Soma Purana

At yoga I know most of the people and others know me. We all feel the affection and warmth towards each other and look forward to seeing each other. I don't know a thing about them, but may be because we don't know anyone's financial status or education or anything else, there are no hangups, no judgment. It is just pure human to human warmness. Can't we be like that in general, not judging others or comparing with others but be kind and loving towards each other no matter what? 

I have seen bright lights, big screens but never saw before bright screens several stories high. With all that light in the city, it felt like the daytime. You could read a book comfortably in the street. May be I haven't been to NYC in recent years and with all the wall street boom and technology things have changed drastically. 

When my mother stayed with us in West Windsor for two years many years ago she would go for her walks everyday and hardly encounter people. I once took her to NYC in train. After we landed in Penn Station, she was dumbfounded. She asked me where did all these come from? She probably thought rest of America was like West Windsor. In NYC yesterday, I had the similar feeling. The crowd was like the twice the size I had seen before in NYC. I asked Raghu where did all these comes from? He said it is little bit more than usual and around 20% are tourists due to the holiday season.

Went to The Christmas Spectacular with the Rockettes last night. What an amazing show!!! Perfection to the tiniest detail. Among all performances I have seen in my life, this one ranks right at the top. Never, never miss seeing the Rockettes at least once in a lifetime. Radio City Music Hall is breathtaking. The NY crowd on almost the last day of the year is exhilarating! No wonder NYC is the greatest city in the world.

http://www.scotthyoung.com/blog/mit-challenge/

For the first time, did back to back two Bikram classes today, 8am to 9:30am and 10am to 11:30am. Months ago, I had to sit out some postures even in a single class. Today, I managed through all the postures in both classes. I felt I was sweating more in the 2nd class. But I did not feel super tired or anything. The second class felt just like the first class. I thought I would have to lie down when I came back, but don't feel tired at all. May be the feeling will come later, I don't know.

I stopped taking water bottle to the Bikram yoga. I found out I didn't need water. If it is there I would drink which is just a distraction and can only create discomfort in certain poses. I have been practicing total stillness in the postures and out of the postures. This does wonders in yoga practice. I still try to fix the towel when it gets crooked in some of the standing postures (like Triangle). I want to try to stop doing it and practice with crooked towel if it gets crooked.

I have seen many students do fixed firm quite easily. This was impossible for me for the first 7 months. Suddenly, in the eighth month, I was able to go down, and now I am comfortable with it. That does not mean I am doing it perfectly. It just means I now need to find out what little things I am doing wrong and fine tune it. Look at the picture below. For me it is bringing the knees closer, pushing the buttocks into the floor, creating that perfect human bridge. Never let the knees come off the ground.

One of the hardest (for me). Look at the picture below. I haven't seen anyone with such perfection. Neeraja is pretty good in this pose. The fundamental aspect most students ignore is locking the knee. Chin with shoulder and stretching and kicking are the next important aspects. Breathing cosciously, slowly, fully is, of course, paramount in all poses - that is a given. Instructors inform as long as you lock the knee, focus on breathing, stretch and kick with chin on the shoulder you get 100% of the benefit even if you don't look as good as in this picture.

Inspired by Sadhguru, I was thinking about this subject. A person might say he feels God rains misery especially on him. Let us take an example. Say, you are walking carrying an open container with sugar in the street. Suddenly it rains. All your sugar is destroyed and you feel miserable. Did the rain cause misery to you? Well a farmer who was awaiting rains is thankful it rained. The township folks are happy that lakes will get some water now. So, the rain is not the source of the misery. Rain happens. It does not have a purpose to cause misery to some or to cause joy to some. It is just a result of nature. You feel miserable because you saw another person who was also carrying sugar was not affected because he covered the sugar container. So the cause of the misery is he covered the sugar and you did not. You learned from this and the next time you covered the sugar. After rain, you still miserable because you got wet and another did not because the other person was wearing ...

