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Thursday, August 31, 2006

Lady luck good luck - Hard luck bad luck

Ten years ago, I set out to examine luck. I wanted to know why some people are always in the right place at the right time, while others consistently experience ill fortune. I placed advertisements in national newspapers asking for people who felt consistently lucky or unlucky to contact me. Hundreds of extraordinary men and women volunteered for my research and, over the years, I have interviewed them, monitored their lives and had them take part in experiments. The results reveal that although these people have almost no insight into the causes of their luck, their thoughts and behavior are responsible for much of their good and bad fortune. Take the case of seemingly chance opportunities. Lucky people consistently encounter such opportunities, whereas unlucky people do not. I carried out a simple experiment to discover whether this was due to differences in their ability to spot such opportunities. I gave both lucky and unlucky people a newspaper, and asked them to look through it and tell me how many photographs were inside. I had secretly placed a large message halfway through the newspaper saying: "Tell the experimenter you have seen this and win #250." This message took up half of the page and was written in type that was more than two inches high. It was staring everyone straight in the face, but the unlucky people tended to miss it and the lucky people tended to spot it. Unlucky people are generally more tenses than lucky people, and this anxiety disrupts their ability to notice the unexpected. As a result, they miss opportunities because they are too focused on looking for something else. They go to parties intent on finding their perfect partner and so miss opportunities to make good friends. They look through newspapers determined to find certain types of job advertisements and miss other types of jobs. Lucky people are more relaxed and open, and therefore see what is thererather than just what they are looking for. My research eventually revealed that lucky people generate good fortune via four principles.


1. They are skilled at creating and noticing chance opportunities.
2. Make lucky decisions by listening to their intuition.
3. Create self-fulfilling prophesies via positive expectations,
4. Adopt a resilient attitude that transforms bad luck into good. Towards the end of the work,

I wondered whether these principles could beused to create good luck. I asked a group of volunteers to spend a month carrying out exercises designed to help them think and behave like a lucky person. These exercises helped them spot chance opportunities, listen to their intuition, and expect to be lucky, and be more resilient to bad luck. One month later, the volunteers returned and described what had happened.The results were dramatic: 80% of people were now happier, more satisfied with their lives and, perhaps most important of all, luckier.The lucky people had become even luckier and the unlucky had become lucky. Finally, I had found the elusive "luck factor". and Here are four top tips for becoming lucky:
1. Listen to your gut instinct -they are normally right.
2. Be open to new experiences and breaking your normal routine.
3. Spend a few moments each day remembering things that went well.
4. Visualize yourself being lucky before an important meeting or telephone call.

Luck is very often a self-fulfilling prophecy!

(By Professor Richard WiseMan, University of Hertfordshire)

Monday, August 28, 2006

KFC Gushan-e-Iqbal, Karachi branch


A KFC branch operated by special people

Sunday, August 27, 2006

How to become millionaire? Ask Darrel Hair !!!



(Letter written by honurable umpire Darrel Hair to ICC titling "the way forward" after oval test controversy demanding US $ 500,000.00 for his early retirement as a solution to his created problem"

Friday, August 25, 2006

Pluto - A dwarf




Astronomers gave Pluto the Mickey Mouse treatment Thursday, classifying the world a "dwarf" rather than a full-fledged planet.
Like its cartoon counterpart, the celestial body became a sidekick when the International Astronomical Union meeting in Prague took a hand vote and decided to downsize the solar system to eight planets.

"Pluto is still Pluto; it is still the same scientifically interesting object at the edge of the solar system," says astronomer Richard Binzel of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a member of the IAU's planet definition committee. "Science has advanced to the point where we realize there are lots of Plutos out there."

Last year's announcement that a world larger than Pluto had been detected — named UB313 and nicknamed "Xena" by discovery team head Mike Brown of the California Institute of Technology — put pressure on the IAU to redefine planets, says planetary scientist Will Grundy of the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Ariz. Over the last decade, some science museums and astronomers had removed tiny Pluto, which is smaller than Earth's moon, from the list of planets.

The IAU's new definition of a planet is that it must:

• Orbit the Sun

• Be big enough for its own gravity to compact it into a ball

• Have "cleared the neighborhood around its orbit," meaning it is not surrounded by objects of similar size and characteristics.

The last condition was added to a draft planet definition proposed by the committee last week that would have added three more planets to the solar system immediately: UB313, Pluto's moon Charon, and the asteroid Ceres, along with dozens more in the Kuiper comet belt in the next decade.

