Coffee and Pasta

open sauce

Although being nice should be an attribute everyone strives for, it can sometimes backfire for you in the workplace. Here’s why.

—————————————————————————————————————

A couple of things came to mind when I typed the title of this blog. First was that when my co-workers see that title along with my byline
they’re going to rupture some internal organs by laughing so hard.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m a pretty friendly, outgoing person, but “too
nice” will never enter the list of descriptive terms for me.

Second, I thought about what a bad rap the word “nice” has gotten
over the years. If someone describes your blind date to you as “nice,”
it usually sets off some internal alarms.

The fact is, being nice is a good thing ,and we can only wish that
more people were nice. But as Clea Badion, writing on behalf of Robert
Half International, says, being too nice can be a detriment on the job.
She says, “The trouble with being too nice is that it often goes hand
in hand with other traits, such as being too accommodating, unwilling
to speak up for yourself, or hesitant to offer constructive criticism
to your colleagues.”

I have to agree. Although you want to be flexible and accommodating
at work, you’re asking for trouble if you’re too much so. Even normally
empathetic people will be drawn into the temptation of shifting work
over to a colleague who is always willing to take on extra duties. It’s
like workplace catnip.

And if you’re too nice to want to risk hurting anyone’s feelings,
then you’re less likely to speak your mind. But you have to eventually
learn that disagreeing with someone’s idea or assessment of a situation
is not like calling their mother a name. If done constructively,
criticism of another person’s idea just highlights your understanding
of the situation. Don’t confuse being direct with being rude. It’s not
always the same thing.

Imagine
having two Umno men at the top of the judicial hierarchy, one as AG and
the other as CJ. You will be able to literally get away with murder (as
if they are not already getting away with it).

NO HOLDS BARRED

Raja Petra Kamarudin

One of the more successful international
trading companies is 3M. It is one of 30 companies in the Dow Jones
Industrial Average and is also a component of the Standard & Poor’s
500 Index. 3M’s sales for 2007 touched US$24.462 billion while its net
income was US$4.096 billion.

3M used to be called Minnesota
Mining and Minerals before its name was shortened to 3M. They did the
same for IBM, LBJ, JFK, etc. Eventually, when all these people or
companies became famous, people started referring to them by their
initials and no longer by their full names. This is the ‘culture’ in
USA, which itself is the initial for the United States of America. Now,
of course, a simple US will suffice as everyone knows who you are
referring to.

3M’s success is in its training program. It is
said to have the best training module for its salesmen and it is also
said there is nothing a 3M salesman can’t sell. For example, the
salesmen are taught, to successfully close a sale, you must sell to the
MAN. MAN here means: Means, Authority and Need. The person making that
decision to buy must have the means (money or budget), authority (power
to make that decision to buy) and need (they require the item you are
trying to sell). If one of these three ingredients is missing then you
will never be able to close the sale.

So, if you are a salesman
and you want to successfully close that sale, go look for the MAN. Only
the person who has the three ingredients of the MAN will make, or be
able to make, that decision whether to buy from you or not.

I am
not a salesman any longer but in my new line of work I also apply the
3M or MMM principle. My MMM principle is: Money Motivates Man (man as
in humankind rather than gender description). Yes, money is the
greatest motivator of man. Nevertheless, there are also other
motivators; sex and power. However, once you have money, then these
others can come easily and naturally.

Ever wondered why wealth,
power and sex always seem to come together? In fact, you can exchange
one for the other. If you have money you can buy power or if you have
power you can make money. And sex can also be used as a ‘commodity’ to
‘sell’ for money and power — or, if you have money and/or power, you
can buy sex easily (and sometimes get it for free if you are an
important and powerful political leader).

Some people are
puzzled as to why Shafee Abdullah would go to all that trouble to fix
Anwar Ibrahim on sodomy charges. He is worth RM70 million, they argue,
and certainly he does not need the money — whatever amount it may be
that they have put aside for the special Black Ops against Anwar. And
he has enough women in his life so sex can’t be the motivator as well.
Okay, so we can rule out money and sex. But what about power? What if
he is slated to be the next Attorney-General and whether he gets the
job or not depends on how successfully he can neutralise Anwar and
remove him as a threat to Umno?

Yes, power sometimes motivates
man more than money or sex — especially when you already have surplus
money and sex and you really don’t need any more in your life. And
becoming the next AG is certainly a powerful enough post to motivate
you and would work well when your other friend from Umno, the current
President of the Court of Appeal, goes on to become the next Chief
Justice.

Imagine having two Umno men at the top of the judicial
hierarchy, one as AG and the other as CJ. You will be able to literally
get away with murder (as if they are not already getting away with it).
And just like how Britannia used to rule the waves, Umno just needs to
wave and rule that your arse gets thrown into prison for the rest of
your miserable life and you become history, like Britannia.

The Malays call this suruh kambing jaga sireh (asking the goat to look after the bettle leaves). The two kambing as head of the judiciary and the Attorney-General’s Chambers will ensure that no sireh will be safe.

MMM
– money motivates man. And money can buy plenty of power and sex. Hey,
who needs to worry about going to heaven after they have died when they
already have heaven here on earth? No, that is not what Islam teaches.
That is what Malays masquerading as Muslims practice.

Talking
about Islam, read the following piece about swearing on the Quran. It
seems Saiful will soon be swearing on the Quran that Anwar sodomised
him. That is not Islam. That is Malay. The good Prophet never taught
Muslims to swear on the Quran. It is a Malay invention just like how
Malays invent many other things about Islam that are not true and
totally false.

Finally, Anwar Ibrahim was charged today and was
released on personal bond. That was certainly a surprise as I could
have sworn (not on the Quran though) he would be denied bail. Anyway,
it looks like Anwar will be able to celebrate his birthday this Sunday
(10 August 200) at home after all instead of in the Sungai Buloh
Prison. Let’s all swarm over to Anwar’s house this Sunday to wish him a
happy birthday.

