Prof Niall Ferguson�€™s Colossus is very strong in intellectual vigour. It is rather weak in its moral persuasion.

The conference centre at Sharm el Sheikh almost compares to the one in Davos. It is impossible to believe that it was built in less than eight months. The main plenary hall easily accommodates about 1500 participants. There are a good number of smaller meeting rooms, high quality acoustics, open meeting spaces and all that a modern convention centre can boast. However, the speed with which it was conceived and constructed is impossible to believe.

When I boarded the Qatar Airways flight on my return from Doha to Mumbai, I remembered a story. The ancient manuscripts of Greek, Indian and Arabic wisdom were on the verge of disappearance. One day, about a thousand years ago, King Al-Mamun, the son of Harun Al Rashid, decided to invest in translating and preserving the ancient wisdom. It did not matter how much it would cost. The royal court gathered all the intellectuals it could and commissioned them to bring best of the knowledge from far away and develop it....

Eliot Weinberger�€™s book 9/12: New York After is a series of essays, which he refers to as �€˜snapshots�€™, of his personal impression; and the political reactions and consequences he expected in the days after 9/11. 

This happened at the beginning of a new century. The Western leaders came together to launch an attack on a strategically located nation in the East. As compared to the nations further to the East that sought to establish a global regime based on Islamic tenets, this nation was culturally closer to the West. But the Western leaders were not happy that the ruler of this nation had usurped power. They wanted to restore power to the legitimate leaders of the nation, living in asylum in the West, who promised them long term economic and security partnership.

Both books �€“ Globalised Islam: the Search for a New Ummah by Oliver Roy and The War for Muslim Minds: Islam and the West by Gilles Kepel tackle the issue of Islam in all its forms�€™ that is militant or political; stating that Muslim neo-fundamentalism is a modern phenomenon. 

You are the CEO of a large corporation. You have to decide about moving or deploying a few hundred million dollars. If you are in stocks and bonds, you will look for short-term signals from markets. If you are serious about long term safety and returns, you must see forces outside the market. It does not really matter whether you are in insurance, manufacturing of goods, exports of computer hardware, tourism, mining or pharmaceuticals. If large amount of funds are at stake, you should ask yourself the following ten questions about how the world will shape in the next ten years.

We are living in an increasingly globalized world today. The world has become smaller due to the miracles of communications. Barriers of distances, languages, and cultures have all been overcome by science and technology. This bridge building for a better World essentially means that we should have today become more accustomed to the �€œother�€ �€“ other religions and other races from across our own national borders. Unfortunately there are indicators that prove otherwise. What explains the 9/11, the Iraq War, and �€œthe cartoon controversy�€ in the barrier-less globalized world?