degenration of ideology

Manas Garg writes : "In fact, beyond a point, it becomes impossible to say what that ideology means."

Good point.

I would say that this stage comes when an ideology stops defining itself in terms of what it is, and starts defining it in terms of what it is not (relative to others) Take away the supporting 'relative' crutches and the ideology falls flat on face.

degeneration of ideas

Referring to my comments on how the thoughts of the founders get distorted and fought over by the followers - One example -

Ayn Rand @ Wikipedia:


"In 1985, Leonard Peikoff, a surviving member of 'The Collective' and Ayn Rand's designated heir, established 'The Ayn Rand Institute: The Center for the Advancement of Objectivism'. The Institute has since registered the name Ayn Rand as a trademark, despite Rand's desire that her name never be used to promote the philosophy she developed. Rand expressed her wish to keep her name and the philosophy of Objectivism separate to ensure the survival of her ideas.

Another schism in the movement occurred in 1989, when Objectivist David Kelley wrote an article called 'A Question of Sanction,' [6] in which he defended his choice to speak to non-Objectivist libertarian groups. Kelley wrote that Objectivism was not a 'closed system' and should engage with other philosophies. Peikoff, in an article for The Intellectual Activist called 'Fact and Value' [7], argued that Objectivism is, indeed, a closed system, and that truth and moral goodness are intrinsically related. Peikoff expelled Kelley from his movement, whereupon Kelley founded The Institute for Objectivist Studies (now known as 'The Objectivist Center').

Rand and Objectivism are virtually unknown outside North America, though there are pockets of interest here and there, and her novels are reported to be very popular in India"

LTVE

Quote from the ISB mailing list -

"My real option calculation of LTVE (life time value of employment) fails the sanity check. That is why I never liked Fin - It replaces hope with, in my case, a decimal point with some trailing figures…"

Zen and the Art ..

___________________________________________________
After a while he says, "Do you believe in ghosts?"

"No," I say

"Why not?"

"Because they are un-sci-en-ti-fic."

The way I say this makes John smile. "They contain no matter," I continue, "and have no energy and therefore, according to the laws of science, do not exist except in people's minds."

The whiskey, the fatigue and the wind in the trees start mixing in my mind. "Of course," I add, "the laws of science contain no matter and have no energy either and therefore do not exist except in people's minds. It's best to be completely scientific about the whole thing and refuse to believe in either ghosts or the laws of science. That way you're safe. That doesn't leave you very much to believe in, but that's scientific too."

_______________________________________________
Blind alley, though. If somone's ungrateful and you tell him he's ungrateful, okay, you've called him a name. You haven't solved anything.
___________________________________________________

But over the miles, and I think most cyclists will agree with this, you pick up certain feelings about an individual machine that are unique for that one individual machine and no other. A friend who owns a cycle of the same make, model and even same year brought it over for repair, and when I test rode it afterward it was hard to believe it had come from the same factory years ago. You could see that long ago it had settled into its own kind of feel and ride and sound, completely different from mine. No worse, but different.
________________________________________________________

Robert M. Pirsig
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

"I'm happy to be riding back into this country. It is a kind of nowhere, famous for nothing at all and has an appeal because of just that. Tensions disappear along old roads like this."

Robert M. Pirsig
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

Windows success ...

Quote in The Inquirer -


"There's a significant school of thought that... Windows' success happened because of Solitaire"
- Wendy M. Grossman

current reading

just completed

Seth's Blog: The New Digital Divide

Interesting thoughts -

Seth's Blog: The New Digital Divide

Roger Waters and Pink Floyd

Roger Waters Reunites with Pink Floyd for Live 8 - InternetDJ.com


hmm .. wish i was there

Not so flattering view of - 'Flat world'

The World Is Flat - Review:

Link Courtsey Rajeev Shashtry

nainital - my hometown

nainital, originally uploaded by vishal_sah.

My picture - uploaded on request of some of my friends whome I haven't met in years So you want to know how I look like now.. Here I am .. ;o)

Bloglines my favourite RSS reader

I have been a regular user of Bloglines since last 4 months, ever since it was introduced to me by Mahadevan.

Earlier I had tried a lot of applications - Sage, Thuderbird, GNU Rss Reader but have given up on these in favor of Bloglines. I recommend that if you give it a try if you have not used it till now.

Today I went thorough the FAQs of Bloglines and saw that it relies on open source. Great.




"What's the Technology Behind Bloglines?

"Bloglines proudly uses and supports the following open source software:

* Linux
* Sleepycat Database
* Apache Web Server
* Clearsilver Template System
* Qmail
* djbdns"

Ritesh Dahiya: Today

Ritesh Dahiya: Today: "Today"

Came across this line at my friends blog -

"Today is the first day of rest of my Life"

How simple and powerful.

Google at $300?

Bullish case of Google - Link courtsey Rajeev Shastry

Google at $300? Hold That Cringe: "Google at $300?"