Oh, and one more thing, it appears like that
very illusive DNA that the police have unsuccessfully tried to get from
Anwar may be no good after all. It seems DNA are no longer regarded as
conclusive and, in Australia, 7,000 cases where convictions were
secured through DNA are being reviewed.

Well, back to the
drawing board I suppose. They will now have to rethink their strategy
on how to secure a conviction against Anwar. The DNA route may not be
on after all.

open sauce

You’re tired. You could put your head down on a desk right now and fall
asleep immediately. You went to bed late last night, had trouble
falling asleep and woke up too early. And let’s not kid ourselves:
Tonight will be the same unless … well, read on.

This is the classic not-so-shut-eye experience of many Americans who
think they are sleep-deprived and possibly need pills or other
treatment to fix their insomnia, teeth grinding, jet lag, restless or
jerky legs, snoring, sleepwalking and so forth.

Reality is quite different.

For instance, insomnia is said to be the most common sleep disorder, but these dissatisfying sleep experiences only get in the way of daily activities for 10 percent of us, according to the National Institutes of Health.
And in almost half of those cases, the real underlying problem is
illness (often mental) or the effects of a substance, like coffee or
medication.

Here are five recent findings that might help you rest easier:

1. We sleep better than we think we do

For most of us, sleep deprivation is a myth. We’re not zombies. The non-profit National Sleep Foundation
(which takes money from the sleep-aid industry, including drug
companies that make sleeping pills) says the average U.S. resident gets
7 hours a night and that’s not enough, but a University of Maryland study earlier this year shows we typically get 8 hours  and are doing fine. In fact, Americans get just as much sleep nowadays as they did 40 years ago, the study found.

2. We need less sleep as we age

We’ll die without sleep. The details are sketchy, but research suggests
it’s a time when we restore vital biological processes and also sort
and cement memories. Last year, the World Health Organization
determined that nightshift work, which can lead to sleep troubles, is a
probable human carcinogen. On the upside, the latest research suggests
we need less of it  as we get older.

3. You can sleep like a baby (or Thomas Edison)

Multiple, shorter sleep sessions nightly, rather than one long one, are an option. So-called polyphasic sleep
is seen in babies, the elderly and other animals (and Thomas Edison
reportedly slept this way). For the rest of us, it is more realistic
and healthy to sleep at night as best we can and then take naps as
needed. EEGs show that we are biphasic sleepers with two alertness dips
- one at night time and one mid-day. So talk to HR about setting up a
nap room, like they have for NASA’s Phoenix mission team members.

4. Animals exhibit a range of sleep habits

The three-toed sloth
sleeps 9.6 hours nightly. But newborn dolphins and killer whales can
forgo sleeping for their entire first month. However, the latter
extreme is not recommended for humans. We grow irritable and lose our
ability to focus and make decisions after even one night of missed
sleep, and that can lead to serious accidents driving and using other
machinery.

5. Get used to being tired, hit the desk

The bottom line is that a good night’s sleep is within the reach of most of us if we follow common-sense guidelines for sleep hygiene:

• Go to bed at the same time nightly.
• Set aside enough time to hit that golden 7 hours of sleep.
• Refrain
  from caffeine, heavy or spicy foods, and alcohol and other optional
  medications that might keep you awake, four to six hours before
  bed-time.
• Have a pre-sleep routine so you wind down before you hop in.
• Block out distracting lights and noises.
• Only engage in sleep and sex in bed (no TV-watching, reading or eating).
• Exercise regularly but not right before bed.

But you already know all this and you don’t do it. So your realistic plan might be to surrender to the mid-day desk nap.

open sauce

After
fifty years of independence, we have still not evolved much in the way
we perceive each other. Our education system has failed miserably in
promoting the wonders and the wisdom of the cultures of the people of
Malaysia.

Azly Rahman

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http://azlyrahman-illuminations.blogspot.com/

KUALA
LUMPUR (times ofi ndia): About 500 angry ethic-Indians on Monday staged
a protest outside a school demanding action against a teacher who
allegedly hurled racial slurs against students from the community in
western Malaysia’s Selangor state.

According
to the police report, a woman history teacher had allegedly called
Indian students in a Class four and five ‘Negro’, ‘black monkeys’ and
other derogatory names.

The crowd began gathering outside the Banting school’s main entrance near here at noon and staged a protest for two hours.

The
teacher had also allegedly said that the community members were stupid
and prone to thievery, the Star daily reported on its website.

The alleged incidents took place on July 17 and 22 when the teacher had allegedly beaten up some Indians students.

A
students also alleged in his report that the teacher had written the
word ‘keling pariah’ on the board and lost her cool when the Indian
students told her that they did not like being called names, it said.

Coalition
of Malaysian Indian NGOs secretary Gunaraj George, who was among the
protesters, said such abuse would only breed hatred and racial
polarisation in schools.

"No
one in his or her right frame of mind would have said these things.
Given this, the best option would be for the teacher to be assigned to
a desk job and not be allowed to be near youngsters anymore," he said.

Meanwhile,
Deputy Education Minister Wee Ka Siong said the schoolteacher might be
sacked if the allegations proved true. "The allegations were serious as
no one was allowed to insult others, especially in a school
environment," said Wee, who was asked to comment.

The ministry was awaiting an official report before taking any action, he added.
 

The
news story above, on the teacher in Banting that hurled racial slurs at
the seemingly defenceless students hurt me as an educator. Racism is
ingrained and must be dealt with through education; particularly
multicultural education or multiethnic studies. After fifty years of
independence, we have still not evolved much in the way we perceive
each other. Our education system has failed miserably in promoting the
wonders and the wisdom of the cultures of the people of Malaysia.

We need a total revamp of our curriculum — especially in history, citizenship studies, and social sciences.

