A new turn?

Many a times I wonder what may I supposed to do? Some of my friends believe research is what an academic must do. Some argue that teaching is more important. And here I am thinking it has to be more than these two extremes.
I do not see the use of research that cannot impact anything other than a journal. At the same time I do not think we are giving students the right tools. And most importantly what am I doing for my fellow man?

Faith?

I have tried to not let things happening in the world influence me too much for a while. But I have to get all these bottled emotions out there.

What have we become? Indiscriminate killing of people is not a solution to any problem. Bombing the instigators is just going to make people more radicalized. The question is not how many bombs we drop and how many people we kill. It is how do we make people return to humanity. I am dying to see a country that is not divided. Even in India we have become too polarized. Polarization does not mean physically harming others but it can also mean attacking someone else's opinion and ideas. Yes if you are giving critical feedback backed by facts than it is a different story. But if you attack someone's thoughts because they belong to a different group than you that is polarization.

Why can't we allow each person to have his/her own views? Why are we so bothered that there is multiplicity in this world? A great man once said the opposite of a deep truth is also a deep truth. Are we moving away from being human and going back to the ape kingdom. This could certainly be a theory. Maybe instead of evolving our brains are de-evolving. I think the brain just gave up and said screw you, you don't deserve a beautiful complex tool like me.

I initially thought this might be a limited phenomenon. But this is happening all over the world. In the US we have Trump vs hillary, in the middle east we have multiple groups falling over each other for power, in india you have numerous political parties and their fans trying to get a leg up on each other, in china we have a government trying to show the rest of the world its power, this list could keep going on. I always was taught that all men and women are equal. I was taught that faith is personal. I was taught that the greatest value to have is humanity.

When I was a child, some kids from the slum next to our house would peep over the compound wall to watch what we were playing. Usually this was either cricket or football. My grandfather asked me why are you not calling those other children to play with you. I didn't know the answer, I had felt I was supposed to keep distance. He never scolded me always taught me. That day I learnt the most important lesson in my life. All are equal. I have never forgotten this and I never will.
When I was working the drivers always wanted to go with me. It never happened that I asked for a car and a driver didn't agree it was not because I am talkative or I gave them tips. It was always because I treated them like an equal. What I ate I gave them, what I drank I shared. They are no less human just because they are not as educated as you. They are working hard to live and the greatest thing you can give God is your labor.

The role of the government

What is the role of the state? The two ends of the political spectrum (left and right) will give you different definitions for this question. Without getting into the conflict and without taking sides let us assume what the state does should be for the benefit of the people.
We have a government that came to power in the centre with a huge majority the idea that they promoted was development. Now, development is a very absurd term to me a non-economist. My first question is development of what? I assume it means development of people. The way that we do so is by expanding business (At least in our country). Now business might be public or private and may entail manufacturing, services, etc. Here, is where I think almost all our governments fail.
In order to develop a business enabling environment one of the most critical factors is human capital. Having demographic surplus does not translate to human capital directly. What is the use of having a huge amount of young people without skills? It is also important that whatever skill programs are dictated by policy are geared to the future not the present.
What businesses were doing 15 years ago may not be their practice today. The dominant businesses of today may not be the dominant one of tomorrow. This is not a statement, this has been shown via multiple empirical studies in different countries. Than the question arises what should we skill people with? I believe we should skill them to become technologically adaptable. In other words, once a person is skilled to deal with different technologies the person can easily migrate his/her skills to other technologies.
How do we do this? Well for one the focus has to be on education. Right now we are opening IITs and IIMs like they are retail outlets. This definitely needs to stop. Unless that money is spent on primary and secondary education we will not have enough children who are capable of fully utilizing the facilities and faculties provided to them by higher educational institutions. What is the use of having so many IITs and IIMs when the input provided to them is not on par?
We also need to focus on research. Research in India is so neglected that we never even think that it can help us develop our human capital. How many indian researchers are fully tenured in US and UK universities? How many academic papers do they publish? Have they not had some form of education in India? Oh yes the brain drain phenomenon! Tell this to someone else. To do research you need facilities, you need institutions and most importantly funding. Other than a few places that I know off, where are the labs and the equipment? Where is this funding?
If you think that funding research is just pouring money down a drain than by all means make funding performance oriented. I am sure the true researchers hell bent on dedicating their life to make things better will not mind. But at least try it. Right now, funding to STEM has been cut dramatically. We are happier importing new technology rather than funding our own research community. We are more bother about politically controlling the IITs and IIMs rather than controlling them based on your performance. We are more interested in changing versions of history and science based on who said it first rather than encouraging advancement in science. We are more bothered about bring innovations from abroad rather than incentivizing innovation at home. Science does not care if some mythological story talked about nuclear physics before the western world. It does care about how nuclear physics can be used to benefit society. How can we understand the world we will in better? Science does not care if mahabhartha talks about nuclear weapons. It cares about non-conventitional energy sources that are cheap and clean. When will we get it into our heads that science is not about religion, science is religion.
If the role of the government is to develop society than we are failing. There are other failures too but that debate is for another post.

