Agent Smith says…

“…when I tried to classify your species, I realized that you are not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctly develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment, but humans do not. You move to an area and multiply & multiply until every natural resource is consumed and only way you can survive is to spread to another area.

There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern – you know what it is?

A virus. Human beings are a decease to this planet, a plague & we are the cure…”

Well I dont like the cure, but part of what Agent Smith said in The Matrix is true. As far as the cure is concenrned, it is within ourselves. Only thing i we have to realize it.

Aliens destroying our planet

In many of my previous blog entries, I have tried to justify why humans are aliens on earth. Here is yet another reason. It is our indifference to this planet that always makes me wonder if we belong to this place.

Earth is a unique planet, because of its ability to sustain life. Earth formed at the same time as rest of the 8 planets and yet life found its way only on earth. Earth is the only suitable place in the solar system to sustain life – neither too close to sun nor too far, making it just the ideal place. Mercury is too close to the sun and too hot. Even if water was on Mercury it would have long ago evaporated. Venus also is too close to the sun to have any surface water. Mars on the other hand is too far away from the sun, making it too cold for any water in liquid form. So, the conditions happen to be just right here on our planet Earth. It is just the right distance from the sun. Our Earth is of perfect size and the heat is neither more nor less, to keep water neither all frozen nor all gas.

Earth, as we all know today, was not always inhabitable. It took millions of year to have an atmosphere that can support life; otherwise earth’s atmosphere had only CO2. In those millions of years life evolved from one cell amoeba to a multi cell and more complex organisms, and then came humans.

Since then the rise in CO2 level is increasing. With each passing year we are producing more and more CO2. The CO2 generated in last 40 years is more than double of the CO2 generated in last 10000 years. The time is not far when there will be no ice on the poles, because of global warming.

Related
How much alien are we?
Humans are Aliens on this ‘Animal Planet’ – Part 1
Humans are Aliens on this ‘Animal Planet’ – Part 2

How much ‘alien’ are we?

How alien are we? I give a lot of thought about it, considering how diverse the life on earth is be it over the surface or in water. Roughly 1.75 million species have been formally described and given official names, undescribed are even much more than that (reference http://www.eoearth.org/article/Biodiversity). It is very likely that many of these species got its origin form different planets in the galaxy.

Around 4.5 billion years ago a star explode under supernova causing enormous amount of rubble of rocks and meteors. Due to enormous acceleration and gravitational force the meteors collided with each other to form bigger rocks meteors which are also known at proto-planets. Over the period of millions of years that followed after supernova this process stopped, forming our solar system.

The earth was not like what it is today. In the beginning it was a ball of molten rocks and gases…. Billions of years ago earth was filled with gases – hydrogen, nitrogen and carbon-di-oxide, but no oxygen. But from where does the oxygen came? What is the source of water on earth?

Origin of life is still the most puzzling of all the things explored by scientists. 3.1 billion year ago humans would have only survived for few moments. What is the source of life? The answer lies in the answers for the source of water & oxygen.

Even after formation of all the planets there were still millions of meteors left in the universe. Many of them found their way to earth. Many of these meteors also contained frozen gases & water and also an important building block of life – amino acids. When they hit the earth surface all these become part of our planet. The impact of frozen meteors cooled down the surface of earth forming continents and oceans. Actually it didn’t cooled the surface instantly, instead its a different topic how the earth’s core was formed with molten iron and nickel. But these meteors actually played a crucial role in cooling done the burning planet.

This explains the source of water, but not about oxygen.

With lot of CO2 and sun bacteria started forming under the surface of water – they were none other than Cyanobacteria also known as green-blue algae. This was the first sign of life. They absorbed sunlight and absorbed CO2 from the atmosphere, and in the process released oxygen. The process we now know as photosynthesis. Over the period of time the CO2 continued to decrease and oxygen continued to increase. Once there was enough oxygen, there was no looking back. Life found its way on the land as well.

This suggests that life on our planet is attributed to the alien bodies that came to earth billions of years ago and become part of the planet and found a way to evolve into complex life. This also may mean that we all, including all animals, are aliens or have some genes of them in us!

