Some fashionably lefty pseudo-intellectuals have decided to call for mobile silence on Jan 30th, to protest against some industrialists praising Narendra Modi's pro-industry policies. Apparently, stating that India needed someone like Modi as PM for industrial growth was beyond what the said worthies could stomach.
The Hatter is mad at this. First and foremost, it's his birthday that day, and he would appreciate more calls not less.
Second, and less importantly, there's the minor issue of freedom of speech. Freedom is a two-way street. If you want to say what you want to, you must give others the opportunity to say what they want, which may not be something you like.
So, while the lefties have their right to call for mobile silence, more reasonable citizens have a right to oppose it too. So pass the word around, use your mobile twice as much as you normally would on Jan 30th. Don't forget to call the Hatter and wish him a Happy Birthday! It's not often you get to stand up for freedom of speech with that phrase.
PS: For the record, the Hatter strongly dislikes Modi's polarization policies. His industrial policies are another matter, and he runs arguably the most transparent and clean administration in the country. 2002 was a crying shame, but so was 1984, and so were all the commie atrocities in Bengal and Kerala over the years. Blatant Muslim-vote chasing is as communal as what the Hindu fundies do. Noone has a clean record there. Apparently, if you want to vote for a genuinely secular liberal economically progressive party, you don't have anyone to vote for. We must, therefore, choose on other parameters.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
We will not be Talibanized!
Moral indignation is jealousy with a halo.
-- H. G. Wells
What can one say? In this day and age, a bunch of goons walk into a pub, with the media in tow, and bash up women - allegedly because they were "behaving indecently". That is - drinking beer with men. I'm sure Sri Ram would approve of their actions, wouldn't he? NOT.
The electronic media, which turned up with their cameras to record the event but did not bother informing the police are getting away too easy. I'd like to see some of them booked as with the goons.
Some Hindu-right organizations seem to be suffering from Fatwa-envy. In a liberal country, they seek the same degree of social control the Muslim fundies unfortunately have on their community. This cannot go unchecked. It's time for all to stand up and say - we will not be Talibanized! We are a free and liberal country, and we will stay that way.
Declare Feb 14th your day of protest against Talibanization, and have your say.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Mullah Nasruddin's Camel
When Ahmed the camelherd passed away, there was much sorrow in his corner of Arabia. He had been a simple man, and was much loved by his neighbours - simple herders all - and didn't have enemies to speak of. Ahmed had seventeen camels, a reasonable number, that was enough to sustain his family. His real wealth, he was fond of saying, were his three sons - Abdullah, Asad, and Ali. He had raised them well and taught them all that good men and good camel herders needed to know. Good simple men they all were. And that was part of the problem.
Ahmed wasn't known to be particularly fond of arithmetic, but had left a strange will. To my eldest son Abdullah, he wrote, I leave four ninths of my camels, and my role as the head of the family. To Asad, I leave a third of my camels, and to Ali the youngest, a sixth. Live a simple but good life, he wrote, and remember what I have taught you.
The camelherders of Ahmed's circle were not highly fond of arithmetic, but they knew enough to do what they normally needed. However, no amount of calculation seemed to yield sensible whole results in this case. Abdullah couldn't take his share of seven and seven ninth camels - how could he? Neither could Asad or Ali claim their absurd shares. So the sons went on living as usual, and the problem of how to divide up their camels unsolved.
When Mullah Nasruddin rode in on a caravan from Baghdad to visit Ahmed's family one day, there was much wonder. It was then that everyone found out that Ahmed had been a student of philosophy in Baghdad during his youth, and had given up city life to live as a camel herder. Nasruddin had known him in his youth, and had come to pay his respects.
So, they put the problem of the will before the learned Mullah - learned, of course, from their point of view. Nasruddin had been kicked out of university, unlike Ahmed who had left on his own, and lived by his wits alone. And his wits were at their end here. His arithmetic did not yield any sensible results either. Knowing that suggesting that the herders kill some of the camels and divide the meat to handle fractional numbers wouldn't be taken well, he did not. As only the truly wise can, he admitted his inability to solve the problem.
Having eaten well and slept well in the tent the herders gave him, Nasruddin got ready to leave for Baghdad in the morning. But before he left, he called together all the herders and addressed them. Sleep, he said, had a way of clearing the mind, and he could not leave without helping his friend's sons. Therefore, he said, he wanted to gift a camel to them.
