A different prespective to Life

Many people believe that we are now living in an artificial construct and, as a result, will self-destruct. But for more than a millennium, humans have been modifying our food, environment, and animals to suit their desires. So let's start with the most simple food. We have been growing wheat and beans for more than a thousand years. But the ancestor of these were just weeds. From selective breeding, advanced agricultural science, and later gene manipulation, we have produced a nutritious grain from a weed. Farming has meant that man can now live in cities, and industrial farming means that a vast portion of the population will not be involved in food production. Then we talk about apples, pears, mangoes, and grapes. All have been affected by man, they have been selected, and that variety with bigger yields has been selected, hence numerous varieties of apples, grapes,  pears, etc. Some people have an idealistic view of farmers planting and growing a particular plant or crop. But

It might be the circles I am moving in or the people that I associate with, a lot of people I come across actually believe that things are getting worst and worst. They seem to have an apocalyptic image and destruction of the world. This might be so, as regards some aspect of human endeavour, but it is no longer the case as regards others. In health, disease, food, time, education, wars, human longevity, human rights, etc. in almost every area, a man most specifically humanity has been improving. The notion we have that things are getting worse does not make sense when judged on the figures. The world population has been increasing, and the simple reason why is that fewer people are dying from the disease, and more people are surviving. Fewer as by proportion of, people live in poverty and extreme poverty. This a book that is very positive and will change your outlook in life. That shows with figures, statistics, graphs, and reason, whatever the "Nay Sayers" might s

Went to a debate yesterday at the Tea House Debating club. Due to the recent political atmosphere in the UK, they decided to have an election debate special. All of the speakers were members of the club and as the tradition, were given the party that they might not agree with. I totally agree with the format and that way of doing things, debating is healthy and should be encouraged in any modern society as it enables people to see things from another perspective and empathise with alternative views. However, the Liberal Democrats, Labour, Green, Brexit, Conservative, and "No Party" i.e. "None of the above", were all represented. They were given 3 minutes to tell us why we should vote for them and another 3 minutes criticising the other parties. After which, there was a vote and two of the six parties were eliminated. During the debate, 2 things became obviously clear or apparent. That the speakers who were able to engage the audience and charismatic, whate

The marathon officially is about 42.195 kilometres (approximately 26 miles 385 yards) and it was said to have been started according to legend, by a   Greek soldier named  Pheidippides , who was a courier runner messenger from the  Battle of Marathon  to Athens (490 BC), who reported the victory. He was said to have died immediately after delivering the message of victory over the Persians. Unfortunately,  Pheidippides  time was not recorded, t he winner of the  first modern Olympic marathon , on 10 April 1896 (a male-only race), was Spyridon Louis, from Greece, in 2 hours 58 minutes and 50 seconds (2:58:50:0). In 2018 at Berlin, Kenyan Eliud Kipchoge took the official record at last year's race, was 2:01:39:0. Hence, those in the know knew that it was only a matter of time when someone ran below 2 hours time mark. The battle to beat the 2-hour marathon is like another similar battle of speed, determination and forbearance, some years ago, the race to beat the 4-minute mile, th

Up till the 18th century, most of sub-Saharan Africa was unexplored apart from the coastal regions. The rest of the world was had been colonized and conquered, the Americas, Asia, Oceania, etc. British, France, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, and Belgium ships had been crating away their riches. Africans had the Atlantic slave trade which crated away from millions of them and wreaked havoc on their civilizations and wiped out entire kingdoms. But this was not done directly by the invaders, Europeans, colonists but by their intermediaries or collaborators who were disenfranchised or enraged minorities to the status quo then, who acted as their active agents and were handsomely paid in arms, alcohol, cotton, and trinkets or by the demise of their perceived enemies. But generally, the African Kingdoms were left on their own and direct contact with Europeans was limited and restricted. The thing that was "protecting" Africans from the direct involvement of Europeans was Malaria, wh

This is a documentary that involves the US, Israel and Iran. It is about a malicious sophisticated software code called Stuxnet which is a computer worm. A worm, unlike a computer virus which like its named biological equivalent, since a virus requires a cell host to replicate itself. But the computer worm can self replicate and activate itself. The code was well written, with no bugs and it has a zero-day exploit.  Which means it could infect the computer immediately, as day zero is an undisclosed computer-software vulnerability that hackers can exploit to adversely affect computer programs, data, additional computers or a network. It is known as a "zero-day" because a virus or worm usually reported or announced before becoming active, but this is activated immediately.  In Stuxnet, there were several zero days. Those with experience in looking at the code security as the professionals they came to the conclusion that it looks like a code written by a nation-state pro