One of my friends threw away his TV, a working, expensive TV. I asked him why he did that. He explained that he was spending too much time watching TV, he was kind of addicted to it. That affected his mind, he felt he was wasting to much of his time. It affected his marriage also. He finally decided, the only he won't TV is if there is no TV. That is why he threw it out. When I was young I used to watch too many movies in theaters and I would always feel bad particularly when I watched like two movies in a single day. I have been spending for little over a year now taking lots of MOOC courses learning a variety of subjects in the field of biology/genetics, physics, philosophy, and so on. So far, seeking knowledge has not created a headache or guilt. Perhaps even an activity such as this could cause tension if it reduces the attention I could pay to my work or family.

26-100 is the largest lecture hall in MIT. It is made immortal by the world famous teacher Walter Lewin. It is rare he won't mention 26-100 in everyone of his lectures. All MIT undergrads would have had 26-100 in their freshman/sophomore years. I want to make it a point to visit this famous room when I visit MIT. I have myself got entrenched (in a virtual sense)  in this room in the last few months as I pursued Lewin's Classical Mechanics MOOC.

This video is very old (1976) and in B&W.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSF651SRBLs This amazing what Iyengar can do at 59.

Very impressed with what I hear... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_EckS3qrVE http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDdUNeKTJWg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfSxB27Nexc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChTnwpkCMhg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3J-cYxxHQGQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjWU9l1mWsU http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMkOhmjJhk0  truly loved this. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uoIXz3KcwME  truly loved this. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHyYZy3kj0s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RyuT8ZlY_xA  This would be very useful for a company that is launching a an ambitious project to make it happen. I am beginning to love this mystic's experiential teachings.

This is black and white video, an hour long, made in 1976. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSF651SRBLs "Yoga is a complete subjugation or sublimation of waves of thought." "...in order to win this oscillations of mind..." What is health? In another interview ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCjEyjXO_Xw ) Iyengar lists different aspects of health, conquest of the body, conquest of the brain, conquest of the indriyas, conquest of the mind, conquest of the intelligence, conquest of the consciousness, conquest of the conscious. Until all these are conquered, one does not have holistic health, only compartments of health. " ...doing yoga comfortably..." "there are four types of practitioners, mild, average, intense, and keenly vehement." "Yoga is coming back to India." Amazing! It started in India thousands of years ago but it languished. It is the western involvement that is still changing yoga and the wind is now blowing in Indi...

I just watched  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JqYzcieCfM Brandy Lyn Winfield is awesome! I did see a few Bikram postures and many others are beyond Bikram. One thing I do recognize is her coolness and amazing smile through all the postures. Brandy is the 2010 US and World female Yoga champion. Jessica, my yoga teacher, keeps telling us to be still and relax in the yoga positions. This is a very difficult thing to do! Eventually one can, as Brandy aptly demonstrates. I think, Yoga is a state of mind more than anything. It is not contorting asanas or hard work or staying in the pain. I can say there is yoga in what Brandy does. Another outstanding yoga is by Kasper van den Winjngaard http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLBOsOt3qtc Kasper was 2010 world male champion. Look how still he is in these postures.

I read about recent UN sponsored World Happiness Report 2013. Happiness is hard to measure. As an emotion it is transient. As a measure of one's feeling about the general level of happiness with one's life as a whole, it is more stable. Bhutan was the first country that promoted the idea of setting country's policies with the intent to raise the index of happiness of its people. John Stuart Mill, an English Pholosopher in 1800s said " “It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied." I take it from this statement that Mill means that somehow being "Socrates" is more wholesome than being fat, dumb, and always happy. The fool might disagree with this. Only the person who is evaluated can say whether he is happy with his life. Of course, his criteria depends on his own values and character. The level of happiness of an individual is not entirely in the individual...

