Science: Breakthrough of the Year and the Runners-Up

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Breakthrough of the Year: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/314/5807/1848

Runners Up: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/sci;314/5807/1850a

Nothingness of Modern Urban Lives...

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Wake up at day-break,
Scramble through morning routines,
Rush to station...just in time for the train,
And rewarded with two inches of space,
You cling to it in the sea of humanity;

Meetings and discussions at office,
Phone calls and deals so many,
The PC your soulmate as you negotiate;
Lost in the flow...wherever it flows...

Friends in the evenings,
Movies on weekends,
A restaurant, a pub, another outing;
Killing time coz you have time to kill...

How long, how long can I shield myself from all this I wonder...

Yes, I deliberately choose to stay away from this hollowness;
The "nothingness" of modern urban lives...

Interesting articles in finance

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http://www.risklatte.com/

A life lost...?

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The more and more I get to know,
The more I realize I don’t know;
The more I realize I don’t know,
The more I want to know what I still don’t know…

In pursuit of the known unknown,
I struggle from shore to shore;
A life lost to the bottomless well of knowledge,
I often wonder, could this life be worth more…

Push me

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Challenge me, confront me,
Hurt me, try to knock me off;

Please push me to the fringe,
The middle-path is too boring for comfort...

Harangue me, abuse me,
Make me the target of your diatribe;

Contradict me, stymie me;

Or I'll waste away in the succor of routine...

Let me earn each breath of fresh air;

Help me explore my limits,
Then I'll know you are my true friend...

Decency vs Dignity

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Being decent to another human is not the same as giving the human his/her dignity.
I, as a human, prefer dignity to decency if the choice comes to that.