LEDs that Burn 10 Times Brighter

Startup Soraa thinks it can make LEDs cheap enough to replace regular bulbs.

• BY PHIL MCKENNA

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Bright idea: Soraa's MR16 LED matches the output of a 50-watt halogen.

Soraa

LED lightbulbs promise a highly efficient, nontoxic, long-lasting alternative to today's incandescent and halogen lightbulbs. Lighting entire rooms using LEDs has, however, proved both technically challenging and expensive.

Soraa, a startup based in Fremont, California, has developed a new type of LED that it says generates 10 times more light from the same quantity of active material used in other LEDs. The company's first product is a 12-watt bulb that uses 75 percent less energy than a similarly illuminating 50-watt halogen bulb. Company officials would not disclose the cost of the bulb, but say it will pay for itself in less than one year through energy savings. 

LEDs contain a semiconducting material that lights up when current passes through it, and are commonly used for low-light applications such as illuminating computer screens.

LEDs are usually made by growing a thin layer of gallium nitride on top of a sapphire, silicon carbine, or silicon substrate. Soraa takes a different approach. It uses gallium nitride for the substrate. This reduces a mismatch in the crystal structure between the two layers, which causes the performance of LEDs to diminish as current densities increase. By reducing such mismatches, or "dislocations," by a factor of 1,000, Soraa officials say they can push 10 times more current through a given area of active layer material. The increase in current density results in a tenfold increase in LED brightness.

Gallium nitride is significantly more expensive than either sapphire- or silicon-based materials, but the increased output more than makes up for the added cost, says Soraa CEO Eric Kim. "We have a simple, highly dense light source that reduces system design, making it the most cost-effective light, period," Kim says.  

Other 50-watt-equivalent LED lights typically combine multiple LEDs into a single bulb. The increased brightness of Soraa's LEDs means it only has to use a single chip or diode.

Soraa's LEDs could prove to be expensive, however. Colin Humphreys, director of research at the University of Cambridge's Department of Materials Science and Metallurgy, says growing gallium nitride in bulk is difficult and time-consuming.

"I pay about $30 for a six-inch diameter silicon wafer or a two-inch diameter sapphire wafer, and about $500 for a one-inch diameter gallium-nitride wafer," he says. Humphreys foundedCamGaN, a startup developing LEDs that use gallium nitride on a silicon substrate. The company was recently acquired by Plessey Semiconductors.  "[Soraa] may well be able to produce gallium-nitride wafers more cheaply, but surely not at the same price as for silicon and sapphire."

Kim says Soraa has a novel method of fabrication that significantly reduces the cost of gallium-nitride production. He adds that the cost of substrate is only a "single digit percent" of the total cost of the company's bulbs. Soraa has received more than $100 million in startup funding, and plans to ship its first bulbs for commercial applications by the end of this quarter.

Upgrade Your Hard Drive to Infinite Size

A competitor for Dropbox offers a way to seamlessly link your computer to the cloud.

TOM SIMONITE 

I wrote last year about a startup offering a simple program that used cloud storage to trick your computer to behave as if it had infinite storage space. Now invites to a trial version of that program, Bitcasa, are starting to trickle out.

I was lucky enough to receive one and tried out both the Mac and Windows versions, of which the latter is described as “alpha” and seems not fully polished. But going by the experience of using the Mac version, Bitcasa is promising. I downloaded a 27 megabyte application and a few seconds later was being told by the Finder that I had a hard drive with over 500 terabytes of free space, an instant upgrade of more than three thousand times. In fact, Bitcasa will swallow as much data as you can push at it, I was told last year, but they weren’t able to hack an infinity sign (∞) into Mac OS.

Once you install Bitcasa it prompts you to choose which of your folders to “cloudify”. Cloudified folders are uploaded to Bitcasa’s cloud right away and get a Bitcasa logo added to their icons in the Finder. Any time you save, copy, or paste new files into a cloudified folder they also uploaded. The clever bit is what happens when you try and pile in more data than there is space for on your hard drive. Bitcasa arranges for some of your data to be stored only in the cloud, not on your PC, but it creates the illusion that all your files are stored locally. You can see them there using a file browser or a program’s open dialogue, but some files will be retrieved from the cloud when you try to open or access them.

That trick could make it much easier to manage a vast movie, music or photo collection larger than your hard drive, for example. Bitcasa could make them appear to be on your computer at all times so you could dig up an old song or photo with a few clicks. They'd take some time to download if you tried to open them, but it would be less hassle than using an external drive.

That design does create the capacity for you to be surprised by how long it takes to access a file, or even to find you can’t access all your data. Last year I heard their software would try and guess what you are most likely to need access to offline and make sure it's stored locally. I haven't used it long enough to tell if that's the case for the beta version. My guess is that Bitcasa’s success will hinge on how well they can help users deal with a service designed to be forgotten about that very occasionally reminds you of its existence in a frustrating way, when you can’t access your data.

