On Truth, Wikijustice and the Emergence of Digital Maoism

What does Truth mean in the age of Wikipedia? Simson Garfinkel explains in this extremely interesting article in MIT's Technology Review.

Wikipedia and the Meaning of Truth.

Thought for the Day

Hey hey let's go kick asses
Taisatsu na mono, protect my balls
Boku ga warui, so let's fighting
Let's fighting love,
Let's fighting love.

...

Hey hey let's go kick asses
This is important:, protect my balls
I am a badass, so let's fighting
Let's fighting love,
Let's fighting love.


For the full translated version, refer to the video.



Courtesy: The anime tribute episode Good times with Weapons of South Park.

The Joker Graphic Novel

A sneak preview of the new Joker graphic novel.











Awesome eh?

Yeah Panda, you can have your orgasm now...

WTF?

A lumbering, heavy feeling weighed Ghongha down, and he dragged his feet under the weight of that fat Python of Dejection. The Korean restaurant ahead beckoned him with promises of exotic dishes, beautiful waitresses and quaint English accents. He crawled towards Seoul's Soul.

The menu was in Engrish. The names of the dishes seemed to be in Martian. And from the girls who worked there as waitresses, he could as well have been in Paradise.

“Why don't you order a live octopus and tear it off savagely? Just like Oh Daesu in Oldboy? The cute waitress will locate the obvious symbolism in the act. And then you can cast me off...Besides, it's a long time since I had an octopus.”, the fat python hissed amicably and lazily crawled inside Ghongha's shirt.

But Ghongha had long since learned not to take the Python's advice seriously. He ordered the standard full course Hanjeongsik and quietly sat down to eat. The waitress was back again to check on him.

“Do you need a fuck?”, she asked him solicitously, full of unfeigned concern.

“Boy did you get lucky!”, whispered the Python and slid underneath languorously. “Looks like it's time for me to leave you for a while”, he added as an afterthought and flashed his fangs in a wide yawn.

Ghongha looked at the girl in bafflement. She was young, perhaps younger than him, slim and beautiful. She wore a casual, loose T shirt and jeans and wore no make up. Her long, straight, somewhat unkempt hair fell over her shoulders bewitchingly. She smiled at our hero and asked again deferentially, “So...do you need one?”.

Ghongha didn't know what to say. He felt the Python's iron grip in his heart tightening even further. Words escaped him and he could not understand anything anymore.

“Relax kid. You're gonna blow this away.” (Hiss...hiss).

“Fine, I'll leave you two to enjoy. She's a sweet girl. I like her. You probably need it too.”, he chuckled wryly and relaxed his grip on Ghongha, slid down his body and began crawling on the floor of the restaurant.

A gentle, grateful smile slowly spread across Ghongha's lips and he nodded shyly to the girl. She smiled her warm, sunny smile and said in her cute accent, “I'll be back shortly”.

And came back soon enough with a spring in her step and joy in her face.

“Here you go”, she said and left again.

Ghongha eyed the fork on the table in crushed bewilderment.

“Shouldn't have left your side at all”, laughed the Python maliciously and leapt back towards Ghongha's table.

Nuggets of Wisdom -- 2

"When miserable, read Dostoyevsky".



PS: Or William Gibson. Just read Burning Chrome. Never has a painkiller acted so fast.

On the Roots of Human Irrationality

Standard Disclaimer:

The following is supposed to be a Game Theoretic take on the causes of human irrationality. Of course, being my own views and having been heavily influenced by what I have experienced and observed, they are liable to have many inherent biases built inside them and I do not think they are very correct.

...

Although in a game, a rational player would play the strategy that is expected to increase his payoff, altruistic people might not be amenable to such analyses because of the apparent disregard that they have for their own welfare (or self interest). I'd like to point out that 'altruistic' people can be included in the realm of rationality. This can be done by considering the fact that people, for whatever reason, may change the structure of the game (or perceive differently, the structure of the game) being played by assigning different numbers in the payoff matrix than what are supposed to exist objectively. Now it is possible that due to their philosophy of what they think is correct and right (as opposed to wrong), causes them to perceive their payoff matrices as different than what is perceived by other people. In this case, they are again maximising their payoffs as is expected of rational people by putting in a higher payoff on the strategies they ultimately end up playing.

Hence on the surface at least, I do not see a reason for a dichotomy.

The causes for the different payoff structure being assigned is what is discussed next.

