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Can't Connect To Internet In LinuxThis means the eth0 couldnt get any ip address.
Do you have a DHCP server on the LAN ?
or you can do one thing.. have a static IP for the eth0 (assuming eth0 is the network card hooked on to your LAN). Open '/etc/network/interfaces'
and have something like this...
======
# /etc/network/interfaces -- configuration file for ifup(8), ifdown(8)
# The loopback interface
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback
# The first network card - this entry was created during the Debian installation
# (network, broadcast and gateway are optional)
auto eth0
iface eth0 inet static
address 192.168.0.50
netmask 255.255.255.0
network 192.168.0.0
broadcast 192.168.0.255
gateway 192.168.0.10
======
Remove all the other interfaces ie. eth1, eth2... till wlan0..
Now check...
Defend Your Research: We Can Measure the Power of Charisma - Harvard Business ReviewDefend Your Research: We Can Measure the Power of Charisma
by Alex “Sandy” Pentland
The finding: It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it. It’s possible to predict which executives will win a business competition solely on the basis of the social signals they send.
The study: Sandy Pentland and colleague Daniel Olguín Olguín outfitted executives at a party with devices that recorded data on their social signals—tone of voice, gesticulation, proximity to others, and more. Five days later the same executives presented business plans to a panel of judges in a contest. Without reading or hearing the pitches, Pentland correctly forecast the winners, using only data collected at the party.
The challenge: Can we really tell who will succeed in competitive business situations without knowing what they have to offer? Professor Pentland, defend your research.
Pentland: This study not only confirms previous research—we’ve used data on social signals to predict the outcome of salary negotiations and even who would “survive” a plane crash in a NASA role-playing game—but takes it further. This time we collected the data well before the event whose outcome we predicted. But in all the situations, these social cues—what we call “honest signals”—were powerful indicators of success.
Sidebar IconKey Number (Located at the end of this article)
HBR: What exactly are honest signals?
It’s a biological term. They’re the nonverbal cues that social species use to coordinate themselves—gestures, expressions, tone. Humans use many types of signals, but honest signals are unusual in that they cause changes in the receiver of the signal. If we’re spending time together, and I’m happy and bubbly, you’ll be more happy and bubbly. There are biological functions that transfer the signals. If I’m happy, it almost literally rubs off on you.
So your devices measure these signals?
Yes, they measure those things as well as how much you face the people you’re talking to, how close you stand to them, and how much you let them talk.
Sidebar IconInteractions Mapping (Located at the end of this article)
Is one type of signaler more likely to succeed?
The more successful people are more energetic. They talk more, but they also listen more. They spend more face-to-face time with others. They pick up cues from others, draw people out, and get them to be more outgoing. It’s not just what they project that makes them charismatic; it’s what they elicit. The more of these energetic, positive people you put on a team, the better the team’s performance.
All you’re saying is that enthusiastic team players will be more successful. We already knew that, didn’t we?
Yes. Attitude, positivity—researchers knew these things mattered; they just didn’t want to deal with them because it was squishy, feel-good stuff. But now we can quantify it. Now it’s science.
How precise a science is this?
It’s getting more precise as we do more experiments. In the salary-negotiation study, we were accurate to within $1,000 in guessing what salary would be offered without hearing the negotiation. With other researchers at MIT—Ben Waber, Lynn Wu, Sinan Aral, and Erik Brynjolfsson—we’re taking these devices into call centers and learning how face-to-face communications affect productivity. We think face time with colleagues is vital, as much as 2.5 times as important to success as additional access to information. Results aren’t final, but we think we can increase productivity by 10% at no cost just by rearranging the environment to promote more employee interaction.
In another experiment, Anmol Madan, David Lazer, and I found that 30% of the variation in MIT freshmen’s political views was a function of their face-to-face exposure to others’ opinions. The more people hung out with their own group, the more they reinforced their own opinions. Again, this all sounds like common sense. But now we’re uncovering the basic mechanisms, and in the future this might lead to very different sorts of political campaigns.
This is where it starts to get creepy.
Yes and no. When you think of it, human language is fairly new. Studies say it may be as little as 50,000 years old. Long before we had language, we had the ability to hunt, move, and survive as teams, as all social species do. It makes sense that the communication signals we used for millennia would be so powerful.
Let’s be clear: Your data don’t actually indicate which pitch will be the best.
Correct. The signals indicate who will win but say nothing about the quality of their ideas. In fact, we’ve controlled for that by having some judges read pitches while others watched pitches. The two groups gave high ratings to different pitches.
Like the Kennedy-Nixon debate: Those who saw it rated Kennedy higher. Those who heard it rated Nixon higher.