It adds up to a very different proposition to Dropbox, which is priced in a way that encourages you to use it to sync important files you need frequent access to, not for long-term backups (The personal version offers 2 GB for free, 50 GB for $9.99 a month and 100 GB for $19.99 a month). Bitcasa also requires less reorganizing of how you manage your data because of it’s neat integration with your computer’s file system, rather than requiring you to put stuff you want synced in a dedicated folder.

Bitcasa aren’t talking to the press right now, but they did confirm in a tweet last month that Bitcasa is free to use during the beta period and will cost $10 a month afterwards last month. Mobile versions appear to be in the works, going by seeing tweets about the company hiring mobile developers. Bitcasa’s Twitter feed also teased forthcoming “Big news for gamers coming soon” earlier in the week. They haven't given any clues about how soon they will properly launch the service. Some beta users are being given invites to share, though. The first five people that click this link should receive one of my invites. If you get one, let us know in the comments how you liked Bitcasa.

Sai Katha (Hindi) - Shri Sai Baba Ka Shirdi Mein Dobara Aana

From Suicide to Redemption

“Or I will kill the ten-headed Ravana of great strength. Whatever has happened to Sita, at least her abduction will be avenged.” (Hanuman, Valmiki Ramayana, Sundara Kand, 13.49) rāvaṇam vā vadhiṣyāmi daśagrīvam mahā balam || kāmam astu hṛtā sītā pratyācīrṇam bhaviṣyati | The supporters of Hanuman    will rejoice at the mere mention of this verse. Screams of joy, adulation, victory, triumph, hope, and good feelings abound when those who love Hanuman hear the words of this verse, which is found in the sacred Ramayana   , the wonderful poem describing the pleasant and heroic acts of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Lord Rama   . Yet, ironically enough, this verse touches on the victory over mental demons of a seemingly ordinary monkey, a being not belonging to an advanced species. Hanuman is no ordinary figure, though, as his victory over the debilitating forces of evil concentrated on the island of Lanka are well documented in the Ramayana, with special attention given in its Sundara-kanda, or book of beauty. The Ramayana is about Rama, and since Hanuman is always tied to the Lord in consciousness, hearing about him is as good as having the Lord’s company. Who hasn’t suffered from the effects of mental demons every now and then? The Vedas, the ancient scriptures of India, account for every type of misery encountered in this world by grouping them into three categories. Adhyatmika miseries are those which arise from the body and mind. These pains would seemingly be the easiest to fix. For example, if we’re plagued by bad thoughts, just turn the situation around and think of good things. If we’re feeling sick, take some medicine. If we’re not getting enough sleep, just sleep more. Obviously the practical application of the solutions isn’t so easy. The mental demons are especially the toughest to get over, for as soon as negative thoughts creep in, a sea of sorrow starts to rise and fill up the mind until a large ocean has been created. The despondent individual, the owner of the mind, is stuck on one side of the ocean and the length and breadth of the water seem too vast to overcome. Finding your way into this helpless situation is not very difficult. You just need a few setbacks, grouped together, one after another. Then you need to start fearing what will happen if you never succeed, if you never find your way out. Think this way long enough and pretty soon you’ll find yourself in a situation where you want out. “O poor twisted me. I’m drowning in my sorrows and I have nothing to rescue me. Life has treated me poorly, as it seems that wherever I go, a black rain cloud constantly drenches me. No one else is wet; just me. In fact, because of my failures, so many other people are going to suffer. Therefore it is better if I just end it all, escape from the tumultuous life that I never figured out how to survive in anyway.” In this way the mind can go from a peaceful existence to the brink of suicide in a few short steps. The material existence is very conducive to this type of defeatist attitude. After all, the land is created with this defeat in mind. The jivas, the individual spirit souls basking in the company of the Supreme Person in His imperishable realm, have no need to leave their engagement, devotional service   . Only when there is a desire to compete with God, to surpass His abilities in creation, maintenance and destruction, can there result a negative condition. The threefold miseries of life only exist in a temporary world devoid of God’s personal association. What is the difference between personal and impersonal? The proprietor starts a business and sets the wheels in motion for its operation, but this doesn’t mean that he’s always at the jobsite. There is generally a stark difference in behavior between the days the boss is in the office and the days he isn’t. When the company owner shows up to work, everyone has to be on their best behavior, as they have to show him that they are working hard. Yet as soon as the boss leaves, it’s party time, provided that another strong hand of authority is not there to watch over everyone. If someone like this is present, their influence likely isn’t as great as the boss’s. Despite the differences in behavior, the presence of the owner is still perpetually there, as his proxies and energies keep the business running. Similarly, even if we deny the existence of God or just forget about Him because of being distracted with other work, it doesn’t mean that the Lord’s influence is not present. It is said that not a blade of grass can move without God’s hand. He created the material elements of earth, water, fire, air and ether and the subtle elements of mind, intelligence and false ego. He controls the heat and the rain, and He is responsible for the creation and destruction of the universe in repeating cycles. All of this information is there in the Vedas, and it shouldn’t be surprising to hear. In practically every spiritual tradition the same information is presented, except maybe not with as much detail. “O Arjuna, I control heat, the rain and the drought. I am immortality, and I am also death personified. Both being and nonbeing are in Me.” (Lord Krishna, Bhagavad-gita   , 9.19) The material world introduced miseries because the boss, the Supreme Lord, is not personally present. He has expansions and different manifestations that reside within every atom, but this influence doesn’t necessarily direct anyone towards anything. For example, in the living entity there reside two souls. One soul is the essence of identity and the other represents the Supreme Lord. Though God’s expansion, the Paramatma, is responsible for all the visible results we see, it is the individual atma, the soul, that takes responsibility for driving the ship, deciding where to go and what to do. The Supersoul has no say in this, as He is an impartial witness, simply watching everything going on and waiting until the day when the individual soul will turn its mind towards spiritual life. In the imperishable land, there is no distinction between personal and impersonal. God’s features, pastimes, names and other things directly relating to Him are not hidden. Nor is anyone there aloof to His presence. Rather, everyone engages in working for His pleasure. Even if He is