In my opinion, the cause stems from the fact that the game being played is not Common Knowledge. The payoff structures are hidden somewhat and although (if the game is repeated) there can exist emerging patterns in the assignment of payoffs to different strategies by players, the fact that common knowledge does not exist causes the other players in the game to rely on their inbuilt, hardwired Bayesian Inference subroutines in their brains which inherently, are heavily dependent on the players' experiential domains.

This is, in fact the reason for superstitions. People seeing black cats crossing their path, relating it to previous mishaps in their own lives infer that the blame for some putative future accident rests solely on the puny shoulders of the cat. This is classic case of correlation being mistaken for causation.

Hence being denied common knowledge and public payoff functions, the game being played transforms dramatically into that in which guessing the behaviour of the adversary becomes a far more intractable problem of mathematics. Also, the prior programming of the individual by means of education (or the lack of it), experience, genetic hardwiring etc makes him prone to assess the game in a radically different way than is usually studied in formal discourses of Game Theory.

So perhaps the more meaningful question should not be "Why are humans irrational?" but "How are humans irrational?"

Nuggets of Wisdom -- 1

Presenting the first installment of Nuggets of Wisdom Series, in which yours truly offers (rarely) original, (sometimes) clichéd, and (almost always) useless insights into the nature of things.

If you take something so seriously that you can't laugh at it yourself or tolerate irreverent jokes about it, know that something's really, really fucked up.

उसने सोचा

मुझे पश्चात्ताप की आग झुलसा रही है. कल रात सो के उठने के बाद अचानक से जैसे ये ख़याल ज़ेहन में कौंध सा गया.

"पापी...".

जाने में या अनजाने में, सोच-विचार के या यूँ ही, कमीनियत में या भलमनसाहत में -- जैसे भी हो, पापों का घड़ा भर-सा गया मालूम होता है. प्रायश्चित्त करने का वक्त आ चुका है.

कैसे हो यह उपक्रम? और क्यूँ हो? जो होना था सो तो हो चुका. तुम्हारे ये बेकार के जुगाड़ मात्र तुम्हारे अहम् को तुष्ट करने के ज़रिये हैं. ये उतने ही मूर्खतापूर्ण हैं जितना 'खून का बदला खून'. अगर इन्तक़ाम दार्शनिक दृष्टि से ग़लत है तो प्रायश्चित्त क्यों नहीं? दोनों एक ही प्रकार की स्वार्थपरक भावना के तुष्टीकरण हेतु अस्तित्वमान हैं. ये सब पुराने ज़माने के हठ योग -- ये सब मैसोकिज्म नहीं था तो क्या था? ये सब विकृत मानसिकता नहीं थी तो क्या था?

खैर, खूब सोचा. लेकिन जैसे चाहे जितना सोचो, बदला तो लेना ही पड़ता है, वैसे अब मुझे पश्चात्ताप भी करना ही पड़ेगा. (मुस्कुरा के) साले बड़े ग्लैमरस फंडे है!

कई तरीके हैं. लेकिन सबसे असरदार तो वो होंगे जो तुम्हारे शरीर को कष्ट देने का काम करेंगे. भूख, प्यास, नींद -- इन पर हमला बोला जाए. काम के घंटे बढ़ाए जायें. मौन व्रत धारण किया जाए. इस देह की सभी आरामतलबी का नाश किया जाए. सभी मनोरंजनों को आग लगा दी जाए. क्यों क्या कहते हो?

धीरे धीरे बात टॉर्चर तक पहुँचे. हाथ पैर पर आरियाँ चलायी जायें. (कसम से, मज़ा आ जाएगा).

फिलहाल ख़ुद को भूखा रखा जाए (दिन में एक बार तो खाना बनता है मगर... नहीं?).
फिलहाल मौन व्रत रखा जाए (ज़रूरत पर तो बोलना ही पड़ेगा मगर... नहीं?).
फिलहाल काम के घंटे बढ़ाए जायें (वीकेंड्स पर तो थोड़ा आराम बनता है मगर... नहीं?).
...

एंह...तुमने खूब सोचा मगर सब बकवास. तुम सही कह रहे थे. ये सब तो ख़ुद को खुश रखने के जुगाड़ हैं. सच में पश्चात्ताप करना है तो बस दो-तीन काम काफ़ी हैं.

एकांत में हमेशा अपने पाप स्मरण करो. जिन्हें तुम्हारे कारण कष्ट हुआ है, उनसे मिलो, उनके सामने नतमस्तक हो, और सच्चे दिल से माफ़ी मांगो. बस.

