Aug
24
Ramadan 2010: State of American Muslims
Filed Under United States, religion | 6 Comments
by Imran H. Khan
Today is nearly the middle of Ramadan, a month of reflection and fasting for Muslims. It is also an appropriate time to reflect upon how Muslims are doing in America. They are certainly getting more than their due share of attention in the media and in the political arena of this country. One of the purpose of this post is to capture a snapshot of what is happening to American Muslims at this time for posterity. It is my intention to do this every year to gauge the trajectory of how this American group is doing.
While considerable progress has been made since 9/11 to educate the Americans in terms of Islam, the American public is still quite confused as to what Islam really is and Muslim practices like fasting in Ramadan. With the upcoming mid year elections and strained economy, political leaders have found Islam and Muslims as a convenient scapegoat for furthering their chances of election. One of the positive change is that the current President understands Islam and has initiated different efforts to bring about harmony between the US and the Muslim world.
Views: 202Share
Aug
18
Reconciling 9/11 sensitivities with Islam
Filed Under United States, religion | 3 Comments
by M. Salahuddin Khan
Weeks of wrangling and public media controversy have seen every manner of argument tried and discarded in favor of the next, in order to secure a legal blockage of the proposed Cordoba Initiative mosque project in lower Manhattan, just 2 blocks from Ground Zero.
Aug
9
Salman Ahmad’s Jihad
Filed Under India, Pakistan, Peace, US Policy, United States, World, education, religion | 1 Comment
by Imran H. Khan
Salman Ahmed is a well known musician out of Pakistan and South Asia. He is the founder of one of the most famous rock bands out of that region by the name of Junoon. He has recently written a book by the name of “Rock and Roll Jihad“. When I first heard about the book and the title it struck me as something odd. Rock and Roll and Jihad had until now not been said in the same sentence. Jihad in Arabic language means to strive. In the Islamic religious sense it means “striving in the cause of God”. Jihad has been classified either as al-jihād al-akbar (the greater jihad), the struggle against one’s soul (nafs), or al-jihād al-asghar (the lesser jihad), the external, physical effort, often implying fighting. Having had seen Salman grow from a cute little child to what he is now, it does not take much to understand how he has used his musical skills to achieve social activism in fighting injustices, bigotry, national animosities, disease, religious misunderstandings, religious radicalism and the list goes on.
Aug
4
…EXCEPT ISLAM
Filed Under United States, religion | 7 Comments
by M. Salahuddin Khan
Debates about mosques in different parts of the country are growing in number and intensity. As they do, fueled by conflating terrorist ambitions with the vast generality of Islam that is 20% of the world’s population, some fundamental questions arise about the moral and constitutional aspects of such debates and the forces that energize them.
Views: 199ShareJul
4
Cost Effective Training System for Laparoscopic and Robotic Surgery
Filed Under Medicine, Pakistan, Technology, United States | 1 Comment
by Shamyl Bin Mansoor, Osman Hasan and Dr Asif Zafar
Minimally invasive surgery (MIS) has revolutionized surgical care and treatment by reducing trauma to the patient, decreasing the need for pain medication, shortening recovery times and hospital stays, and improving cosmetic results. Laparoscopic surgery is accomplished by gaining access to the abdominal cavity, visualizing the cavity using a laparoscope, and performing diagnostic and therapeutic procedures. The term “laparoscopy” comes from the Greek words “laparo” (the flank) and “skopein” (to examine). As surgeons became skilled in laparoscopic cholecystectomy, they began to use laparoscopy to perform other advanced abdominal operations.
Jul
3
Core Competence: J-79, Kelly Johnson and PAF
Filed Under India, PAF, Peace, Technology, United States | 8 Comments
by Imran H. Khan
Core technologies and capabilities that drive the economies take a long time, large amounts of money and even bigger patience to bear fruit. But once they mature, the rewards are well worth the effort. Malcolm Gladwell in his book “Outliers” makes a similar case for outstanding achievers, that it is more of their earlier start than their brains that make them excel. It is sustained practice of ones art or profession that over the period of time blossoms into an unsurpassed ability. Developing countries typically try to shy away from making investments in longer gestation technologies and therefore commit themselves to the path of perpetually playing catchup with developed countries. This is a story of a jet engine that propelled Air Forces possessing it into an unrivaled position. Read more
Views: 1207ShareMay
31
OPEN@2010
Filed Under Entrepreneurism, Pakistan, United States | 1 Comment
by Contributors from OPEN Chapters
Organization of Pakistani Entrepreneurs of North America “OPEN” is now in its twelfth year of existence. At its core it is a philanthropic organization of like minded innovative and entrepreneurial people who contribute their time and efforts for the greater good of the society that they live in. Its top driven loosely coupled model of chapters has enabled it to grow to all corners of the US, extending its impact even outside these borders. Each chapter has evolved based on the inherent local business strengths as well as the level of support from the community. In celebration of OPEN’s tenth anniversary in 2008 all the chapters got together at the organization’s birthplace in Boston. During this event the leaders from different chapters presented their vision for the future. The purpose of this blog is to capture some of what has transpired since then. Read more
May
6
Responsible Response to the Time Square Bomber
Filed Under Afghanistan, Pakistan, US Policy, United States | 4 Comments
by Imran H. Khan
We in the Pakistani American community have been deeply troubled by the attempt by one of its new member to bomb the Time Square. Pakistani American community is a well to do community; as was this perpetrator. Faisal does not fit the typical profile of these kinds of criminals. Before we start talking about putting out the correct responses within our society to stop this in future; we need to learn more about what made Faisal undertake such a mission. Read more
Apr
17
JadooTV: Connecting Diasporas with Home Lands
Filed Under Afghanistan, India, Pakistan, Technology, United States | 12 Comments
by Imran H. Khan
Seldom does something so small make such a major social splash as the JadooTV box. The reason is that the box is just the tip of an ice berg. The multimedia content aggregation, Jadoo Portal, globally distributed media servers and a high bandwidth global infrastructure constitute the whole iceberg. JadooTV is a palm size box that connects the internet to your TV set and allows you to browse and watch audio, video and multi-media content in your living room or wherever your TV is located. It could even be in a car. The concept of connecting TV is not new and there are other companies providing devices that do the same; like VuNow from VerismoNetworks and IPTV2000 from Netgear. Read more
Apr
12
by Imran H. Khan
I was privileged to visit the most powerful laser on the planet at National Ignition Facility(NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory this week. NIF was created to generate a controlled Fusion Reaction that happens regularly on stars. The NIF houses a 1.8 Mega Joule laser that will be used to fire a laser pulse at a 2mm target of hydrogen atoms to create Fusion reaction consists of involving deuterium (D) and tritium (T). Deuterium is an isotope of hydrogen, so-called “heavy hydrogen”, and is found in seawater (about 33g per tonne). Tritium is an isotope of hydrogen, and may be produced by neutron reactions with lithium, which is widely available, both from ore from the earth and also from seawater. In each D-T fusion reaction 17.6 MeV of stored energy is released, along with a Helium nucleus (He) and a neutron (n). This is about one million times the amount of energy released from a chemical reaction, such as the burning of fossil fuels. This is how so little fuel can produce so much energy when fusion is employed. The answer to human energy needs may lie at the beginning of the periodic table rather than at its end. Read more