Responding to the blog: Ramarao Kanneganti

If I had more time, I would have written a more thoughtful response to the blog that Viplav wrote. Of course, I was confused as to how torespond. I could respond as Ramarao Kanneganti about the inaccuracies inportrayal (for example, I did lift bricks and so on). Or fallacies inlogic (Does truth depend on whether I covet a BMW, or struggling to payfor health care bills?) But then, it could have been ego satisfying, butnot particularly interesting.

I could have responded as a "new intellectual", but the definition proved much elusive. The post has a bunch of statements about "newintellectual", with only some of the statements demonstrably valid forme. In any case, the only statement that resonated with me is that I am depending on limited amount of information to make pronouncements. The rest are either red herrings or plain fantastic.

If I am accused of coming to a decision with little information thanavailable, I agree. But then, it is the process of decision making aidedby statistical inferencing, monotonic reasoning, and backed by an incremental weltanschauung. There is a strong precedence for it. Infact, if there is anything I am an authority on, it would be that -- my PhD thesis is about such models and reasoning.

Lest you all should think I am too smug, I am constantly aware that that my model is incremental (at times, parts of it invalidated throughlearning), and work to incorporate any new knowledge into my world view.Through my experiences I am aware that more information does not always been different judgment. Or, information can provide different "wisdom"in different people.

In any case, there is a name for what I do, or what I am: it is called"intellectual gadfly". I am not an intellectual. I am so painfully awarehow people mistake my playful, ahem, brilliance with intellectual discourse.

I would have very much liked if he had written how I am much mistaken about virasam Ban. At least it could have been an illuminatingdiscussion. I could have said why I did not condemn the arrest of NVenugopal or Vara vara Rao or Kalyan Rao. I could have said why "choice"is not the motivating factor, if any. I could have said lot of otherthings.

Instead, this analysis leaves me in an unenviable position: defend myself and come across as a egotistical blow hard; not defend myself andappear as all that I am accused to be. Ignoring it is the easiest optionthat anybody would advocate, but somehow I could not do it, perhaps outof past impression of the author:-).

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Rama