During the MOOC lull, I picked up to read an old book "The Assassins" by Elia Kazan. I have lost all interest in watching TV, many days I haven't watched a single minute of TV (today, for instance). I have mixed feelings about this book. All the same, it is thousand times better than watching meaningless TV shows.  I received a mail about and signed up for the MOOC course " How Viruses Cause Disease!" In the mail there was a statement, I thought I should repeat here  "... stimulating their brain with exposure to real science, rather than   watching yet another vapid, IQ-lowering reality show, and continuing the psychological descent into the twitching mass of consumerist jelly that is the product of the modern media enterprise..." I absolutely agree with the statement. Back to the book... Don't expect lots of murders, violence as the title might suggest.  Elia Kazan was a very famous movie maker  (directed famous movies Street Car Named D...

I got certificate recently for What a Plant Knows. I have also completed Georgia Inst of Tech Coursera course Applications of Engineering Mechanics, MIT EdX course Introduction to Philosophy and UAustin EdX course Take Your Medicine - The Impact of Drug Development and expecting the certificates soon. Once that is completed, I will update the MOCC Completion table (another post).

Pari is in India for 6 weeks. She left a week ago. I have started some cooking following various old recipe books. So far so good. My experience running the dishwasher was disastrous. I put dishwashing liquid in some compartment that said "Dry something.." At the end I had whole lot of soapy stuffy all around the dishwasher outside. I ran the dishwasher again.

The only MOOC in the remaining days is my Classical Mechanics by Walter Lewin of MIT.  Only three more lectures and the Final are remaining. 1 through 32 lectures, 10 quizzes, 3 midterms are already done. This has been a real tough course but an amazing experience! The Final is in early January and not much is left in the rest of December. I have had at one time 5 courses running in parallel so this is going to be somewhat boring next couple of weeks. I am planning to work my Calculus 2 preparation which I will be teaching at MCCC starting January 21, 2014.

Most are extraordinary. These would be the best teachers you ever came across. Some are not great teachers. But, I found every MOOC professor is extremely knowledgeable. So far, most enthralling MOOC professors I have had were Mohammed Noor (Duke), Eric Lander (MIT), Walter Lewin (MIT). Eric Lander was the best among the best. 

Out of 20 MOOCs I have completed thus far eight were extremely hard, the hardest I have encountered. Many were extremely easy requiring about a few hours of work every week. These courses start on different dates and run for different lengths of time. So, at times I have too many at the same time. I have had to drop some because it was just impossible to handle the work. For me, MOOCs that are not hard sciences are easy. The traditional hard sciences (biology, physics, math) require a lot of hard work. The hardest courses I have had were aught by professors at MIT, Duke, and Caltech.

When I started in September 2012 my first MOOC, it was just to try. Later as as I learned through genetic testing (go to 23andMe.com) that I carry two copies of APOE Epsilon 4 allele which increases the risk for Alzheimer's, I thought I would take MOOCs to keep my brain busy and fight the risk. First of all the risk is not certain; most risk assessment is based on European population and I don't have family history of AD. As I have completed 20 MOOCs I am just addicted. This is a lot of fun. The majority of the courses (11) are biology related. Three are related to nutrition and exercise. I found the biology courses helped me follow life science news stories that seem to get reported. I have had absolutely no exposure to biology in my schooling before and I found this field absolutely fascinating. If the choice were available to me I would have chosen genetics as my field. Quite a few courses I have taken are Physics or engineering courses. It is a thrill to reengage in ...

I started MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) on 9/17/12. My first course was "Introduction to Mathematical Thinking" by Keith Devlin of Stanford. The following is the list of courses I have completed thus far. I will keep adding to this list as I complete more. Most courses were from Coursera (www.coursera.com). I have begun to take some courses from EdX (www.edx.org). The EdX courses will be marked in Bold Red. Not all courses offer distinction.  The ones where I got distinction are indicated in the course title.           No. Course School Weeks Start 1 Intro to Mathematical Thinking (Distinction) Stanford 7 9/17/12 2 Intro to Genetics and Evolution (Distinction) Duke 10 10/10/12 3 Drugs and Brain Caltech 10 12/1/12 4 Nutrition for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention UC SF 6 1/28/13 5 Energy 101 (Distinction) ...

