Revolusi dunia arab

Saya turut bangga atas kebangkitan negeri-negeri arab melawan pemimpinnya yang dzalim. Anehnya ada saja pandangan yang mengatakan kalau aksi mereka adalah provokasi atau ditunggangi oleh yahudi dan amerika. Anehnya lagi pandangan ini disampaikan oleh sesama muslim yang cukup berilmu.
Tega-teganya sesama muslim berprasangka buruk kepada saudaranya yang sedang menyabung nyawa berjuang melawan penguasa yang dzalim.

Masih teringat dua minggu yang lalu ketika jumatan di masjid Estrecho, seruan doa untuk Libya yang disambut dengan "amin" yang mampu membuat saya merinding, menggetarkan sanubari.

Learning math by writing program

A bright idea grab from a talk below. In general he is questioning the mathematics curriculum in this computer age. One suggestion is instead of teaching students to have magnificent skill being computing machinery, it would be better if students are taught to develop that machinery by writing a computer program.

However there is a question left, how we can teach student to have skill for solving basic problems that usually solve without any tool. I feel somehow there are something can be learnt by learning this skillful calculating machinery that might develop our understanding in other field of knowledge.

modest

Just lost important entries on my pda! Apparently a pair of AA batteries can last for two months in this m105.

In today's modern society, it is very rare to see women in modest dress. Even in muslim society, fully veil covered young women still often reveal other part of their body for the sake of up to date fashion.

Few days ago I saw two mormon LDS women missionary on the train. They are young, in the beginning of twenty, wear long skirt, modest dress, just so beatiful. Even thogh I don't agree with mormon religious teaching, as Catholics also consider that it is cult, I really admire their modest dress code. I wonder how hard to live those way of life in this so secular society.

I rarely saw mormon women, but I often saw the young men. They wear modest dress code as well, formal suit, with tie, helmet and bicycle. Here is a movie about this young mormon men during their missionary journey, in comedy plot though, the best two years.

Some Jewish orthodoxes also have modest dress code, here is an example. A good example of humble language, instead of harsh and arrogant that we often see in many religious places.

U or V

It has been long time I curious about latin words that have no 'u'-letter. I wonder how 'u' and 'v' are interchange. Finally I got the clue after I learnt Italian pronounciation. Italians pronounce 'v' exactly as 'u' in today's languange. Therefore 'u' can be eliminated just like in old latin alphabet. A concise example is the word 'university'. By pronouncing it as 'uniuersity', it will sound almost the same, thus since latin doesn't have 'u', it is written as 'vniversity'.
Apparently the same argument applies to 'y' and 'i', Yves, Ysabel and so on.

last edited:24 March 2011

young man

It was in a city bus in nothern Italy. A twenty something man with his at most 10 years old brother. Apparently come from low class Italian family. On a very short time stalking, I really admired them. A very touching moment of heartbreaking conversation. How the the little brother reluctantly left his brother, and how the big brother advice him to hurry go to school and tell him that he must go for working. Wisdom is everywhere.

Woman

A touching scene of Bjork's movie last night, "dancer in the dark", made me realize how tough women are. Her child asked her "Why do you keep asking me stupid questions?". I feel really angry and sad to hear that. Angry for the rude question and sad for it somehow resembled myself. Suddenly a really deep sorry clung me. So bad I've treated the woman who always loves me unconditionally.
Forgive me God, forgive me Mom.

A tiny present in women's day.

last updated: 24 March 2011

citation

Nashiruddin Al-Albani. Here is the wiki entry. I shall not give any opinion about his relation to wahabbism or his teaching and judgement on hadits that are considered to be valid for centuries long. I shall only remark his very good and strict understanding of 'sanad' to comprehend Hadits.
He used very strict scientific approach to examine the validity of hadits. Since hadits is not 'provable', its validity depends on the credibility of every person who are listed on citation. Their honesty, ability to remember or even morality are measurements of their credibility.
Al-Albani re-discovered that there are many well known hadits which do not have credible citation path, so these hadits are considered as weak or even fabricated. This finding left a great legacy to give citation on every occasion when a hadits is told, so audiences can examine its correctness by themselves.
The notion of citation also closes the opportunity of miraculous twisted religious teaching. But it opens opportunity of ordinary people who have knowledge to argue with 'holy' people. Using the help of technology, this act is even easier, therefore single interpretation that might be twisted can be avoided. Everybody will be able to contribute and argue logically, regardless their background knowledge. However it may ignite reluctancy to people who think that ordinary people CANNOT interpret religious teaching. Only the ones with broad knowledge are allowed to do that. Agree with that, however when these 'knowledgable holy' people issue a decree that has no valid citation or cannot be inferred from valid citation then this kind of decree should be simply rejected.