not directly in front of them, they think of Him nonetheless. With the Supreme Lord thinking about Him is as good as being with Him. In this way even if one is trapped in a material realm and suffering from the threefold miseries of life, they can turn their area into a replica of the spiritual world by acting in the Lord’s interest. How do we do this exactly? Moreover, how do the effects manifest? We can take the wonderful Shri Hanuman as an example to learn from, though his behavior should not be directly imitated. The great ones make it look easy, but if anyone were to try to repeat their feats of strength and bravery, they would come up short. Hanuman was purposefully put into the situations he found himself in by the hand of God, because the Lord knew that Hanuman was up to the challenge. Though God, who is known as Krishna in His original form, does not have a personal presence in the material land, He can choose to make appearances in it whenever He wants. Depending on the time and circumstance, He will take on different spiritual manifestations. In the Treta Yuga, Krishna appeared as the pious and handsome prince of Ayodhya, Lord Rama. One way to tell if someone is God is by noticing their exquisite beauty. Rama was a warrior prince, and for an important period of time in His life He roamed the forests without any royal garb. In fact, the stipulation was that He had to roam around like a beggar, though He was allowed to take His weapons with Him, His bow and arrow set. Yet even when roaming the forests, Rama looked more beautiful than anyone else. Accompanied by His wife Sita Devi    and younger brother Lakshmana   , Rama’s beauty increased all the more. When the different villagers would see Rama and Lakshmana walking by, they would remark that the creator must have first made them and then used whatever he had left over to populate the rest of the world. Those with a pure vision could become immediately liberated from the pangs of material existence by seeing Rama and Lakshmana. Devotion to God as a practice is known as bhakti-yoga, or devotional service. There are specific tastes that come from this interaction, tastes only available to those who recognize, honor and cherish the personal forms of the Supreme Lord, understanding that He is a personality just like everyone else. In the abstract vision of God or in the impersonal mode of worship, the transcendental tastes are absent. Hence these other paths are always inferior to bhakti. Looking upon the Lord with amazement and feeling a thrill throughout the body is one method of worship, but service can also manifest through direct acts, work performed for the Lord’s satisfaction. This was the route taken by Hanuman. His work was no ordinary business either. Playing out her role in the dramatic, real-life play that is the Ramayana, Sita was taken away from Rama’s side by a powerful king named Ravana. Rama was the greatest bow warrior in the world, so Ravana knew he couldn’t defeat Him in battle. Struck as he was by the impulse to have Sita, the most beautiful woman in the world, for his wife, Ravana devised a plan where he could take Sita away without anyone knowing. When it came time later to find His wife, Rama enlisted the help of a band of forest dwellers residing in Kishkindha. They were mostly monkey-like, but they had many human features and tendencies as well. Hanuman was the most capable of these warriors, so he was tasked by Sugriva, the king of these Vanaras, to look for Sita and return the information of her whereabouts to the camp. Though given the task by Sugriva, Hanuman was essentially performing devotional service for Rama. Long story short, Hanuman ended up in Lanka, Ravana’s remotely situated island. Hanuman was all by himself; no one was there to help him. No telephone to use to call home. No text message to send to get advice. He had to find Sita using his tremendous skills, which included an unmatched fighting prowess, a keen intellect, and mastery over every mystic perfection of the ancient system of yoga. As endowed as he was in these areas, Hanuman’s greatest strength was his devotion to Rama. This is what initially enabled him to infiltrate Lanka without being noticed. He searched and searched, but he couldn’t find Sita. Lest we think devotion to God is all roses and lilies, Hanuman then quickly fell into a depressed state. His love for Rama coupled with his failure to find Sita made him sadder than ever. Though he had such wonderful abilities and had already exhibited tremendous feats of strength and heroism, he essentially hated himself for not having found Sita. Obviously, none of this was his fault, for what had he done wrong? He did everything asked of him. Ravana was the one who took Sita, so he was really to blame. Nevertheless, Hanuman decided that if he returned to Kishkindha a failure, everyone else would soon quit their bodies. Rather than be responsible for that, Hanuman thought it would be better to just starve himself to death. This way he would give himself the proper punishment. He was on the brink of suicide. Then he thought to himself some more. He correctly decided that if he should quit, so many bad things would happen. If he continued to fight on, however, at least there would be a chance of succeeding. This is the rule to live by. The Paramatma is always residing within us, so as long as the life breath is there, there is an opportunity to connect with Him, to make the most of the human form of life. With death we have no idea where we will end up next. There is no guarantee that we will even get the opportunity to try to understand God and the need for worshiping Him. Deciding that living was better, Hanuman still couldn’t get over his sadness. That Sita wasn’t found was really bothering him. In the above referenced verse, we see him change course, reawaken from his temporary slumber. Hanuman decided that if he was going to fail, he was going to take Ravana down with him. Hanuman is described as having tremendous fortitude and being an elephant among monkeys. One would have to be courageous to continue to fight, especially when they were just on the brink of suicide. Hanuman is the most powerful person, and he only uses his strength for good. If Sita were no longer living, Hanuman would get revenge by taking out Ravana. Who was Ravana to escape punishment? Why should Hanuman have to suffer while Ravana continued to live? Through this wonderful passage Hanuman once again reveals his unmatched level of devotion to Sita and Rama. His love for them is a thing of beauty. Though he roams the earth in the guise of a monkey, his portrait is flawless, bringing satisfaction to those who are dedicated to serving the Supreme Lord in thought, word and deed. Hanuman’s fortitude would enable him to emerge victorious, to find Sita and help in her eventual rescue. He showed us that even in devotional service there are severe ups and downs. But if our heart is situated in the right place, we will find the right course of action every time. Anyone who regularly remembers Hanuman and his devotion will be guaranteed to find redemption from the curse of material existence. In Closing: “Not finding her Sita may be gone, Sadness mind constantly dwells on. Ravana should escape, who is he? By me punished with death will he be.” From failure Hanuman first in sadness dove, Then thinking of success from despair arose. Ravana for his deed would not get away, The powerful Hanuman the demon to slay. In devotion Hanuman always to finish strong, His deeds and qualities daily dwell upon.