There was much consternation at this - Nasruddin was known to be not well off, and owned not more than one camel. Whether he actually owned one was a mystery as well, but his word had to be taken for it. The herders could not accept his gift knowing that it was probably beyond his ability to give. But the rules of hospitality were such that a guest's parting gift must be accepted. And so it reluctantly was. Nasruddin promised to have the camel sent with the next caravan that came that way.
Perhaps, said Nasruddin, once the herders had decided that Ahmed's sons must accept his camel as a gift, we could take another look at the troublesome will. Let's see, he said, with the total number of camels at eighteen, Abdullah gets four ninths of that number - eight - Asad gets a third - six - and Ali gets a sixth - three. The herdsmen nodded their heads, the arithmetic was a lot simpler now. After the sons had led away thier share of the herd it was noticed that one camel - Nasruddin's gift - had not been claimed, for nine, eight and six add up to seventeen.
Even the simplest of herdsmen saw what had been done there, and praised Nasruddin's wisdom. As a gift for solving the knotty problem of Ahmed's will, he was presented with a gift of, yes, a camel. Nasruddin rode with a caravan back that day to Baghdad, and all was well.
......
Nasruddin didn't actually own a camel, but an imaginary camel did just as well as a real one in this case. This happens to be how the modern banking system works, where modern money is like Mullah Nasruddin's imaginary camel in many ways.
A long time ago, money used to be "real" - either made of actual precious metal, or backed by an equivalent reserve of precious metal. These days, for reasons best explained by real economists, most money is not backed by anything. Central banks decide how much money circulates in the economy. Also, most money is just numbers on a computer instead of actual currency notes.
The Central Bank, the controller of money supply - RBI, Federal Reserve, or other such entity - lends some amount of money (or fictional camels) to banks. Banks lend this fictional money to other people or entities in turn. If you work for a living, it's likely that your employer pays you with fictional money that it borrowed from a bank. You deposit that money into your bank account, and the bank can promptly go lend that money to someone else again. Thus not only are you paid with fictional money, but the same fictional money is lent again and again and again as it circulates through banks. To keep depositor liquidity managable(meaning, so you can actually withdraw money when you need it), banks have to maintain a 'fractional reserve' - a certain fraction of the money that they take in as deposits or borrowing must be retained without lending.
So how does the system work? It is presumed that players in the economy create value, but need to borrow money as capital. Once they are able to sell their product for a higher price than all the inputs into it, they return the money they borrowed plus interest and pocket the remaining profit. Banks use the interest they earn to pay interest in turn to depositors and the Central Bank. All is well at the end of the day and the fictional camels return to Baghdad.
What about money that remains in your bank accounts - your savings? As goods and services that the economy produces (the GDP) increase, the money supply is increased to match, at least in theory. Fictional camels then magically become real, something even Mullah Nasruddin could not do.
What if things go bad and some borrowers are unable to repay? The loss must be borne by shareholders and depositors in the bank whose money (real camels) must replace the money (fictional camels) borrowed and released into the economy. Why? If money supply outpaces GDP growth, more money ends up chasing the same number of goods and services, so inflation results. In reality, some amount of inflation always happens partly because banks tend to be optimistic in pushing more money into the system than is absolutely necessary.
Sometimes, things go really bad, and banks go insolvent - they have not enough equity capital to compensate for the loans that have not been repaid. In theory, they just go bankrupt. In reality, governments bail banks out by lending them more fictional camels, in the hope that they'll do better next time. The banking and financial system - and the fictional camels - are what run the capitalist economy. A lot depends on the system not running out of camels, fictional or real.
Therefore, the show must go on.
Statutory warning: The Mad Hatter is not an expert on Mullah Nasruddin folktales. Also, anything he says about economics may just be a load of imaginary camels.
Ahmed wasn't known to be particularly fond of arithmetic, but had left a strange will. To my eldest son Abdullah, he wrote, I leave four ninths of my camels, and my role as the head of the family. To Asad, I leave a third of my camels, and to Ali the youngest, a sixth. Live a simple but good life, he wrote, and remember what I have taught you.
The camelherders of Ahmed's circle were not highly fond of arithmetic, but they knew enough to do what they normally needed. However, no amount of calculation seemed to yield sensible whole results in this case. Abdullah couldn't take his share of seven and seven ninth camels - how could he? Neither could Asad or Ali claim their absurd shares. So the sons went on living as usual, and the problem of how to divide up their camels unsolved.
When Mullah Nasruddin rode in on a caravan from Baghdad to visit Ahmed's family one day, there was much wonder. It was then that everyone found out that Ahmed had been a student of philosophy in Baghdad during his youth, and had given up city life to live as a camel herder. Nasruddin had known him in his youth, and had come to pay his respects.
