A pertinent social debate

So, recently I was drawn into a discussion regarding marriage with one of my friends. And it was dragged on and we were discussing about the fact that many times the women do not change their last names to that of the guy they are getting married to. Not to be politically correct or anything but, many people in the society take it for granted that the girl will change their last name to that of the husband's, and the only reason that any one has to backup this argument is that, "Its the culture" or "It is going on for ages".

Well too be true, that is not a substantial argument for any girl to change her last name and in the present era women are more independent and many want to keep their last names as before and it is also not frowned upon by many open minded people. I even asked few of my friends, if they care about their wife's last name issue, and all of them were least bothered about it. The answer was, "Come on! I don't really care."

So far so good... But when I took the question a step further, "So, what about your kids?". Do you care about the kid's last name. And suddenly, the whole "open mindedness" thing was gone and the guys answered, "Obviously ! the kid will have the father's last name". The problem is there is nothing so obvious about it. We tried to come up with supportive arguments for either cases, but really were not able to reach any definitive answers.

An argument in support of the guys were as the kid is nurtured in the father's house (well at least looking from a perspective of many oriental society structure), the kid's nature is more inclined towards the father's upbringing. But, this fails in the case of a nucleus family, as both mom and dad of the kid has equal contribution in the kid's upbringing.

Another way to look at it is, what is more important allocation of resources by the father for the kid, or the mother's 24X7 for the kid. This again is not quite good enough, because in present times, well both parties equally contribute.

So, at the end one can leave upto the kid without the last name for 16 years, when he can legally choose his last name. But, that is not a reasonable scientific solution if someone has to decide for the first 16 years :)

Well I thought about it a lot and couldn't reach any reasonable conclusion... So, if any of you readers (however few you are), let me know what you think...
Thanks

I am hopeful for India

Well that's being said, the next immediate question that arise is Why? The recent events in the capital and across, have shown the common man that there are things that can be done. Anna Hazare being standing up for a strong anti-corruption bill, Dr. Subramaniam Swamy trying his best to uncover the political masks behind which such corruptions are going on, the enormous numbers being displayed and forwarded through emails across the globe, the numbers being the trillions of dollars that are in foreign banks. That is certain to move the commoners  like ourselves in despair and leave us to certain extent if I say honestly amazed. I being a student counting numbers all my life, don't really know what is the term for a number higher than 10 crores and there are 5 more digits after that. I just end up saying Wow, goodness gracious, what the hell these people will do with so, so so much money.

I mean the accused A. Raja in the 2G spectrum scam has acquired or I may say looted 12.5 billion USD, to give a general idea, of how much that money is, its almost half the worth of Google Inc. (29.5 billion USD). So one can only imagine. I wonder, I really do, that what these people will be able to do with such sums of money. No, you probably cannot buy islands in the Caribbeans, you cannot buy out companies, you cannot buy yachts no nothing, because as soon as you invest, the media will question you that just being a minister how did you get such a huge amount of money. So, what exactly they do with such money, they just put it in banks in Switzerland, Mauritius, Leicester. According to a recent interview with Dr. Swamy, as he mentioned that these people are so in-secured about the money that they don't even  mention any nominees for their accounts. So, if they die, which eventually they will and there is no one to collect the money, it automatically becomes a property of the bank. So, long strty story short, its gone. And everytime I read one of these articles, I am just so amazed by the irrationality and greed of human mind.

To be honest, I am in some ways happy that we had the 2 colossal corruptions in the history of our country, because nothing really happens, things don't change until a common man stands up and says "Its enough!". The term has its own deep meaning, it says that we are not going to take any more, we are not going to suffer for mistakes you did, we are our own masters and we won't let you run our lives.The way I see it, the recent scams are equivalent to the Jallianwala Bagh incident during India's struggle for freedom. That was the incident, which really made everyone say "Its enough!". And lets accept it, these corruption is in the system from a long long time, if you carefully trace back it goes as far back as Indian Independence. This was imminent and this happened now.

And the true significance of this event and what makes it so fundamentally different from the others, that it has started with few people and got the support of the nation, without much provocation from any political party (I will be careful in my last sentence, atleast not much political interest is visible to me right now). So, I am sure that things will change and it will change soon. Today as I sit and write this blog, I really feel unfortunate that I am not in India, in support of this bill and probably will think about it for a long time. But everyone is bound by the social obligations he has and may be I am not courageous enough to break free my obligations. But I am happy to see many are, people from all parts of the society, have participated actively in the protests and made lives for our prime minister and the ruling party really hard.