India

This country is really incredible! Behind a such kind of a country there must be incredible people.
Anywhere you go visiting education or research center, very probably you'll find Indian. This achievement is impossible unless they have a top notch education system.
Amid the very diverse culture, religion and civilization, India steadily grows and overcomes her problem. Having billions of population, one can argue this number of smart people might be merely a matter of probability. Moreover there are uncountable problems there. However this statistics is somewhat too good to be compared against other developing countries.
India has many good universities, which are scattered in various states. Then each year many of their alum go to university abroad, and some of them are the best university. Still this is not the picture of India education in general, which is pretty bleak actually. However they already have many university graduates as locomotives.
Despite bleak education quality, India succesfully educate her people about equality, and merit system. The result can be seen on goverment cabinet composition, which is full of professional with various race and religion background. Apparently these people are the ones who drive India to the bright path. Unlike the case of less mature developing countries, India elites succesfully ditch their personal greedy interest and put their people and future interest on the first place. I argue that this implies the people who vote them as well. Instead of vote and install political clowns, they pick up professionals graduated from famous major university around the world. Democracy and education must go in parallel to get this effect. Without education, democracy will only be a stimulator for destruction, because it will only give opportunity to cunning politician to represent and rule people who do not have any idea how important their votes are.

retrospect

Akhir-akhir ini sering mendengarkan kuliah singkat beberapa peneliti dari berbagai bidang ilmu komputer. Sangat menarik, membuka wawasan dan sangat mengesankan. Namun jika mengingat kondisi tanah air hal semacam ini hanya membuat sedih saja. Ingin rasanya menjadi seperti mereka, namun sepertinya tidak mudah lagi, mengingat keterbatasan background knowledge yang dimiliki, dan berbagai hal lain yang sepertinya merupakan pembenaran akut atas berbagai kemalasan dan kegagalan.

Ketika kuliah S1 saya cuma mediocre yang harus rajin konsultasi kepada para master untuk bisa dapat nilai baik, sehingga saya tahu betul betapa cerdasnya teman2 saya yang lebih pintar. Andai mereka berdiri di depan ruangan seminar menjelaskan penelitiannya, atau duduk mendengarkan kemudian setelah seminar saya bisa tanya mereka seperti masa kuliah dulu. Kadang saya berharap alangkah beruntungnya jika nanti anak2 kita dididik teman2 kita yang cerdas2 itu dan negeri ini dipimpin oleh mereka. Sayangnya dunia nyata tidak selalu menghargai kesetiaan para pencinta ilmu pengetahuan. Tuntutan kebutuhan dan lingkungan membuat mereka harus bekerja untuk Boston, McKinsey, accenture, E&Y, Total, Chevron dan sejenisnya. Walaupun ada pula yang spartan tapi jumlahnya tak seberapa. Beruntung jika jika spartan ini dari kalangan berada, tapi rasanya terlalu berat jika mereka dari kalangan masyarakat biasa.

Mungkin dengan program semacam ini bisa menghibur teman2 yg cerdas ini walaupun cuma sekedar sebuah foto mereka di depan menara eifel atau pisa di profile jaringan sosial. Membuka harapan bahwa kecintaan mereka pada ilmu yang mereka tekuni ada yang menghargai. Siapa tahu nanti mereka akan mewarnai lembaga2 akademik/riset dunia dan 10-20 tahun lagi memanggil adik2 kelasnya untuk bekerja sama, seperti yang dilakukan orang-orang India dan Cina, dimana 20-30 tahun lagi adik2 kelas itu bisa jadi anak2 kita.