So, they put the problem of the will before the learned Mullah - learned, of course, from their point of view. Nasruddin had been kicked out of university, unlike Ahmed who had left on his own, and lived by his wits alone. And his wits were at their end here. His arithmetic did not yield any sensible results either. Knowing that suggesting that the herders kill some of the camels and divide the meat to handle fractional numbers wouldn't be taken well, he did not. As only the truly wise can, he admitted his inability to solve the problem.
Having eaten well and slept well in the tent the herders gave him, Nasruddin got ready to leave for Baghdad in the morning. But before he left, he called together all the herders and addressed them. Sleep, he said, had a way of clearing the mind, and he could not leave without helping his friend's sons. Therefore, he said, he wanted to gift a camel to them.
There was much consternation at this - Nasruddin was known to be not well off, and owned not more than one camel. Whether he actually owned one was a mystery as well, but his word had to be taken for it. The herders could not accept his gift knowing that it was probably beyond his ability to give. But the rules of hospitality were such that a guest's parting gift must be accepted. And so it reluctantly was. Nasruddin promised to have the camel sent with the next caravan that came that way.
Perhaps, said Nasruddin, once the herders had decided that Ahmed's sons must accept his camel as a gift, we could take another look at the troublesome will. Let's see, he said, with the total number of camels at eighteen, Abdullah gets four ninths of that number - eight - Asad gets a third - six - and Ali gets a sixth - three. The herdsmen nodded their heads, the arithmetic was a lot simpler now. After the sons had led away thier share of the herd it was noticed that one camel - Nasruddin's gift - had not been claimed, for nine, eight and six add up to seventeen.
Even the simplest of herdsmen saw what had been done there, and praised Nasruddin's wisdom. As a gift for solving the knotty problem of Ahmed's will, he was presented with a gift of, yes, a camel. Nasruddin rode with a caravan back that day to Baghdad, and all was well.
......
Nasruddin didn't actually own a camel, but an imaginary camel did just as well as a real one in this case. This happens to be how the modern banking system works, where modern money is like Mullah Nasruddin's imaginary camel in many ways.
A long time ago, money used to be "real" - either made of actual precious metal, or backed by an equivalent reserve of precious metal. These days, for reasons best explained by real economists, most money is not backed by anything. Central banks decide how much money circulates in the economy. Also, most money is just numbers on a computer instead of actual currency notes.
The Central Bank, the controller of money supply - RBI, Federal Reserve, or other such entity - lends some amount of money (or fictional camels) to banks. Banks lend this fictional money to other people or entities in turn. If you work for a living, it's likely that your employer pays you with fictional money that it borrowed from a bank. You deposit that money into your bank account, and the bank can promptly go lend that money to someone else again. Thus not only are you paid with fictional money, but the same fictional money is lent again and again and again as it circulates through banks. To keep depositor liquidity managable(meaning, so you can actually withdraw money when you need it), banks have to maintain a 'fractional reserve' - a certain fraction of the money that they take in as deposits or borrowing must be retained without lending.
So how does the system work? It is presumed that players in the economy create value, but need to borrow money as capital. Once they are able to sell their product for a higher price than all the inputs into it, they return the money they borrowed plus interest and pocket the remaining profit. Banks use the interest they earn to pay interest in turn to depositors and the Central Bank. All is well at the end of the day and the fictional camels return to Baghdad.
What about money that remains in your bank accounts - your savings? As goods and services that the economy produces (the GDP) increase, the money supply is increased to match, at least in theory. Fictional camels then magically become real, something even Mullah Nasruddin could not do.
What if things go bad and some borrowers are unable to repay? The loss must be borne by shareholders and depositors in the bank whose money (real camels) must replace the money (fictional camels) borrowed and released into the economy. Why? If money supply outpaces GDP growth, more money ends up chasing the same number of goods and services, so inflation results. In reality, some amount of inflation always happens partly because banks tend to be optimistic in pushing more money into the system than is absolutely necessary.
Sometimes, things go really bad, and banks go insolvent - they have not enough equity capital to compensate for the loans that have not been repaid. In theory, they just go bankrupt. In reality, governments bail banks out by lending them more fictional camels, in the hope that they'll do better next time. The banking and financial system - and the fictional camels - are what run the capitalist economy. A lot depends on the system not running out of camels, fictional or real.
Therefore, the show must go on.