Can Memes (not the internet kind) can explain things?

Meme is a replicator proposed by Richard Dawkins and behaves much like a gene. It is selfish and gets copied and replicated by others. The only difference between a gene and a meme is that a meme is a type of idea.

I have heard of gene's being suppressed by using various drugs. I have been thinking what about memes being suppressed. If there is a suppression of memes than technically the memes should vanish maybe they can be discovered later but more importantly new memes would take their place.

What if memes are a part of our identity. Than if they are suppressed or considered to be regressive we will not display them openly but at an opportune moment we will be able to say that I always had this meme. Than will prolonged suppression lead to overt displays of the meme when the environment in conducive?

Well memes are supposed to be selfish replicators. This would imply that all sorts of ideas will be in fashion at one particular time that said would it be possible that less widely accepted ideas that are great at multiplying become the dominant ideas and push the other ideas in oblivion? I guess it is possible.

What is memes are attached to a symbol or an object. I assume that ideas are associated with certain objects and brand names. If the brand or object is in dominance and some incidents take place are we more likely to see causality? What if the object is not dominant would we than associate the incidents with the object or will be establish some other form of correlation?

While it is interesting to talk about this selfish replicator. It is important to understand that it can do harm. It can help in spreading ideas or information that may not have any basis (similar I guess to a rumor). How do we control memes or at least verify them? Well if I go with Dawkins there is no way to do so, because essentially they are selfish replicators.

How much is excessive?

Everyday in the paper we read about an award being returned or someone taking a stand for what they believe is wrong (both these things are the same to me). The other side of the argument is that these people are supporters of an opposition political party. I despise all political parties equally, in other words I am an equal opportunity political party hater.

One of the prominent themes why people are returning their awards is the rise of religious fringe elements or as one scientist put it the attempt to make it institutionalized. For me a researcher in the field of organizations religion was never absent religion was and will remain one of the prominent institutional logics that is prevalent in society. Then if it was never absent why has it become so important now? Well it was never the dominant logic the dominant logic was may be that of state or professionalism or maybe even community now these logics are in direct conflict with the logic of religion. We never saw religion as an important part of our identity and now when it is suddenly growing in prominence we are finding it difficult because it goes against our identity.

The other side always considered religion to be a part of identity and now they are able to express their views more aggressively. There is also the question of information. Today with easy access to information and loads of it we are able to find data, studies and what have you to support our assertions these might not be scientific but than as psychology suggests all we need is one strand of information to boost the fact that our view is right while the other view is wrong. Given that there is a sudden prominence of religion as an institutional logic I am not surprised to see an attack on rational debate with invalid and unscientific knowledge we are really stretching our imagination to be honest and being creative.

As a social scientist I take on only the role of an observer. It is my job to show the world a mirror and let them figure it out. I cannot be biased, I think that if we were rational and believed in data we might have been better. But than I am just a simple researcher!!!

Strings

They cling to your body like wires
controlling your thoughts your ideas and your movements
They make others expect things from you
controlling the way you speak, listen and emote
Do they make you who you are supposed to be?
It is tough to cut them away
It is difficult to let go
Let them go and life might not be as complex
Let them go and you will have to make sacrifices
One string makes the kite fly and one string makes the dog walk straight
What do we do away with?
I wish there was no philosophy
No need to portray an image
Only needs and no wants
But then would I be human?

Time does not fly

When you are facing the grind that no body can help you with. When there are too many routes to take and all of them seem lucrative. When you are stuck in your dreams. When you would gladly exchange your work for a swim in the sea Time my friend does not fly