Right. We’re social creatures. When we see someone we are looking for those honest signals. Are they enthusiastic? Do they look like they know what they’re talking about? This is what venture capitalists do, right? They look for buzz. But they also need to understand the substance of the pitch and not be swayed by charisma alone. Over the long term, the content matters more to success, obviously. But both are important. Positive, energetic people have higher performance. We’re proving that.
What’s next?
We’ve studied individuals and groups. Now we’re examining how people in organizations work together. Once you understand that social signaling is important, you ask, Can I see those patterns writ large? Besides reorganizing the call centers, we’re looking at ways to organize large groups to promote positive interactions and boost productivity. We think we can find ways to decrease stress, increase job satisfaction, and make people in large organizations work better together.
You sound excited.
I am. I see what happens to people when they participate in our studies—they become more aware of this signaling behavior, and it makes them work better with others. They realize it’s true that you can tell when people are excited about something. You can tell when they’re paying attention, when they’re on the same page. We all sense it. We all have an intuition about it. But because we can measure it, social intuition is no longer magic; it’s now quantitative science.
HBR.org > January–February 2010
Key Number
The accuracy of Pentland’s predictions about who would win a business-plan competition, which he made without reading or hearing their presentations.
HBR.org > January–February 2010
Interactions Mapping
Using data from his devices, Pentland can map interactions, representing people as dots and conversations as lines.
Measuring the Impact of Charisma | Psychology TodayCan we really tell who will succeed in a business competition before we even hear their ideas? The answer may surprise you.
As it turns out, what counts most may not be what you say, but rather how you say it. There is a certain style of social interaction - one that our research group has identified quantitatively - that is highly predictive of success in a variety of situations.
One recent study in our research group focused on executives attending a 1-week intensive executive education class, where the final project in the class was pitching a business plan. We outfitted these executives with sociometers - specially designed digital badges to measure social signals such as tone of voice, proximity to others, energy level, and more. When the executives wore these sociometers at a mixer on the first evening of the week-long course, their social styles at the mixer were predictive of how well their teams' business plans would be perceived one week later at the end of the course.
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What we found was that people with a certain social style - a kind of energetic but focused listener - acted as "charismatic connectors." The more charismatic connectors a given team had among its members, the better the team performance was judged during the business plan pitch. One important point to remember here is that it was not simply one charismatic individual, but rather a charismatic team, that pushed them toward success.
One reason these teams performed better may be simply that the members worked together better. We found very similar results in a separate study focused on brainstorming: the more of these energetic, focused listeners that were on a team, the better the quality of their brainstorming. In brainstorming sessions with teams whose social style was similar to these "charismatic connectors," the resulting quality of the talking was characterized by high levels of listening, more even-handed turn-taking, and high levels of engagement, trust, and cooperation.
These "charismatic connectors" are the ultimate team players - and the key to making a team successful. Their style is marked by a kind of energetic listening - but they are not the normal "extravert" or "life of the party" type. Rather, they appear to be interested and focused on everyone in the group and what they have to say. While this may all appear utterly obvious, the truth is that social science has had, up until now, very few ways to measure such behavior objectively and quantitatively and in real time. With new tools such as the sociometer, management science has the possibility of really becoming a science.
Getting to the Top In the Caucasus - The New York TimesGetting to the Top In the Caucasus
By HOWARD TOMB; HOWARD TOMB lives in New York City. His first two books, ''Wicked French Lessons'' and ''Wicked Italian Lessons,'' will be published this fall by Workman.
THE man in the street, the man in the woods, even the top-notch travel agent have probably never heard of Europe's highest peak. But the obscurity of this Russian volcano is undeserved; any strong hiker with an ice ax and a pair of crampons can reach the summit at 18,481 feet, and look down on 30,000 square miles of mountains, high plains and inland seas.
The ancients knew the peak as Strobilus, the mythical prison of Prometheus. Birthplace of three rivers and 22 glaciers, it is equal to its legends. In the afternoon, as the dormant volcano sheds its blankets of fog, its great mass and symmetry humble the jagged 17,000-foot peaks at its feet.
It is called Mount Elbrus, and no mountain could be better suited to divide the European and Asian Continents. From its slopes, high green plains roll northward into Russia. To the south, the spectacular Caucasus, often compared with the Alps, create a barrier to Soviet Georgia and the Middle East that runs more than 300 miles without being crossed by a road or penetrated by a tunnel. To the west is the Black Sea, and on especially clear days, the Caspian Sea is visible 250 miles to the east.
The Elbrus region is an easy day's travel from Moscow. The flight south to Mineralnye Vody, a town known for its mineral springs, takes two hours. Intourist buses take visitors the last 150 miles to one of three hotels 7,000 feet up in the Baksan Valley.
