who was playing possum, grabs him, recovers some of his failed vigour but falls and dies, his wounds being too great. Arjuna, weakened by the draining of his strength, collapses to the ground and is helped up by Jara and away from the scene.

This was very interesting in that, after a long while, I watched a play willing to examine divine legends and sacred personas in a harsh light, making them simultaneously more human and believable than the holier-than-thou versions we read, see and hear of in airbrushed versions of the Mahabharata. A standing ovation to both the playwright and the actors for providing us with such thoughtful and wholesome entertainment while also forcing us to re-evaluate our blind beliefs in the rightness of things we hear and see.   

An article from physorg ( read it here) describes how scientists have just proved, theoretically, that rotating space elevators are not only practical but also economical - they don't need any power to operate. They just use the natural forces in play that lead to coffee rising from a cup when stirred vigorously - simple centrifugal forces. Makes for very interesting reading but but but.....

In order to approach anything near practical implementation, this needs FAR more theoretical proof, accompanied by a stable government rich enuogh to invest in a project that is sure to take the better part of a generation to realise. That said, here's hoping it happens in my lifetime....Woohooo! Walter Jon Williams' and so many other sci-fi authors' dreams and stories will come true! I so want to be around if and when this is realised.

Poignant, terrifying and displaying amazing skill, this is the last photograph taken by famous Japanese wildlife photographer Michio Hashino before he was mauled to death by the bear ( in pic). Read more about him here.

What a pic! And what a man! I salute his devotion to his craft!