I
am sharing with you the piece below I wrote some time ago, at the
height of the protest by our Malaysian Indian brothers and sisters. I
dedicate this piece below to any child mentally abused in schools –
especially and ironically, by teachers.

(Again) A Plea for Malaysian Indians

Azly Rahman

The economic anarchy of capitalist society as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of the evil. We see before us a huge community of producers the members of which are unceasingly striving to deprive each other of the fruits of their collective labour - not by force, but on the whole in faithful compliance with legally established rules.        - Albert Einstein in ‘Why Socialism?’ (1949) What do I think of Western civilisation? I think it would be a very good idea.  –Mohandas K Gandhi Will Queen Elizabeth II of England pay for the 150-year suffering of Indian Malaysians? How would reparations be addressed in an age in which we are still mystified by newer forms of colonialism - the English Premier League, Malaysian Eton-clones, Oxbridge education, and British rock musicians such as the guitarist-astrophysicist Dr Brian May of the better-than-the-Beatles rock group Queen (and recently appointed chancellor of a Liverpool university)? Who in British Malaya collaborated with the British East India company in facilitating the globalised system of indentured slavery? Will the current government now pay attention to the 50-year problems of ethnic-Indian Malaysians? We need to untangle this ideological mess and listen to the pulse of the nation. We are hyperventilating from the ills of a 50-year indentured self-designed pathological system of discriminatory servitude of the mind and body, fashioned after the style of colonialism. We need a crash course in the history of reparation, slavery, and the declaration universal human rights. We need to understand the style of British colonialism as it collaborated with the local power elites of any colony it buried its tentacles in and sucked dry the blood, sweat and tears of the natives it dehumanised and sub-humanised. We need to calculate how much the imperialists and the local chieftains gained from the trafficking of human labour - across time and space and throughout history.     In short, we need to educate ourselves on the anatomy, chemistry, anthropology and post-structurality of old and newer forms of imperialism. British imperialism has successfully structured a profitable system of the servitude of the body, mind and soul and has transferred this ideology onto the natives wishing to be "more British than their brown skins can handle". We need to encourage our children to read about the system of indentured slavery - of the kangchu and kangani and how the Malays were also relegated to becoming ‘reluctant’ producers of the colonial economy. The Malays’ reluctance led to the British designation "lazy native". We need to also learn from the Orang Asli and the natives of each state and how their philosophy of developmentalism is more advanced that the programmes prescribed under the successive five-year Malaysia Plans. A philosophy of development that respects and is symbiotic with Nature is certainly more appropriate for cultural dignity that the one to which we have been subjected; one that exploits human beings and destroys the environment under the guise of ‘progress’. Caged construction Our history lessons mask the larger issue of traditional, modern and corporate control of the means of production of Malaya. We see the issue of race being played up from time immemorial; issue of convenience and necessity to the sustenance of the status quo and the proliferation of modern local oligopoly and plutocracy. Our history classes have failed our generation that is in need of the bigger picture; ones that will allow us to see what is outside of our caged construction of historicising. Our historians, from the court propagandist Tun Sri Lanang to our modern historians written under the mental surveillance of the ruling parties, have not been true to the demand of the production of knowledge based on social and humanistic dimensions of factualising historical accounts. We need to study the political-economy of the rubber and canning industry and the relationship between the British and the American empire as industrialisation began to take off.           The ethnic-Indians in Malaysia have all the right to ask for reparation and even most importantly they have the rights as rightful citizens of Malaysia to demand for equality and equal opportunity as such accorded to the ‘bumiputera’. Every Malaysian must be given such rights. Failure to do so we will all be guilty of practising neo-colonialism and we will one day be faced with similar issue of reparation; this time marginalised Malaysians against the independent government of Malaysia. How are we going to peacefully correct the imbalances if we do not learn from the history of international slavery, labour migration and human labour trafficking that, in the case of Hindraf, involved millions of Tamils from Tamil Nadu province? I once wrote a piece calling for all of us to help the least privileged of our fellow Malaysians - the Indians. The piece called for the leaders to stop fighting and to help each other as well. I wrote a passage on the need to help each other in the spirit of selflessness and collaboration: "It is time for the other races to engage in serious and sincere gotong-royong to help the poorest of the poor among the Indians. It is time that we become possessed with a new spirit of multi-cultural marhaenism. The great Indonesian leader Ahmed Soekarno popularised the concept of marhaenism as an antidote to the ideological battle against materialism, colonialism, dependency and imperialism. The thought that the top 10 percent of the richest Malaysians are earning more than 20 times compared to the 90 percent of the population is terrifying. What has become of this nation that promised a just distribution of wealth at the onset of Independence?" Not a Hindu problem Now we have a better scenario - we have the rights group that is beginning to pull together,-close ranks and demand for their basic human rights that have been denied. Not only their rights to be accorded places of worship and economic justice, but also the rights to look at history and ourselves and interrogate what actually happened and who actually was responsible for the misery, desolation and sustained abject poverty to which they have been subjected. It is not an ethnic-Indian nor a HINDRAF, nor a  Hindu problem - it is universal problem that cuts across race and religion. If we believe in what religion has taught us about human dignity and the brotherhood and sisterhood of humanity, we will all be speaking in one voice rallying for those who demand for their rights to live with dignity.             In the protest movement, I believe there are Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Catholics, atheists, Buddhists, Sikhs, Bahais, Jains, etc rallying for the cause. In other words there are human beings speaking up for peace and social justice. It is the right of every Malaysian to lend support to their demands. We have let the ethnic-Indians in Malaysia suffer for too long. We ought to have a programme of affirmative action in place. We ought to have a sound programme for alleviation of poverty for the Indians and radically improve their conditions through political action, education and cultural preservation. We ought to extract the enabling aspects of culture though and perhaps reconstruct the our understanding of the relationship between culture and human progress. Worse, we humiliate and shame innocent children in schools, out of own ignorance of the idea that each child is a gift of God — a "fitrah" as a Muslim would say, and that each child, as Prophet Muhammad would say, cannot be discriminated based on race, creed, religious background, status, etc. How much damage will continue to be inflicted on the child’s mind if daily, he/she is violently abused through words that dehumanizes the self, degrades culture, and destroy self-esteem? Teachers should know this best.     But can the current political paradigm engineer a solution to the problems of the ethnic-Indian Malaysians, as long as politics - after 50 years - is still British colonialist-imperialist-oppressive in nature? We have evolved into a sophisticated politically racist nation, hiding our discriminatory policies with the use of language that rationalises what the British imperialists brutally did in the open.             But our arguments cannot hold water any loner. Things are falling apart - deconstructed. The waves of demands, the frequency of rallies and the excavating of issues drawn from the archaeology of our fossilised arrogant knowledge - all these are symptoms of deconstructionism in our body politics. It is like the violent vomit of a rehabilitating cocaine addict undergoing treatment in a Buddhist monastery somewhere in northern Thailand. We cannot continue to alienate each other through arguments on a ’social contract’ that is alien from perhaps what Jean Jacques Rousseau wrote about some 300 years ago - a philosophy that inspired the founding of America, a nation of immigrants constantly struggling (albeit imperfectly) to meet the standards requirements of equality, equity and equal opportunity especially in education. How do we come together, as Malaysians, as neo-bumiputeras free from false political-economic and ideological dichotomies of Malays versus non-Malays, bumi versus non-bumi and craft a better way of looking at our political, economic, social, cultural, psychological and spiritual destiny - so that we may continue to survive as a species for the next 50 years? As a privileged Malaysian whose mother tongue is the Malay language and as one designated as a bumiputera, I want to see the false dichotomies destroyed and a new sense of social order emerging, based on a more just form of linguistic play designed as a new Merdeka game plan. Think Malaysian - we do not have anything to lose except our mental chains. We have a lot to gain in seeing the oppressed be freed from the burden of history; one that is based on the march of materialism. We are essentially social beings, as Einstein would emphasise. Our economic design must address the socialism of existence. Let us restructure of policies to help the ethnic-Indian Malaysians - they are our lawful citizens speaking up for their fundamental rights. Let us help restructure the lives of the poor before they restructure the lives of the rich.

