What really is Intelligence???

Hmmm... lets get started. 

What is Intelligence??? Webster's English Dictionary defines it as "the ability to learn or understand; the ability to cope with a new situation". We intelligent humans learn and understand from day 1. We always learn new things, we try to understand the concepts and we adapt to new situations. Without intelligence, we could not have come so far. The technological advances that we have made is immense and marvelous. The two greatest innovations, especially since the last 50 years or so, are the computer and mobile phones; they have changed our world so much that "Six degrees of separation" is actually reduced to three. These things are not possible to accomplish without intelligence. But can we (pro)claim ourselves to be intelligent???

The answer is NO. Why??? Because we don't know what constitutes intelligence or how to measure it. Comparing to animals, we are more superior and that's why we call ourselves the Intelligent Animals. But how do we know for real that animals are not intelligent??? What constitutes intelligence??? Sure... we built rockets and animals didn't... no denying that... but maybe animals didn't think building rockets to be intelligent. They must have thought "Building rockets??? What a waste of time!!! Let's do something better". Maybe they have done something better... Maybe that has changed their kingdom forever... Maybe we don't even know what it is. Maybe we are not even looking for it. Maybe the animals are intelligent. Maybe we just claim ourselves to be intelligent. Maybe the animals are laughing at our pathetic state. Maybe the animals are making fun of us because we think ourselves to be intelligent. Maybe what we do is dumber than the dumbest. Maybe the true definition of intelligence is not even known to us. Maybe thats why we consider ourselves to be intelligent. Maybe we are the dumbest of all the species. Maybe living in more than 3 dimensions is intelligent. Maybe animals are already capable of it. Maybe animals know what happens after death. Maybe they pass this knowledge to their children. Maybe they know what is there at the end of the universe. Maybe they don't need rockets to find it out. Maybe they can travel in dimensions which we can't even comprehend. Maybe they don't need a language to communicate. Maybe they communicate with all the species. Maybe they communicate with God daily. Maybe they have mastered telepathy. Maybe they don't need college education to become intelligent. Maybe school and college is only for the dumb ones like us. Maybe they know the answers to everything. Maybe thats why they live so peacefully. Maybe thats why they are not in a rat race. Maybe we are last in the race. Maybe they are telling us what intelligence means. Maybe they are trying to tell us what happens after death. Maybe they are trying to tell us what can be found at the end of the universe. Maybe they are telling us that rockets are a waste of time. Maybe they are trying to tell us answers to all the questions we have. Maybe we are not listening. Maybe we are not even trying to listen. Maybe mankind is deaf. Maybe mankind is blind. Maybe we will never find answers to anything. Maybe we are not even progressing in the right direction. Maybe we will never become intelligent. Maybe I am wrong. Or maybe I am not.

Quotable quotes from Chennai

This blog is going to be really short. So please bear with me:-)

Recently I had been to Chennai on official training. I overheard a couple of quotes, some in Tamil and some in English.

1. We are not worthless. We are just useless. (hard fact!!!)

2. Truth is independent of what people think is the truth. (makes sense... don't u think so!!!)

And my favourite (regarding a father-son duo):

3. He didnt touch a woman. His son didn't leave a woman untouched. (superb... no comments!!!)

The Dark Knight

Finally. That’s right… finally I saw it. The only reason why I saw the movie was because my friends forced (some even threatened) me. There was one more reason actually… it replaced numero uno Godfather in IMDB rankings. So I decided to check it out first hand. Is it really such a good movie??? Is it really worth the hype??? Has Heath Ledger really acted that well as claimed by many??? I am not a fan of all these ...man movies – Superman, Batman, Spiderman, etc. But “Curiosity kills the cat” and I had to find the answers.

As always, my cousin and I went to see the movie. He had booked tickets online at Fun Cinemas. Our experience started off on a bad note. The ticket vending machine was malfunctioning and we couldn’t get our tickets printed though my cousin swiped his credit card twice. We had to go to stand in line at the counter. (I wouldn’t even try to explain our experience waiting in the long queue) Once we got our tickets, we rushed to the theater as we were already 5 minutes late. Searching for our seats we found that someone had already occupied them. When questioned, they told that they mistook their seats for ours. How dumb!!! Can’t they differentiate between 18 & 19 and 20 & 21… God help them.

The moment of truth arrived. The first scene was that of a bank robbery. Nothing great in that scene… you get the first glimpse of the Joker though. Lesson to be learnt from the first scene: “Never trust anyone”. The movie progresses… Batman appears, Joker appears blah blah blah. I do admit that some scenes are good… like the one where Batman goes underneath the truck which Joker is driving and topples the truck… or the scene where its written “Slaughter is the best medicine”… that was really funny… or the scene when Batman (in his ordinary human being avatar) says “It was your idea”.

I still have no answers even after seeing the movie. It’s just an "ok ok" movie. There is nothing extraordinary in this movie that sets it apart. It has no good action sequences, it’s not fast paced… it’s just another movie. So why exactly is this movie considered to be great??? How did it generate such hype??? I guess the marketing team did a very good job… hats off to them. There is no other logical reason for the movie’s success. As it was Heath Ledger’s final movie, maybe it added to the hype. Maybe fans of Heath Ledger paid their homage to their favourite star by generating more hype around the movie. There could be one more explanation: Mass hysteria.

