GULLIVER 25/10/26 ECONOMIC TIMES
REMEMBER, FOR EVERY GULLIVER THERE ARE MANY LILLIPUTIANS
   “Beware- and be aware – of survivorship bias, which makes us focus on astonishing and inspirational stories, while ignoring numerous cases of individuals on the same track who never came close to success”
Data Cruncher
Atanu Biswas

        Jonathan Swift’s great satirical novel, Gulliver’s Travels, was published 300 years ago this week — on Oct 28, 1726– with the original title, ‘Travels Into Several Into Several Remote Nations of the World. In Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and then a Captain of Several Ships.’
    There is something oddly soothing about Lemuel Gulliver. He goes through life threatening situations such as storms, shipwrecks, pirates, being left by his companions, and mutines, and still manages to survive and tell the tale. Gulliver’s story is, by nature, a survivor’s story.
    His extraordinary adventures — in Lilliput, where tiny people are constantly fighting petty political feuds; in Brobdingnag, where giant humans criticize European customs; in Laputa, a place full of impractical intellectuals cut off from the real world: and in Houyhnhnms, where rational horses coexist peacefully with humanoid savages called Yahoos–make every extraordinary danger appear survivable.
    Which is why we should look at Gulliver through the lens of an idea that sounds thoroughly modern: survivorship bias
    The idea of survivorship bias can be traced back to Diagoras of Melos, a 5th century BC Greek poet and sophist, or professional travelling teacher. Diagoras, an atheist, was once shown some painted tablets depicting sailors who had prayed during a violent storm and survived shipwreck. He asked a deceptively simple question: “Where are the pictures of all those who prayed and then drowned?”
    That question carries a remarkable modern insight: we tend to build our understanding of things from what is visible, and ignore what is not, or has disappeared/removed. It’s the essence of survivorship bias–a tendency to overestimate the likelihood of success, because failures have quietly vanished from our field of vision, along with the corresponding data.
More than 200 years after Swift, statistician Abraham Wald encountered a remarkably similar problem during WW2. The military wanted to reinforce bombers returning from combat. Analysts examined bullet holes in the aircraft that had made it back home. The obvious suggestion was to add armour to the places where the aircraft had suffered the most damage.
Wald saw a trap. The aircraft being examined were survivors. They had been hit and had nevertheless managed to return. Wald realised that the damage visible on the returned planes weren’t necessarily the most vulnerable places in the aircraft. Absence of damage in a particular area could be more ominous if a hit there prevented the aircraft from returning. The lesson was to consider not only the survivors, but also those who didi not survive. One of the most important statistical ideas is to account for both groups.
As humans, we focus on astonishing and inspirational stories — like a runaway boy becoming a film star, or a street food seller becoming a famous sportsman — while we ignore that numerous such individuals never came close to success.
A college dropout, now a successful entrepreneur, can tell us how taking risks and ignoring conventional wisdom ‘made the difference’. Maybe it did. But thousands may have taken similar risks, ignored similar advice, worked just as diligently, only to close their businesses. Their stories don’t appear in newspapers, business schools, or inspirational books.
In his 2007 book, The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable, Nasim Nicholas Taleb called data obscured by survivorship bias ‘silent evidence’. Success has a microphone; failure often has silence.
Over the last 300 years, Gulliver’s Travels itself has undergone a kind of cultural selection. It’s been rewritten, abridged, illustrated, translated, parodied, and adapted into various media. But the Gulliver most people remember is not necessarily the one Swift originally created.
Children’s Gulliver, cinematic Gulliver, comic Gulliver have all survived Swift’s original satirical Gulliver, making Lemuel a survivor twice over: first as a traveller, then as a cultural character.
So, three centuries after Gulliver and about two-and-a-half millennia after Diagoras, the question remains the same: where are the stories of those who didn’t survive, the Lilliputians of history and data?
(The writer is professor of statistics, Indian Statistical Institute (ISD), Kolkata

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Happy to share my piece published in the Speaking Tree Economic Times titled Care for Nature. Hope you enjoy reading it.

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QUOTES 6/11/16
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Everything changes nothing changes
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It’s easy to make a buck. It’s a lot tougher to make a difference…TOM BROKAW
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Supreme Self is mistaken for this universe by the power of maya. If we think deeply, the universe disappears and Brahmn alone remains…THUS SPAKE SRI RAMA
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Panic causes tunnel vision. Calm acceptance of danger allows us to more easily assess the situation and see the options…SIMON SINEK
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For an oil lamp to burn, the wick has to be partially immersed in the oil. If the wick is completely drowned in oil, it cannot bring light. Life is like the wick of the lamp; you have to be in the world and yet remain untouched by it… SRI SRI RAVI SHANKAR
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The definition of today’s AI is a machine that can make a perfect chess move while the room is on fire… ANONYMOUS
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What is there in a name? It is merely an empty basket, until you put something into it…CHARLES BABBAGE
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To be an ideal guest, stay at home…EW HOWE
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I will honour Christmas in my heart and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, Present, and Future. Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out lessons that they teach… CHARLES DICKENS, A Christmas Carol
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Our failure to properly deal with Germany and Japan early cost the world dearly later on. We dare not make the same mistake with China…STEVE FORBES
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Diabolical forces are formidable. These forces are eternal, and they exist today. The fairy tale is true. The devil exists. God exists. And for us, as people, our very destiny hinges upon which one we elect to follow…ED WARREN
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This is not a how-to book, whether to build an economy, an army, or a nation. It is an account of the problems my colleagues and I faced, and how we set about solving them…LEE KUAN YEW, The Singapore Story
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Technology is nothing. What’s important is that you have faith in people, that they’re basically good and smart, and if you give them tools, they’ll do wonderful things with them…STEVE JOBS
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By Kamlesh Tripathi

