Monday, April 28, 2008

the ToI is eroding my faith on Scientific Research !

I have been an avid reader of the Times of India (ToI) and I don't even remember since when! May be since I started making some sense of the jumble of words in school text books.

I today understand why I took to the ToI so religiously. The English mesmerized elders (all bhaiya's, didi's, uncles, coaches, guides and neighbours who had made it to be someone) held the paper to be sort of a magic potion - drink it and the language would get integrated in your DNA. I am worried today that the DNA might have got mutated.

Well, that's about the fixation with the ToI. Let me focus back to the ToI and the scientific research. The following article appeared in the ToI lately:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Earth/Are_we_heading_for_ice_age/articleshow/2975016.cms

Till about yesterday, the paper ran a feature on global warming, making us enlightened about how many degrees of temperatre will cause how much of the polar ice to melt and which all cities will get extinct? I boosted the sample dose provided by the paper by taking a regular shot of documentaries and features on the subject from varied resources. Thankyou friends for you unfailingly supplemented me with whatever you learnt on global warming. I am sorry all you kiddos, who visited my home on birthdays, diwali, etc. and I made you watch the re-runs of 'an inconvenient truth', 'the climate camp', .....

And today, suddenly THE GLOBAL WARMING IS OVER !!!
Its not only over, but has given way to yet another monster ready to wipe out the human civilization from the face of the planet. The world has cooled quickly between January last year and January this year, by about 0.7C. The enlightened scientific community predicts this is the begining of yet another ICE AGE.

This brings some childhood memories to the fore, even before Global Warming was heard of, we were worried about ICE AGE.

First Ice Age, then Global Warming, and then Ice Age again. So what is it that is actually threatening us? Honorable scientific community and media, please make your mind first. Surprisingly, this is not only about Global Warming, it is about all you publish about scientific research....
Today eating less is healthy; tomorrow eating less is unhealthy......
Today tea is good; tomorrow tea is bad......
Today chocolate is good; tomorrow chocolate is bad......
I am simply getting nuts with the state of contradiction.

I am taking to believe that today much of the scientific research is about putting forward contradictory theories. And in the process 'they confuse the common people like me.'

Dear ToI, I am not a victim anymore !!!
I have taken to Google news and now receive alerts for news according to my interest.