Most Extraordinary Building Architecture

The rise of State capitalism: new masters of the universe or an ominous portent?

  

The Visible Hand of the government
‘The Visible Hand’ was the title which the famed London-based economics weekly, The Economist, used when it published a special report in its issue on 21 January 2012 on the rise of state capitalism in the modern era.
The title has a pun: The governments do not care to hide what they do when they interfere in an economy, because they think that they are all powerful and can do anything openly.

The markets which are more powerful than governments do their work subtly without being seen by anyone, as conceptualised by Adam Smith, father of modern economics, with the publication of his masterpiece ‘The Wealth of Nations’ some 236 years ago.Hence, the choice of the title by The Economist implies that it is now a battle between the visible hand of the government and the invisible hand of the free market system to rescue the world from the current economic malaise and thereby deliver prosperity, sustainability and super-living to people.
China’s success story resurrects state capitalism
Taking the readers through the most successful story of state capitalism today, China’s admirable growth record in the last three decades, The Economist has drawn attention to the rise of state capitalism in other parts of the world which it calls the state capitalism’s global reach making it ‘the new masters of the universe’.
There has been a temporary receding of state capitalism in 1990s after the collapse of the Soviet Union and its satellite states that had inspired many developing and emerging nations as the role model of state action.
However, with China’s success and the re-emergence of Russia as a nation of worth, state capitalism too has made a sudden and hasty come-back with a difference. According to The Economist, there are three reasons for its unexpected triumph over the free market system.
“First, it is developing on a much wider scale: China alone accounts for a fifth of the world’s population. Second, it is coming together much more quickly: China and Russia have developed their formula for state capitalism only in the past decade. And third, it has far more sophisticated tools at its disposal. The modern state is more powerful than anything that has gone before: for example, the Chinese Communist Party holds files on vast numbers of its citizens. It is also far better at using capitalist tools to achieve its desired ends. Instead of handing industries to bureaucrats or cronies, it turns them into companies run by professional managers.”
Thus, according to The Economist, “The invisible hand of the market is giving way to the visible, and often authoritarian, hand of state capitalism.” In other words, state capitalism has been viewed as the all-time saviour of the global economy thereby relegating the once powerful and admired free market economy system to an unimportant place in economic history.
Old adherents to state capitalism
State capitalism places its trust on the governments’ ability and its right to intervene in an economy in the name of providing benefits to people. The intervention takes place in the form of governments’ running commercial enterprises sometimes as state monopolies and sometimes in competition with private businesses and grabbing the wealth belonging to the people by using coercive powers.
History is not without adherents to this type of governmental intervention in economic activities simply to strengthen the powers of rulers, while providing welfare services to members of society as well.
The economic system which Kautilya, the 4th century BCE Indian economist and philosopher, advocated in his treatise on economics, The Arthashastra, was a typical state capitalism because he advised the king to run commercial enterprises, license private individuals to run certain enterprises under the king’s orders and grab private wealth if there is a severe shortage of resources in king’s treasury.
The king’s ability to grab the private wealth by coercion was a problem at that time too, because, the Buddha, 200 years before Kautilya, advised the householder Vyaggapajja, as canonised in the Anguttara Nikaya under a discourse titled Vyaggapajja Sutra, that householders should protect their hard earned wealth from kings who have an inclination to grab such wealth by using their coercive powers in the same way they protect their wealth from thieves, enemies, natural hazards and undesirable relatives.
The kings in ancient Lanka too practised state capitalism to the letter: All resources in the country belonged to the king and private individuals used them commercially subject to king’s permission and payment of due taxes to the king.
But the state capitalism practised today by governments is different from what was practised in the ancient past or even in the not-so-distant past by communist countries.
State capitalism checked by good governance in the past
In the ancient past, in this part of the world, though the kings had absolute authority, they were always guided by good principles of governance known as ‘Dasa Raaja Dharma’; Kautilya advised the king that “just as one plucks fruits from a garden as they ripen, the king should collect revenue as it becomes due because if revenue is collected before it is due, it will make people angry and spoil the very sources of revenue.
The Buddha praised the Lichchavi rulers because they had taxed people like a bee which sucked nectar from flowers without trampling them. Hence, governments could have powers, but those powers should be used to protect their subjects and not to put them to misery. Kautilya was very particular about this role of the king: He said that a king who observed the duty of protecting his people justly and according to law would go to heaven and those who failed would end up in hell.
Today state capitalism breeds bribery and corruption
In communist countries, state capitalism was exercised by resorting to all inclusive central planning and by using all governmental machineries for the production and distribution of the goods needed by people. The Soviet Union was one good example: there, from a little pin to a space rocket, everything was produced according to a centrally prepared plan which was implemented by governmental production units.
In India, during the times of Jawaharlal Nehru and his daughter Srimathi Indira Gandhi, all economic activities were directed by the government according to five year rolling plans and even the private sector businesses had to produce goods according to the production quotas set by the government through a wide spread permit system.
As Gurcharan Das, the author of India Unbound, says, exceeding those production quotas was a punishable offence and many an entrepreneur was sent to jail for committing that economic crime. In both countries and others that adopted this economic model, a very powerful bureaucracy was established which took individual liberty and freedom away from the people.
Worst was that in India, according to the Columbia University based economist of Indian origin, Jagdish Bhagwati, it led to an immutable system of those in power trying to earn extra benefits for themselves, which economists call ‘rent seeking’ and ordinary laymen ‘bribery and corruption’. When people observe that those in power could practise bribery and corruption with total impunity, they too try to join the powerful gang of people in politics and bureaucracy thereby giving birth to a bribery and corruption driven society.
Wider state capitalism: an attempt to control every aspect of human behaviour
This system could not continue to serve people for long as promised. Almost simultaneously in early 1990s, Soviet central planning collapsed and India had to start dismantling its ‘Permit Raj’. But today, against the worldwide economic calamities, state capitalism has raised its head once again in a new form: the expansion of government activities into commercial enterprises by using the fundamentals of free market system as practised by China and other countries that have embraced this new economic model.