open sauce

quantum computers are practical today but this article and
associated comments are full of hypes. Let me explain. I will tackle
the problem (in bold), give a more accurate but far too concise
statement (at the end, in italic) and I will try to explain it a bit
more in the text that is found in between the bold and italic parts.

Typical personal computers calculate 64 bits of data at a time. A
64- qubit quantum computer would be about 18 billion billion times
faster.
—
Untrue. This immediately follows from the idea of a superposition over
all bits. But let me explain this a bit more clearly. It is true that a
single quantum bit can be both true and false. However, another far
more accessible way to look at this is that each option has a certain
probability assigned to it. So, instead of saying that a bit is 0 with
100% certainty, you can say that a quantum bit is 79,42% a 0 and 21.58%
certain a 1. So yes, a quantum bit can be both 0 and 1, but the problem
is that you need to read the value. This is nothing like an ordinary
computer. Reading a quantum bit actually destroys the superposition.
This means that the qubit collapses to either 0 or 1 with a probability
that was described above. It would be more accurate to state that a
quantum qubit can somehow hold billions of billions times more
information. This, however, is under the assumption that the quantum
system is not disturbed and not measured.
—
Great, so I can hold a billion billion times more information, but
reading it will collapse it to a single value, making it no more useful
than an ordinary computer.

A working quantum computer could be so mind-bogglingly powerful that
it would solve in seconds certain problems that would take the fastest
supercomputer millions of years to complete.
—
True. But, well, only if you would clearly emphasize the could.
In certain things, a quantum computer can be mind boggling fast. For
example, if we search a deck of 2 cards for the card we want, we need
to look at 1 card to be 100% certain which card it is. (It either is
the card we look at, or it isn’t. In the latter case, we know for sure
that it is the other card we did not look at). A quantum computer can
do better and need only look at a single card in a deck of 4 cards to be certain which card is the correct one. 
—
Given a very concrete problem, a quantum computer can indeed be a
lot faster. Overall, the speedup is not so mind boggling as this
conclusion would suggest. But yes, a quantum computer can do things in
seconds that would take an ordinary computer millions of years. Then
again, a GPU can calculate pi a lot faster than an ordinary CPU. There
is no more magic in it than that. It is better suited for a number of
jobs, but grandly fails when it comes to some other jobs.

… But a QC could break the most complicated encryption in hours.
—
RSA is dead indeed. But we predicted this! RSA has an inherent weakness. Both you and the public know n, which is the product of two primes. RSA simply relies on the fact that, given n,
it is really very hard to find out what the original primes were.
However, there are oodles of special properties in this problem, making
it only a matter of time before someone found a way to beat RSA. A
quantum computer can indeed break RSA. Instead of thousands of years,
it needs hours. But for this to work, we first need to make a quantum
computer with a couple of thousands of qubits. The biggest we built
that had full entanglement consisted out of 7 qubits. Ough. When we
move to other encryption algorithms that do not rely on public and
private keys, such as AES, a quantum computer fails to deliver to the
promise. Agreed, a substantial speedup can be obtained. For example, a
key of 256 bit can be cracked by a quantum computer about just as fast
as a 128 bit key on an ordinary computer. So instead of 2^256 is is
reduced to 2^128. The exponent is actually halved! However, the problem
is still in NP. And making a bigger key is still P. Thus simply
doubling the key size will stop a quantum computer from reading your
most precious information.
—
RSA is dead when a big enough quantum computer can be built. This is
an extreme challenge and not to be underestimated. However,
alternatives exist and all other types of encryption remain quite safe.
So, keep on using AES and the likes.