I know my friends are going to comment on my opinion (maybe on my English too), some of them who are Batman-fanatic psychos might even take it personally but that’s that. All in all, ITS DEFINITELY NOT WORTH THE HYPE. I learnt my lesson. (I guess you all know which lesson I am talking about... for the not-so-intelligent ones, read the blog again)

Just a thought

Mobile phone has become a basic necessity of our lives. It’s hard to find a person who doesn’t use one.

Each and every person is familiar with PhoneBook, where you can store your friends’ names and their respective phone numbers. Consequently, when your friend calls you, it checks his/her number with the set of phone numbers that you have stored in your mobile and displays his/her name on your mobile screen. Ex.: Consider that Michael Jackson is your friend and you have stored his mobile number, which is 767 5464, in your mobile. When you get a call from 767 5464, it shows “Michael Jackson calling” and not “767 5464 calling”.

Let’s say that you get a call from a stranger. By stranger I mean a person whose phone number is not stored in your mobile. Hence, his number will be displayed on your mobile. What really happened is this – when the stranger initiates a call to you, he sends his phone number to the base station. The base station then finds you and forwards that phone number to your mobile. Your mobile would then check if that number is stored in its flash memory. In this case, it hasn’t been stored and hence would display his number on your mobile screen. My question is “Can we not have a ‘look-up system’ in place which will retrieve the name of the stranger and then forward both his name and number to you rather than forwarding just his number???” I think this feature will be very useful.

Each phone number is registered under a name. With this look-up table whenever you get a call (or an sms), you will at least know the name of the person/organization. Will building such a system be overkill for adding just one feature??? Will this system be an overhead to operations such as call or sms??? Are there any other constraints, technical or otherwise??? Why hasn’t any mobile/base station company implemented this yet???

Oh GOD!!!

pour water down the drain...
pour water on the wash basin carefully...
pour water on the front wall and its the opposite wall...
pour water on yourself...
keep the mug back in its position...
look at yourself in the mirror...
wipe the mirror with your banian...
pour water on yourself again...
hmmm... DONE.

It's a small world after all

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines technology as "the practical application of knowledge especially in a particular area". Definition or not, we can't argue about the fact that technology has indeed broken all barriers, geographical or otherwise. Very complex things is made to look simple (though it ain't!!!). We all love to send sms... I love to send group sms though. Though SMS is an acronym for Short Messaging Service, to me it means Simply Message Send maadi :-) During my tenure at my previous company, I was (un)fortunate to see the actual code of the SMS protocol. Believe me... you wouldn't send an SMS if you saw how complex the architecture is. And SMS is a baby compared to Calls. But its simple to use and that's the beauty of technology.

Just now, I had a first-hand experience of how technology has changed our lives. "I am just a call away" really isn't applicable only to neighbours. My close friend who is currently pursuing his M.Sc abroad asked me to give a book to his cousin and gave me her number too. I forgot to take that number with me and went to his cousin's house. I realized I had no number... hmmm... what to do now??? I called my friend and told him to tell his cousin that I am waiting outside her house. Within 20 seconds, she came out and picked the book from me. 20 seconds is all it took for the message to pass from India ---> abroad ---> India. Its that simple. Hats off to all those who slog to make our lives simpler and simpler.

It really is a small world after all...

one sandwich = Rs. 175. Any takers???

We all like to go to theaters, watch movies and have a nice time.

I always wanted to go to PVR Gold Class atleast once. I had to wait nearly 40 months for that to become nanasu from kanasu. One fine day, my cousin (duh...) and I decided to watch a movie in Gold Class. We wanted to make our first-time experience special :) So we sat down and listed out all the movies that were currently being screened at Gold Class. Due to lack of options, we decided to go to Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. My cousin had booked the tickets online for the 7:30pm show. So we decided to leave house at 6pm. To our bad luck, we got caught in traffic and then in rain and then in traffic again. It was 7:35pm when we reached Gold Class. I was cursing my cousin for being late and vice-versa. To our good luck, the movie started at 7:45pm or so. As soon as we entered Gold Class, we were offered a glass of "Appy Fizz" each. I had to drink both the glasses :( Then we went inside the movie hall. There were 32 seats (four rows of 2-4-2 seats) and by God, it was houseful. (the reason why I was astonished is that each ticket is Rs. 500, India is definitely shining)

The barcaloungers were awesome. The cushions were really soft and it could recline to 180 degrees. We actually saw the whole movie horizontally :) During the course of the movie, one of the theater staff came with a menu. We had a look at the prices and then at the food items. One sandwich = Rs. 175!!! I couldn't believe my eyes. Then I thought "ok maybe the quantity will be good..." and ordered a sandwich, thereby drastically reducing the weight from my wallet. Let me explain the quantity now: exactly 2 slices of bread, 2 tomato pieces, 2 cucumber pieces, a couple of chips, some cheese spread I guess, a lettuce leaf and a small cup of ketchup. Lets evaluate the actual cost of that sandwich: exactly 2 slices of bread - Rs. 2, 2 tomato pieces - 25 paise (a kg of tomato costs Rs. 10), 2 cucumber pieces - 25 paise (one whole cucumber costs Rs. 3), a couple of chips - 25 paise, some cheese spread - maximum Re. 1, a lettuce leaf - 25 paise maybe and a small cup of ketchup - Rs. 3. That comes to Rs. 7 tops. A reasonable price considering we ate in Gold Class would have been Rs. 50. But it was Rs. 175!!! The entire time we ate, we cribbed and cribbed. The irony was that we kept asking ourselves "Which stupid guy will pay so much for a sandwich???"

"Haasige iddasthu kaalu chaachabeku" - lesson learnt.