Long envied by outsiders, Europe is getting poorer: Europeans are experiencing a decline in their purchasing power. Adjusted for inflation and purchasing power, wages have declined by about 3% since 2019 in Germany, by 3.5% in Italy and Spain and by 6% in Greece. Real wages in the U.S. have increased by about 6% over the same period
Seymore Hersh: US played critical role in Crimean Bridge attacks. “Of course it was our technology. The drone was remotely guided and half submerged—like a torpedo.”. . Proxy war? Leaked documents reveal the extent of U.S. involvement in the Ukraine fight.
Will AI kill the radiology stars?Algorithms today are more accurate than those of almost two-thirds of radiologists... Human Vs Machine
Milking India: Chinese mobile companies evade Rs.9,000 crore in tax in India, Rs.1,629 crore recovered
Just the facts: Condensed background to Manipur situation
Noam Chomsky’s corrosive effects on linguistics as well as politics: “A deep disregard and contempt for the truth, a monumental disdain for standards of enquiry, a relentless strain of self-promotion, remarkable descents into incoherence, and a penchant for verbally abusing those who disagree with him.”
No matter how deceitful or duplicitous their researchers can get, major universities tend to whistle and look the other way.
Beware of BBC. They are part of the Hinduphobia machine.
They've even turned something as boring as vegetarianism into a sensationalized and caste/oppression-fraught topic.
Today Geeta Pandey published this. It has all the woke buzzwords. Shame on her:https://t.co/GDg95s8gBK
— Probably Not Actually a Monkey (@ApeThinks) July 29, 2023
TikTok Pushing Chinese Propaganda: TikTok is facing numerous government inquiries in Europe and abroad about its ties to the Chinese state. One of regulators’ top concerns about TikTok is a fear that it could be used by the CCP to warp civic discourse in democratic nations.
Italy regrets joining China's BRI: Signing up for BRI was an “improvised and heinous act” by the previous administration, Rome’s defense minister says. Done little to boost Italy's exports, making China the only winner.
Brain-drain: A third of India's most sought after engineering graduates leave the country. Nine out of 10 top scorers in the annual joint entrance examination held nationally for admission to the IITs and other reputed engineering colleges have migrated. Up to 36% of the top 1,000 scorers, too, have taken this path.
India to lose 6,500 millionaires in 2023: Dubai and Singapore remain preferred destinations for wealthy Indian families..‘Millionaires’ or ‘high-networth individuals’ (HNWIs) refer to those with investable wealth of $1 million or more.
Germany's BIG FAT Churches: The two main churches have total assets worth about €300 billion with combined annual turnover of €150 billion. State payments are only a small part of church income in Germany, with taxes to the tune of €13 billion annually making up the bulk of it.
In addition, there's a sizable amount of income from church assets about which the clergy keeps mum. The two churches are said to be the biggest landlords in Germany, owning forests, farmland and other real estate, as well as holding stakes in businesses such as publishing houses, breweries, banks and insurance companies.
Biggest losers of AI boom are knowledge workers: The transformation will pile pressure on higher-wage knowledge workers whose activities “were previously considered to be relatively immune from automation,” according to McKinsey study.
A few years ago, McKinsey had estimated that about half of worker hours worldwide were spent on tasks that could be automated. Now it’s raising the figure to as high as 60-70 per cent. Employees could find that their time is reallocated — or that their jobs disappear.
EU Hits Google with Antitrust Charges: Google faces EU break-up order over anti-competitive adtech practices. Google may have to sell part of its adtech business.
Intel set to gain $11 Billion subsidy for German chip plant . . . Chinese companies are frantically pre-ordering GPUs before US sanctions fully kick in. ByteDance has gobbled up $1 Billion of Nvidia GPUs for AI this year.
Nisargadatta: The world is your reflection, begin in yourself.
Organ donors: India has one of the world's lowest rates of organ donation. The current health system limits the health benefits of donated organs and allows private hospitals to profit without contributing much to the system.
“Doctor, is this really necessary?”: Prevent unnecessary medical care — by asking your Doctor these 4 questions first: "Is this really necessary? What are the risks? Are there other options? What happens if I don’t do anything?"
Doctor's dependency on Big Pharma: The medical industry spends a great deal on marketing to physicians directly, with the majority of the “physician-focused marketing budget” spent on “detailing.” Detailing is when “pharmaceutical representatives talk directly to physicians to ‘promote and market their companies’ drugs.’