I am taking a MOOC on "Care of elders with Alzheimer's Disease..." One care giver / assessor went to a patient's house. The patient's wife had said that her father with AD was complaining that  the men in the red hats were coming to take him away and then he would rapidly decline from there. This happened every day at the same time in the evening. The assessor looked outside the window and saw  gorgeous baskets of red flowers on the porch...hanging baskets in line with the front window of the room we were just sitting in.  When the patient began his red hats men complaint the assessor went outside and removed the hanging baskets and returned to the house.  The patient completely  calmed down.  It appears the flowers were casting a red glow on the lower half of the living room window and when you looked at it from where he sat facing the wall, he was seeing the  reflection  of the red flowers which had a sort of hat shape. Often there are simp...

There is one specific microRNA called miR-122 which is specific to human liver. This is absolutely required for Hepatitis C virus (HCV) replication. If you take it away, the virus can't replicate. This is why HCV is hepatotropic (hepato- means special affinity to liver). Drugs that target miR-122 would be a good anti-viral therapy. Reduced miR-122 levels in the liver is associated with a rare liver cancer called hepatocellular carcinoma. HCV is a small enveloped + single-stranded RNA virus. miRs, generally, bind to 3'UTR repressing gene expression. But, miR-122 binds to 5'UTR of the viral mRNA stimulating viral proteins. It is amazing how viruses use host machinery for their own replication. When host cells (human) recognize a viral infection they induce apoptosis (programmed cell death or suicide) but viruses block apoptosis. Host cells tend to stop dividing upon infection, but viruses prevent cell cycle arrest. Human cells have numerous mechanisms to reduce and stop ...

Mary Jarvis conducted class + seminar again on 10/5/13 Sat at Plainsboro. This is after about a month from the last training. We were lucky to have to have it again. Unlike the previous one which was like 8 hours long, this was only 4 hours long. Of course she talks a lot during yoga; that gives plenty of time to rest. She is an amazing teacher. I benefited from this session much more than from the first one. A little tip she gave that I adopted completely transformed one of my postures and put me in the right direction. Neeraja and I attended the session. I have not missed yoga after returning from Navika program near Boston a little over a month ago.

A month ago, I attended all day Bikam yoga class+seminar by Mary Jarvis, one of the top Bikram instructors in the world. At the end of the day the class was over and she went into meditation. I was waiting for her to come out because I wanted to talk to her. I had to wait for long time. She sat meditating for 15 minutes or longer and was perfectly still.  I have no idea whether she was in "Ideal" meditation mode. As far me, I can say, it would be impossible to even just sit still for more than 2 minutes, never mid the thoughts. In Bikram yoga, we are supposed to practice meditation while in postures and while not in postures. This seems doable for me since the postures last for up to a minute and in between postures it is short 5 sec to 20 seconds. We never close our eyes. The idea is not shut of external stimuli but to "meditate" in spite of the stimuli.  My current definition of "meditation" is (a) be aware of what is happening around you and with...

You can't say "I will produce a masterpiece" and then produce it. It doesn't work that way. I read twice a masterpiece called Caine Mutiny by Herman Wouk and saw the movie too. The movie comes no where near the book. A masterpiece is a product that touches your nerve. It has the ability to obliterate the difference between reality and fiction. I was so impressed by Caine Mutiny I got hold of another of Wouk book Winds of War. It was a flop in my mind. There are exceptions of course. probably Shakespeare. Or, Kumaravyasa He could write thousands of truly masterpiece poems. I read Eric Ambler's Dirty Story which is a fabulous book. Again I was so impressed I bought another of his novels The Light of Day. That was great too. I got one more of his novels called Topkapi. All three Ambler's books I read were great.

