PakFellows Blog » Science & Technology

News of Bin Laden’s Death and Social Media’s Power of Communication

Sidrah Zaheer — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 16:01:42 +0000

I was about to sign out of my email account, when there appeared a new email in my inbox. I immediately opened it to check it out. It was from one of the citizen journalism social networking sites I am a member of. All it said without any details to the information was that Bin Laden died. He was killed finally. How was it all done, the email did not elaborate. Just as this email came to my inbox due to subscription to its newsletters, it went to many others too for revealing one the biggest headlines of the year.

I was intending to shut down my computer to carry on with the day’s routine. But when I received the email, I changed my whole plan of following on my usual routine, at least for the next forty minutes or so. All I was curious to know was how did Bin Laden meet his death. Indeed, it was good news, but not a relieving one. Since killing the name behind the terrorist attacks on 9/11 doesn’t finish off the evil intent his other co-networkers still hold.

I went to Google further about Bin Laden’s death to get the details. There was a whole stream of updates scrolling from the micro-blogging website, Twitter. Almost each second, people from all around the world, were tweeting their reactions about the news and their feelings on the matter. Everyone from journalists to news readers, all were there streaming their immediate thoughts. It is amazing how the breaking news of Bin Laden’s death was actually broken by Twitter. The world came to know of one of the greatest headlines in recent history, but not through mainstream news media, but through the social networking website, Twitter.

Although it does show the status Twitter has achieved and the importance of connectivity through social networking in this advanced era of fast communication, it also tells us how any news can be spread instantly without any detailed analysis. The first impact is obtained and a perspective fixed at the outset. This is the power of social media and it is growing ever more.

This year is the 10^th anniversary of the dreadful events in the New York City in 2001. Let us hope that just as the evolution of social media has given us such communicative power, different nations from around the world also evolve in their understanding of each other and learn to respect their differences in cultures and traditions. Though there are many different languages, but keeping in mind the essential purpose of a language, which is communication, let us negotiate and build bridges. Living peacefully together and co-existing in harmony is what I hope can attain such power of connectivity as social media has today.

Golden Ages of World

Faiza — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 08:38:18 +0000

Knowledge is an unfathomable sea having no bounds. It is a continuous journey towards light. It cannot be confined to any finite areas of studies.

Allah Almighty (SWT) says:

اقْرَأْ بِاسْمِ رَبِّكَ الَّذِي خَلَقَ

“(O Beloved!) Read (commencing) with the name of Allah (SWT) Who has created (everything).”

Everything created in the universe is attributed to the Creator as He is the Creator of the entire universe. So, the knowledge we acquire must also pertain to everything in the universe. The earth and the sky, the moon and the sun, the stars and planets, the vastness of oceans and the meandering flow of rivers from hills to the sea down through plains, the torrents and the violent waves, the rhythm of waterfalls, blossoming of buds, the sunrise and the sunset, the freshness of vegetable world, the flora of plants, the splendour of the trees and variety of stones, the charming fragrance and pleasant colours of leaves and fruits and, so to say, the entire universe and its contents are but the creation of the One and the Only Lord. He has no partners or peers; He is Matchless and Singular.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULj4j8DpvJ0

The ‘first true scientist’

Saeed — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 07:13:31 +0000

Original post on BBC by Professor Jim Al-Khalili
University of Surrey
Professor Jim Al-Khalili presents Science and Islam on BBC Four at 2100GMT on Monday 5, 12 & 19 January

Isaac Newton is, as most will agree, the greatest physicist of all time.

At the very least, he is the undisputed father of modern optics, or so we are told at school where our textbooks abound with his famous experiments with lenses and prisms, his study of the nature of light and its reflection, and the refraction and decomposition of light into the colours of the rainbow.

Yet, the truth is rather greyer; and I feel it important to point out that, certainly in the field of optics, Newton himself stood on the shoulders of a giant who lived 700 years earlier.

For, without doubt, another great physicist, who is worthy of ranking up alongside Newton, is a scientist born in AD 965 in what is now Iraq who went by the name of al-Hassan Ibn al-Haytham.

Most people in the West will never have even heard of him.

As a physicist myself, I am quite in awe of this man’s contribution to my field, but I was fortunate enough to have recently been given the opportunity to dig a little into his life and work through my recent filming of a three-part BBC Four series on medieval Islamic scientists.

Modern methods

Popular accounts of the history of science typically suggest that no major scientific advances took place in between the ancient Greeks and the European Renaissance.

But just because Western Europe languished in the Dark Ages, does not mean there was stagnation elsewhere. Indeed, the period between the 9th and 13th Centuries marked the Golden Age of Arabic science.

