How not to do a talk

J. Krishnamurti makes many mistakes in this talk of his, and this talk might as well be titled "How not to give a talk". I have generally not found much by way of insight in J. Krishnamurti's writings, and that is because I don't think there is very much in there. So I was not expecting a great deal when I listened to this talk, but I had to give up after about five minutes because he never clarifies what he means by his many very elliptical sentences in the first minute. Within 60 seconds, he manages to say something obtuse ("I really don't know why you are clapping") and something very bizarre ("Have you ever tried clapping with one hand? Please do that now... from today."). I listened to all of five minutes before I gave up. To those who perserved longer: please let me know what I missed.



I am quite aware of J. Krishnamurthi's reputation as a philosopher in certain circles, but I have some background in Philosophy myself and, over the years, have come to love the field. Indeed, as I noted on my List, many of my organization behavior posts have been written to be an exercise in philosophical thought. So, you know, I know that those are some pretty bold statements to make, but there it is.

And finally, I would like leave a message here for the good people at the Theosophical Society over in Adyar. In case they have not cancelled their subscription to the resurrection of the World Teacher, I would like to let them know this : yes! I am available!!

Shall we dance?

And now for something completely different. Here is "Shall we dance?" from the cartoon version of "The King and I":

Cows in India, or What Gets Measured Gets Managed

Prefatory Note: This is intended to be a talk, not an article. Please treat it as a sort of transcript of my talk. In particular, expect low information density. I find that much of the information in TED-style talks comes in the Q&A. My lecture is really in a very different tradition, if you will, of lecture, namely, the Case Based method of teaching. The aim of the lecture is to inform the audience assuming that they have already read the Case Materials beforehand. It is a more intimate setting, but makes for a much richer experience. Furthermore, with the Case Method and unlike in a regular talk, you can engage with nearly all the members of the audience on substantive issues related to the topic at hand during the course of the lecture itself. Thus, the Case Method technique serves as validation for the idea itself. Using this technique, I have given this speech a few times thus far, and have found the main idea validated each time. I hope you enjoy the presentation.

The Talk:
I created and uploaded a video of my talk for my meeting with Prof. Lietz, but unfortunately, my Macbook has a soundcard problem, and so the sound is simply not showing up. Here is the video.



The title of the talk is "Why are there cows on the road in India?" In this post, I will provide a brief walkthrough of the talk since there is no sound. This is meant to be a very accessible talk so please feel free to write in if there are any questions at all, but please do bear in mind that this is a talk and so it is meant to be heard, not read.

My basic argument is simple. The way Indian Assemblies work today is dysfunctional, and we need a system of checks and balances there. There is just too much commotion in the Indian Parliament and State Assemblies today. (I have a clip from one of the State Assemblies in my video above (6:12 to 6:28). You will see footage here of an incident involving two members that occurred in the Kashmir State Assembly.) Things are clearly not working. I propose that we need to have a system of checks and balances in Assemblies and in the Parliament to make sure order is restored. I propose one such system (Proposal A - please see below), but it does not necessarily have to be the one that is adopted. In fact, even if the Parliament does not adopt this proposal, people could use a variant of the proposed system to keep tabs on the politicians themselves (Proposal B - also see below). What gets measured gets managed. What these proposals offer is a way for people to measure the performance of the members of parliament (MPs). If people can keep track of the performance of their members of parliament, they could put pressure on the politicians to do something about it.

Pizza and Panini

The third installment of our column is coming up at the Times of India. And to give you an update on the TEDx talk - my preparations for the TEDx talk are coming along well. Tomorrow, I am scheduled to talk to Nori Gerardo Lietz, an expert on world real estate markets here at Stanford. So exciting!

I expect to have an interesting talk with her and I imagine she would have some very interesting things to say on the topic, which <drumroll> is "Why there are cows on the street in India?" Anyway, the latest installment of our column is almost there. Hope you enjoy this month's puzzle.

Hello, Young Lovers

Oh, and if you aren't reading all the posts about "Golden Balls" - and why wouldn't you be? - maybe you would like to listen to another song from "The King and I"? So, for all those who would rather listen to musicals than watch game shows, here is another song from "King and I". And in case, you haven't noticed : we have a new look for the blog.

Enjoy!

Must Watch : Ask the Delphic Oracle3

We have the third in the series for our column at Indiatimes up and running. It is a short post with a video at the end. An edited version of the post is below. You don't need to know advanced mathematics to enjoy the video, so go ahead and press play!

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Two contestants, one pot of money to win.

A British gameshow called "Golden Balls" invites contestants to play a version of the Prisoner's Dilemma, wherein the two contestants have to decide whether they're going to "split" or "steal" a pot of money.

If they both opt to split, they split the money. If one opts to split, and one opts to steal, the one who steals it gets the whole pot. And if they both opt to steal it, then neither get the money.

Prisoner's Dilemma is a classic game from game theory. What happens next? You've got to watch this.

The theme for May - Talk

The theme for the month of May will be Talk, that is, Talks on Mathematical topics. I will be making a series of posts on this theme and, in my posts, will provide examples of effective and ineffective technical talks and presentations. We will also continue to make posts on the theme of Thailand since Panini and Thailand are, of course, the flavors of the month.