I don’t consider doing nothing, just sitting on one’s butt fulfilling. I don’t consider doing what every Joe does fulfilling. I consider doing or at least try doing what every Joe doesn’t do fulfilling. A friend I know quit his IT job, does odd things. He decided one day to go to far north in snowy Himalayas to take a film-making course. How many people take film making course in Himalayas? He says, he “struggled alone.” I think struggling is the essence of life. Struggle and feel it. What is great in struggle-free? Like water flowing down a slope; that is just gravity, an external force moving you. It is more worthwhile trying to find a way to move by yourself, unaided. You will move little but it is entirely on your own. More fulfilling, more authentic. The wold is full of Joe’s. They are a sorry bunch, mindlessly moving together. Don’t expect any adoration from them. Why should you? You should feel pity for them. A couple of examples: I had a friend in IT, she got disg...

Saw Jobs in theater and Changeling on TV. I saw Steve Jobs in Bell Labs two decades ago. He had come to Labs to show his NEXT computer; he had left Apple at that time. I was blown away by the richness of his NEXT computer. I don't think he sold NEXT much at all. In fact I had seen one Next computer in Labs, one of the MTSs had it. I vividly remember Jobs' style. Seeing the movie reminded me of his walking style and his bent back stature. The movie was simply superb. It reflects American spirit and gives the viewer a glimpse of why America is great. America has at any time thousands of Jobs though not as spectacularly successful, but driven with zeal and energy all the same. Can you think of an invention in the last 50 years or so that came from a company outside of the US of A? I don't believe that people like Jobs, Gates don't exist elsewhere, but there is something in American culture and psyche that cultivates such men and women. The movie brought back sweet me...

On 8/17/13 Sat, all three of us (Pari, Neera, and me) spent time with Mary Jarvis at Plainsboro Bikram yoga studio. It was all-day affair. It started with the class which ran for more than 2-hours, but of course, with a lot of of time in between postures while Mary talked. After the class we had an hour-break. After the break, Mary spoke and spoke. There were many demonstrations of several postures by some outstanding students from Voorhees' studio  and Fenlon Lamb our instructor here. Mary made us redo some of the postures, but this time with special instructions. It was, all in all, a very good day spent.

Traditional purpose of going to a foreign country is sight seeing. I am personally not too interested in sight seeing. Once you have seen a tall building, you have seen all tall buildings. On the other hand, I feel the most rewarding part of touring a foreign country is observing and understanding the culture, how people interact. I visted Japan on business many years ago. Let me present some experiences. I stayed in a Buddhist temple during the time. My host Muso Tanizaki was the priest there. I had to leave my shoes at the door and place them neatly and facing the outside.  Muso took me to a restaurant that served priests. This was purely vegetarian. We sat in a little room just for two of us and were served for more than an hour by a Japanese lady continuously.  I visited Tokyo one day, got of the bus and asked a man the directions to go to Akihabara known as Electric Town. The man couldn't speak English and I couldn't quite follow his directions that he was attempt...

I finished reading "Team of Rivals" by Doris Kearns Goodwin. Goodwin is winner of Pulitzer prize. This book was written in 2005 but didn't get much attention until Spielberg's movie "Lincoln" loosely based the book came out 2012. I have read that there are over 15000 biographies of Lincoln. The movie focuses on just one aspect, Lincoln's backroom dealing to get the 13th amendment (abolition of slavery) to the US constitution. The book "Team of Rivals" is much more than that. Goodwin probes into the 1960 primary campaign and delves deeply into the characters of Lincoln and his primary rivals and then goes into, again deeply, into his presidency, civil war, his reelection, and ultimately his assassination. I found 100s of pages on the characters in the 1960 campaign hard to read but found out it is essential to understand the political genius of Lincoln, particularly, in his years as President. Lincoln brings in all three of his primary riv...

