Several (most?) Hindus engage in ritual fasts to propitiate various gods. Apparantly (via my sister), when they travel abroad, they have a problem. They don’t know when to start or stop their fasts. What timezone do Hindu gods live in?

From the latest post in Rico Mariani’s series on the history of Visual Studio

Debt is a great way to think about trade-offs: every time you make a choice that isn’t right in the long term, any short-cut, accumulates some debt.  Any bug you choose to defer, that’s debt.  Some debt you should write-off, that fix just isn’t happening, some you should address, but always you should be aware that you’ll have to deal with it sooner or later, and it may as well be sooner.

I have been very busy at work lately and have fallen behind on my usual reading schedule but I took the time to read this piece by Prof Hornstein (via Ayn Rand in India). It is a good analysis of the significance of the two trials in ‘The Fountainhead’. Definitely worth reading.

Via Buyer Behaviour,

…Rituals give us a felling of power. They are one of the very few things, perhaps, in our control, and therefore, so important to us.
- Sumaa Tekur, The Power of Rituals

I have never understood why so many seemingly reasonable people accept and carry out mindless rituals, mostly during religious ceremonies. The quote above seems to be a good explanation. I am not sure if it is the only one, but it is certainly something to think about.

Take a look at another hilarious post at Let’s Put DA. I liked the one on Mamata Bannerjee the best.

Old Mamata B went to a farm. Eeya Eeya O.
And on that farm, she saw a plant. Ayyayyayyo.
With some protests here,
And some violence there.
Here a speech, there a speech,
Everywhere a screech screech.
Old Mamata B caused great harm. No Nano Nano.

I always enjoy reading Eric Lippert’s posts but this one is better than usual. I would like to learn to write like that.

I recently read Jeffrey Archer’s novel “A Prisoner of Birth”. The novel could have been much better if it had an original plot – instead of borrowing the plot of “The Count of Monte Cristo”. But this post is not about the novel. It is about an interesting issue that I thought was worth pondering over.

At one point in the novel, the protagonist is falsely accused of a murder. Most of the evidence is against him and the jury is expected to pronounce him guilty. The prosecution makes him an offer to plead guilty and his lawyer advises him that he could get off with a two year sentence for manslaughter instead of a twenty two year sentence for murder. The protagonist immediately refuses.

What would you do? And why?

I chanced upon this post at “Truth, Justice and the American Way”. Go read the post. Then read the comments. Then read this quote

I think it is very beautiful for the poor to accept their lot, to share it with the passion of Christ. I think the world is being much helped by the suffering of the poor people.
—Mother Teresa

Does it make sense?

For some time, I have been thinking of writing a series of posts on “Atlas Shrugged”. What I took away from it, why I was so influenced by it, why I enjoyed it. So I was delighted to discover the comment thread on Aristotle The Geek’s post Dry Humor that featured an excerpt from “The Fountainhead”. I think Aristotle The Geek nails quite a few of the things I would have written myself. I still intend to do the series, but meanwhile, go read the thread.

http://informationageprayer.com/