Statutory warning: The Mad Hatter is not an expert on Mullah Nasruddin folktales. Also, anything he says about economics may just be a load of imaginary camels.
Tuesday, January 06, 2009
7 = 6.1
In case you were wondering why Microsoft never gets around to making a good OS, it may be because they're spending time on tough problems like creating a truly brilliant (read stupid) numbering scheme.
I hope this isn't a hoax, because it's almost too funny to be true.
I hope this isn't a hoax, because it's almost too funny to be true.
Saturday, January 03, 2009
从印度到中国 (cóng Yìn dù dào Zhōng guó)
There's a new movie coming to town on Jan 15, called "Chandni Chowk to China". Below the title in English can be seen the title in Mandarin - 从印度到中国 (cóng Yìn dù dào Zhōng guó), which means "From India to China". Not quite the same as the English title, but close enough.
.. all of which reminds me of something else which I've been meaning to blog about, but never got around to, my brief visit to Shanghai a few weeks back.
Visiting China, especially Shanghai does leave quite a forceful impression. As Westerners never tire of saying about India, it doesn't matter how much you read about it, the experience is entirely different and worth it.
Here are a few random impressions from my visit. Be warned to take all of them with a pinch of salt - it is all too easy to read too much into too little in China.
The Chinese are making a serious effort at modernizing their country, and doing it from the outside in as it were. The overwhelming impression one gets when one enters the country is of a concerted attempt to copy the Americans wherever possible. The immigration area at Shanghai airport looks like a copy of any American airport, down to the uniforms of the security guards. Once you're out, the highway system looks American in design, except for the driving which will make Indians feel right at home. Red are considered suggestions, and lane markings ignored when needed.
The famous Shanghai smog is as bad as advertised. I didn't get to see much other than a uniform dull grey in the skies, with rather low visibility. The city itself is quite interesting, divided into a modern quarter (Pudong) east of the Huang Pu river and the old city (Puxi) west of Huang Pu. Pudong is where most of the recent development action is, as was allegedly nothing but farmland not too long ago. Locals apparently prefer to live in Puxi, which has more of the Chinese-European flavour of Old rather than the dull modernity of Shanghai. The Nanpu bridge over the Huangpu river is quite spectacular.
I didn't have too much time for painting the town red (ahem), but did manage a brief trip to the Bund and Xintiandi, happening districts of Shanghai. The food, it must be said is rather good. If you let your Chinese hosts order, you will end up with rather interesting and quite tasty food. As is widely known, very few Chinese speak even passable English. You do encounter passable (but not very good) English among those working in the hospitality industry at the high end. Most taxi drivers do not speak or comprehend English, neither do people at normal restaurants. Having a Chinese speaker go with you is almost a must, to interpret for you and show you the right places.
One thing my trip has done is to get me thinking more about the old Hindi debate. Talking to Chinese who've turned up in Shanghai from all over the country, it seems like it's perhaps not all that bad a thing to have some enforced uniformity in language. The Mandarin policy has indeed suppressed a lot of cultural and linguistic diversity in China. However, it seems to have given the Chinese a level of easy mobility that we do not have in India. In my brief chats, I did not hear of much resistance from "locals" to the influx into Shanghai from all over China. Compare Bangalore, where one doesn't feel fully welcome even after a decade and a half here. I'm not convinced yet, but I am less sure of my position on the Hindi question than I was. Piyush, are you reading this?
A striking story that I heard second hand is that of someone whose family's farmland was taken away by the government when he was younger. His family moved into a city, where he went to school, did well, and was able to build a good life. Apparently, this person believes he got a good deal overall, and was happy that lots of jobs were created as a result of farmland being turned into industry. This is just one data point, but it's inevitable to contrast this with attempts to take over farmland in India, which have seen violent and counterproductive protests from those who lost land. Perhaps it is the naivete of the Chinese, or their trotting out the party line to a foreigner, but it would definitely seem that they're a lot more sanguine about side-effects of development than the Indian populace. I don't know if that's a good or bad thing, but it does help the wheel of development roll much smoother.
Chinese aren't as well informed about the world, it would seem from my brief impression, as their counterparts in other countries at similar levels of education. Perhaps it's the strict control of information that is to blame, or their reticence. I do get the feeling I may have read too much into some of my brief conversations, though. One tends to form impressions too soon, and correct them at leisure.
Interestingly, a lot of rumours abounded about factories being closed and a lot of people being out of work as a result of the slowdown in the global economy. English newspapers talked about the whole situation as a problem, but with the strict control of information, one doesn't really get to know of the real size of the problem. If it were India, one would end up knowing way more than one needed.