Instead, the orbit-clearing requirement means Pluto, Ceres and UB313 become "dwarf planets" under a second resolution also adopted. None have cleared their orbital belts of similar-sized objects. The new definition passed with 95% of the votes, says the IAU's Lars Lindberg Christensen.

"I'm of course disappointed that Xena will not be the 10th planet, but I definitely support the IAU in this difficult and courageous decision," says Brown. Others were less enthusiastic. "I think this is utter nonsense. How can we ever say whether something has cleared out its orbit?" says astronomer Sanjay Limaye of the University of Wisconsin in Madison.

Meanwhile, textbook and encyclopedia writers, including publication of the 2007 World Book Encyclopedia, have been awaiting the new definition. "I suspect kids are going to be more interested in Pluto now than before," says editor in chief Paul Kobasa.

Thursday, August 24, 2006

I Don't Want It

MADRID, Spain - A reclusive Russian won the math world's highest honor Tuesday for solving a problem that has stumped some of the discipline's greatest minds for a century — but he refused the award.
Grigory Perelman, a 40-year-old native of St. Petersburg, won a Fields Medal — often described as math's equivalent of the Nobel prize — for a breakthrough in the study of shapes that experts say might help scientists figure out the shape of the universe.
John Ball, president of the International Mathematical Union, said that he had urged Perelman to accept the medal, but Perelman said he felt isolated from the mathematics community and "does not want to be seen as its figurehead." Ball offered no further details of the conversation.
Besides shunning the award for his work in topology, Perelman also seems uninterested, according to colleagues, in a separate $1 million prize he could win for proving the Poincare conjecture, a theorem about the nature of multidimensional space.
The award, given out every four years, was announced at the mathematical union's International Congress of Mathematicians. Three other mathematicians — Russian Andrei Okounkov, Frenchman Wendelin Werner and Australian Terence Tao — won Fields medals in other areas of mathematics. They received their awards from King Juan Carlos to loud applause from delegates to the conference. But Perelman was not present.
"I regret that Dr. Perelman has declined to accept the medal," Ball said.
Perelman's work is still under review, but no one has found any serious flaw in it, the math union said in a statement.
The Fields medal was founded in 1936 and named after Canadian mathematician John Charles Fields. It come with a $13,400 stipend.
Perelman is eligible for far more money from a private foundation called The Clay Mathematics Institute in Cambridge, Mass.
Proving the conjecture — an exercise in acrobatics with mindboggling imaginary doughnuts and balls — is anything but trivial. Colleagues say Perelman's work gives mathematical descriptions of what the universe might look like and promises exciting applications in physics and other fields.
"It is very important indeed because it really gives us an insight into geometry and in particular the geometry of the space we live in," said Oxford University math professor Marcus du Sautoy. "It does not say what the shape (of the universe) is. It just says, 'look, these are the things it could be.'"
Academics have been studying Perelman's proof since he left the first of three papers on it on a math Web site in Nov. 2002. Normal procedure would have been to seek publication in a peer-approved journal.
Three separate teams have presented papers or books explaining the details of Perelman's work, which draws heavily from a technique developed by another mathematician, Richard Hamilton of Columbia University. The Clay Mathematics Institute says the two men could conceivably share the Poincare money.
Ball said he asked Perelman if he would accept that money. Perelman said that if he won, he would talk to the Clay institute.
Perelman is believed to live with his mother in St. Petersburg. Repeated calls over many days to a telephone number listed as Perelman's went unanswered. Acquaintances refused to give out his address or the number they use to contact him, saying he did not want to talk to the media.

The Raj and WWII

THE collapse of British rule in Southeast Asia in the early years of the Second World War was both sudden and absolute as the Japanese invaded their colonies -— Singapore, Malaya, Burma, Shanghai and other territories. There was no resistance; it did come later, towards the end of the war.Although the outcome of the war was different, Japan’s stunning victories badly humiliated the colonialists, weakened their economic might and played an instrumental role in bringing down the curtain on the British Empire that had never seen the sun setting on its conquests. Although Japan had to pay a heavy price for that — atom bombs were dropped on two of its cities — its role in the war reshaped the continent’s future forever, bringing independence to the enslaved lands.The British had over the years now reconciled with the end of their great empire; they could not swallow the humiliation their troops were subjected to by Japan in East Asia. The surrender ceremony in Singapore was one such event. Another was the decision taken in a state of helplessness not to defend Malaya. And then their troops suffered a long spell of indignities in prisons memories of which still haunt the surviving war veterans of the eastern front and the officers who served in the Asian colonies.