Sri Lanka is one such country where state expansion has taken place rapidly in the last five years into almost all activities of human life from good personal behaviour to private consumption. This has taken place according to a set pattern of state capitalism as prophesied by American economist Murray Rothbard, a follower of Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises who wrote extensively on economics of human liberty along with other Austrian economists.
Murray Rothbard’s prophesy of state capitalism
According to Rothbard, state capitalism is directly in conflict with democracy, liberty and human freedom. In a book he published in 1962 under the title ‘Man, Economy and State’, he presented three types of state intervention under state capitalism by way of interfering in exchanges which people make for normal healthy life.
The first he called ‘artistic intervention’ under which a government intervenes in private non-exchange activities, that is, activities which have no market transaction completed by payment of a price, such as how people should behave, what they should consume and what they should not, what type of artistic activities they should engage themselves in, to what extent and how they should practice their religions, what type of information they should have access to and so on. In this manner, governments try to regulate even the thinking patterns of people.
The second intervention is the ‘binary intervention’. This refers to forced exchange between individuals and governments and in this intervention, private individuals have no choice but to patronise state monopolies, receive knowledge under state sponsored or run educational systems, accept moneys issued by governments though its value may be falling in the market, etc. Thus the government becomes the all-powerful authority of deciding how and what people should do in the market.
The third is the ‘triangular intervention’ under which private individuals have to have exchanges among themselves as mandated by the government. For instance, a government may decide that a private television station should not carry foreign produced TV commercials and under that restriction, private companies, TV stations and TV viewers have to be happy with only permitted TV commercials.
Rothbard: state capitalism is threat to liberty, freedom and democracy
It is obvious that Rothbard’s definition of state capitalism is much wider than the narrow definition of state capitalism used by The Economist. In terms of Rothbard’s definition, many countries today are in fact practitioners of state capitalism to varying degrees. Along with the rise of economic, cultural and spiritual nationalism, governments have tried to regulate practically every type of behaviour of their citizens. To Rothbard, this is a serious threat to human liberty and freedom.
Sixty years ago, the British writer George Orwell prophesied in a novel titled ‘1984’ the emergence of a world in which the governments would become extremely powerful by the year 1984 basing his creative work on the developments taking place in societies like those in the Soviet Union at the time of writing his novel. The year 1984 has now passed and the government could not play that powerful role as prophesied by Orwell in his novel; instead, the Soviet Union collapsed within six years from 1984.
However, the modern trend is that as Rothbard has prophesied, governments throughout the world have tried to impose their will on citizens in a subtle manner which does not go to the extent of the open extremism of George Orwell’s prophesy. But it has affected the individual behaviour, their creativity and innovative spirits adversely.
But how have the governments become able to impose their will on citizens? As Bhagwati has said of India’s bureaucracy which is bent on earning extra benefits for itself or earning undue rents, it is the bureaucracy itself that has rallied round governments to exercise their new powers on people.
Rothbard: no shortage of supporters to state capitalism
Rothbard in his 1980 book on ‘Power and Market’ has argued that under state capitalism the role of the government economists is immensely enhanced while in a free market system, the role of economists in general is limited, because everything is done there by the invisible hand in the market. But, under state capitalism, the size and the function of the government expand continually bringing about a similar expansion of the power and the role of the state economists too.
Since governmental interventions create new problems, the state economists have to find solutions for those problems; then, those solutions create new problems and state economists have to now find solutions to those new problems as well. So, solutions and problems expand like the spread of wildfires and, as a result, state economists become all powerful people in the society.
Rothbard argues that this simple self-interest prejudices the views of many economists in the state sector and therefore they become the fierce champions of state capitalism which their political masters have to just use for building up their own political base and power.
Self-created problems generate more problems
The corollary of the self-created problems breeding further problems in this way is the general tendency of state economists to look at free market economists disparagingly. According to them, free market economists are just ideologists devoid of practical experience and could talk on theories but cannot offer solutions.
But the state economists, according to their own rating of themselves, know both the problems and the solutions. What is missing in this rating is that those problems are created by themselves by unnecessarily interfering in the free market activities and there is no need for solutions had they not intervened in the market in the first place.
Rothbard’s Law: loss of focus leads to do one’s worst
This has led to the famous Rothbard’s Law in economics. This law says that if one loses focus on what one should do, one ends up in specialising in what one is worst at. In laymen’s language, the governments lose their focus by engaging in unnecessary interventions in economies.
These interventions create problems and governments have to now find solutions. The solutions also create problems because one mistake leads to another mistake. Eventually, governments and therefore state economists too specialise in creating problems for which they have to go on seeking solutions eternally.
Enlightened self-interest is no ground for creativity
State capitalism’s greatest weakness is the loss of creativity and innovative spirits of people who have power to decide on governments’ intervention in an economy. Since their self-interest which can be termed ‘enlightened self- interest’ because it is exclusively for their own enlightenment, there is no incentive for them to use their energy for being creative and innovative for the benefits of others.
Steve Jobs of Apple fame, according to his biographer Walter Isaacson, found fault with President Barack Obama because he was all up to please everyone, a tactic to promote his enlightened self-interest. Jobs is reported to have said that as long as USA has this policy of satisfying one’s enlightened self-interest, it loses its creativity and innovative spirit, the saviour of that country in its current economic malaise.
The new Masters of the Universe or what?
Will state capitalism be the new Masters of the Universe as claimed by The Economist? Yes and no. Yes, in the short run by helping a country to use all its energy and resources to produce more and more through concerted governmental action. Money is poured into projects in large amounts and economic activities start booming. So, everyone rallies round the government and promotes state capitalism further.
But in the long run? No, because state capitalism fails to identify priorities and allocate resources accordingly, the projects are chosen arbitrarily on whims and fancies of rulers, resources are wasted on the projects that are so undertaken, further resources are wasted to correct errors and justify those projects when there are criticisms against them, bribery and corruption are bred at all levels giving birth to a corruption tolerating society and above all, creativity and innovative spirits are killed because people are not encouraged to think differently. So, in the long run, the masters may not be able to maintain their master-ship unabated.
(W.A. Wijewardena can be reached at waw1949@gmail.com.)