The three-hour bus trip begins on the high plains and passes through small villages and mile after mile of sunflower farms. The plains give way to foothills once scoured by glaciers and now incised by thundering rivers. Finally, pine and hardwood forests appear, the hills become steeper and thick with wildflowers and above them, the peaks of the Caucasus become visible among the clouds. The landscape is reminiscent of Switzerland, but the mountains are taller.
In the Baksan Valley's hotels, unfortunately, all comparison with Switzerland must come to an end. Soviet hotels do not compete with each other for business; visitors are assigned to them by Intourist. Hot water is usually plentiful, and travelers with hard currency are entitled to private baths and single beds, rather than bunks, but this is where luxuries end in these large, concrete-slab hotels. For a three-week stay in the Baksan Valley, for example, a roomful of four mountain climbers was issued one miniature bar of soap. Repeated requests for resupply were turned down.
There are no restaurants in the area. Everyone is expected to eat three times a day in the hotel dining room, where the waitresses can be surly and the menu is whatever one finds on the plate. Boiled and fried meats are the focus of almost every meal, including breakfast. White bread, yogurt, yellow cheese, sour cream and fresh vegetables are always available, but when a truckload of, say, green peppers arrives, every meal is a green pepper festival until the supply is gone. Travelers may want to take food from home. But no one goes mountain climbing, or to the Soviet Union, for that matter, for luxury.
Climbers spend two days or so hiking in the forests and mountains around the hotels to get used to the air at 7,000 feet and the nine-hour time difference. Ten minutes away by hotel bus, the Chiget resort chairlifts carry tourists to 10,000 feet for walks and views among the peaks and brilliant green glacial lakes. Shepherds on horseback tend their flocks in the high alpine meadows, bringing to mind the Cossacks who rode there until early in this century.
Impromptu ice climbing competitions among Soviet climbers take place in the crevasses of nearby glaciers. Spectators wearing crampons gather carefully at the edges of these cracks in the ice, some over a hundred feet deep, and cheer on the competitors. In the past 20 years, Soviet climbers have developed speed-climbing equipment and techniques that are virtually unknown in the West.
After acclimatizing in the Baksan Valley, climbers take the nearby Elbrus resort gondola and chairlifts to 11,500 feet. From there, it is an easy two-hour hike to the Refuge of Eleven, a hotel perched between two glaciers on an exposed ridge of volcanic rock at 13,650 feet. Built in the 1930's, the building sleeps 200 and looks like a gigantic Airstream mobile home; its sheet metal hide is rounded to cheat the ferocious winds, and antennae sprout from the roof.
Climbers on Elbrus avoid the drudgery of other climbs to similar heights. On Alaska's 20,320-foot Denali, for example, climbers must carry tents, stoves, fuel, ropes, shovels and three or four weeks' worth of food. The typical load of 150 pounds ra person requires two carries of 75 pounds each for every new camp.
Climbing hardware and ropes, standard on other climbs, are unnecessary on Elbrus because the route to the top crosses no crevasses. The hotel and its beds (two, three or four to a room) take the place of tents and sleeping bags.
Climbers carry their own food to the Refuge, but, including time to acclimate and an extra day in case of bad weather, they spend only three or four days there, and can take along heavy items such as canned food, cheese, potatoes and tomatoes.
Cooking is done by climbers in the communal kitchen where fuel and a big stove are provided. Pasta, rice, beans, vegetables, bread, cheese and canned meat and fish are combined according to the imaginations of the cooks. (A meal has almost invariably taken on a stewlike form by the time it reaches the table.) The dining room is the hotel's gathering place. Almost every climbing party has one or two members who speak some English, and there is a natural camaraderie among climbers everywhere. A number of Soviet cities are still closed to foreigners, and many visitors to the hotel have never met an American. Over tea and marmalade, Latvians, Armenians, Azerbaijanis, Siberians, Georgians and Russians are eager to discuss everything from world events to camping equipment to Stevie Wonder.
One or two days in and around the Refuge allow climbers to get used to the altitude, in preparation for a summit attempt. They spend the time socializing, reading, playing chess, hiking on the surrounding glaciers and enjoying the views.
When the sun is up, water flows from a pipe stuck directly into the glacier above the hotel. Ice can be melted on the stove when the water isn't flowing. The low temperatures make plumbing impossible, and trying to dig a hole in the volcanic rock or glacier ice would be pointless. The outhouse, therefore, must hang over the edge of a cliff, and every visit there is an adventure.
Once climbers become acclimated, they usually begin their summit attempt between 2 A.M. and 4 A.M. while the snow is still hard. Parties try to reach the top before noon, when the snow begins to get too soft for easy walking.