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THE FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS—HAPPY DIWALI

Kamlesh Tripathi

It’s Diwali, the festival of lights,
That celebrates the victory of good over evil,
Truth over falsehood, hope over fear,
And spreads joy all over.

It’s five days of passionate festivities,
With sweets, rangoli, and lamps, freely available.
The fireworks ascend,
As darkness recedes and sorrow ends.

It celebrates wisdom dispels ignorance,
Pokes through the veils of the mind’s ignorance.
As Ashwin wanes and Kartik begins,
Amavasya’s darkness brings a new dimension.

Marked in October or November’s embrace,
It follows the harvest with warmth and grace.
Before winter descends with its chill,
The golden diyas shine to the hilt.

From Dhanteras and Dhanvantari’s healing art,
To Lakshmi and Ganesha, cherished in every heart;
The churning ocean’s treasures of yore,
Find echoes in legends and sacred lore.

Ayodhya glows as Rama returns,
With Sita and Lakshman in his fold.
Hanuman’s loyalty adds to the cheer,
As Diwali lamps magnify the cheer.

From Ravana’s fall to Rama’s victory,
From Krishna’s triumph over Narakasura’s cruelty,
With Shiva, Vishnu, Durga and Kali’s grace,
Gods and demons meet in myth’s timeless space.

Sparklers and phuljhadis brighten the skies,
As radiant sparks dance across the skies.
The darkest night wears a celestial glow,
While hopes blossom where lamps aglow.

In life’s struggles, Diwali brings light,
It’s an oasis of peace in a world of fright.
The cosmos adorns its glorious robe,
As countless lamps illuminate the globe.

May love conquer hatred, may goodness unite,
May every heart shine with compassion bright.

Let joy and peace bless every life—
Happy Diwali, a festival of light!

kamleshsujata@yahoo.com

(The author is a senior ex-corporate executive, a cancer activist and a columnist)

Written and posted by Kamlesh Tripathi

Author, Poet, & Columnist

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https://kamleshsujata.wordpress.com

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QUOTES 3/11/26
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The ID card was launched with fantastic claims about supposed benefits. In truth, it represented the worst of govt…DAMIAN GREEN
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Monism and dualism are essentially the same…As dualists hold the father and son to be two, monists hold them to be really one. Dualism is in nature, in manifestation, and monism is pure spiritually in essence… SWAMI VIVEKANANDA
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In all politics truth is optional… TOI 3/11/26
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Popularity should be no scale for the election of politicians. If it would depend on popularity, Donald Duck and The Muppets would take seats in the Senate…ORSON WELLES
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Acceptance looks like a passive state, but in reality it brings something entirely new into this world. That peace, a subtle energy vibration, is consciousness…ECKHART TOLLE
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Pollution is nothing but the resources we are not harvesting. We allow them to disperse because we’ve been ignorant of their value…R BUCKMINSTER FULLER
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All parents damage their children. It cannot be helped. Youth, like pristine glass, absorbs the prints of its handlers. Some parents smudge, others crack, a few shatter childhoods completely into jagged little pieces, beyond repair…MITCH ALBOM, The Five People You Meet in Heaven
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I hate flying. Know why? Because no one really understands how planes actually work…ADAM LEVINE
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Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else’s opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation… OSCAR WILDE
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They wanted an America that is too small for some of us. We know that this is an America that is big enough for all of us…ABDUL EL-SAYED, Senator-elect, Michigan
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Nothing hurls an individual towards their goals faster than the string of defeat. That’s when all the probing post-mortem questions get asked. Victory is the fluffing up and reinforcing of the existing ego…STEWART STAFFORD
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Good wine is a necessity of life for me… THOMAS JEFFERSON
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History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce…KARL MARX
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How can we be so arrogant? The planet is, was, and always will be stronger than us. We can’t destroy it; if we overstep the mark, the planet will simply erase us from its surface and carry on existing…PAULO COELHO
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Key is how we think not what we think
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It is true that liberty is precious; so precious that it must be carefully rationed…LENIN
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Only two kinds of people can attain self-knowledge: those who are not encumbered at all with learning, whose minds are not over-crowded with thoughts borrowed from others; and those who, after studying scriptures and sciences, have come to realise that they know nothing… RAMAKRISHNA PARAMHANSA