That being said, many might be speculating or thinking "Oh its just another bill, we will see hat happens!", "The proposed committee will again turn into a toothless lion, mostly like the present prime minister or the president." But, either we can delve in that or we can try to make the change, and constantly promote the thought that "Lets not do anything which is wrong morally or socially!" If people make a pledge that we wont do anything wrong, I am sure the evil will be rooted out from the system eventually.

I am also hopeful for India, because  any nation to flourish needs a strong society, a helpful and hospitable surroundings. India still has a very very strong social structure and family values to the most part. The growth rate of the country is really high. If you think about the good things, since 1947 inspite of our own problems like poverty, over population, corruption, war and terrorism, India is still leading in many sectors, of the modern world, in computers, in research ofcourse cricket and there are so many more, and most importantly we are in course of addressing our biggest worries, the corrupt politicians and I am certain that only good will come out of it, because its not possible to stop 1.6 billion people, who are saying "We want to do what is right!, We want to change things".  India's prosperity is not based on selling goods made using cheap labor to the United States, but its prosperity is based on knowledge base that we have. Education probably is the most valued asset in India.

When they say India is poor, or a third world country, well it is disturbing to hear, because, its unimaginable to me that how a country where 1 billion people are working day in and day out, can be poor. It is not possible, now we are in the process of removing the parasites from the system, and if 1 billion people are trying to get things done, they will get it done today, tomorrow or next week. The people who compare India or say that it is a third world country in an attempt to find a politically correct word for "poor", to them my fellow friends they need to really brush up the history. A third world country is not synonymous to a poverty stricken country. If you are doing it , you are comparing India and Somalia, considering both are third world countries (according to UN, or should I say America). During the cold war, there were two poles in the world, one being USA, Ocenia and western Europe who supported capitalism and the other being USSR and China, who were supportive of communism, there was a third group of countries, who were indifferent of either of them, so they called it the third world. So, that eventually became South Asia and Africa. But really you cannot compare either of them.

So, that being said, I am also hopeful for India, because of the smart people like Subramaniam Swamy, Kiran Bedi, who are really fighting for the system from inside and are gaining support of vast majority of people from within the country and abroad. I am also hopeful, because the way I see it India is not under any foreign or economic crisis as half of the world is now, it just had some snakes in the system, which are getting weeded out by the people for a better tomorrow.

For people looking for more information apart from news, if they do not already know
http://www.indiaagainstcorruption.org/

The Class, the Professor and the Student... still what's missing ? How students manage to sleep in the class?

Well I have been thinking about it a lot. What is missing in the class? What hinders learning ? And what makes the class boring? and I think I have broken down the problem to some extent, though there is a large group of educationalists who are trying to come up with interesting ways of teaching, make the students more engaged in the class, using props and what not, but still to me most of them are quite not feasible for a graduate level courses. They might work on an experimental level and may be for kids? And come on lets get real you really cannot teach a bunch of graduate students with a bunch of lego kits or make them draw things and seriously wonder why the so called education reformers don't think of improving the graduate courses.. Is it not a concern? or they think that there is nothing that can be done to improve the quality of courses in a graduate school. I really disagree. I think it is also an important issue to address and it is not easy and may be people do not put a serious effort because it is just too hard. When I say hard, it is hard because unlike a primary school, in a graduate course the level of student vary on a wide range specially in interdisciplinary courses, because they come from a different background, they have different cognitive ability and more often than not, people who are teaching the courses are researchers than a teacher. I do not blame the professors teaching the courses, it is hard to find a balance between being a researcher and being a teacher. So, without further adieu, here is something which I think might solve or ease the situation to some extent if not completely.

Assumptions: So, let us make some linear assumptions about the students. I will like to assume that the students who come to take the course are really interested in the course material and want to learn and apply it and are very honest about it. There might be some nonlinearities for sure, like the student is supposed to take the course as a requirement, the student is not interested at all and just goofing off. We will account for that later.

Another simple assumption I will like to make without any kind of prejudices is that the teacher really wants to teach and make the student understand the material.

The Problem: So, if the student wants to learn and the teacher wants to teach and both parties in the system are fine. What is the problem ? The problem lies in the mode of communication, the way of teaching. The problem lies with the fact that the what teachers follow in the class a routine I like to call active teaching. I am totally against the active teaching. It is time we rule out the process of active teaching. In most cases the professor forgets that he is not supposed to be an educator, but a facilitator of education. This mode of teaching was ok and worked may be 100 years back, today it might not work. Sure some professors try to improve the learning experience in the class with some aids, but most of them are crude and I dont think it will work. So what are the things the teachers try to do?