Fastest-charging EV: China's Xpeng G9 SUV claimed to be world's fastest-charging mass-produced EV
Chinese Exascale Supercomputer: OceanLight, operated by the University of Science and Technology of China, races neck and neck with crowning jewels of Western supercomputing achievement such as Frontier and Summit, as well as Japan's Arm-based Fugaku.
Alcohol is a neurotoxin: Stop drinking, keep reading, look after your hearing: A neurologist’s tips for fighting memory loss and Alzheimer’s. “Alcohol is a very, very weak neurotoxin – it’s not good for nerve cells.”
Afghanistan exit looks even worse a year later: Taliban 2.0 was a mirage, and the Taliban today is Taliban 1.0 with one major difference; they are far better armed than the Taliban that ruled over most of Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001. Now they ride into battle with American armored vehicles and M-16 rifles that were left behind as the US military rushed for the exits last summer. The Taliban today also face a far weaker opposition movement in Afghanistan than was the case for the pre-9/11 Taliban.
Bride trafficking along the China-Pakistan economic corridor: Cases of fraudulent marriage between Pakistani women and girls — many of them from marginalized backgrounds and Christian families — and Chinese men who had travelled to Pakistan. The victims were lured with payments to the family and promises of a good life in China, but reported abuse, difficult living conditions, forced pregnancy, or forced prostitution once they reached China.
China is steadily wiping out German industry: "Over a decade ago, the sudden emergence of Chinese competitors wiped out Germany's advanced solar power industry. Now, that experience is likely to repeat across a broad spectrum of industries. Germany is slowly but surely realizing that a national industrial strategy based on synergy with China is headed toward a dead-end.’’
Role-reversal: “China-made EVs could turn Sino-EU automotive trade on its head. In EV trade – the future mainstay of the auto sector – the EU is quickly becoming a net consumer of China-made vehicles”
Windfall: For Reliance, With Love: Russian oil has supercharged profits. Reliance’s GRM stood at a sky-high $24 to $26 per barrel.
Is the tank doomed? "This war has been the day of the drone. It tells us that you need drones for defence to keep enemy drones off your back. You need classic low-level air defence including lasers and electronic jamming.".. In the future remote-controlled, unmanned tanks - essentially armoured drones - will be moving across the battlefield in tandem with crewed tanks, increasing their firepower while reducing the risk to life.
Russia learns to neutrlize drones: In the early months of the war in Ukraine, drones emerged as an unexpected source of victory against Russian forces. But Russia has learned from the humiliation by drones. The drone wonder weapons are becoming increasingly ineffective because Russia has improved its defense systems and is downing and jamming many of Ukraine's drones. "Drones were able to play such a role because the Russians were slow to set up an air defense system".
Anti-drone gun: Russia employing Stupor, an advanced electromagnetic weapon, that severs the connection between drones and their operators.
Drone power: Iran set to deliver armed drones to Russia
Drone force: Ukraine sent dozens of 'dronations' to build army of drones. But electronic counter-measures were becoming increasingly effective.
A Manipur Hill Came Crashing Down: At least 50 buried alive. "When a railway line or road is constructed in such topography, it involves a lot of vegetation clearing, slope-cutting and after that, and soil filling, but we are observing that these activities are leaving the soil very loose and vulnerable to erosions".
Doing nothing can be harder than doing anything: How to Do Nothing is not about inaction, staring at the ceiling or relocating to an isolated cabin on the beach or the hills; rather the contrary. It is an active “act of resistance”, an “action plan”, skewed to free people from the shackles of the attention economy and vulgar capitalism.
It is indeed high time to drop off the high-tech social-engineering assembly line, away from the herd mentality. Technology, like money, is a “useful servant but a bad master”.
Learning from nature: Scandinavian-style forest schools are booming in Europe and the US – and spreading in Asia, too.
Privacy hits Zuck's pocket: Apple iOS privacy change will decrease Facebook’s sales this year by about $10 billion.
‘Sold by Amazon’ program shut down: Amazon shuts down ‘Sold by Amazon’ program in the US following antitrust investigation. Amazon engages in unlawful price-fixing and restrained competition in order to maximize its profits.
Mindfulness: The 10-minute hack that is as ‘good as 40 minutes extra sleep’
Light Therapy and Melatonin: Optimize Health and Immunity with Sunlight.