Great advances were made in mathematics, astronomy, medicine, physics, chemistry and philosophy. Among the many geniuses of that period Ibn al-Haytham stands taller than all the others.

Ibn al-Haytham is regarded as the father of the modern scientific method.

As commonly defined, this is the approach to investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, or correcting and integrating previous knowledge, based on the gathering of data through observation and measurement, followed by the formulation and testing of hypotheses to explain the data.

This is how we do science today and is why I put my trust in the advances that have been made in science.

But it is often still claimed that the modern scientific method was not established until the early 17th Century by Francis Bacon and Rene Descartes.

There is no doubt in my mind, however, that Ibn al-Haytham arrived there first.

In fact, with his emphasis on experimental data and reproducibility of results, he is often referred to as the “world’s first true scientist”.

Understanding light

He was the first scientist to give a correct account of how we see objects.

He proved experimentally, for instance, that the so-called emission theory (which stated that light from our eyes shines upon the objects we see), which was believed by great thinkers such as Plato, Euclid and Ptolemy, was wrong and established the modern idea that we see because light enters our eyes.

What he also did that no other scientist had tried before was to use mathematics to describe and prove this process.

So he can be regarded as the very first theoretical physicist, too.

He is perhaps best known for his invention of the pinhole camera and should be credited with the discovery of the laws of refraction.

He also carried out the first experiments on the dispersion of light into its constituent colours and studied shadows, rainbows and eclipses; and by observing the way sunlight diffracted through the atmosphere, he was able to work out a rather good estimate for the height of the atmosphere, which he found to be around 100km.

Enforced study

In common with many modern scholars, Ibn-al Haytham badly needed the time and isolation to focus on writing his many treatises, including his great work on optics.

He was given an unwelcome opportunity, however, when he was imprisoned in Egypt between 1011 and 1021, having failed a task set him by a caliph in Cairo to help solve the problem of regulating the flooding of the Nile.

While still in Basra, Ibn al-Haytham had claimed that the Nile’s autumn flood waters could be held by a system of dykes and canals, thereby preserved as reservoirs until the summer’s droughts.

But on arrival in Cairo, he soon realised that his scheme was utterly impractical from an engineering perspective.

Yet rather than admit his mistake to the dangerous and murderous caliph, Ibn-al Haytham instead decided to feign madness as a way to escape punishment.

This promptly led to him being placed under house arrest, thereby granting him 10 years of seclusion in which to work.

Planetary motion

He was only released after the caliph’s death. He returned to Iraq where he composed a further 100 works on a range of subjects in physics and mathematics.

While travelling through the Middle East during my filming, I interviewed an expert in Alexandria who showed me recently discovered work by Ibn al-Haytham on astronomy.

It seems he had developed what is called celestial mechanics, explaining the orbits of the planets, which was to lead to the eventual work of Europeans like Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler and Newton.

It is incredible that we are only now uncovering the debt that today’s physicists owe to an Arab who lived 1,000 years ago.

Wi-tribe to be the next WiMAX Operator in Pakistan

Saeed — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 10:12:15 +0000

Aamir Atta at ProPakistani had reported back in May 2008 that Wi-Tribe is planning to enter into WiMAX market in Pakistan, after Wateen and Mobilink. Now after Motorola has signed a multi-year WiMAX contract with wi-tribe Pakistan limited, Wi-Tribe seems set ready for a the all-new wireless broadband Internet provider to enter the Pakistan.

Motorola says that it will supply infrastructure and a comprehensive services package that will enable wireless broadband services for wi-tribe’s customers.

It merits mentioning here that wi-tribe Pakistan Limited is a joint venture between Qatar Telecom (Qtel) and Saudi Arabia’s A.A. Turki Group of Companies (ATCO). wi-tribe is also aiming to deliver instant wireless broadband connectivity from North Africa across the Middle East and up to Asia (AMESA region).

In a wi-tribe statement issued from Islamabad, Mohammad Sadiq, CEO of wi-tribe Pakistan limited said that WiMAX is changing the way people are connecting and is opening doors to a new world of opportunities, “We will be offering high-speed Internet that is simple, affordable, and a portable alternative to fixed broadband”, added Mr. Sadiq.

While on other hands, Mr. Ali Amer, Vice President Sales, Middle East, Africa and Pakistan, Motorola Home & Networks Mobility, at the signing ceremony said “WiMAX will become a driving force in Pakistan. This is why Motorola stands at the forefront of such an important industry standard that enables progressive service providers such as wi-tribe to launch high-speed, rich, yet affordable communications services.”

It is learned that Motorola will straight away begin deploying wi-tribe’s WiMAX network from October 2008 in the 3.5GHz spectrum. Commercial launch is expected during 2009.