Further references: Humans are alien of animal planet – part 1 & part 2

Energy needs and it’s effect on global warming!

My company is starting a initiative “Go Green – Reduce Reuse Recycle” on ‘Earth Day’ i.e. celebrated around the world by earth lovers. This initiative includes:

• Travel smart - You reduce 1.5 kg of carbon dioxide pollution for every 5 km you don’t drive. Use public transport, avail of the company transport, or simply try car-pooling. You not only contribute to less pollution, you also cut down on fuel cost and stress pills because of less driving.
• Tree plantation – The company is providing 55 trees, to be bought, and will be planted in the company’s campus.
• Reduce paper – Resist the urge to print everything. A visit to the printer room reveals how much paper we waste. As a “green” measure, all printers are by default to duplex print. Also, hand dryers are provided in the wash rooms to reduce the paper usage.
• Vermi-composting on Company’s Campus - Vermi-composting is the technique of using EARTH worms to break down the organic waste generated out of food, paper etc. to create fertilizer. The company will produce vermi-compost fertilizer for all trees on the campus.

This seems to be a really nice initiative at a company level, but the success of it depends on the individuals. Company cannot enforce them, these are just suggestion and best practices. It is left up to individuals to realize their responsibility and find out ways how they can contribute in making earth a better place to live. Companies like mine have started a small but a significant step toward making a greener earth.

I think the demand of energy is directly proportional to the green house gases which are the main source of global warming. Consider this – the electricity used in IT to keep the industry running is huge. The number of computers is doubling every year. Each computer consumes a lot of power and generates a lot of heat. This is not all – to keep the computers cool, air conditions are installed, which again consumes the equivalent amount of energy or perhaps more. Big companies like Google & Microsoft have huge data centers with tens of thousands of computers. They consume massive amount of energy. There is a lot of scope of reducing this electricity consumption by having more energy efficient computers with generate much less heat or does not require any external cooling. I read somewhere that Microsoft was planning to open a big datacenter in Russia or Siberia. I wonder if that is the step to reduce the air conditioning bill…

We all know from our school days that the primary source of electricity are coal (thermal), water (dams), nuclear. Wind and Solar energy is tried at some places but they have not gained the popularity, primarily because ROI is not good. Electricity produces from bio-wastes have been experimented successfully, but again there is the problem of adoption. People tend to use things which are easily to install and use. Wide adoption of alternate fuels requires willingness from both the government and individuals.

Fuel seems to be the major source of contaminating the environment because when it burns it releases CO2 and other gases participating in green house effect. It is very unlikely that the consumption of fuel may be reduced because our demand for energy is only going to increase with each passing day. We need to find better and efficient ways of using the available resources. Scientists are busy finding alternates to currently available fuels option – like in Brazil, ethanol produced from sugarcane is used as an alternate to petrol. Ethanol is cheaper then petrol and produces less green house gases. More than 70% of the gas stations in Brazil now have ethanol available. This was only possible by the willingness and participation of government and citizens.

Government in US is forcing the auto industry to come up with more fuel efficient engines, with alternate to petrol and diesel. With each passing year emission norm are becoming tougher. Hybrid cars are the future, but they are a long way from adoption by common man. We have long heard and seen nuclear powered submarines, but that technology is still far from being used in cars & planes. But there will be one day when our cars will have a small nuclear battery inside that may never be required to be replaced for the car’s entire life.

All this is a big plan, most of them may not even see the light of the day, but as individuals we should thrive of discipline to use our natural resources efficiently. Charity starts from home, so shall any good cause.

Celebrate ‘Earth Day’, everyday!

Do you like what you do?

*This blog entry is specifically targeted for people in IT.

Do you like what you do? How often do you do things that you do not like but still do because everyone else is doing that?
Working in a global company gives an advantage of knowing fellow peers working elsewhere in world. Different parts of the world have different working style and cultures.

Look at Japan, people are hard working or rather workaholics – they come early and go late. They have high quality standards. They have long working hours and they have unsaid rules like no one leaves until the boss leaves. But they still manage to get time to go to pubs every night. They like pub hopping, and they still manage to come to office next day by 8 am. Surprising! I wonder when they sleep.