1. View early morning sunlight.
2. Get more light throughout the day. Preferably sunlight.
3. Minimize bright light (screen time) after sunset.
4. There is more to sunlight than Vitamin-D
5. Oral melatonin is not a substitute
6. Oral Vitamin-D is not a substitute
7. LED bulbs bad - no Near-Infrared-Radiation. Incandescent bulbs better.
Terror financing: Crypto worth around 4 crore transferred to Hamas, reveals Delhi Police probe
Violence mars education: Violence has periodically marred Kerala's higher education system and the state is not a magnet for higher studies. Should politics be kicked out of campuses? . . . . . . . . . . . Bring NOTA to student elections. If 'NOTA wins', annul the elections that year.
What India Needs In Ladakh: India has over 4,000 medium tanks, but not a single light tank. The advantage rests with the PLA, whose armoured units in Tibet are equipped with the new ZTQ-15 (or Type 15) light tank.
Whoever gets there first, wins: A bizarre race against time is under way for the US Navy to reach its downed F35-C fighter jet - before the Chinese get there first. The prize? All the secrets behind this very expensive, leading-edge fighting force.
E-bikes: The top-selling electric vehicles in the U.S. have two wheels. "Replace a car with a mode that contributes less to congestion and has a lighter carbon footprint".
6G: Jio, Finland's University of Oulu ink JV on 6G technology
Anti-Arab sentiment sweeps Turkey: Many Turks believe Syrian refugees have overstayed their welcome. Now, as the economic crisis in the country gets worse, attacks have begun to escalate, both rhetorically and physically. Some want all foreigners out of Turkey.
China is beating the world on yet another greentech: As with other climate technologies like solar panels, wind turbines, and batteries, on hydrogen electrolyzers China is already eating the rest of the world’s lunch.
Has India lost its demographic sweet spot? "The country’s working age population growth rate which was more than 2 per cent till 2010 has dropped to 1.5 per cent. 75 per cent of the countries with economic growth of 6 per cent or more had a working age population growth in excess of 2 per cent. Most developed nations slowed down as their working age population dropped".
We need to map skill requirements of the future and ensure that the education system is tuned to deliver them. Mere large scale investment in education, though needed, will not be enough.
Who Abandoned Bagram Air Base? Biden essentially blamed his generals. “They concluded—the military—that Bagram was not much value added, that it was much wiser to focus on Kabul. And so, I followed that recommendation.”
Delete Chrome: “Chrome is the only major browser that does not offer meaningful protection against cross-site tracking... and will continue to leave users unprotected.” Having promised to ditch tracking cookies, Google changed its mind. “If you use Chrome, you give up your privacy”.
Google “has trackers installed on 75% of the top million websites,” several times as many as Facebook. Similarly, just look at the recent reports suggesting Google will pay Apple some $15 billion this year to be the default search engine on its devices.
Light pollution from street lamps linked to insect loss: Artificial street lights disrupt the behaviour of nocturnal moths, reducing caterpillars numbers by half. Modern LED streetlights appeared to have the biggest impact.
Online gaming: China restricts kids’ online gaming to three hours a week
- Exhausted: Youth in China, Japan and South Korea are 'lying flat' because they're exhausted and without hope
Taliban 2.0: Swapped Kalashnikovs for Twitter, cricket gear and selfies with children. But they never bothered addressing human rights or women’s rights concerns. When pushed, the Taliban adopted a “women’s rights within an Islamic framework” fudge.
Tamal Bhattacharya returned from Afghanistan, and said Taliban in 90's and Taliban now are different. But Sharia law in 90's and Sharia law now are not different.
TSMC: “Twenty years ago there were 20 foundries, and now the most cutting-edge stuff is sitting on a single campus in Taiwan.” How a Taiwanese chipmaker became a linchpin of the global economy.
Since every new node of process technology requires more challenging development and bigger investment in new production capacity, other chipmakers have over the years started focusing on design and left production to dedicated foundries such as TSMC. The Pentagon has been quietly pressing for the US to invest more in advanced chipmaking so that its weapons are not dependent on foreign manufacturers.
Making honey without bees and milk without cows: Tailoring the micro-organism carefully and choosing the right feed stocks for fermentation, it's possible to create anything from honey, to egg whites, to milk. "It is molecularly identical, so it should be the same".
Heat wave: Deadly heat waves will be common in South Asia, even at 1.5 degrees of warming. A wet bulb temperature of 32 degrees Celsius (89.6F) is considered to be the point when labor becomes unsafe, and 35C is the limit to human survivability—when the body can no longer cool itself.
Jaguar I-Pace launches in India: Costs twice as much as a Tesla Model-3.. Indian govt would need to address the country's dirty power grid, which would increase the carbon footprint of EVs plugged into it.
