Rakesh Reddy Kandula

Games Indians Play by V. Raghunathan

Last week a friend of mine had come from hyderabad. So, took him to forum…and by default I went to landmark also. This is the place where I will never get bored……I can spend hours together in landmark looking at all the books. Finally bought two books and one of them was this one Games Indians Play by V. Raghunathan.

Coming to this book, I had heard about this book already but didn’t knew what it was all about. So, when I found it in landmark, I just saw the contents and it seemed to be really interesting. This book is basically about “why we are the way we are” i.e., why are we Indians the way we are….an interesting read isn’t it??? I came across many new concepts of game theory through this book and the way the author correlates them to the way Indians think and behave is quite interesting. Especially the prisoner’s dilemma framework was really good. Also the different variations of this and then trying to understand the characteristics of human rationality, irrationality, egotism, competetion, co-operation among we Indians, etc through this framework was really good. Also the author discusses about the various scenarios that he had used when he was teaching at IIM-A and a few experiments that he used to do in parties, etc.

On the whole its an interesting read and would definitely recommend it. If you don’t have the time to read the book atleast try reading about the concept of prisoner’s dilemma, pseudo dilemma, wolf’s dilemma, etc. They are really really interesting concepts worth looking at. Also original articles on prisoner’s dilemma by hofstadter that were published in scientific american in 1980′s are worth reading.

Of all the quotes that I came across in this book, the one I liked the most is this

“India is a functioning anarchy” —by J.K.Galbraith (US ambassador to India, 1962).

Add comment May 30th, 2008

Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach

A friend of mine told me about this book Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach. The book has just 3 parts ( around 39 pages) and its all about a seagull jonathan livingston who is different from the other gulls. He loves to fly not just to find food but to learn what all he can do in the air. Its about not following the same daily routine as the other gulls would do but to do something that he wants to. In his efforts to learn flying he was outcasted from the community. But still he would continue doing the same and then one fine day he finds himself in another world. Here he learns many new things and ultimately he comes back to the flock that had outcasted him. He comes back only to teach the other gulls that also wanted to learn flying. I am not going to talk about everything in detail….but I would definitely recommend that everyone has to read it.

The book basically tells us that everybody can do everything provided we don’t give up hope and trust ourselves. Its about not just doing what everyone else does ( I would call it a herd mentality), but rather do something that we really want to. We should listen to ourselves more often..and that said I don’t mean we have to be selfish….. what I mean is to do what our inner mind wants us to do but not just to satisfy our selfish needs. One more thing that this book tries to tell us is that there is nothing like attaining perfection… there is always so much to learn in this world.

Add comment February 19th, 2008