I want to report on my Bikram Yoga so it motivates me to keep going. After coming back from my vacation in India, I had to go to Wash., DC for training and that disrupted my Bikram for a few days. I restarted Bikram on 6/26/13. I hope to continue going everyday non-stop. Week of 6/23/13: 4 days Week of 6/30/13: 7 days 11 continuous days so far. Week of 7/7/13: 7 days 18 continuous days so far. Week of 7/14/13: 7 days 25 continuous days so far. Week of 7/21/13: 7 days 32 continuous days so far. Week of 7/28/13: 7 days 39 continuous days so far. Week of 8/4/13: 7 days 46 continuous days so far. Week of 8/11/13: 7 days 53 continuous days so far. 8/17/13 Mary Jarvis class and seminar Week of 8/18/13: 7 days 60 continuous days so far. Week of 8/25/13: 6 days 67 continuous days so far. [8/31/13: Sat in Worcester, MA. No yoga  (later made up with a double on 12/29/13)] [9/1/13: Sun Went to Bikram in Auburn, MA] [9/2/13: Mon. no Yoga  (later made up with a double on 1/...

When I learned CPR decades ago and was the caption of the first aid squad at AT&T Red Hill facility, the A-B-C (Airway-Breathing-Circulation) in this order was stressed. Not any more! It is now CAB (Circulation-Airway-Breathing).  Furthermore, mouth-to-moth is not required any more, especially, in bystander CPR. Just the chest compression at the rate of 90 to 100 per minute will do. Most effective depth of compressions =2 inches. 2 inches results in 100% resuscitation, and 1.5 inches results in 15% resuscitation.

Most people think heart attack and cardiac arrest are one and the same. They are completely two different things. In the case of heart attack, there is a blockage in the arteries that supply blood to the heart and as a result a portion of the heart muscle is starved of blood flow. The heart attack victim usually complain of chest pain, nausea, shortness of breath. There is cardiac activity in a heart attack victim.  YOU DON'T DO CPR ON A HEART ATTACK VICTIM. The treatment is aspirin, angioplasty, and other medications. In cardiac arrest, cardiac function *heart) suddenly stops. There is no cardiac activity. The victim suddenly collapses. The only immediate treatment in cardiac arrest is CPR and defibrillation. Cardiac arrest is the leading cause of death in the developed world.

I am in India for the last few days now. Yesterday morning as I was walking back from my younger brother's (Gopala) house to my elder brother's house, I challenged myself to smile at and talk to as many strangers. I naturally do this, but this time I wanted to extend my nature as an experiment and carefully note the reactions in me and the other person. In India usually it is a tough challenge to engage a stranger into a conversation, particularly, of the opposite sex. Smiling is hard too since people avoid eye contact. Within a few hundred yards, I came across a uniformed person of the city bus service standing near a restaurant. I struck up a conversation, he said he is a bus inspector. After some casual words, I offered to pay for coffee. He said he just had it. From his reaction, I knew he didn't expect this from a stranger. He seemed happy to have met me. I felt good of extending brotherly affection to a stranger. Along the way, I met another ten-twelve year old b...

Consume a variety of foods: We don't exactly know what nutrients we need. Consume an assortment of foods. Keep an eye on portions: Applies to only some foods like pizza, rice. You can eat all you want vegetables and fruits. Eat plenty of produce: Make it as colorful as possible - green, orange, red, blue/purple, yellow. Includes legumes (beans, lentils, peanuts). Eat whole grains: whole wheat, oats, barley. Replace white rice with brown rice. Limit, limit, limit!: Try to cut out refined flours, and sugar please. Use splenda instead of sugar in coffee. Enjoy more nuts and vegetable oils: Walnut, almond, pecan. Canola oil and olive oil. Shun trans fats: cut out cookies, donuts, all bakery products, sweets. Keep sodium down: Cut down salt. Use sea salt instead of table salt. Watch your Calcium and Vitamin D: Drink some milk (D fortified). Get a few minutes of sun, not too much. Cut out liquid beverages: This includes soda and juices too!

