LifeItself

My American friend just expressed a concern that video-conferencing through Skype from Saudi Arabia (or Poland) might be unreliable and sound quality low.  Hmm...  Unreliable at which end?  I just checked the WiFi speed at my Red Sea home, and it averaged 69.93 Mega bits per second (Mbps) on downloads and 39.77 Mbps on uploads. On campus WiFi, I clock 150 Mbps on both downloads and uploads. Just three months ago, I was lucky if I got a sustained upload speed above 10 Mbps in Austin at home or on campus. Then there is telephony.  When my wife and I were in the savannah east of Al Ula, near Mada'in Saleh , we and our Saudi friends, as well as the Egyptian driver, were on a 3G network and the internet, checking out the missing details.  The network reception was excellent over the entire 2000 km we covered. The ancient town of Al-Ula, parts of which are 3000 years old. Our Saudi companions, a young Government Affairs person from KAUST (left) and the wisest...

This blog follows two closely related posts that are 15 months old: Why Good Engineering Education and Research Are Inseparable? Part I - Teaching    Why Good Engineering Education and Research Are Inseparable? Part II - Research and Technology   Now that I am a little more knowledgeable on the subject of secondary and higher education, a few more remarks are in order. First, Church and Academia (read Universities) are the only two institutions that span over 2000 years of history of our Roman and Catholic civilization.  As I focus on education, I will leave Church alone.  I will also omit the epochal contributions of the early Arab Caliphate universities and Indian schools.  Both contributed invaluably to the rise of Academia in Europe. In particular, Arab schools preserved most of what we know today about ancient Greek philosophy, mathematics and medicine, and greatly added to this knowledge. Empires, states, emperors, kings, princes, presidents,...

When I share with people my assessments of where the Earthlings are stumbling rather blindly, my listeners often say: "Oh, you are such a pessimist! What would you do differently?" My short answer is: "Stop, face reality, and think. Facing reality is not pessimism. Do not try to be a better, more obedient sheep, whose sheephood is certified by a Harvard et al. at a huge expense. Squealer teaching Molly a new slogan she will  recite with unbending conviction and lead other sheep in repeating it.  Think of Fox News, MSNBC, Facebook, Rush Limbaugh, most newspapers, and almost all glossy magazines on sale in the U.S.  I can think of only four magazines that appear not to be run by the U.S. pigdom. For those who have read and understood " Animal Farm " by George Orwell, let me remind you the fate of Boxer, a powerful horse, who dedicated his life to hard labor for the good of others, and was greatly admired by all animals. With his strong muscles and persistenc...

I have decided to start a series of brief comments on the current flood of rather incoherent babble that attacks us in the U.S. from every which direction. Here is a relevant snippet from my favorite New York Times, 5/30/2011, Changing the world by dropping out : Parents, do you hope that your children have the chance to become like Peter Thiel, the PayPal co-founder, Facebook investor and hedge fund manager? If so, Mr. Thiel suggests that you encourage them to drop out of school. In fact, he will help by paying them to do it. On Wednesday, the Thiel Foundation , funded by Mr. Thiel, announced the first group of Thiel Fellows , 24 people under 20 who have agreed to drop out of school in exchange for a $100,000 grant and mentorship to start a tech company. More than 400 people applied. The winners include Laura Deming, 17, who is developing antiaging therapies; Faheem Zaman, 18, who is building mobile payment systems for developing countries; and John Burnham, 18, who is w...