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I was pointed to an article during a Twitter discussion on the Bullet Train project a little while back. Entitled " The Economics of the Bullet Train and Whether It Makes Financial Sense To Take a 0.1% loan ", it concludes that the project is economically feasible. As a student of earth science, this is my response to the article, as well as my take on the Bullet Train in the context of the climate crisis. The Assumptions With no background in economics, finance or rail technology, I am not in any position to comment on those aspects of the project. Hence, I begin with the assumptions that: The interest rate is very generous (with whatever assumptions required about exchange rates, etc). The Shikansen system is plain awesome. I focus instead on the what the author of the article calls "The "Other" Aspects". My Contentions " Is a bullet train desirable when we don't have enough toilets? " Personally, I do not think build

Maharashtra witnessed some dizzying political theatrics last month. I am not a political analyst, and I do not claim to understand much of what happened. However, as a student of Earth Sciences who is told remarkably often that the "real world" is out of my depth, I have tried to understand this election and put it in perspective of the climate crisis. My attempt to make sense of the State Election chronology While the political circus kept the whole state, and probably the Centre as well, engaged for a whole month, November also saw a parallel plot-line developing. This one directly affected over a crore people and indirectly affected the whole country. In fact, the plot of Kaun banega CM  was so gripping that while going through the November news, I realised that this parallel plot had not even made the headlines. Articles from the print archives of Indian Express In 2019, Maharashtra suffered first from a drought during the monsoonal months, and th

Scientists have issued a fresh set of warnings about the climate crisis. And if the past is any indicator, then we can expect a fresh set of reminders on social media about how small India's per capita carbon emissions are, in comparison to the developed world. Per Capita Carbon emissions in metric tonnes Qatar 43.9 USA 16.5 Australia 15.4 Canada 15.2 Russia 11.9 Japan 9.5 Germany 8.9 Sweden 4.5 India 1.7 We should be collecting taxes from other countries for polluting our world. — Nilesh Shah (@NileshShah68) October 13, 2019 (Never mind that there is no real discussion about carbon taxation outside of academic circles.) India has the lowest per capita carbon emissions among all the G20 Nations. > Carbon Emission By Nation In Metric Tonnes: ●Australia: 16.5 ●USA: 15.7 ●China: 7.7 ●U.K: 5.7 ●India: 1.8 The west has no right to lecture India on Climate Change. #HowDareYou — Vivekk | विवेक | বিবেক | விவேக் | (@oyevivek

← Continued from Page 1 June 26, 2019:  " 'Murder' of a tree: Why modern judiciary needs to rise above anthropomorphism and learn science" It is interesting to note that you do believe in science, though selectively. You say: " To start with, a tree is not a permanent storage of CO2. It is just a transit house where CO2 is captured and stored temporarily. The day a branch or some leaves fall and are burned, as we do in our cities, CO2 returns back to the atmosphere along with some PM 2.5, as partial burning leads to a release to such particles. If you want to argue that burning is not the option, the other exit for a tree is organic decomposition that releases other greenhouses gases like methane ." Not everyone has the training to spot scientific errors and fallacies, and I beg you to not take advantage of that. A tree is not a permanent storage of CO 2 , but it is an excellent storage of CO 2  nonetheless. Yes, the decomp

For other readers : According to his TOI blog , Samir Shukla is a Visiting Professor of Bionics at IIM Ahmedabad. He writes on various platforms such as Times of India, Economic Times, DNA India, Medium and Quora. I am writing this letter in an admittedly agitated mood. If you go through his blog, you may reach the same stage. I encourage you to go through his posts on any topic of your interest and concern, and get familiar with his style of writing and (presumably) thinking. He has advice for scientists, economists, feminists, activists, the judiciary, etc etc., without having any apparent expertise in any of these fields. However, I must point out, he is not wrong everywhere, so I am restricting the content of this letter to the concept of climate change. TLDR? Summary: Common man - do not believe fake experts. Media houses - raise standards for your platforms, do not enable the spread of misinformation. Dr. Shukla - please educate yourself or don't sprea

This letter is primarily intended for students of the BS-MS program at the Department of Earth Sciences, IIT Kanpur, but I am putting it up on a public platform in case it may help others too. ---- Hi all, I wrote a post earlier suggesting some perspectives before you make career choices. The general lack of appreciation for Earth Sciences in our country (and maybe other countries too, I wouldn't know) can be problematic to someone who's set out on this path but is unsure why or where it's going to lead. It doesn't help that there is so much noise all around us ( foreign interns! placements! startups! Netflix!! ), it can easily drown out any feeble indications of where our interests truly lie. And 2 or 3 years of exposure to a discipline may not give you enough conviction to pursue it seriously. When you choose a career, you should consider what your career would offer to you in terms of  your  vision for your life. Some careers allow you to earn

← Part I: Greenhouse Gases Man or nature? The Question Previously , we saw that anthropogenic emissions are causing global warming and climate change. But how do we know they are the main cause of climate change? How do we know that modern climate change is indeed caused by mankind? Scientists who study past climates on our planet have discovered large climatic variations in the Earth's past. For example, temperatures in several places were 5 - 12  o C higher than today, around 55 million years ago. If the Earth could show such large variations with no humans present on it, how can we be sure that the climate change we see today is caused by humans? After all, modern climate change has only caused a change of about 1  o C so far (on average). What if modern climate change is simply natural? The Answer Scientists can simulate the climate system using computer models. We can compare results from climate models with actual meteorological observations to

Mr. Deb, I recently read two of your articles on LiveMint (sources below),  and forgive me for being blunt, but please stop spreading lies . I am not concerned with your opinion of Greta or your faux concern over the child. While you write catchy headlines supposably fixated on Greta Thunberg, your actual attacks are on climate scientists and the IPCC. I'm not the first person to point out your ignorance and prejudice in this matter. I laud Bibek Bhattacharya and Krishna AchutaRao for taking the initiative with their pieces. This is my contribution to cleaning the mess you're making by being a reckless and irresponsible voice in the climate conversation. Here are my replies to 5 of your most vitriolic statements: (1) "IPCC has just released another doomsday scenario. Since bad news sells, it's made headlines." The IPCC does not release doomsday scenarios. IPCC predictions provide estimates of what could happen under specific future scena

This letter is primarily intended for students of the BS-MS program at the Department of Earth Sciences, IIT Kanpur but I am putting it up on a public platform in case it may help others too, and in case others may chip in and contribute to the discussion. I am writing this, not because I think I am the best person to advise you, but only to start this discussion. I hope you will discuss anything I say further with other, more experienced people. ----- Hi all, Some of you are making choices towards your futures right now. Some of you will choose to exit Earth Sciences after your undergraduate degree. And some of you may already have plans of how to do so. Indeed, there are numerous options available - since you are at an IIT, you are in a reasonably good position to land a job in other sectors such as banking or data analytics or coding. You may also consider preparing for a UPSC exam or getting an MBA after this. This post is not intended to criticise any of those