I started Bikram Yoga at Plainsboro studio on January 6th 2013. Today is 4/19/2013 and I have gone to yoga EVERYDAY since the start. I completed 100 days of Bikram Yoga in a row on 4/16th. Bikram yoga is 90 minutes long and is done at a temperature of ~105 deg F which is pretty hot. The Bikram postures are tough. There are 26 postures which are done in sets of two. 13 are standing postures and 13 are done lying down. Standing postures require tremendous strength in legs and thighs. There are some standing postures that are still very difficult for me. But, I am seeing some improvement everyday. Before I started Yoga my LDL was 148. Two months after I started Bikram, it had dropped to 108. The huge drop in LDL may be a coincidence, I would know after the next blood test. I have outstanding teachers. Mishel, Mori, Meredith, Heidi, Jess, and Jen. Mishelle and Mori drive you, provide lots of guidance to make corrections, but I love it. They just want you to practice yoga co...

In India, men sometimes get upset when they getting the girls and blame the mother of having some deficiency. Sex of the baby is determined by whether she carries two X-chromosomes (then it would be a girl) or an X and Y (then it would be a boy). Mother's egg always contributes ONLY X-chromosome. A man, on the other hand, can produce sperms that have either an X or a Y-chromosome. Sperms compete to fertilize the egg, and it is pure chance whether   a sperm with X or sperm Y enters the egg. X-chromosome is three times bigger (155 million base pairs) than Y-chromosome, so Y-chromosome is slightly lighter (not 1/3rd because there are 22 other chromosomes that are of equal length in both the egg and the sperm) and should be faster in reaching the egg. One would expect more boys conceived as a result.  Boy babies are only slightly (1.2%) more likely than girl babies, however, because male fetuses are less likely to be carried to term than female ones.

Mutations are considered bad. only about 24 mitotic divisions occur from the fertilized egg that starts a little girl's embryonic development and the setting aside of her future eggs (which is done long before she is even born). No matter what the age of the mother, she transmits only about 15 new mutations to her offspring. The sperm of a man, in contrast, are the descendants of at least 400 mitotic divisions since the fertilized egg that formed him. A man continues to add one to two new mutations every year.  So, A 25 year old man contributes ~25 times more mutations than the mother (mother's age does not matter) to the baby. A 40 year old man contributes ~30 times more mutations than the mother (mother's age does not matter) to the baby.

Humans think, that is why we are humans. Thinking and thoughts are part and parcel of human existence. By concentration, or meditation, we may be able to suspend or reduce the rate of thoughts. Once we are out of meditation, we are back to being full-fledged “thought” creatures. We have some control on what those “thoughts” are about, not 100% control. Senses aid in what we think. Sometimes thoughts about some thing or event or person or topic just gushes up uncontrollably. There is no point in squelching the thought, instead, it is better to acknowledge the thought and let it run its course. While we may not be able to control the thought, we are able to control whether and how we translate the thought into action. We ARE responsible for our actions; we cannot say, well the thoughts drove me to do it. We are all kind of schizophrenic – I, as X, think. I, as Y, can do lots of things. Observe what, as X, I am thinking,  Judge what, as X, I am thinking,...

Human body requires a blood pH value between 7.35 and 7.45 (slightly alkaline) in order to function properly.  Zero is the most acidic a solution can be, and 14 is the most alkaline.   The pH of food  before you eat it  does not always determine the pH effect it will have on your body  after you digest it . For example, lemons are highly acidic fruits on their own. But lemons actually raise pH levels after digestion, which means that they help bring your blood pH back into balance, and are therefore considered an alkaline food. The point is not to completely eliminate acid-forming foods; rather it is about BALANCE. To maintain balance, about 60 to 80% of your diet should be alkaline foods. The key alkaline-forming and acid-forming foods my family consumes are as follows. Highly Alkaline Forming Foods sea salt, pumpkin seed, lentils, onion, sweet potato, lime, lemons, nectarine, watermelon, tangerine. Moderately Alkaline Forming Foods Apricots, spices...

Just completed "Introduction to Engineering Mechanics"with distinction taught by Dr, Wayne Whiteman of Georgia Institute of Technology. This course was primarily about drawing Free Body Diagrams (FBD) and determine force and moment reactions at any point in a 2-D or 3-D object in static equilibrium under forces and moments. I had learned this as part of my BE decades ago. This was a good revision and also I appreciated the power of FBD for the first time.