In Europe, people come early and leave early. Friday is usually half day because no one is in office after 4PM.  The beer party starts at 4 pm on Friday and continues till Saturday night. (It may sound like an exaggeration but is still true).

In US, people are more professional come early, go early and the time that is spent in office is highly productive.

In all the above three cultures one thing is in common – They find time for themselves; do things they like and have heart to follow their passion.
Now you must be wondering what point I want to make. There is a Scott Adam’s Dilbert Law – After every salary raise you will have lesser money in your bank account. All my friends agree with that. What do we do with our money?

Now let’s talk about us – Indians. How often do we follow our heart? Do we have passion for something? Who are our role models? How do we contribute to the society? Do we define new paths and set example for others to follow by setting new trends?

I think we seriously miss doing something passionately for ourselves. And this is from the beginning. As a child you do things which your parents want you to do. Most of the time what we do is based on what will impress others, but not on what we like. What we do is more decided based on the circle of friends, the company we are in, the money we earn. We always try to make a statement but in doing so we miss doing things that are close to our heart.

How expensive will it be to maintain a car in future?

Today I spent my complete day with a friend of mine. We are neighbors. So after our lunch we were watching an old movie ‘chupke chupke’, where in once scene the driver repairs the car, and the owner of the car says to his wife that if the car had been taken to workshop then then minimum Rs100 bill would have come. This was some 30 years ago. I am not an economist, but will do some simple math without bringing any inflation or current salary trends in.

Today if you take your car to workshop then  you will spend minimum Rs.1000, and I m only talking about a samll car. So it is almost 10 times more than that as it used to be in 70’s. If we continue to go at this pace, then in next 20 to 25 years taking a car to workshop may be as expensive as spending 2 nights in a 5 star hotel today.

Now look at the petrol price today, it is above Rs.52 per liter, which 30 years ago was just Rs.10. I still remember taking my father’s scooter out and then 2-3 rupees from friends and filling petrol for Rs.10.  The oil prices today we get are highly subsidized by government but which still means the price of petrol has gone up by 5 times. In next 25-30 years this price of petrol may be equivalent to taking a family of 4 for a movie today.

It will be so good if there is some machine which does not require any maintenance and fuel.

Wakeup call for companies around the world. India is coming!

It is well known that Tata’s and Mahindra’s are the front runners in the bid for Ford’s famous Jaguar & Land Rover premium brands. Tata has the backing from Ford’s Union. According to the union, if the British based units are sold it should to be to a company “with an established presence and background in manufacturing,”. Tata has a solid presence from manufacturing steel, to automobile, to software and so goes down well with the union.This is just one side of the coin though the other side is not as pretty for Tata’s. The dealers’ does not want these brands to be sold to Tata or for that matter any other Indian company. According to them, the brand image shall be seriously dented if sold to any company in India, as a developing country. This will impact sales and high end users will not prefer to buy these cars anymore.India is one of the fastest growing economies in the world. Anyone making such a comment is surely very insecure and is unable to digest the fact that India, which was once a golden bird, is once again ready to spread its wing around the world. I can understand the fact that till now USA & UK companies were buying companies around the world, and then suddenly companies from a developing country start buying out companies & stocks around the world may hurt many egos and pride.What happens to companies who set up their manufacturing units in India? Volkswagen, Mercedes have setup their plants and others are following. They have plans to export the units (cars) from India. You can buy your cloths (Banana Republic, GUCCI, POLO, etc.) all ‘Made in India’, you can buy a Mercedes ‘Made in India’ but you cannot buy a Jaguar ‘Made in UK’ just because it is owned by an Indian company. This is just double standard… I cannot understand this logic! For long people across the world have wear premium brands made in India. I think it’s time now for them to understand soon they will be travelling in made in India or Indian branded cars.

CA Launches State-of-the-Art Technology Center in Hyderabad, India

CA President and CEO John Swainson Cuts Ribbon at US$30 Million ITC Campus.

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