Just finished watching a series on Netflix  "When they see us" consisting of 4 episodes, these series were all directed by Ava DuVemay who also directed 13th and Selma . It was made for Netflix and it follows the story of five 14 to 16-year-old Harlem teenagers of colour called the " Central Park Five " who were arrested for raping and molesting a 28-year-old, white female jogger in New York Central Park in 1989. The story was built around their lives and what actually happened on the day of the incident. The fact the boys were arrested by a bias police force with a white female lead, Ms Linda Fairstein who then the sex crimes chief in the Manhattan district attorney's office, and she was determined to get them. She said, “Every young Black male who was in the park last night is a suspect in the rape of that woman”. That throws innocent until proven guilty out of the window. The police were biased and out to make an arrest from the very beginning and press

I had the opportunity to attend a Debate yesterday at the Tea House Theatre, not far from Vauxhall Station in South East London. The debate motion was “ This House Believes the Caster Semenya ruling is unfair ”.  The running order was 6.30 pm - 6.45 pm: Introduction to the debate 6.45 pm - 7.45 pm: Public debate and audience Q&A 7.45 pm - 8.00 pm: Break 8.00 pm - 8.45 pm: Showcase debate 8.30 pm - 9.00 pm: Post-debate drinks Being the first time of attending I did manage to find the place easily and the surroundings were excellent. It is a nice pub at the end of the Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens in the centre of London. It was not far from Vauxhall Underground Tube Station. The public debate was done by amateurs and students who were members of the debating club. The issue was well thought out and at the end, I sided with the notion that ruling was unfair. As it seemed they had specifically targeted Ms Caster Semenya . But later when the professional deba

There is a book I am currently reading on great and good ideas. One of the numerous example given is that of Dr Barry Marshall.  The Australian doctor turned the treatment of peptic ulcers on its head and was subsequently awarded a Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine. This doctor noticed that most of the patient with ulcers had a stomach bug Helicobacter pylori . It lives in the stomach and is shaped like a corkscrew and is able to burrow into the mucus lining of the stomach and hence avoid the acidic environment. The bacteria H. Pylori also uses chemotaxis to neutralize the acid producing a large amount of urease which breaks down the urea present in the stomach to form carbon dioxide and ammonia. These neutralise the acid. After Dr Marshall produces his report in Australia he was ridiculed by the established doctors and scientists. Most of them did not believe that any bacteria would survive in the hostile acidic environment of the stomach. The stomach does produce Hy

  In his 1798 book  An Essay on the Principle of Population , Reverend Thomas Robert Malthus observed that a nation's food production increased arithmetically  (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, etc.), but population growth increased geometrically (1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, etc.). Reverend Malthus postulated that there would be a point when the population growth would outstrip food production. This has since been known as the Malthusian Trap , in that " Populations had a tendency to grow until the lower class suffered hardship, want and greater susceptibility to  famine  and  disease ". Malthus essay is one of the articles that Charles Darwin, who had an experience of breeding pigeons, read that lead him to think of evolution because there was a constant "battle" between populations of species for survival, he deduced that those which have advantageous genes will be "selected" naturally as the disadvantaged will die out i.e. go extinct. Our dear

There is a book that I am currently reading, about gaining insights and a new way of thinking. Among its numerous examples, it gives that of the British attack on the  naval base at Taranto,  a coastal city in southern Italy on the night of the 11th of November, 1940. France had already surrendered on the 25th of June, 1940. The US had not yet entered the war yet, hence only Britain was fighting Germany, Italy and Japan.  This attack was seen as revolutionary, a change in the current general thinking and a different approach to warfare. This is the first time an attack from an aircraft carrier by planes on other ships. T he first all-aircraft ship-to-ship naval attack in history, employing 24 obsolete  Fairey Swordfish  biplane  torpedo bombers  from a new  aircraft carrier   HMS  Illustrious  in the  Mediterranean Sea . The plan for this attack had been on the books since  1935 when Italy invaded Abyssinia (Ethiopia).  It was thought that ships are safe in a harbour which was less t

The Book After reading about 23 things, they don't tell you about Capitalism . Instead, I develop a yearning to read about Capitalism and finance, especially after working in finance and doing short courses. I would like to say and believe that I have a more than average knowledge of it. However, it will seem that everything was not necessary as we have been made to believe, and we have all been lied to and deceived over the years by our governments and some brilliant people  - like  Alan Greenspan  (Chair of the Federal Reserve  of the United States from 1987 to 2006. ) and some others. Maybe I am hard on them because they were telling us what they believed to be the truth, as they were apologetic when it turned out not to be so . With the technocrats and the financial wizards who had developed complex algorithms that will detect any changes in the market immediately, we put our faith in them. They had complex financial instruments that were hedged. Either way, the underline