1. Use Presentation slides: Though I think it is a good introduce the course, it can never replace the chalk and board system. Reason being, if you are using the classic chalk and board, the amount of information that is being produced in front of the class is more engaging and it is a process that takes some time, giving the brain enough time to inculcate the new information, whereas the time spend between slides is never enough to get the information from the slides to the notebook to the brain. Come on, give some time to learn. Also, while a chalk board system involves the professor in the process, a slide system keeps both the student and the teacher aloof from the process.

2. Take more tests: Really you think, that will help in a graduate course. The people sitting on the benches have passed 100s of tests before to be able to sit on those benches. You cannot scare them with tests and if that is what you are trying to do, it is not really teaching. It is force feeding, either you mugg up everything taught or u fail in the class and really you cannot make some one learn anything with that.

3. Asking Rhetorical Questions: Well I am sure most professors do that and it is always the same response to the question, "Are you following?" A 10 sec silence and few head nods on the first benches and that is probably a "full-proof guarantee" for the professor that the students got it.

4. Prejudices: Now this is a tough one, and to the most part I will like to blame the graduate students. Come on people till now you have taken so many courses and everytime you ask the "senior" students the same questions. 1. How is the professor? 2. How does he grade? 3. Is the course easy or hard? Really it is a big big mistake that they do everytime and yet never learn. And the senior students give their honest opinions and let out all their griefs. They take you for a half an hour crash ride about the whole thing because they also did the same when they were wearing your shoes. They lay it all over you. The course is hard, too many test, professor is grumpy or they say he is nice and really god with grading. So, you start making an opinion about the whole thing and go to class with a prejudice and really that is a bad thing. Its like asking some one hey you watched that thriller movie? How does it end? At what times you laugh and what times you are scared? Come on if it was hard for the senior student, it might not be hard for you. It might be an easy A for him, it might not turn out the same for you. It is a ride that you need to take and enjoy don't make the prejudices come in your way and ruin the process. We all are different, with different individualities and different cognitive ability, with so many differences still we fall for the "honest opinion" of the other student.

The Solution: So, what is the solution to these problems, how can we improve in order to have a better understanding of the course material. How can we restructure the system so that the students do not sleep in the class. This whole process I will like to call passive teaching and it will require a good deal of effort from both sides. Active learning is too easy a process to follow and that is why people do it, and if it is too easy may be it is not right.

Ever wondered, why you hardly read instructions of a new game and start playing it without knowing the rules and in a matter of hours you end up mastering it, but also find the loop holes and the bug in the system, inspite of the initial boredom and fuzziness of not understanding the deal with the game. So, why didnt you fall asleep while playing the game. The reason being you were using the brain's cognitive ability in order to understand the game. Brain is a huge cognitive machine and it has amazing cognitive abilities and when put to proper use, it does amazing things. And, ever wondered why you never forget cycling even after 20 years while you forget the thermodynamic equations right after the semester got over or may be during the semester sometimes too. The reason being, we hard-wired the cycling in our system, developed a plasticity in the brain for cycling rather than the equations where we didnt use the real cognitive ability to learn it and everything just remains in the volatile memory. That is probably the reason, even the students who got an A+ in some course are unable to answer the questions after a semester and that is anything but learning.

Proposal There is always a gap between different students. I cannot stress this more. For some the course material is too easy (so they sleep or loose interest), some find it really hard to follow, so they loose interest. So, why not keep everyone in the class engaged at their level of understanding and make the teacher a facilitator of the learning. Why not let the students knit their own stories about the subject matter and then correct for the mistakes they commit in the process, make use of their ability to form stories, because Science is science, but it is also an art. Why separate the art from science? Because my understanding is if you learn this way it stays with you all the time. So, what I propose is that, instead of teaching, may be it is better idea to create a series of presentation slides for one class and just give the students and let not the professor speak during the class at all. Jus present the series of slides with thought provoking question pictures or results. Like which makes them wonder How it happened, and also such that the series of slides are able to draw a conclusive connection and a train of thoughts that will complete the process of understanding. Because we can learn looking at a pattern, that is how the mankind learnt just by observing and formulating rules. That is how Dr. Feynman puts it, "Nature plays a game of chess, and we look at the moves and try to learn few things about it." So why break this natural way of learning through observation. Why not make the students come up with their own way of putting the pieces all together. Who knows they will be able to see some loop hole which was not seen before. And of course, if there is something wrong (well lets say incorrect, because nothing is wrong, it is just a matter of perspective), the professor is always there to correct it through a series of conclusive debate with the student. Observe and learn that is the way of nature, that is how research is done, and so why to take research out of the class to the labs, why not bring it into the class and learn together. There is no need to separate classrooms and labs.

Well, they are just my thoughts on why we end up sleeping in the class even in hot sweaty summer and cramped up benches...