(नहीं...नहीं...नहीं...कतई नहीं).

<*शीशे पे पत्थर फ़ेंक के मारता है. टूटे हुए शीशे के टुकड़े हाथ में चुभते हैं, चेहरे पे खरोंच मारते हैं. खून ही खून. हँसता है, हँसता है, खूब दिल खोल के हँसता है*>

The Great Gig in the Sky

Richard Wright, keyboardist and one of the founder members of Pink Floyd, died on 15th September.

Link to news on Pink Floyd's site.

Link to obit in Wired.

All my hopes of witnessing the ultimate mega-ass-kicking reunion of my favourite band are dashed to the ground.

<*Sigh*>

PS: Solzhenitsyn followed by Richard Wright. I wonder who, from my pantheon, is slated next.

<*Double Sigh*>

Pure Pornography

The LHC goes operational today!

You Large Hardon (sic!) Collider, I demand orgasm now!

Another list in the Wall (Part 4)

The following is the list of my favourite books in no particular order. Only those belonging to the 'Beyond AA' category are admitted.

1) The Insulted and the Humiliated (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
2) The Brothers Karamazov (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
3) Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
4) Notes from the Underground (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
5) The Idiot (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
6) Anna Karenina (Lev Tolstoy)
7) The First Circle (Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn)
8) The Gulag Archipelago (Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn)
9) Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (Robert M Pirsig)
10) Neuromancer (William Gibson)
11) The Selfish Gene (Richard Dawkins)
12) लाल टीन की छत (निर्मल वर्मा)
13) Godel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal, Golden Braid (Douglas R Hofstadter)
14) The Catcher in the Rye (J D Salinger)
15) 1984 (George Orwell)
16) Midnight's Children (Salman Rushdie)
17) कुरु कुरु स्वाहा (मनोहर श्याम जोशी)
18) Catch 22 (Joseph Heller)
19) चंद्रकांता/चंद्रकांता संतति (देवकीनंदन खत्री)
20) Fight Club (Chuck Palahniuk)
21) Infinite Jest (David Foster Wallace)
22) Lolita (Vladimir Nabokov)
23) 2666 (Roberto Bolaño)
24) Road to Reality (Roger Penrose)
25) Underworld (Don DeLillo)
26) The Savage Detectives (Roberto Bolaño)

W(h)ither Now

Link to news that Virgin Comics is shutting down.

I had blogged last summer about the Indian Comic Book Revolution and how awesome the new titles -- Devi, Sadhu and Ramayan 3392 AD seemed. However, as I discovered, along with Somnath, that the later issues were done in a very non-serious and lazy way, (as if the team were pulling a night-out just before the morning of the deadline) my enthusiasm shrank. There was deterioration in every department -- sketching, inking, story, character development.

And now they're shutting down.

<*Sigh*>

Somnath, the ball is in your court now.

जबसे मिली है मोहब्बत

The song's catchy and the dance steps, positively infectious. Titled "World's most pathetic dance", it has to be seen to be believed.

Courtesy: "Pyaasi Raat", the movie.

Doggy Style

The great Anurag Kashyap's next venture will be a superhero movie. It will star Kunal Kapoor. And here is where it gets totally awesome -- it will be based on the violent Raj comic book series Doga, which I have had the pleasure of reading as a kid and blogging as a fan.

Link to news item

I am sure Kashyap's version will kick ass. He should be able to preserve the murky origins of the superhero and do justice to the gory and violent nature of his retributions.

All hail the great man!

Link -- Doga on Wikipedia

India, Science Fiction and Holy Fucking Cows

Confessions of an Addict: The God that Died

Warning: Long post.

<*Nanga Fakir stands on the podium looking very pensive. Lifts a glass of water and drinks up. Eyes his audience with a heavy heart*>

Nanga Fakir: In the last part, I had reached the point when the Russian Fever had arrested the then thirteen year old Nanga Fakir. Indeed, good sense demands that I continue with the story of his addiction and describe the events that followed after the The Idiot fell into the hands of our little hero. However, a recent development has made me change my mind.

<*Confused murmers from the audience*>

Nanga Fakir: I have received word that Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn died yesterday. So instead, I will talk about him today.

...

It was the vacations after high school. Nanga Fakir was in Gorakhpur with his brother who went by the name of Shashikar Bhaiya (who was every bit an addict as NF was, and perhaps more). The talk veered off to the books that the cousins were reading those days and very casually a new Russian name was slipped in by the older brother.