Quantum computers could also take advantage of another quantum
property, teleportation. Teleportation allows information about one
particle to be transmitted to another particle some distance away. A
quantum computer could use teleportation instead of wires to move bits
around inside itself.
—
Well, for this trick to work, you need to create an entangled qubit.
This means that you actually have two qubits, but when you read one
qubit, you immediately influence the other qubit. Some tricks, and some
classical communication, make it possible to exactly reproduce the
original qubit in some other place. This is quite cool, since normally
a random qubit cannot be cloned. But starting from a basic entangled
qubit and transmitting some simple information over a classical
communication line makes it possible to destroy the original and obtain
the new, exact, copy in the new location. But please, this is not Star
Trek "beam me up" style teleportation. Researcher need their funds, and
teleportation just sounds soooo cool that they immediately found the
funds for fundamental, but far less spectacular research.
—
You can teleport things, given that you can communicate over a
normal communication line and given that you already have an entangled
qubit. This itself suggests that prior quantum communication needs to
be possible before you can even consider teleportation. During the
process, you need classical communication. So let’s have some wires,
okay?

I honestly do not think that QC will come to be any time soon, leave alone applications that would run on it. 
—
A number of people stated this or similar ideas. But QC are here,
today. Let us think again of a qubit as being both 0 and 1, but with
some associated chance. Making a qubit that is 50% a 0 and 50% a 1 is
actually very simple. Now, what would happen if we measure this? We get
a truly random number generator! This and applications in quantum
cryptography are hot in todays quantum world. Quantum cryptography
makes it possible to detect when someone is eavesdropping and allows
you to have an arbitrarily secure channel of communication. This makes
it possible for example to share a common key that no one else knows,
eliminating the need for RSA. So quantum computing will actually
protect us from quantum computing power ;-).
—
Quantum computers exist today. They are great for generating truly random numbers and for some kick-ass cryptography. Go visit http://www.idquantique.com/
and order your random number generator USB stick today. It will
outperform each and every random number generator that utilizes current
day computers. Or pick us some quantum cryptography, but mind you that
these are quite pricey!

Even if one is built and actually works, I don’t see *Personal* Computers as we know going away so soon.
—
Current day classical computers are very speedy and they are very good
at basic number crushing. A quantum computer is nothing magical and it
cannot solve some random problem. It only consists out a few bits and
can only outperform a classical computer given some very specific
problems (mostly search problems). But classical computers are cheap,
have tons of bits to spare and can do all the rough preliminary work!
—
Classical computers are here to stay, indeed.

I wrote a somewhat accessible paper this year on this subject for those
that have sufficient computational and some mathematical background.
This may clear up more things.
http://tinf2.vub.ac.be/%7Edvermeir/courses/seminarie/Kim_Bauter…

Sejak akhir-akhir ni, agama Islam cenderung dilihat sebagai satu agama yang dipenuhi kemarahan, kezaliman, fahaman extremis, tidak toleran kepada penganut agama lain, dan sebagainya. Lebih teruk lagi, apabila ada sesetengah pendakwah yang suka menggunakan pendekatan penyeksaan Allah pada mana-mana hambaNya yang engkar sebagai taktik mudah untuk "melembutkan" mereka yang tak ambil pusing tentang agama. Seolah-olah macam itu saja sifat yang Allah ada. Memang benar yang balasan Allah atas dosa-dosa yang kita semua telah lakukan adalah keras dan terbayang seksanya. Itu adalah benar.

Terpulanglah. Fikir-fikirkan lah. Semoga amalan kita sehari-hari dapat mendekatkan kita semua pada Allah S.W.T. Apa kata kita mulakan dengan sebutan "Bismillahirrahmanirrahim"?

p/s Jemput baca artikel kat bawah ni. Ia lebih bernas berbanding penulisan saya yang kurang berilmu ni.

Tajdid Iman: Tanda pencipta mencintai manusia

APABILA rakyat mencintai rajanya, hal itu perkara lazim dilakukan.
Bagaimanapun, suatu hal sungguh menyentuh hati ialah apabila seorang
raja mengasihi rakyat tanpa pilih kasih. Sanggup berdebu dan menjejak
tanah, memberi apa diminta dan mendengar setiap rintihan dengan hati
paling lembut kepada rakyat.

Begitulah cinta Allah kepada hamba-Nya. Maha Agung dan
Perkasa itu mengisytiharkan kedudukannya yang amat dekat kepada
hamba-Nya. Firman Allah bermaksud: “Dan apabila hamba-Ku bertanya
mengenai Aku, maka (jawablah) sesungguhnya Aku dekat. Aku memakbulkan
permohonan orang yang berdoa apabila dia meminta kepada-Ku.” (Surah
al-Baqarah, ayat 186)

Sesungguhnya apabila Allah mencintai hamba-Nya, ia dapat
dilihat dengan jelas dan dirasa melalui hati bersih. Ketika Allah
mencintai seorang hamba, maka jatuhlah ke dalam hati hamba itu ilham
suci yang membuat dia mengenali tanda kecintaan-Nya.

Ada beberapa tanda yang boleh dirasa oleh hati manusia antaranya:

l Tanda Allah mencintai seseorang ialah apabila dia menjadi
begitu berminat dengan ibadah. Adakalanya sesetengah orang berusaha
sekuat-kuatnya untuk beribadah, hatta melebihi kapasiti diri sebagai
insan lemah. Tujuannya hanya satu iaitu mahu mencintai Allah.

Tetapi ibadahnya seolah-olah kosong tanpa rasa, tawar tiada
kemanisannya, semangat imannya maju dan mundur, turun dan naik,
akhirnya tenggelam pula dipukul arus dunia. Ketika beribadah semestinya
seseorang mampu menghadirkan keyakinan bahawa saat itu Allah mencintai
dirinya.

Pernahkah kita menikmati sujud yang panjang sambil menghadirkan dalam
hati bahawa saat itulah Allah mengisytiharkan nama kita sebagai orang
dicintai-Nya?