Eventually when the Allied forces began their counter-attack and began making gains, it became apparent that the Japanese would lose. In battles at Imphal and Kohima, they tasted their first major defeat of the war, and they too began to suffer with their troops dying by the thousand. It was the triumph of Britain’s 14th army. It took two full years for Britain to raise it and turn it into a competent force, and by 1944 it was ready to fight the Japanese.The authors of the book argue that the famine was a turning point in the war and in Indian history. But Japan’s victories had already dispelled the notion that only “whites”, being a superior race, were entitled to rule India. The famine, which to a large extent was caused by the supply of enormous quantity of foodstuff to Burma, turned the British into villains of the piece in the eyes of the general public.

Forgotten Armies: Britain’s Asian Empire & the War With JapanBy Christopher Bailey & Tim Harper, Penguin Books.
ISBN 0-140-29331-0

Tuesday, August 22, 2006

Hair comes problem !!!

MEDIA IN PAKISTAN

Sad as it may sound, there will be many who will wonder whether Darrell Hair would have done what he did on Sunday if the bowling team were Australian or English. Umpire Hair should be asked why he chose not to warn Inzamam before deciding that the ball used by his bowlers had been tampered with. Surely, he (Hair) should have known the consequences of his actions and given his history with the Pakistan team it could have been interpreted by the latter to be a deliberate slight or provocation. He says he followed the laws governing the game and that may well be the case but he failed terribly in exercising commonsense and good judgment. Most importantly, the umpires should be asked for specific evidence on which they decided to take action because the allegations are extremely serious and because those accused have vehemently denied them and are asking for proof since the cameras seem not to have detected any such thing.

Editorial the news – Pakistan
28.08.06



The ball is now firmly in the court of the International Cricket Council (ICC), an organisation not known for clear thinking. The Pakistan board has repeatedly told the ICC that it has no faith in Darrell Hair, going so far as to request that he should not be appointed for any matches involving Pakistan. The ICC, in its wisdom, instead ensured that Hair featured in some of Pakistan’s most important matches in recent years. There is a widespread view that Hair is heavily biased, for whatever reason, against subcontinental teams, particularly Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Sunday’s controversy has only added to these fears. If the ICC supports Hair and further penalises Pakistan — which is highly likely — it must provide incriminating footage confirming that ball tampering did indeed occur. If none is forthcoming, it has to be ensured that the Oval Test was Darrell Hair’s last as an umpire.

Eiditorial Dawn- Pakistan
28.08.06


Pakistan only changed their mind at the behest of ECB officials and Mike Proctor. What this reveals of the ICC's communication skills nobody knows; presuming that the decision to forfeit the match had been taken by the umpires when they took off the bails at 5.00pm, did the match referee not speak to them before he negotiated with Pakistan a return to play? Apparently not, and it appears that for half an hour, only the umpires knew the result of the Test match. The crowds didn't know, viewers didn't, Pakistan didn't, the ICC didn't; and this of a result destined to be one of the most controversial in the history of the game.

Osman Samiuddin Editor Cricinfo - Pakistan
August 21, 2006



MEDIA IN UK


London - The controversial end to the Test cricket series between England and Pakistan dominated the front-pages of Britain's newspapers yesterday after the tourists forfeited the fourth Test at the Oval on Sunday.
The Independent dedicated its cover to Pakistani bowler Shahid Nazir holding a ball, under the headline "It's just not cricket!"
The result was, according to former England bowler Angus Fraser writing in The Independent, "the day cricket spun out of control".
The newspaper even dedicated an editorial to the chaos at The Oval, lamenting: "A cricket match should not end like this."
"Whatever turbulence rocked the world, one thing could be relied upon: A Test match was a Test match and a Test match was cricket."
"It was played in whites; it paused for lunch and tea; and a player walked back to the pavilion without demur, however preposterous the umpire's ruling."
The Daily Telegraph put the sport on a considerably lower pedestal, declaring that "cricket proved yet again that it is capable of wrapping itself so thickly in politics, race, argument and drama that it resembles anything but a sport synonymous with fair play."
The Times laid the blame squarely at the feet of the sport's governing body, the International Cricket Council.
The Guardian said umpire Darrell Hair already had a "knife-edge relationship" with the tourists, ruling Inzamam run out in a Test in November, and disallowing Salman Butt a crossing run for running.
Meanwhile, as if lost in the news of the forfeit, the Financial Times reminded its readers: "Academic as it seemed, England were making good progress towards saving the game by making Pakistan bat again." - Sapa-AFP

THE STAR
August 22, 2006 Edition 2

"For a start they should have an enquiry into this and Darrell Hair should prove that there was ball tampering."If he cannot prove this, the Pakistan team are entitled to take him to court for defamation. "If I was the captain I would have seriously taken him to court for calling my team and me cheats." However, Imran feels the decision to stay in the dressing room instead of returning to the field was not the correct course of action. He feels Pakistan should have carried on and completed the match and then stated their case at a press conference afterwards.

