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2 min read
'First state to disburse highest compensation'
The following jacket advertisement (which is expensive) appeared in The Hindu (and perhaps other newspapers as well; I didn't check) yesterday: Something seemed off about the messaging here
5 min read
A little ignorance can be a good thing
Picture a city where most drivers use the same navigation app. At 9 am, the app says one side street is the quickest shortcut to get from area A to
7 min read
Why do we trust scientists?
Individuals can’t master the mathematics of cryptography or the molecular biology of vaccines, yet they still trust these fields of science and the suggestions of their exponents to make decisions.
4 min read
The 'impact' of climate writing
The problem begins simply enough. A journalist finds a word that seems to fit almost everything. It might be "crisis", "pivot" or the ever-convenient "impact&
5 min read
On Jane Goodall
Jane Goodall was a celebrated figure in conservation. Her work with chimpanzees in the Gombe Stream National Park in Tanzania redefined primatology. However, more than a few publications as well
3 min read
The 'religious' function of science
We often understand science primarily in terms of its tangible successes, looking to it for advances in medicine, for the foundations of technologies, and for the tools with which to
2 min read
A bad Nobel for Mokyr
The American-Israeli economic historian Joel Mokyr has been awarded one half of the 2025 special Nobel Prize for economics "for having identified the prerequisites for sustained growth through technological
7 min read
What does a quantum Bayes’s rule look like?
Bayes's rule is one of the most fundamental principles in probability and statistics. It allows us to update our beliefs in the face of new evidence. In its
9 min read
Using 10,000 atoms and 1 to probe the Bohr-Einstein debate
The double-slit experiment has often been described as the most beautiful demonstration in physics. In one striking image, it shows the strange dual character of matter and light. When particles
4 min read
Curiosity as a public good
India has won 22 Ig Nobel prizes to date. These awards, given annually at Harvard University by the magazine Annals of Improbable Research, honour studies that "first make people
12 min read
Dispelling Maxwell's demon
Maxwell’s demon is one of the most famous thought experiments in the history of physics, a puzzle first posed in the 1860s that continues to shape scientific debates to
5 min read
CSIR touts dubious 'Ayurveda' product for diabetes
At 6 am on September 13, the CSIR handle on X.com published the following post about an "anti-diabetic medicine" called either "Daiba 250" or "
2 min read
A danger of GST 2.0
Since Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman's announcement last week that India's Goods and Services Tax (GST) rates will be rationalised anew from September 22, I'
9 min read
Lighting the way with Parrondo’s paradox
In science, paradoxes often appear when familiar rules are pushed into unfamiliar territory. One of them is Parrondo’s paradox, a curious mathematical result showing that when two losing strategies
1 min read
GST 2.0 + WordPress.com
Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced sweeping changes to the GST rates on September 3. However, I think the rate for software services (HSN 99831) will remain unchanged at 18%