Successfully finished the course "Nutrition for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention"  taught by Katie Ferraro of University of California, San Francisco. Got the certificate too. Most useful course in our lives. 

Weight alone doesn't. http://www.haescommunity.org/ There are overweight or obese people who have better cardiovascular health than normal-weight people. Daily vigorous activity is the key to good health. For some people regular exercise may not result in weight loss. That is OK. The body is amazing. It has a lot invested in its weight and wants to maintain it even if you try hard to diet it or exercise it away. It does it by slowing metabolism or making the body "efficient."  The focus should never be weight loss. 

Watched in theater quite a few great movies. Argo (Oscar for best picture and screenplay, film editing) Lincoln (Oscar for best actor and production design) The Guilt Trip Zero Dark Thirty Side Effects Silver Linings - Playbook (Oscar for best actress) Each one of these is absolutely wonderful. My number one choice also would be Argo followed by Silver Linings

Watch this wonderful TED video at http://www.shanghaivegetarians.com/how-you-can-eat-to-starve-cancer/ Also see http://www.readcube.com/articles/10.1038/427787a

I started this course last week. This is a tough course. Requires solid understanding of classical mechanics and single variable calculus. Taught by the famous Walter Lewin of MIT. Dr. Lewin uses tons of gizmos in his classroom and conducts experiments as part of teaching. He is an absolutely wonderful teacher. He prepares >20 hours for a one hour class. 

Supplements may not necessary at all as long as varieties of plant based foods (fruits, vegetables, and legumes) are consumed. If one takes some supplements limit them as follows. Excessive amounts of some of these supplements could incrase some cancer risks. Selenium: 55 mcg Vitamin E: 33 IU CalciumL 1200 mg Zinc: 11 mg Consume cooked tomatoes or tomato sauces along with other vegetables.

Nutritional component reducing cancer risk       Cancer sites Fruits and non-starchy vegetables                     Lung, mouth, pharynx, larynx, esophagus, stomach Carotenoid-containg foods                               Lung, mouth, pharynx, larynx, esophagus Tomato                                                           Prostate Allum veg (onion, garlic)                                  Stomach, col...

I used http://www.pennmedicine.org/health_info/wellness/nutrition_calc.html INPUT: 136 lbs, 5 ft 5 in, male, 60 years, intermediate physical activity level. OUTPUT: To   maintain your current weight , consume 2392 calories. The recommended distribution of your daily calories is: carbohydrates: 359 g protein: 60 g fat: 80 g The recommended daily amounts of key vitamins and minerals are: sodium: 2400 mg calcium: 1200 mg cholesterol : 300 mg vitamin D: 10 mcg vitamin C: 60 mg iron: 10 mg folate: 200 mcg vitamin B12 : 2 mcg

US Energy Sources: Coal 20% Oil: 26% Natural gas: 36% ___________ Nuclear: 9% Renewables: Biomass (wood, corn ethanol): 5% Hydro: 3% (pretty much fixed) Wind: 1.2% (almost 10 times the solar due to solar cost) Geothermal: 0.25% Solar: 0.17% (so low!) Solar cost is coming down! US Energy Information Administration: http://www.eia.gov/ US imports ~20% of its oil. ~24% from Canada ~10% from Mexico (dropping as Mexico is consuming more of its own oil) ~10% from Saudi Arabia ~8% fromVenezuela the rest from Nigeria, Russia, Iraq, Columbia, Algeria, Angola, Brazil About 22% of world oil is exported by SA, 18% by Russia,  the rest of the countries are in single digits. US has 1400 active rigs producing 10 million bbls of oil. SA has 50 active rigs producing 11 million bbls of oil.   >10 Russia   (10.2)   Saudi Arabia (11.2)   United States   (10.1)   7-10   4-7 China   ( 4.3)   Iran   ( 4.2)   2-...