Rasulullah SAW bersabda yang bermaksud: “Jika Allah
mencintai seorang hamba maka Ia berfirman: Wahai Jibril sesungguhnya
aku mencintai si polan maka cintailah dia.” (Riwayat Imam Ahmad)

Maka orang yang yakin bahawa Allah mencintai dirinya tidak
pernah rasa was-was adakah ibadahnya diterima atau tidak? Jauh sekali
rasa takbur kerana dia yakin yang menolongnya untuk melakukan ketaatan
adalah Allah juga. Bukan kerana kehebatan dan kewarakan, melainkan
Allah yang menuntun ke jalan takwa.

Kemudian dia sampai kepada satu makrifah mendalam mengenai
Allah iaitu cinta Allah kepada hamba-Nya jauh lebih agung daripada
cinta sesama insan. Manusia boleh mengkhianati ibu bapanya atau anak
dan isterinya, kawan atau kekasih atas alasan tidak mendapat keuntungan
daripada perhubungan itu. Tetapi cinta Allah kekal tidak pernah luntur
walaupun dicabar oleh sepak terajang hamba derhaka.

l
Tanda Allah mencintai seseorang ialah apabila maksiat membuat dia
bangkit mendekati Allah. Adakalanya dosa boleh mendatangkan manfaat
iaitu apabila dosa itu akhirnya membawa kepada keinsafan, taubat dan
istighfar.

Kemudian seseorang bangkit mengejar Allah, berusaha
mendapatkan hatinya yang hilang di belantara maksiat. Ia sama sekali
tidak berputus asa daripada rahmat Allah. Ia sentiasa mengingati janji
Allah Yang Maha Pengampun.

Firman Allah bermaksud: “Katakanlah: Wahai hamba-Ku yang
melampaui batas terhadap diri mereka sendiri, jangan kamu berputus asa
daripada rahmat Allah. Sesungguhnya Allah mengampuni dosa semuanya.
Sesungguhnya Dia Maha Pengampun lagi Maha Penyayang. Dan kembalilah
kamu kepada Tuhanmu, dan berserah dirilah kepada-Nya sebelum datang
azab kepadamu Kemudian kamu tidak dapat ditolong (lagi).” (Surah
al-Zumar, ayat 53-54)

Janganlah kerana dosa semalam seseorang menyangka Allah
tidak sudi mendengar rintihannya, terputus tali langit di hatinya,
tertolak segala doanya dan terusir dia daripada pandangan Allah.
Rasulullah SAW bersabda bermaksud: “Demi Tuhan yang diriku berada dalam
genggaman-Nya. Seandainya kamu tidak berdosa nescaya Allah akan
mematikan kamu. Kemudian Allah akan mendatangkan satu kaum yang
melakukan dosa dan mereka memohon keampunan kepada Allah lantas Allah
mengampuni mereka.” (Hadis riwayat Imam Muslim)

Hamba yang taat apabila perangainya berubah menjadi iblis
pun Tuhan tetap menunggu, di setiap malam rintihan hamba itu diintip
hingga ia pulang kembali ke sisi-Nya. Rasulullah SAW bersabda
bermaksud: “Tuhan kita turun ke langit dunia pada waktu malam tatkala
tiba sepertiga malam yang akhir lalu berfirman: Siapakah yang berdoa
kepada-Ku nescaya aku terima, siapakah yang meminta kepada-Ku nescaya
Aku beri dan siapakah yang meminta ampun nescaya Aku ampuni.” (Hadis
riwayat al-Bukhari dan Muslim)

Mengapa Allah masih mencari hamba-Nya yang jahat, membangkang
dan suka berpaling dengan sombong? Kecintaan apakah itu yang boleh
memaafkan sekeji-keji dan sehina-hina manusia? Betapa lembutnya Allah
dan Maha Pengasih lagi Penyayang kepada makhluk-Nya.

Dengan cinta-Nya ditutupi segala aib hamba yang hina,
memberi peluang berjuta kali dan menangguhkan seksa untuk tetap setia
menunggu di langit dunia, bilakah agaknya hamba-Nya ini mahu
membersihkan diri.

Saat Allah mencintai seseorang, tempat pertama menerima
sentuhan cinta itu ialah hati mereka. Di situlah Allah lenyapkan segala
rasa putus asa dan kesedihan akibat dosa mereka kemudian diganti dengan
harapan dan keinginan untuk berubah menjadi insan bersih. Hati kita
seeloknya selalu berbisik: “Aku tahu bila Allah mencintaiku, iaitu saat
aku membenci segala kejahatanku.”

l Tanda Allah mencintai seorang hamba ialah apabila dilapangkan dadanya menerima ilmu yang menjadi petunjuk ke jalan benar.

Allah tidak sesekali membiarkan seseorang insan terkapai-kapai
dalam lautan dosa. Bahkan dikirim ke atas hati manusia petunjuk
hidayah-Nya supaya manusia terselamat daripada gelombang keganasan
dirinya sendiri.

Manusia dibekalkan hati, perasaan, akal dan fikiran untuk
membezakan mana baik serta yang keji. Tidak cukup dengan itu, diutuskan
juga Rasul, diturunkan al-Quran, dilahirkan pejuang agama-Nya terpilih
untuk menerangi kegelapan seraya berdakwah fisabilillah.

Allah juga menjaga pusaka peninggalan Rasul iaitu ilmu
Islam, menjaga al-Quran daripada pencerobohan manusia dan mewariskan
sunnah Rasul-Nya supaya menjadi ikutan. Baginda SAW bersabda bermaksud:
“Apabila Allah mencintai seseorang maka ia membuatnya faham mengenai
agamanya.” (Hadis riwayat al-Bukhari dan Muslim)

Penulis ialah pendakwah dari Sarawak dan boleh dihubungi melalui Juanda@msu.edu.my

Keterbukaan
manusia mengundang kehadiran syaitan ke dalam diri masing-masing
sebenarnya ada kaitannya dengan sifat mazmumah yang diamalkan dalam
kehidupan seharian.

