Sending Pakistan to Mars

[Selous]

Till the day comes when even a stray dog wants not for food and water we have no right to try and go to Mars.

 

[kaku1]

I admire Dr. Sahib


However I disagree with him on this.


If you want to get to space, to moon, to Mars, you need to go make a simple request to our rocket program incharge in military.

When they test their rockets, don't just shoot them up with minimal stuff.

Put some astronomy equipment as payload instead of mock bombs.

This will serve to test both the rocket and get some science done.


Some times Dr. Hoodboy talks complicated things as if he himself is a religious scholar.


Peace.

Firstly, Pak needed to respect there scientist. Dont know but what the Pakistani have the problem with Abdul Qadeer Khan, If I was Pakistani, I would salute him. Just to protect the state interest and state institute, Musharaf created a perfect scape goat.Even if he selflessly worked for Pakistan.

I want to ask a question to all Pakistani members, when America arrested Von Braun, did they sended him to Numberg Trials. If we talk morally, he should be indicted and prosecuted in waging war against America for its involvement in V2 program, and at some point he was the member of SS, the same SS which caused the genocide. But still, America given him even bunglow in Las Vegas, and because of this man, Saturn program and Apollo was success.

So, I want to ask question, there should be a moral in state when it come to state interest?

 

[Guynextdoor2]

Good article, makes a lot of sense. As for the people saying Dr.Hoodbhoy should 'take steps' and that he 'does nothing', Well, he does a lot more than most Pakistanis combined. He is currently teaching at university level and undoubtedly takes considerable action to help educate Pakistanis.
Instead of having one person to work more and more, why not have more and more people to work a little?

He's an MIT grad and Abdus Samad's protégé- he could have chosen to teach at Harvard/ MIT and become extremely rich. He has chosen to come back to his country and serve it. It is very admirable.

 

[Viking 63]

It all comes down to will and budgets, we don't have to look at things with Indian image, rather what we want and require to strengthen our nation. If that requires following India to Mars then that's our mission. But I don't recall anyone following the Americans to moon right? There were more than dozen countries who could have achieved that feat. But no they chose a different path. Pakistan does not need to ape everything India does, we need to clarify what our path is as a nation first and then gradually move towards that.

 

[Gauss]

I think what indians like to say about us is right. We do have an intelligence problem. Pakistani nation has an IQ level well below the world average. Thats why we cant get things done, things that are scientifically challenging or require good problem solving skills. The remedy to this problem is to develop a culture of thinking. Students must be encouraged to think deeply about things from a young age. Pakistani state has itself suppressed thought in public life uptill now otherwise people will be asking questions like why are we living with an imagined enemy ? So the change has to come from the topmost level. Pakistani state must change its policy from one of stupefying its people to one that promotes enlightenment.

 

[HariPrasad]

View attachment 159264

Sending Pakistan to Mars
Pervez Hoodbhoy
Updated Oct 18, 2014 01:02pm
View attachment 159265
The author teaches physics in Lahore and Islamabad.

When spacecraft Mangalyaan successfully entered the Martian orbit in late September after a 10-month journey, India erupted in joy. Costing more than an F-16 but less than a Rafale, Mangalyaan’s meticulous planning and execution established India as a space-faring country. Although Indians had falsely celebrated their five nuclear tests of 1998 — which were based upon well-known physics of the 1940s — the Mars mission is a true accomplishment.

Pakistanis may well ask: can we do it too? What will it take? Seen in the proper spirit, India’s foray into the solar system could be Pakistan’s sputnik moment — an opportunity to reflect upon what’s important. Let’s see how India did it: First, space travel is all about science and India’s young ones are a huge reservoir of enthusiasm for science. Surveys show that 12-16 year olds practically worship Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking, are fascinated by black holes and Schrödinger cats, and most want a career in science. They see more prestige in this than becoming doctors, lawyers, financial managers, or army officers. Although most eventually settle for more conventional professions, this eagerness leads India’s very best students towards science.

Ten years ago, I had personally experienced this youthful enthusiasm during a four-week lecture tour across seven Indian cities that took me to all sorts of schools, colleges, and universities. In places, hundreds turned up for my talks on scientific subjects. Every city had at least one much-visited science museum, and sometimes two or three. Student scientific societies, which appeared active, were everywhere.

How can we Pakistanis get to our bit of the solar system? Or establish a presence in the world of science?

Second, Indian universities have created the necessary backbone for advanced scientific projects. University quality goes from moderately bad to very good, with the median lying around fair. Many mediocre ones produce rotten science PhDs and publications prodigiously, suffocating growth. On the positive side, research in the theoretical sciences carried out in India’s very best universities — as well as institutes such as TIFR and IMSC — compares favourably with that in the world’s top universities.

Rigorous entry standards for students, and a careful selection of faculty, have been important ingredients for this relative success. National examinations for entrance into the Indian Institutes of Technology would make the best students anywhere in the world sweat.

Third, India values — nay, venerates — its top mathematicians and scientists. There is scarcely an Indian I’ve met who doesn’t know the story of Srinivasa Ramanujan, the child prodigy from Madras who astonished the world of high mathematics but tragically died at the age of 32. India is dotted with institutes bearing such names as S.N. Bose, C.V. Raman, M. Saha, and Homi Bhabha.

Back to space: a developing country looking at faraway Mars can take either the Arab way or the Chinese-Indian way.

The first needs a ticket. Petrodollars paid for Prince Salman ibn Saud, the first Arab in space, and put him aloft an American space shuttle in 1985. Recently the UAE announced plans for a Mars mission within 18 years. Just as cash and foreign experts built Dubai and its mega-sized airport, they will also put sheikhs on planets.

