A Ganesha Carrot


Ganesha shaped carrot from our garden
In time for Ganesha Chaturti


The historical moment or event I i wish I had witnessed.

The event I would have like to have witnessed is Buddha, sitting under the Bodhi tree and opening his eyes after receiving enlightenment. The moment would truly have been transcendent, as he spoke to those assembled before him, giving a glimpse into the incredible insights he had gained. 


Haas Scholars Fall Colloquium

Presented my research at the Haas Scholars Fall Colloquium today.
Overall, got very positive feedback. 



Prof Brian Powers, Sociology: I’m really overwhelmed with the depth of this research and the impact it's going to have. Well thought out project, personal as it is. It’s incredibly scholarly.

Prof Dacher Keltner, Psychology: I think many of you know that Hari writes for the Daily Cal. When he was in my class, he would send me his poetry all the time. He is a brilliant writer and a brilliant thinker and I think you all felt that in that presentation. That was an incredible tour of 13 minutes and 47 seconds, from the personal to the humorous to the in-depth critique to the societal critique to the measures to the theory. I mean that, I’ve never felt, I’ve never had a presentation in my lab of that precision. The second thing is Hari’s presentation tells us why we need diversity in scholarship. His scholarship is just you know, its a devastating critique on measures and theories out there and we need these perspectives. What a rich perspective, so it was a remarkable presentation and he’s a remarkable young scholar.





 



 

#1 Public University

 




"UC Berkeley is the No. 1 U.S. public university, the sixth-best among publics and privates nationally and the world’s eighth-best university overall, according to the Times Higher Education‘s 2022 World University Rankings, released today.

The United Kingdom’s University of Oxford ranked first among private and public universities worldwide, followed by Harvard University, the California Institute of Technology, Stanford University, the University of Cambridge, MIT and Princeton.

After UC Berkeley, Yale University and the University of Chicago rounded out the top 10.

As for the top five U.S. public universities, after UC Berkeley in first place, UCLA ranked second and in 20th place globally, followed by the University of Michigan, (24th); the University of Washington (29th) and UC San Diego (34th).

The Times Higher Ed World University Rankings evaluated more than 1,600 universities across 99 countries and territories based on five criteria: Teaching (the learning environment), research (reputation and volume income), citations (research influence), industry income (knowledge transfer) and international outcome.

Overall, UC Berkeley ranked sixth in the world for research with a score of 96 points out of 100; 14th for teaching (85.7 points); 21st for citations, (99.1 points) 104th for industry income (84.7points) and 235th for international outlook (staff, students and research) with a score of 77.6 points."

View the complete list of Times Higher Education 2022 World University Rankings rankings.

Forbes #1 College

"It isn’t enough to ask which schools give the best return on investment. It’s also important to evaluate what kind of students they educate and whether they make themselves accessible to those who can’t afford high sticker prices."





 

First Football Game of the Season

 



















Sixth Semester teaching the Autism DeCal

50 and waitlisted!!

 Woo hoo. Not only have 50 students enrolled but the class is waitlisted as well. 



Got Approval for 50 students this time. 

The paperwork for the course gets done during the previous semester as the course syllabus has to be approved by Academic Senate COCI (Courses of Instruction) along with faculty support from the sponsoring faculty. 

This time, we got approval for 50 students, so super thrilled. This will be the largest class size yet. Over the years we have grown from 17 to now 50!!





Inspiration Porn

 Autism Lexicon: Inspiration Porn

Inspiration Porn: A term that refers to the portrayal of individuals with disabilities as inspirational solely because of their disability, often objectifying them and reinforcing ableist stereotypes. This phenomenon typically emphasizes the disabled person's ability to overcome challenges, thereby detracting from the broader societal and systemic issues they face. [Read in More detail].

PlainSpeak: Inspiration Porn refers to when disabled people are shown as being amazing just for doing everyday things, simply because they're disabled. It often leads to them being seen as inspirational or brave in a way that actually puts them down. [Read PlainSpeak in more detail]. 

One of the Lecture slides used in 1:54 Autism Class

 Inspiration porn was coined by disabled comedian Maysoon Zayid and popularized by the disabled activist Stella Young in her Ted Talk. (I had initially thought it was coined by Stella Young, just due to the popularity of her Ted Talk, till I was corrected by disability activity Rebecca Cockley who knew both)



Genetics and Plant Biology Building

 Got my honors seminar class in this building this semester. 













Barker Hall




Got a class in Barker Hall this semester. 

https://bds.berkeley.edu/barker"Barker Hall is located on the Northwest corner of campus (map) and houses labs from the Department of Molecular & Cell Biology and from the Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute (HWNI).  It was named after UC Berkeley Biochemist Horace Barker." famous for discovering an active form of Vitamin B12.