Genes predict Parkinson spread

NEUROSCIENCE RESEARCH AUSTRALIA

Parkinson’s disease is the second most prevalent neurological condition after dementia. Image: STEEX/iStockphoto Two genes related to protein accumulation in the brains of people with Parkinson's disease can indicate how quickly the disease will progress in an individual, say NeuRA researchers. "Our study shows that these two genes can be used as a surrogate marker to estimate the rate of Parkinson’s disease progression, with positive predictive values of 94-100% for certain genotypes," says lead author of the study, Dr Yue Huang. "This finding could be important for guiding the development of therapies for Parkinson's disease," she says. Parkinson’s disease is the second most prevalent neurological condition after dementia. The disease is characterized by the abnormal accumulation in the brain of a protein called α-synuclein, as well as the loss of dopamine-producing cells in an area of the brain known as the substantia nigra. The loss of these cells causes the symptoms of Parkinson's, including trembling, stiffness, slowness of movement and a loss of fine motor control. Dr Huang, working with Prof Glenda Halliday at NeuRA, investigated two genes – NACP and MAPT – implicated in other studies as risk factors for Parkinson's disease. The NACP gene is related to the production of the α-synuclein protein in the brain, while the MAPT gene is involved in the production of another protein in the brain, called tau. By testing 123 patients with Parkinson’s disease to determine what version of NACP and MAPT they carried, as well as measuring the severity of their disease and how quickly their disease progressed, the team was able to demonstrate that certain versions (polymorphisms) of these genes interact to influence how quickly some patients with Parkinson's deteriorate. They found that those people with a variation of the NACP gene that predisposed them to producing high levels of the α-synuclein protein in the brain experienced more rapid disease progression. They also found, however, that patients who had low levels of α-synuclein, but a variation of the MAPT gene that meant they produced high levels of the tau protein, also experienced more rapid disease progression. "Based on current knowledge, it is perhaps not surprising that genetic variation predisposing to high α-synuclein expression gives rise to more rapid progression of Parkinson's disease," says Dr Huang. "However, our results suggest that low α-synuclein expression may also be as detrimental in people with high tau expression levels, calling into question the concept that reducing neuronal α-synuclein in all Parkinson's patients may be therapeutically advantageous." The study was published in the Journal of Parkinson's Disease. Editor's Note: Original news release can be found here.