Little Nanga Fakir: Sol...zhe..ni...what???

Not so little Shashikar Bhaiya: Solzhenitsyn. The book is called The First Circle. You know, he's a pretty marvellous writer. Even though he is alive, his books are already considered classics.

Little Nanga Fakir: What's this book about?

Not so little Shashikar Bhaiya: Oh there is hardly any story. Its just political prisoners sitting together and talking. You know, very thought refining.

Been thus introduced to His Magisterial Awesomeness, Nanga Fakir put this book on the playlist isntantly.

Some years passed by. In the meantime, Nanga Fakir had decided to break out of his addiction and had awarded himself a voluntary exile from the Addiction Kingdom.

But then he had also befriended Somnath Pal, who (like the true Bong that he was) had access to the secret archival library of the Ramakrishna Math and who one arbit day announced that he had indeed located the Book.

<*A wry smile spreads across Nanga Fakir's face. He takes off his glasses (when the fuck did he start wearing them? Ah, the phony bastard!) and rubs his eyes unhurriedly, perhaps for dramatic effect*>

Nanga Fakir: You know a junkie never quits. He takes a break. And very soon, he had in his hands the tattered old copy of The First Circle. Within two days, he gorged this six hundred page tome and ecstatically went to his friends and sang songs about how awe-fucking-some the book was. Obviously, the friends didn't care shit about either the book or the author. They listened him out semi-patiently though and soon left baffled, the dismayed asshole who couldn't understand the tepid, don't-give-a-fuck attitude of fellow humans.

As revenge, he wished their private parts would melt away the night before the JEE exam.

Soon, the exams got over and NF decided to go book hunting with Somnath Pal and entered the famous portals of Ram Advani book depot in Hazratganj, Lucknow. Their talk about books and which one to read/buy was overheard by the old man who was in charge. Very soon, Mr Naseer was sufficiently impressed by the phony, third rate glib litgiri NF is so known for spewing out. They came out of the store with an overpriced Sons and Lovers and some books from Naseer's personal collection which included 1984, Animal Farm, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich and some more.

One Day... was different from The First Circle in that it was more descriptive of the life led by zeks in Gulags.The First Circle was almost Science Fiction. Heavily philosophical, unwaveringly bleak and unapologetically dystopic, The First Circle was Russian literature at its gloomy best. And so was One Day... but the scope of the gloom was limited, for it covered only one day in the life of Ivan Denisovich.

With the aid of Somnath, soon Nanga Fakir acquired Cancer Ward and devoured it like a hungry dog. Still unsatisfied, he managed to locate the first volume of the author's most celebrated work -- The Gulag Archipelago in Blossoms, Bangalore during his third year in Surathkal.

Of all of Solzhenitsyn's books, this was the one that shook him most deeply. Heavily suffused with gallows humour, it is the most rigorous, intelligent, brilliantly researched and meticulous indictment of any historical regime ever in human history -- a task that seems impossibly great given the fact that innumerable roadblocks were cast in the path of the mathematician-turned-writer and that many a time, he was banned from using the archives (most of which were classified anyway). And this was just Volume 1! Despite his best efforts, Nanga Fakir has yet not been able to locate/read Volumes 2 and 3 of Gulag Archipelago.

Indeed he had blogged about The Gulag Archipelago (Volume 1) previously too. Those who really want to pay their tributes to the great man are advised to read the above link.

<*Overwhelmed, Nanga Fakir takes his phony glasses off. A tear (perhaps glycerine?) floats down his cheek*>

Nanga Fakir: Let's remain silent for two minutes in the memory of The God that Died yesterday.

<*Half a minute of an uncomfortable, enforced silence is broken by farts and the voices of children crying. NF becomes furious*>

Nanga Fakir: You all deserve to die assholes!

(Weak Voice): "It's you who is the asshole. You said you were going to talk about Solzhenitsyn. But you talked about yourself all the time. How YOU discovered him, how YOU liked him, how YOU became a fan, how YOU blogged about him some days ago. You miserable piece of shit, you deserve this."

<*Flings a leather boot towards the podium. Nanga Fakir sees it coming but is too lazy to move aside. The boot hits his nose and he is knocked out. Security men run to his aid and there is pandemonium in the auditorium*>

End of Part 2

Link: Solzhenitsyn dies on 3rd August 2008 (NY Times Obituary).

Confessions of an Addict: Buildup to The Russian Fever

WARNING: Long Post.

...