Motorola will supply award-winning equipment from its WiMAX portfolio including the WAP 400 WiMAX access point, which features diversity MIMO antenna capabilities to enable strong indoor penetration.

10.5 million unverified mobile connections blocked

Saeed — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 09:28:13 +0000

Original post by Babar Bhatti at State of Telecom Industry in Pakistan

While many numbers and policies have been floating around for the unverified SIM issue, PTA has issued a new statement which I am sharing here. As we know this has been one of the most difficult issues for the industry. A few big changes announced:

The control of sale/verification will shift from Franchisee/Retailers to Mobile Companies
No more than 10 connections against single person (CNIC)

Not only has it required a change in the way business has been done but it also has made an impact on the revenues and that too in an already difficult economic and business environment. This shows how important it is to craft thoughtful policies at the beginning. Any mess that you try to fix after it is in the market takes a much longer time and effort.

Chairman, Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), Dr. Mohammed Yaseen presided over a high level meeting of Chief Executive Officers of all Mobile Companies on 7th October, 2008 to discuss the progress of different deadlines given by PTA for blocking of unregistered SIMs, blocking of more than 10 connections on single CNIC and on the proposed project for activation of SIMs After verification.

Chairman PTA showed great concerns on the outcome of recently concluded survey of franchisee and retailers done jointly by PTA and Mobile Companies. The results showed violation of Standing Operating Procedure (SOP) on verification by franchisees and retailers. He further emphasized that PTA may take stern action against the Mobile Companies on the basis of these violations.

The meeting was informed that after considerable efforts total 10.5 million connections have been blocked so far. In first phase connections sold uptill 30th April, 2008 have got verified through NADRA. More than 7.3 million connections found unverified have been blocked. In the second phase, PTA is endeavoring to clean subscriber’s data of connections sold from 1st May, 2008 to 30th May, 2008. Uptill now a total of 0.6 million connections which remained unverified have been blocked.

SOP on verification also binds the Mobile Companies to block more than 10 connections against single CNIC. Mobile companies were asked to block additional connections by 30th September, 2008. Uptill now 2.6 million of extra connections have been blocked.

Chairman PTA further informed the CEOs that a considerable improvement has been seen in the verification process, however PTA feels that unless sale of Pre-active SIMs are not stopped, full implementation on the SOP will not be possible. The meeting discussed in detail the proposed system under which company will sell non activated SIMs and Mobile companies will activate the SIM after verification of subscriber’s antecedents from NADRA. The proposed system will have number of advantages like; The control of sale /verification will shift from Franchisee/Retailers to Mobile Companies; It will have added security parameters and being automated will be more reliable.

Since this is new concept which requires considerable operational and administrative arrangements, therefore Chairman PTA formulated a working group of Cellular Mobile Companies, NADRA and PTA to propose workable solution so that all aspects of verification is catered, by 20th October 2008.

Pakistan’s Contribution to the Large Hadron Collider (LHC)

Faiza — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 21:12:52 +0000

Large Hadron Collider (LHC – not to be confused with Lahore High Court in anyway) is a Physicist’s dream come true. Being world’s biggest science apparatus ever built this is a show of science on how far have we come to in our mental and analytical evolution. Today with the LHC we are at brink of understanding the existence of ours from the very basic ground up. This time we are not even looking at the DNA, neither we are exploring the fossils, we have even gone beyond all that. We are today finding how the Big Bang happened. And there especially to know about that first particle (infamously called, the God Particle) known as Higgs boson.

This LHC spans over an area of 27 KM underground setup spanning over the Swiss-Franco border, with support from thousands of Physicists, scientists and laboratories from over eighty-five countries. It is housed in the same tunnels which were dug in 1989 for Large Electron-Positron Collider, with of course some new specialized construction. With an estimated cost between €3.2–6.4 billion, this machine successfully fired itself up on 10th Septemeber 2008, whereas the full high intensity firing will be done by 21st October. Yet already it has made sensational news world wide.

With reports of people filing a petition against it, to an Indian 16 year old girl who committed suicide as she thought once LHC is fired it will bring end of the world (refer to as Doomsday), to continuous circulating emails and forum postings calling relating it with playing God, to finally sending death threats to some of the leading involved scientists. World has gone paranoid it seems to the frenzy the LHC’s elaborate marketing has caused. Doomsday prophets have suddenly popped out everywhere. Just only tragedy would be that majority of them don’t even know what are they talking about!

In order to help explain the whole process to the common people, perhaps even those who have gone paranoid, a scientist working at the CERN has even released her own rap! Honestly, if you follow it carefully it explains it way better than most of the texts you will find about it online.