எலும்பு தேய்மானத்திற்கான தீர்வுகள்

வயதான நபர்களுக்கு எலும்புத் தேய்மானம் வருவது இயற்கையான ஒன்று. ஆனால் உடற்பயிற்சியின்மை, உட்கார்ந்த நிலையிலேயே வேலை பார்த்தல், கால்சியம் சத்துக் குறைவான உணவு வகைகள் போன்ற காரணங்களாலும் எலும்புத் தேய்மானம் ஏற்படுகிறது. மனித உடலில் 206 எலும்புகள் உள்ளன. இந்த எலும்புகளில் மாற்றங்கள் தொடர்ச்சியாக இருக்கும். எலும்புகளுக்கான அடிக்கட்டமைப்பை புரதங்கள் வலுவாக்குகின்றன. கால்சியம், பாஸ்பேட் போன்ற மினரல்கள் எலும்புகளுக்கு இடையில் பரவி மேலும் வலு சேர்க்கிறது. இந்த இயக்கம் உடலில் தொடர்ந்து இருப்பதால் உணவில் அதிக கால்சியம் தேவைப்படுகிறது. இதற்கு சிறு வயது முதல் பால் மற்றும் பச்சைக் காய்கறிகள் போதுமான அளவு எடுத்துக் கொள்ள வேண்டும். நாம் உண்ணும் உணவில் உள்ள சத்துக்களை உடல் உட்கிரகித்துக் கொள்வதற்கான உணவு மற்றும் உடற்பயிற்சிகளை வழக்கப்படுத்திக் கொள்ள வேண்டும். எலும்பைப் பொறுத்தவரை அளவுக்கு மீறி அழுத்தம் கொடுப்பது மற்றும் விபத்துக்களினால் எலும்பு முறிவு ஏற்படும். காயங்களினால் ரத்தக்கட்டு உண்டாகும். மினரல்கள் இழப்பு காரணமாக எலும்புத் தேய்வு ஏற்படும். எலும்புத் தேய்வின் அறிகுறியாக உடலில் வலி ஏற்படுகிறது. எலும்பு வலுவிழக்கும் போது உடல் எடை முழுவதையும் தசைப்பகுதி தாங்குகிறது. இதனால் தசையும் பலவீனம் அடையும். உடல் சோர்வு, வலி, வீக்கம் ஏற்படலாம். மூட்டுப்பகுதியில் வீக்கம் உண்டாகும். உடலை அசைப்பதே கடினமாக இருக்கும். உடலில் நோய் எதிர்ப்பு சக்தி குறைய தொடங்கும். எலும்புத் தேய்மானம் ஏற்படுவதை தடுக்க கால்சியம் உள்ள உணவுகள் எடுத்து கொள்ள வேண்டும். மேலும் உடற்பயிற்சி செய்யும் போது எலும்புக்கு தேவையான தாதுக்கள் தசைப்பகுதியில் இருந்து உட்கிரகிக்கப்படும். இதனால் சத்தான உணவு சாப்பிட்டாலும் உடற்பயிற்சி கட்டாயம் அவசியம். இதில் எலும்பின் வலிமைக்கு தேவையான ஊட்டச்சத்துகள் கிடைத்து விடுகிறது. இதனால் எளிமையான நடைப்பயிற்சி, வீட்டு வேலைகள் மற்றும் தோட்ட வேலைகளும் இதற்கு கைகொடுக்கும். எலும்பு மற்றும் மூட்டுக்களில் வலி காணப்பட்டால் உடனடியாக மருத்துவரை அணுகி எலும்பு உறுதித் தன்மை குறித்த பரிசோதனை செய்து கொள்ள வேண்டும். இதன் மூலம் எலும்பில் தாதுக்களின் குறைபாடு அளவு அறிந்து அதற்கு தகுந்த சிகிச்சை செய்து கொள்ளலாம். பாதுகாப்பு முறை: சிறு வயது முதல் ஏதாவது ஒரு உடற்பயிற்சியை வழக்கப்படுத்திக் கொள்ளலாம். உட்கார்ந்த நிலையில் வேலை செய்பவர்கள் நடைப்பயிற்சி மற்றும் சைக்கிள் பயிற்சி மூலம் தங்கள் எலும்பை உறுதி செய்து கொள்ளலாம். உடல் எடை அதிகரிப்பின் காரணமாக எலும்பின் உறுதித் தன்மை குறையும். எலும்பின் உறுதி குறைந்து நோய் எதிர்ப்பு சக்தி இழக்கும் நிலைக்கு தள்ளப்பட்டு மற்ற நோய்கள் உடலை எளிதில் தாக்க வாய்ப்புள்ளது. பெண்களுக்கு மெனோபாஸ் ஏற்பட்ட பின்னர் ஈஸ்ட்ரோஜென் மற்றும் புரோஜெஸ்ட்ரான் ஆகிய ஹோர்மோன் சுரப்பு குறையும். இதனால் எலும்புத் தேய்வு ஏற்படும். கால்சியம் குறைபாடு ஏற்படும். எனவே இந்த சமயத்தில் பெண்கள் முழு கவனத்துடன் இருந்து கால்சியம் சத்துள்ள உணவுகள் எடுத்துக் கொள்ள வேண்டும். வயதானவர்களுக்கு ஆஸ்டியோபீனா எனப்படும் எலும்பு கொழகொழப்புத் தன்மை அடைகிறது. இதனால் உடல் எடையை தாங்க முடியாமல் கால்கள் வளைந்து விடும். ஆஸ்டியோபோரசிஸ் என்ற பாதிப்பால் கீழே விழுந்தால் கூட எலும்பு உடைந்து விடும். எனவே எலும்பின் உறுதியைப் பாதுகாப்பது மிகவும் அவசியம்.