Nanga Fakir: Hello folks! I am Nanga Fakir.

"Hello Nanga Fakir".

Nanga Fakir: I am an addict.

(Weak voice) "Sure honey, go ahead".

Nanga Fakir: I guess it was innate. Something that I had been born with. Some affliction which seals your fate even before you're born. I have long suspected a genetic basis for many of the ailments that I suffer from -- pessimism, cynicism, depression, fondness for black humour and scatological jokes, boredom, nausea, laziness, aversion to pets etc. A new item has been added to the list. It is addiction.

<*glances nervously at the audience and smiles in confusion*>

<*the audience eyes him full of compassion, feigned perhaps*>

Nanga Fakir: This will not be an intelligent account. It will be an erratic recollection at best.

<*audience nods in encouragement*>

Nanga Fakir: Perhaps it started with comics. The cheap, sold-on-the-roadside stuff one could rent for a night. Many a day would pass while the infant NF would read about the adventures of Bankelal under the slanting rays of the sun, oblivious to all worries of the outside world.

The fascination continued. With Chandamama captivating him in its fantastic yarns of ancient empires, beautiful princesses, wicked sorcerers and powerful yogis, NF would get transported to parallel universes where he would commandeer armies and humble the most powerful by his wisdom and magic.

Then came the crucial discovery of the book that took his world by storm -- Chandrakanta. The masterful suspense, the ancient empires, the mazes and labyrinths, the tilisms, and the aiyyars made the normally quiet, introspective kid exclaim in hushed reverence -- "This is the greatest book that has ever been written."

He hunted for, and soon read the six parts of the Chandrakanta Santati series. And since the supply of comics/books dried up due to reason not remembered, he reread all the seven books of the series one after the other -- again and again and again.

His appetite grew by leaps and bounds. Reading books was all that he would do, drawn irresistibly to the yellowed pages and the smell of the moth eaten papers. He felt an almost carnal pleasure in watching the pages turn and the content reveal itself. He read without purpose, goals, plans, or ulterior motives. His addiction had begun then.

Come 8th standard and he gave his school library a not indifferent look. Lurking in the glass panelled shelves, he saw along with his friend who went by the name of Man, a collection of stories by Soviet writers. He came back promptly the next day to return the book and look for more. A book by the name of Mother caught his attention. "Ah, another Russian book!", he said to himself and got it issued.

This started what he now refers to as The Russian Fever. Very soon he had on his hands Anna Karenina which, although he did not understand in its entirety, hit him with a force that he had not thought possible.

By now, Nanga Fakir would read books simply because the cover jacket of the book would look sexy. The pubescent kid would get aroused in the wrong regions of his body due to the wrong reasons and he would not notice this till the time to remedy the situation was too far gone past.

And then it happened. During one of his rounds of the school library, he noticed a fat, white book squeezed between two fatter tomes. He decided to investigate.

The book smelled funny. It was written by a Russian guy with an unpronounceable name and the translation was by some female called Olga Shartse. The book was called "The Idiot (part one)". He decided to give it a try since the book cover was sexy, the smell was different and the writer was Russian.

He stood in line to get the book issued. The librarian looked at him wearily. She saw a frail, undersized kid holding a book that weighed heavier than him. "You're sure you want to get this issued?", she asked. "Yes ma'am", came the prompt answer. Slowly and methodically, all entries were made and signatures acquired. And at the end of it all, the book came into Nanga Fakir's possession.

End of Part 1

<*no longer nervous, Nanga Fakir ends his account with the audience clapping enthusiastically. he smiles confidently to all those present and is happy with his performance*>

(Weak Voice) "By all means, your account was fascinating and engrossing. But why do you talk in third person? At times it is irritating to hear you say 'Nanga Fakir felt this...' etc etc."

Nanga Fakir: Hey fuck you bitch!

Why so Serious?

Sonu and I caught up with the premiere show of The Dark Knight at the East End Mall today. First day, first show, first to be seated in the hall. And what a dazzling two and a half hour blast!

Go see it...now.

The Fag End

Finished a couple of more books -- Survivor and Diary (both by Chuck Palahniuk). Survivor is awesome; very nearly as good as Fight Club, while Diary is the weakest of the four books the writer's written despite it having one of the most awesome first five pages of a fiction book I have had a chance of reading.

Currently on the book playlist are The Extended Phenotype and Godel, Escher, Bach both of which will probably keep me occupied for a long time to come.

अथ बाजपाई उवाच

क्या आर्बिटाप है!