But how can we cash-strapped Pakistanis get to our bit of the solar system? Or establish a presence — which we so far lack — in the world of science? The process will be slow, but here is how to do it.

First, create enthusiasm in our young people for science. Space exploration is only a part of the larger whole. Instead of TV channels saturated with dharna news and random political “experts”, have good educational programmes. Standards of English in Pakistan must improve; they have fallen so low that English-language TV channels no longer exist. Sadly, the world of science is closed to those who can only read or understand Urdu.

Second, we must re-educate ourselves to know the difference between science and “cargo science”. This phrase, borrowed from anthropology, was introduced by the physicist Richard Feynman during his 1974 commencement address at the California Institute of Technology.

Feynman said: “In the South Seas there is a cargo cult of people. During [the Second World War] they saw airplanes land with lots of good materials, and they want the same thing to happen now. So they’ve arranged to imitate things like runways, to put fires along the sides of the runways, to make a wooden hut for a man to sit in, with two wooden pieces on his head like headphones and bars of bamboo sticking out like antennas — he’s the controller — and they wait for the airplanes to land. They’re doing everything right. The form is perfect. But it doesn’t work. No airplanes land. So I call these things cargo cult science, because they follow all the apparent precepts and forms of scientific investigation, but they’re missing something essential, because the planes don’t land.”

We must stop teaching a kind of science in Pakistani schools which is science only in name but which bypasses its essence — evidence and reasoning. Students experience mathematics as a bunch of cookbook prescriptions, physics and chemistry are mountains of formulae, and experimental science has been almost totally banished.

Our universities need even more drastic reform. Desperate to show evidence of improvement, government organisations such as the Higher Education Commission and Pakistan Council for Science and Technology have institutionalised a reward system that has led to armies of cargo PhDs — with wooden pieces sticking out of their heads — as well as mountains of cargo publications. Serious de-weeding is needed else academic fakes will crowd out the few genuine academic scientists around.

Third, and last, individual scientific achievement must be recognised while narrow prejudices, both religious and ethnic, must be firmly rejected. India has had many, but Pakistan has had only one great scientist — Abdus Salam. His tragic marginalisation must be reversed. This will be a strong signal that the country is finally prepared to move into the future.

The author teaches physics in Lahore and Islamabad.

Published in Dawn, October 18th, 2014

Good article but already posted.

I have heard some of his speeches on you tube. He is impressive. He is the one like Nzam Shetty and Hasan Nisar who dare to speak the truth at the cost of being unpopular in Pakistan. Till persons like them are their in Pakistan, I see a hope in Pakistan back on right track and progress. I wish Pakistan a good luck for mission like Mangal yaan in future.

 

[Thorough Pro]

he is a good for nothing anti state loudmouth with nothing to show as his accomplishments but eager to criticize our achievements in other fields. what doors to heaven has indian mars mission opened for its citizens, ore than half a billion of whom still live like dogs in poo pile.

On one hand he criticizes our defence expenditure for our survival on the other hand he is rooting for a space program. Confused or what?

 

[Agent Smith]

its very old article, already posted 3 times before.

 

[Soumitra]

I admire Dr. Sahib


However I disagree with him on this.


If you want to get to space, to moon, to Mars, you need to go make a simple request to our rocket program incharge in military.

When they test their rockets, don't just shoot them up with minimal stuff.

Put some astronomy equipment as payload instead of mock bombs.

This will serve to test both the rocket and get some science done.


Some times Dr. Hoodboy talks complicated things as if he himself is a religious scholar.


Peace.

 

[Soumitra]

Till the day comes when even a stray dog wants not for food and water we have no right to try and go to Mars.

@RiazHaq likes this

 

[Kaniska]

Sometimes when i go through the comment section of any article in Pakistan news paper, irrespective of the subject like Physics,Math or any scientific topic always ends of discussing about Islam and what has been mentioned in your religious books?...This is quite strange that even those English speaking readers are also so obsessed about religion in all technical and scientific topics too...

 

[Gauss]

**** off you false flagger coming from a shithole with a billion people who couldn't learn to defecate in a civilized in 70 years have a higher IQ, probably in that shit hole IQ is synonymous with the poo pile, higher the poo pile higher the IQ. now get of that mountain of shit and spread some more "IQ".

Every intelligent pakistani knows that our average IQ level is below the world average. Those that dont realize this are not intelligent themselves.

 

[Capt.Popeye]

Dr. Hoodbhoy please take first steps like EDHI and change the situation from the impossible to possible.

Is Edhi creating a program to send pakistan to Mars?

 

[Secur]

We should get all of the political religious whiteknights on a one way mission bound for mars. Pretty soon, Mars will have it's own insurgency movements and their perverted versions of shariah implemented on Martians.

That will be quite a large payload, why dont we save ourselves from the time and money required for such endeavor, send only a single Zia to accomplish all that?

Mr Solo, keep-up bashing Pakistan - your favorite topic. You could not sleep well without doing so; tonight again you are going to sleep tight.

Ironically, this nation doesn't even seem to learn from criticism, whether constructive or not. What he says isn't wrong in the essentials, even if you disagree with the words and the tone used.

 

[khail007]

Ironically, this nation doesn't even seem to learn from criticism, whether constructive or not. What he says isn't wrong in the essentials, even if you disagree with the words and the tone used.

Only those have a right to criticize which have their hands clean; @secure you have to go thru my full message and not only a part of it.

Go thru the all threads in history of PDF which were initiated by Mr Solo and you will be able to understand what I mean. If Mr Solo is Aristotle of PDF then he had to start from his own nation's blunders which made this world more insecure.

But there is a saying; 'Pani hamaysha nichli jaga per he aata hai'. Some Pakistani are very generous to accept such finger pointing even if those doing that are more entitled.