Imran khan to sky sports
21 Aug 2006



Bob Woolmer’s view is that any allegation of ball-tampering should be explained by the umpire to the captain on the pitch at the time it occurs. “This incident is harming cricket and that is what I do not like,” Woolmer said. “Considering that the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) wrote to the ICC before the series, asking, in so many words, that Hair should not stand, if possible. I did not have the chance to talk to him on Sunday. However, if I do this week, naturally I shall ask him what proof he had that there was tampering to the ball.”

The times

MEDIA IN SUB- CONTINENT

By playing, even under protest, Pakistan would have only submitted to the grave injustice which came sans any evidence. By playing on without protesting the way they did, they would have only given in to the race and region specific profiling which is against the very spirit cricket is ingrained in. Even if Pakistan had won the Test, where they held the upper hand throughout, it would have been a tainted victory.
Instead, Inzamam's action has given Pakistan a high moral ground which Asians must make full use of. And thank him for it.

Atul Sondhi (Racial profiling of asian cricketers)
Hindustan times August 22, 2006

A Story With Moral

A water bearer in China had two large pots, each hung on the ends of a pole which he carried across his neck.. One of the pots had a crack in it, while the other pot was perfect and always delivered a full portion of water.

At the end of the long walk from the stream to the house, the cracked pot arrived only half full.

For a full two years this went on daily, with the bearer delivering only one and a half pots full of water to his house. Of course, the perfect pot was proud of its accomplishments, perfect for which it was made. But the poor cracked pot was ashamed of its own imperfection, and miserable that it was able to accomplish only half of what it had been made to do.

After 2 years of what it perceived to be a bitter failure, it spoke to the water bearer one day by the stream. I am ashamed of myself, and because this crack in my side causes water to leak out all the way back to your house.

The bearer said to the pot, Did you notice that there were flowers only on your side of the path, but not on the other pot's side that's because I have always known about your flaw, and I planted flower seeds on your side of the path, and every day while we walk back, you've watered them.

For two years I have been able to pick these beautiful flowers to decorate the table. Without you being just the way you are, there would not be this beauty to grace the house

Moral:
Each of us has our own unique flaws. We're all cracked pots. But it's the cracks and flaws we each have that make our lives together so very interesting and rewarding.

You've just got to take each person for what they are, and look for the good in them.

Saturday, August 19, 2006

FIRST LAW OF THERMODYNAMICS ???

DUBLIN, Aug 18: An Irish company threw down the gauntlet on Friday to the worldwide scientific community to test a technology it has developed that it claims produces free energy.

The company, Steorn, says its discovery is based on the interaction of magnetic fields and allows the production of clean, free and constant energy — a concept that challenges one of the basic rules of physics. It claims the technology can be used to supply energy for virtually all devices, from mobile phones to cars.

Steorn issued its challenge through an advertisement in the Economist magazine this week quoting Ireland’s Nobel prize-winning author George Bernard Shaw who said that “all great truths begin as blasphemies”.

Sean McCarthy, Steorn’s chief executive officer, said they had issued the challenge for 12 physicists to rigorously test the technology so it can be developed.

“What we have developed is a way to construct magnetic fields so that when you travel round the magnetic fields, starting and stopping at the same position, you have gained energy,” McCarthy said.

“The energy isn’t being converted from any other source such as the energy within the magnet. It’s literally created. Once the technology operates it provides a constant stream of clean energy,” he told Ireland’s RTE radio.

McCarthy said Steorn had not set out to develop the technology, but “it actually fell out of another project we were working on”.

One of the basic principles of physics is that energy can neither be created nor destroyed, it can only change form.

McCarthy said a big obstacle to overcome was the disbelief that what they had developed was even possible.

“For the first six months that we looked at it we literally didn’t believe it ourselves. Over the last three years it had been rigorously tested in our own laboratories, in independent laboratories and so on,” he said.

“But we have been unable to get significant scientific interest in it. We have had scientists come in, test it and, off the record, they are quite happy to admit that it works.