Getting stale already: Y Combinator's new batch features its largest group of Indian startups
Akash missile export: Govt to approach China-wary nations. Focus will be on high-value defence platforms to achieve target of $5-billion annual exports.. “The export version of Akash will be different from the system currently deployed with the Indian Armed Forces”.
Exploiting the loopholes: Amazon, Flipkart are violating investment rules related to multi brand retailing.
Jerry Seinfeld: Transcendental Meditation and weight training will 'solve just about anyone's life'. Seinfeld practices TM twice a day or “any time I feel like I’m dipping”... Oprah Winfrey, hedgefund billionaire Ray Dalio and even singer Lady Gaga are proponents of TM, and credit much of their success and productivity to the practice.
Crops grown in Bangalore high on toxic heavy metals: The 17 lakes in and around Bangalore have become part of the city's drainage system, into which flow untreated sewage and industrial effluents from garment factories, electroplating industries, distilleries and other small-scale but polluting units. "The heavy metals are absorbed by the crops along with other essential plant nutrients." Cadmium can be a carcinogen and an endocrine disruptor which can lead to fertility and reproductive issues in men and women while long-term exposure can lead to bone diseases.
Afghan proxy war - India is the big loser: The Four-Party format crystallises Pakistan's crucial role as a factor of Afghan security and stability. This works in China's favor and, paradoxically, makes Pak an indispensable partner for the US (and Russia) as well. A revival of Pak's moribund strategic ties with the US is already under way. China's shadows lengthen over the Hindu Kush and Afghanistan transforms as a hub of the Belt and Road Initiative.
Han Love Jihad: China promoting marriages among Han and Tibetans
Comparing Indian and Chinese startups: Nine of India’s top 10 unicorns by value are in the online-consumer space. In China, three of the top 10 are online consumer companies, two are bricks-and-mortar businesses, and the rest are a mix of hardware and B2B.
pSecular utopia: 50% nominated posts in Andhra Pradesh for SCs, STs, BCs, minorities
Loan Mela: The new governments will have to spend more than Rs 220 billion in Rajasthan, more than Rs 160 billion in MP, and nearly Rs 30 billion in Chhattisgarh to keep the promise.
The *political cost* of keeping BJP away from power by promising 'impossible' dreams and creating 'unsustainable' coalitions should soon play out, whether in Karnataka or Madhya Pradesh, one needs to have patience to wait out for it
We saw industry after industry violating every pollution control norm - this sort of growth they said, nobody wants, when locals cannot get clean air or clean water. Every river we crossed was a dry bed and often the river bed was being drained of water by mafia https://t.co/YmOxXCVdma
Mobility: Mahindra Electric is betting big on e-rickshaws
“Ancient Modalities”: Meditation is the fastest growing wellness activity in the US
David Godman on Papaji, Ramana & Nisargadatta: At the very moment that each thought rises, if one vigilantly enquires ‘To whom did this appear?’ it will be known ‘To me’. If one then enquires ‘Who am I?’ the mind will turn back to its source and the thought that had arisen will also subside. By repeatedly practising in this way, the mind will increasingly acquire the power to abide at its source.
Tao Te Ching: “Clay is made into vessels; but it is on their empty hollowness that use depends. The door and windows are cut out to form a house; but it is on empty space, that its use depends. Doors and windows are chisel out to make a room. It is the empty space in the room that gives its function. Everything is shaped by nothing”.
English language hindering scientific advances: The researchers point out an imbalance in knowledge transfer in
countries where English is not the mother tongue, saying "much
scientific knowledge that has originated there and elsewhere is
available only in English and not in their local languages".
Late to the queue: Rahul never stood in a queue to become the leader of his party
Doubts pale promise of GM crops bounty: There is little evidence that the introduction of genetically modified crops in the US had led to yield gains beyond those seen in conventional crops.
Sun therapy: Scientists boosted testosterone in men using nothing but a very bright light
Maanasa Mendu: This brilliant 13-year-old figured out how to make clean energy using a device that costs $5
Why are women banned from Mount Athos? The largest area in the world from which women, and female animals, are banned. "Simplest way to ensure Padres' celibacy".
Inciting violence: KKKangress caught fomenting caste conflict in Haryana
Ditch Urdu, UNESCO advises Pakistan. "The continued use of Urdu as the language of instruction, even though it is spoken at home by less than 8% of the population, has contributed to political tensions". ... similar to English in India
Fixing traffic congestion: What happens in Delhi is important to the whole country because Delhi is facing problems which will affect other cities over time as their incomes, number of cars and level of pollution increase in tandem.