Coming back from a brief introduction to the LHC, lets talk about the contribution of Pakistan it. Its a matter of pride for me at least at the moment as a Pakistani is that LHC has been assisted in this by Pakistani wonderful scientists too. Pakistan has a long history of participating with CERN and has a long tradition of wonderful physicists who are working around the world. A prime example would be Dr Abdul Salam himself who sadly was forgotten by Pakistan just because of his religious preferences. Dr Salam was the first man to be accredited with all the collaboration with CERN which continues till todate when he convinced CERN to give Pakistan stacks of nuclear emulsion exposed for further study of pions, kaons and antiprotons in 1960s.

In 1997 Ishfaq Ahmad (special adviser to the prime minister of Pakistan and former chairman of the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission) was able to sign a contract between PAEC and CERN after elaborate discussions an in-kind contribution worth one million Swiss francs for the construction of eight magnet supports for the CMS detector.

In 2000, CERN signed another agreement which doubled the Pakistani contribution from one to two million Swiss francs. And with this new agreement Pakistan started construction of the resistive plate chambers required for the CMS muon system. While more recently, a protocol has been signed enhancing Pakistan’s total contribution to the LHC programme to $10 million.

Pakistan with all these efforts is already hoping to become an observer state at CERN.

All in all, Pakistan has contributed the LHC in numerous ways including some of the following in particular:

1. Detector construction
2. Detector simulation
3. Physics analysis
4. Grid computing
5. Different mathematical software developments
6. Manufacturing of mechanical equipment
7. Alignment of the CMS tracker using lasers
8. Testing of electronic equipment
9. Barrel Yoke: 35 Tonn each feet made in Pakistan
10. Assembling of CF Fins for the Silicon Trekker’s TOB
11. Out of the total 300 chambers of CMS 245 were made in Islamabad, out of which 226 are already installed at CERN

I wonder how many Pakistani news channels picked this positive news coming from Pakistan? Did you know at least? Why not tell others why you feel proud as a Pakistani on it?

Source: Pakistan’s Contribution to the Large Hadron Collider (LHC)

P@SHA Career Expo at Avari Lahore on August 24

Saeed — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 11:24:31 +0000

On the third leg of its tour the P@SHA Career Expo heads for the land of the five rivers, the Punjab – more specifically Lahore. The event will be held at the Avari Hotel in Lahore on Sunday August 24 from 9 am – 6 pm.

It will include:

A job fair which will see some of Lahore’s prominent IT companies posting jobs for fresh graduates and experienced professionals – Netsol, Infotech, Systems, Bearing Point, Kalsoft, TRG, VahZay, Adamsoft, Intel, IBM etc will all be there
Workshops on Presentation Skills, Resume Writing, How to earn money through Blogging, etc.
Counseling – guidance on career selection and growth
Startup Insiders session from 4 pm – 6 pm for aspiring entrepreneurs

A must-attend event! If you are seeking a job with one of Pakistan’s leading IT or IT Enabled Service companies, don’t forget to come to the P@SHA Career Expo on August 24th where representatives from these companies will all be waiting for the brightest fresh graduates and experienced professionals in Computer Science, Business Studies, Marketing and Management.

Join a US$2 billion industry that has seen continued and tremendous growth and innovation in the last 5 years. No registation required.

Source: http://pashanews.org/?p=151

The ‘DonateBandwidth’ Project – work of a Pakistani Scientist

Saeed — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 13:36:18 +0000

It was refreshing to see quality work being done by one of our own scientists right here in Pakistan. The best part of it all was that we Pakistanis are most likely to be the first to benefit from such technology. Dr. Umar Saif, we are proud of you indeed!

MIT Technology Review (TR), a premier technology magazine, has featured the work of Dr. Umar Saif and his team on improving Internet connectivity in the developing-world. The Project, dubbed DonateBandwidth, is a follow-up project of the Poor Man’s Broadband work which was featured in New Scientist in Nov’07.With DonateBandwidth, users in the developing-world can help each other by donating their unused bandwidth to those who need it. This project received funding from the US State Department/NAS and HEC and will be further developed in collaboration with UC Berkeley.

Umar compares the project to distributed computing schemes such as SETI@Home, which uses volunteers’ spare computer power to collaboratively analyze radio signals from space, looking for signs of intelligent life. “DonateBandwidth permits sharing of unused Internet bandwidth, which is much more valuable in the developing world, compared to computing cycles or disk space,” he says.

It is rare that research in Pakistan catches the attention of a publication like the Technology Review. Reading the complete article makes one proud to be associated with the likes of Umar Saif.

PakFellows Blog » Science & Technology

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