One hopes to be back there more often. China will play a much more central role in the world economy going forward, and doing business in China will become more and more important. The Hatter is learning Mandarin, and hopes to be able to speak at least halting Mandarin by the end of the year - if for nothing else, to roam around Shanghai unassisted.
新年快乐 (xīn nián kuài lè) ! Happy New Year all!
.. all of which reminds me of something else which I've been meaning to blog about, but never got around to, my brief visit to Shanghai a few weeks back.
Visiting China, especially Shanghai does leave quite a forceful impression. As Westerners never tire of saying about India, it doesn't matter how much you read about it, the experience is entirely different and worth it.
Here are a few random impressions from my visit. Be warned to take all of them with a pinch of salt - it is all too easy to read too much into too little in China.
The Chinese are making a serious effort at modernizing their country, and doing it from the outside in as it were. The overwhelming impression one gets when one enters the country is of a concerted attempt to copy the Americans wherever possible. The immigration area at Shanghai airport looks like a copy of any American airport, down to the uniforms of the security guards. Once you're out, the highway system looks American in design, except for the driving which will make Indians feel right at home. Red are considered suggestions, and lane markings ignored when needed.
The famous Shanghai smog is as bad as advertised. I didn't get to see much other than a uniform dull grey in the skies, with rather low visibility. The city itself is quite interesting, divided into a modern quarter (Pudong) east of the Huang Pu river and the old city (Puxi) west of Huang Pu. Pudong is where most of the recent development action is, as was allegedly nothing but farmland not too long ago. Locals apparently prefer to live in Puxi, which has more of the Chinese-European flavour of Old rather than the dull modernity of Shanghai. The Nanpu bridge over the Huangpu river is quite spectacular.
I didn't have too much time for painting the town red (ahem), but did manage a brief trip to the Bund and Xintiandi, happening districts of Shanghai. The food, it must be said is rather good. If you let your Chinese hosts order, you will end up with rather interesting and quite tasty food. As is widely known, very few Chinese speak even passable English. You do encounter passable (but not very good) English among those working in the hospitality industry at the high end. Most taxi drivers do not speak or comprehend English, neither do people at normal restaurants. Having a Chinese speaker go with you is almost a must, to interpret for you and show you the right places.
One thing my trip has done is to get me thinking more about the old Hindi debate. Talking to Chinese who've turned up in Shanghai from all over the country, it seems like it's perhaps not all that bad a thing to have some enforced uniformity in language. The Mandarin policy has indeed suppressed a lot of cultural and linguistic diversity in China. However, it seems to have given the Chinese a level of easy mobility that we do not have in India. In my brief chats, I did not hear of much resistance from "locals" to the influx into Shanghai from all over China. Compare Bangalore, where one doesn't feel fully welcome even after a decade and a half here. I'm not convinced yet, but I am less sure of my position on the Hindi question than I was. Piyush, are you reading this?
A striking story that I heard second hand is that of someone whose family's farmland was taken away by the government when he was younger. His family moved into a city, where he went to school, did well, and was able to build a good life. Apparently, this person believes he got a good deal overall, and was happy that lots of jobs were created as a result of farmland being turned into industry. This is just one data point, but it's inevitable to contrast this with attempts to take over farmland in India, which have seen violent and counterproductive protests from those who lost land. Perhaps it is the naivete of the Chinese, or their trotting out the party line to a foreigner, but it would definitely seem that they're a lot more sanguine about side-effects of development than the Indian populace. I don't know if that's a good or bad thing, but it does help the wheel of development roll much smoother.
Chinese aren't as well informed about the world, it would seem from my brief impression, as their counterparts in other countries at similar levels of education. Perhaps it's the strict control of information that is to blame, or their reticence. I do get the feeling I may have read too much into some of my brief conversations, though. One tends to form impressions too soon, and correct them at leisure.
Interestingly, a lot of rumours abounded about factories being closed and a lot of people being out of work as a result of the slowdown in the global economy. English newspapers talked about the whole situation as a problem, but with the strict control of information, one doesn't really get to know of the real size of the problem. If it were India, one would end up knowing way more than one needed.
One hopes to be back there more often. China will play a much more central role in the world economy going forward, and doing business in China will become more and more important. The Hatter is learning Mandarin, and hopes to be able to speak at least halting Mandarin by the end of the year - if for nothing else, to roam around Shanghai unassisted.
新年快乐 (xīn nián kuài lè) ! Happy New Year all!
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