“But for us to be able to commercialise this and put this into peoples’ lives we need credible, academic validation in the public domain and hence the challenge,” McCarthy said. —AFP

Saturday, August 12, 2006

American media coverage of middle east

Part I



Part II

Friday, August 11, 2006

SEPARATING VIEWS FROM NEWS

The disruption of the alleged plot to blow up trans-Atlantic flights fails to reassure the world's press, with one pan-Arab paper warning that other UK cells might now act quickly before being discovered, while a Russian daily says further home-grown attacks are "practically inevitable".
A second pan-Arabic commentator echoes the concerns in several countries that past claims of foiled attacks were either false or "exaggerations", to serve what a Hong Kong paper calls "Bush's path of cowboy counter-terrorism".
ADIL DARWISH IN PAN-ARAB AL-SHARQ AL-AWSAT
The capture of this terrorist cell group may push other cells, that have for a long time been planning an operation and have not yet been detected by the police radar, to move quickly before being caught... Most of those arrested are British citizens by birth who embraced Islam, unfortunately, in mosques and centres controlled by extremists. The danger is that the youth has been brainwashed and no longer acknowledges national affinity with the country.
MIKHAIL OZEROV IN RUSSIA'S KOMSOMOLSKAYA PRAVDA
Most of those arrested are young people of Pakistani origin from Birmingham and London, over 20 people... But how many more terrorists are still at large? Experts here think a new attack is practically inevitable.
HUNGARY'S NEPSZAVA
The most shocking factor of the plot is that the participants in it are reportedly British citizens... Muslims living in the West and suffering from discrimination become alienated from the country that has received them and a sense of adversity and possibly hatred builds up in them... The West faces an almost impossible task, it must stop not just terrorism itself but the spiral of hatred too.
ABD-AL-BARI ATWAN IN PAN-ARAB AL-QUDS AL-ARABI
Past experience has shown that most reports of plots were intentional exaggerations to achieve political goals that serve the interests of the war which the duo - Bush and Blair - are waging against Islamic terrorism ... Tony Blair and George Bush are the real fascists... They are the ones who wage wars and commit war crimes in Lebanon, Iraq and Afghanistan where hundreds of thousands of innocent people are killed.
OKTAY EKSI IN TURKEY'S HURRIYET
What if this is also another claim without substance?... We remember the days following the terrorist tragedy in London last year on 7 July. The British police, upset by this event, had killed an innocent Brazilian electricity technician. Last June, 300 policemen broke into the house of a 23 year-old postman, shot him in the shoulder and caught his brother. Then it was understood that these had nothing to do with terrorism.
BRAZIL'S FOLHA DE SAO PAULO
The police operation which, according to the British government, foiled a terrorist attack on civil aviation, could give Prime Minister Tony Blair ammunition against critics of anti-terror measures in place since 2000... Mistakes by police following a "shoot to kill" policy resulted in the July 2005 killing of Brazilian Jean Charles de Menezes... Two months ago, the police arrested two Muslim brothers on suspicion of terrorism... Both were released without charge.
HONG KONG ECONOMIC TIMES
The wrong path of the eye-for-an-eye, US-led war on terror has helped terrorism to expand instead... Although Bush's path of cowboy counter-terrorism may be played for a while, it will only increase hatred, encourage terrorism, and spread disaster to the whole world.
MUSTAFA BALBAY IN TURKEY'S CUMHURIYET
Prevention of the plans for airplane operations in the UK is worrying because it demonstrates the level of power reached by the terrorist organisations. The initiatives of the global powers to dominate the whole world and crush even the smallest opposition bring hate and violence. One feeds the other.
AHMAD RAJAB IN EGYPT'S AL-JUMHURIYAH
I wish that President Bush and Tony Blair would ask themselves one question: why were British planes flying to the US chosen? Despite all the evidence, will the Americans and the British learn from this lesson? I doubt it.
KENYA'S STANDARD
British intelligence, police and anti-terror sleuths, working closely with their American counterparts, struck terrorists a major blow by foiling their plan and, better still, saved the lives the terrorists sought to take. The lesson? The war on terror must continue for it is far from won.