Apabila syaitan beraja dalam diri, seseorang
itu akan sanggup melakukan apa juga perbuatan keji dan mungkar kerana
keinginan nafsu akan menjadi sebati dengan sifat jahat syaitan itu
sendiri.

Hati, suatu organ istimewa kurniaan Allah kepada
manusia pada saat itu juga akan mula goyah apabila sedikit demi sedikit
syaitan durjana mula merayap untuk menguasai tunjang di dalam badan
manusia itu.

Beruntunglah golongan manusia yang berupaya
menangkis godaan itu. Mengikut ulama, syaitan akan menguasai tubuh
badan manusia melalui 10 pintu:

Pertama, melalui sifat sombong
dan angkuh. Ia berpunca daripada keegoan manusia yang lazimnya mudah
hanyut ketika dilimpahi kemewahan dan kesenangan.

Kedua, melalui
sifat bakhil dan kedekut. Setiap harta benda dan kemewahan yang
diperoleh adalah kurniaan Allah yang seharusnya dibelanjakan ke jalan
yang hak.

Ketiga, melalui sifat takbur dan bongkak. Allah
berfirman bermaksud: " Sesungguhnya Dia tidak menyukai orang yang
takbur." (Surah an-Nahl, ayat:23)

Keempat, sifat khianat.
Khianat yang dimaksudkan bukan saja melalui perbuatan merosakkan
sesuatu yang menjadi milik orang lain, malah mengkhianati hidup orang
lain dengan tidak mematuhi apa-apa bentuk perjanjian, perkongsian dan
sebagainya.

Kelima, sifat tidak suka menerima ilmu dan nasihat.

Keenam,
melalui sifat hasad. Rasulullah SAW pernah bersabda bermaksud: "
Hindarilah kamu daripada sifat hasad kerana ia akan memakan amalan kamu
sebagaimana api memakan kayu yang kering." (Hadis riwayat Bukhari dan
Muslim).

Ketujuh, melalui sifat suka meremehkan orang lain. Abu
Umamah pernah meriwayatkan bahawa Rasulullah SAW bersabda bermaksud: "
Tiga kelompok manusia yang tidak boleh dihina kecuali orang munafik
ialah orang tua Muslim, orang yang berilmu dan imam yang adil." (Hadis
riwayat Muslim).

Kelapan, melalui sifat ujub atau bangga diri.
Menurut Imam Ahmad, Rasulullah SAW bersabda bermaksud: " Jangan kamu
bersenang lenang dalam kemewahan kerana sesungguhnya hamba Allah itu
bukan orang yang bersenang-senang saja." ( Hadis riwayat Abu Naim
daripada Muaz bin Jabal)

Kesembilan, melalui sifat suka
berangan-angan. Islam adalah antikemalasan. Orang yang berat tulang
untuk berusaha bagi mencapai kecemerlangan dalam hidup akan dipandang
hina oleh Allah dan manusia.

Kesepuluh, melalui sifat buruk
sangka. Seseorang yang suka menuduh orang lain melakukan sesuatu
kejahatan tanpa diselidiki terlebih dulu amat dicela oleh Islam.
Rasulullah bersabda bermaksud: "Nanti akan ada seseorang berkata kepada
orang ramai bahawa mereka sudah rosak. Sesungguhnya orang yang berkata
itulah sebenarnya yang telah rosak dirinya." (Hadis riwayat Muslim)

Dr. Azly Rahman
http://azlyrahman-illuminations.blogspot.co                                                                  

                                                                 [The
incident at the PR gathering I saw on video prompt me to invite all of
you for a dialogue. I am still searching for answer to the culture of
underground music in Malaysia. Below is my proposition, written some
time ago, for us to begin the discussion.]

I thought that after The Rolling Stones,
rock and roll will no longer evolve to its most "dangerous" form. I was
wrong. Listen to these two pieces of music here and here.

Can you understand the lyrics and figure out where the harmony? What images come to your mind?

Now, read the entry below:

"The
black metal scene gained some unsought mass media attention in 1991
when Mayhem’s frontman Dead (left) committed suicide by a shotgun blast
to his head. His note simply read "Excuse all the blood". The
ammunition was supplied by Varg Vikernes.

"His body was
discovered by Aarseth who, instead of calling the police, ran to a
nearby convenience store and bought a disposable camera which he used
to photograph the corpse for a future Mayhem album cover (Dawn of the
Black Hearts). Apocryphal reports also claim that he then took some
pieces of Dead’s splattered brains and made a stew out of them and/or
members of the band took bone fragments from their friend’s skull and
made necklaces out of them."

So reads two paragraphs from Wikipedia, on the beginning of Death Metal music.

Is
our youth listening to more "mentally dangerous" music, such as Death
Metal and Black Metal? Are their brains being fried by the fast,
rhythmic, unsophisticated music with lyrics that glorify death,
depression, and destruction? Who are its fans and fanatics? Why is this
para-demonic music becoming a paralysis to our youth culture?

Educators, parents, and policymakers – why is our youth taking this dangerous path to freedom and creativity?

Threat to mental security?
   
Let
us talk about the issue of alternative music in Malaysia – of
Death/Black Metal and its threat to mental security. How could the
Metallist go to the masjid, the
Hindu temple, the Christian church, the Buddhist wat, or the Sikh
temple and focus on the ultimate reality when their consciousness is
already abducted and imprisoned by demonic forces?

Without
playing any Death/Black Metal CD backwards, we can clearly analyse the
messages behind the music. We need to understand the language that
shapes this genre.