புற்றுநோயை தடுக்கும் உண்ணாவிரதம்

சிறிய கால அளவிலான உண்ணாவிரதம் புற்றுநோயை தடுக்கும் என்று சமீபத்திய ஆய்வொன்றின் மூலம் தெரியவந்துள்ளது. இதுகுறித்து அமெரிக்காவின் தெற்கு கலிபோர்னிய பல்கலைக்கழகத்தில் நடைபெற்ற ஆராய்ச்சியின் முடிவுகள் தற்போது வெளியிடப்பட்டுள்ளன. சிறிய கால அளவிலான உண்ணாவிரதம் புற்றுநோயை தடுப்பது மட்டுமல்லாது, நாம் எடுத்து வரும் சிகிச்சையின் மூலம் கிடைக்கும் பலனை விரைந்து கிடைக்கச் செய்யும் என்று அவர்கள் தெரிவித்துள்ளனர். மேலும் புற்றுநோய் கட்டிகள் மற்ற இடங்களில் பரவுவதையும் தடுக்கிறது. கீமோதெரபி சிகிச்சையின் போது இந்த சிறிய கால அளவிலான உண்ணாவிரதம் இருத்தல், சில வகை புற்றுநோய்களையும் குணப்படுத்துவதாக அவர்கள் தெரிவித்துள்ளனர். இதுகுறித்த மேல் ஆராய்ச்சிக்கான பணிகள் விரைவில் தொடங்க உள்ளதாகவும், அதுகுறித்த பணிகள் நடைபெற்று வருவதாக ஆராய்ச்சியில் ஈடுபட்ட மாணவர்கள் தெரிவித்துள்ளனர். இந்த ஆராய்ச்சி குறித்து எலியை வைத்துக் கொண்டு சோதனை நடத்தியதாகவும், அதில் இம்முடிவுகள் வெளிப்பட்டதாக அவர்கள் தெரிவித்துள்ளனர். சாப்பிடாமல் இருக்கும் போது புற்றுநோய் செல்கள் ஓய்வுநிலை அல்லது உறக்கநிலைக்கு சென்றுவிடுவதாகவும், இதன்மூலம் அவைகள் பெருக்கமடைவது மற்றும் பிரிந்துசெல்வது தடுக்கப்பட்டு இறுதியில் அழிந்தும் விடுவதும் கண்டறியப்பட்டதாக அவர்கள் தெரிவித்துள்ளனர்.