SKY NEWS - BY GEORGE GALLOWAY (British MP)

Sunday, August 06, 2006

DON' T HAVE E-MAIL ADRESS

A jobless man applied for the position of "office boy" at Microsoft.
The HR manager interviewed him then watched him cleaning the floor as a
test.
"You are employed."
He said." Give me your e-mail address and I'll send you the
application to fill in, as well as date when you may start."
The man replied "But I don't have a computer, neither an email."
I'm sorry", said the HR manager, "If you don't have an email, that
means you do not exist. And who doesn't exist, cannot have the job."
The man left with no hope at all. He didn't know what to do, with only
$10 in his pocket. He then decided to go to the supermarket and buy a
10Kg tomato crate.
He then sold the tomatoes in a door to door round. In less than two
hours, he succeeded to double his capital. He repeated the Operation
three times, and returned home with $60. The man realized that he can
survive by this Way, and started to go everyday earlier, and return
late Thus, his money doubled or tripled every day. Shortly, he bought
a cart, then a truck, then he had his own fleet of delivery vehicles.
5 years later, the man is one of the biggest food retailers in the US.
He started to plan his family's future, and decided to have a life
insurance.
He called an insurance broker, and chose a protection plan. When the
conversation was concluded, the broker asked him his email. The man
replied, "I don't have an email". The broker answered curiously, "You
don't have an email, and yet have succeeded to build an empire. Can
you imagine what you could have been if you had an email?!!"
The man thought for a while and replied, "Yes, I'd be an office boy at
Microsoft!"
Moral of the story:
M1 - Internet is not the solution to your life.
M2 - If you don't have internet, and work hard, you can be a millionaire.
M3 - If you received this message by email, you are closer to being an
office boy,
than a millionaire..........
Have a great day!!!

Saturday, August 05, 2006

SOME CORPORATE LESSONS

Lesson Number One
*****************
A crow was sitting on a tree, doing nothing all day.

A small rabbit saw the crow, and asked him, "Can I also sit like you and do nothing all day long?"
The crow answered "Sure, why not." So, the rabbit sat on the ground below the crow, and
rested.

All of a sudden, a fox appeared, jumped on the rabbit and ate it.

Management Lesson:

To be sitting and doing nothing, you must be sitting very, very high up.
____________________________________________________


Lesson Number Two
*****************
A turkey was chatting with a bull. "I would love to be able to get to the top of that tree," sighed the turkey, "but I haven't got the energy."

"Well, why don't you nibble on some of my droppings?" replied the bull. "They're packed with
nutrients."

The turkey pecked at a lump of dung and found that it actually gave him enough strength to reach the
first branch of the tree.

The next day, after eating some more dung, he reached the second branch.

Finally after a fortnight, there he was proudly perched at the top of the tree. Soon he was promptly spotted by a farmer, who shot the turkey out of the tree.

Management Lesson:
Bullshit might get you to the top, but it won't keep you there.
_______________________________________________________

Lesson Number Three
******************

A little bird was flying south for the winter. It was so cold, the bird froze and fell to the ground in a large field.
While it was lying there, a cow came by and dropped some dung on it. As the f rozen bird lay there in the
pile of cow dung, it began to realize how warm it was.
The dung was actually thawing him out! He lay there all warm and happy and soon began to sing for joy.

A passing cat heard the bird singing and came to investigate. Following the sound, the cat discovered the bird under the pile of cow dung and promptly dug him out and ate him!

Management Lessons:
1) Not everyone who drops shit on you is your enemy.
2) Not everyone who gets you out of shit is your friend.
3) And when you're in deep shit, keep your mouth shut!

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

INVISBLE WORLD

LONDON, July 31: It’s unlikely to occur by swallowing a pill or donning a special cloak, but invisibility could be possible in the not too distant future, according to research published on Monday.

Harry Potter accomplished it with his magic cloak. H. G. Wells’ Invisible Man swallowed a substance that made him transparent.

But Dr Ulf Leonhardt, a theoretical physicist at St Andrews University in Scotland, believes the most plausible example is the Invisible Woman, one of the Marvel Comics superheroes in the Fantastic Four.

“She guides light around her using a force field in this cartoon. This is what could be done in practice,” Leonhardt told Reuters in an interview.

“That comes closest to what engineers will probably be able to do in the future.”

Invisibility is an optical illusion that the object or person is not there.

Leonhardt uses the example of water circling around a stone. The water flows in, swirls around the stone and then leaves as if nothing was there.

“If you replace the water with light then you would not see that there was something present because the light is guided around the person or object. You would see the light coming from the scenery behind as if there was nothing in front,” he said.

In the research published in the New Journal of Physics, Leonhardt described the physics of theoretical devices that could create invisibility. It is a follow-up paper to an earlier study published in the journal Science.
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