Death/Black Metal fans do not actually need
to do "devil worship" – they are already possessed by terminologies
that glorify the devil and the demonic. There is hope for them to
repent and to "de-evolve" into ethical human beings with real human
consciousness.

In the process of glorifying the sight, sound,
and symbolism of the demonic, these predominantly Malay youth do not
realise that they are also being bought by the international record
companies that sell cultural junk to these youth who do not understand
not only meanings in the lyrics but also the names of the bands. Poor
command of the English language will also facilitate this
mentally-fatal misunderstanding. They simply do not have any idea what
the language of their music means, let alone the neuro-linguistic
impacts on their personalities.

But first, let me do a quick
linguistic analysis to prove that these lovers of demonic music are
actually glorifying unholy death instead of celebrating the beauty of
life. Educators well-versed in the translation can do similarly with
other examples.

Look at these words that chronicle the
development of this brand of music of the demons. It does not take a
Noam Chomsky or a Jacques Lacan fan to analyse the nature of language
that our youth, especially the Malays, are possessing themselves with
and are loving the act and the art of unsophisticated music and do not
add value to even the history of rock and roll.

Below are some
of the names of Western Death Metal bands that our Malaysian fans are
listening to and perhaps worshiping. I have provided a loose
translation to each.

Atheist = Si Ateis/Manusia Yang Tak Percaya Keujudan Illahi
Autopsy = Pembedahan Keatas Si Mati
Carcass = Bangkai Binatang
Death = Kematian
Entombed = Di Batu-Nisan kan
   Morbid Angel = Si Malaikat Jahanam
Napalm Death = Kematian di sebabkan Bom Napalm (di gunakan di Perang Vietnam)
Obituary = Notis Kematian di Akhbar
Possessed = Di Rasuk
Suffocation = Tercekik Lalu Mati Lemas
   
Source: Wikipedia

Below
are some of the names of Black Metal groups. I invite Malaysian
linguists to help check the accuracy of translated words below to be
read to the fans of these new genre of "creatively nihilistic" music.

Venom = Bisa
Hellhammer = Penukul Neraka
Bulldozer = Bulldozer
Mayhem = Keganasan dan Kehancuran
Darkthrone = Singahsana Kegelapan
   Enslaved = Di Perhambakan
Immortal= Tanpa Kematian

You can explore more of these names in this site.
In addition to the glorification of the demonic aspect of humanity and
the naming of groups based on such pride, some of the titles in the
track of a popular groups elaborate the nature of anti-humanity. Lyrics
from an album by the group Masacra (translated as Pembunuhan Kejam yang
Berleluasa), for example, provide such imagery:

1. Enjoy the Violence
2. Ultimate Antichrist
3. Gods of Hate
4. Atrocious Crimes
5. Revealing Cruelty
6. Full of Hatred
7. Seas of Blood
8. Near Death experience
   9. Sublime Extermination
10. Agonising World

Another example of tracks the group Morbid Angel (translated as Malaikat Jahanam) reflect the following:

1. Invocation/Chapel Of Ghouls
2. Unholy Blasphemies
   3. Angel Of Disease
4. Azagthoth
5. The Gate/Lord Of All Fevers and Plague
6. Hell Spawn
7. Abominations
8. Demon Seed
9. Welcome To Hell

Source: Anus
   
Culture of trash?

Death
and Black Metal Malaysian music represents the advancement of the
development of "trash culture" that continue to plague society that is
already plagued with all forms of corruption. This "Metal" culture do
not have a sense of authenticity nor peaceful and liberating dimension
to its foundation. It preys upon those who themselves are lost through
the social and educational system – those who had fallen through the
cracks of an unfairly meritocratic system that often put the death
spell on children’s intelligence.

The proliferation of the
culture of trash is one way for consumer capitalism to divide, conquer,
and victimise our youth. It is a by-product of our open-sky policy and
largely our five-year economic plans that cultivate all forms of
underground culture and subculture – cultures of resistance that
actually do not add value to the advancement of an ethical civilisation.

Our
society will arrive at a juncture whereby the elders are no more to be
respected, the "demonic aspects" of music such as in Black and Death
Metal will continue to shape and hegemonise public discourse and the
extreme excesses of modernisation will rear their ugly heads and adorn
our mental and cultural landscape. The vehicle for this path of
"progress" will be the economic and political ideology that subdivides
people into "post-industrial tribes" ready to be consumed by market
forces.

We have therefore developed a set of "subcultures" that
are trashy in nature – from the way we conduct our politics to how we
shop and play to the form of leisure we engage in. These are
consequences of the corruption of the political, economic, and moral
fibres that are designed by those who owns the means of
political-economic and socio-cultural production and control.

We,
as well as our youth of today and tomorrow are the recipients of the
"gifts of this Malaysian nation of plenty" – including the youth that
are school drop-outs, at risks, incarcerated and those who are enjoying
the glories of demonic music.

Only re-education and the
re-thinking of our cultural policy will help devise ways to design
strategies that will bring us closer to a utopia based on the true
meaning of republicanism and socialism that bring meaning to the word
"humanism".

The world of many of our dispossessed Malay youth is
a world of metal made of black and dead souls. They must start
listening to kronchong, ghazal, and the Indian ragas!
They must start looking at the larger picture of oppression and
dehumanisation. Or begin with New Age, Baroque, or Classical music for
relaxation and the enhancement of the capacities of the cerebral cortex.

But who will guide them through this siratul-mustaqim
or the noble or peaceful path of human evolution? Are they being
exploited by others, in the name of creativity and revolution they do
not yet quite understand? While the lyrics sound revolutionary, the
means of performing them manifests insanity. Is this brand of  youth
"protest movement" going haywire and being capitalized by those who
owns the means of controlling their wild and savage sense of creativity?
   
Educators,
unite – you have nothing to lose except your own children and
grandchildren to the chains of the Black/Death metallists. Time for
PETRONAS to help finance bands and orchestras in our public schools
before our youth produce more demonic music.