In those hours, the temperature usually ranges between 0 and 30 degrees. Wool or polypropelene underwear is worn under wool pants and sweaters, wind pants, a down parka with a hood and one or two pairs of wool mittens with Gore-Tex shells. Climbers also need double boots, battery-powered headlamps and glacier goggles. Everyone carries a knapsack with sunscreen, extra clothing, fatty snacks such as cookies, chocolate and nuts and a quart or more of water.
The volcano's slopes, although encased in ice, are smooth and gradual. No vertical climbing is necessary. Crampons (spikes strapped to boots) prevent slipping, and an ice ax provides balance.
The unpredictable and sometimes violent weather allows the novice to experience authentic high-altitude mountaineering with a minimum of risk. Foreign climbing parties are accompanied by Soviet guides who speak their language and know the mountain well. Every group travels with a two-way radio and checks in with master guides at the Refuge at least three times a day. Even in an extreme white-out, the hotel is never more than two or three hours away, under accurate compass navigation.
The altitude adds to the challenge of the Elbrus ascent. Most climbers are able to reach the saddle at about 17,500 feet between the twin peaks. The next thousand feet look easy; the summit seems tantalizingly close. But the way becomes steeper, and every step becomes a battle between the body and the will. This is the essence of high-altitude mountaineering.
There was no moon the morning of our party's first attempt, and we began climbing under a thick carpet of stars. Upwind, perhaps 150 miles to the west, a lightning storm illuminated the distant peaks.
Climbing in our party were a retired Alaskan in his early 60's, a fit British policeman, two young businessmen from the New York area, a forest ranger from Idaho, our American leader from the Mountain Madness tour company and our Russian guide, Alexi Kalishnikov.
Just before sunrise, as we passed 16,000 feet, the winds began gusting to about 30 miles an hour. Without trees or any other objects with which to judge scale, the summit seemed close, and we kept hiking. The winds increased steadily, and by the time we reached the saddle at 17,500 feet, we were in a furious hailstorm. The wind-driven hailstones, about the size of BB's, stung our faces and found their way inside our goggles.
Visibility was down to about 15 feet, but Mr. Kalishnikov knew the mountain well enough to find a fumarole, where warm gases escaping from the dormant volcano had bored a hole in the ice. We huddled inside to await a break in the weather.
There was no change after an hour, so we decided to retreat. The trail is marked every 20 to 50 feet with bamboo stakes, but these were hard to find in the storm. With the aid of a compass, we were able to descend a thousand feet or so, out of the storm. Our Alaskan climber was deeply tired and needed frequent rests. In two hours, we were back at the Refuge.
We recuperated for a day, and prepared to make a second assault. The following day we rose again at 2 A.M., this time to find that the weather had closed in. Thinking we had missed our last chance, we went back to bed.
Mr. Kalishnikov surely had our best interests at heart when he woke us again at 4:30, but we found it hard to abandon our warm beds. The weather had cleared, and we were running late.
OUR oldest team member had opted out. The rest of us were fully acclimated and we made good time back to the saddle, arriving there by 10:30 that morning. It was especially cold, about 10 below with a stiff wind, and we passed some Polish climbers who had turned back before reaching the summit; their thin parkas and flimsy mittens were no match for the elements.
We were better prepared and felt ready to push for the summit after a rest at the carcass of a cabin at 17,500 feet. The Soviet people seem to have a mania for building structures in improbable locations, the Refuge being a case in point. The pine cabin in the saddle had lost not only its roof but the walls, too, had been blown apart by the relentless winds.
We had to take a breath or two for each step of the last pitch, but after another hour, we were on top. Below us, the peaks of the Caucasus poked through the clouds and marched into the distance for hundreds of miles. The Black Sea appeared in the east for a moment and then vanished again in the mist.
For 10 minutes, we sat in a silence of awe and exhaustion. As we made our descent back to the Refuge, the snow achieved a perfect slipperiness. Launching ourselves down the slopes in sitting positions, we used our ice axes as rudders and hollered into the enormous afternoon. Staging an ascent of Elbrus Arranging Trips
Trips to Elbrus are usually made in summer, but are possible any time of year. In the winter, when the snow is more powdery, the climb is done on cross-country skis. Trips should be planned well in advance.
The following companies lead trips to Mount Elbrus. Prices cover all expenses within the Soviet Union.
Mountain Travel (6420 Fairmount Avenue, El Cerrito, Calif. 94530; 800-227-2384) offers 13-day trips to Elbrus. The cost is $2,120 a person.
Mountain Madness (7103 California Avenue SW, Seattle, Wash. 98136; 206-937-8389) leads 23-day trips to Elbrus for $2,400 that include a five- to seven-day trek from Elbrus across the Caucasus into a pristine and especially remote region of Soviet Georgia.
R.E.I. Adventures (Post Office Box 8090, Berkeley, Calif. 94707; 800-622-2236, in California 800-624-2236) runs 16-day trips for 10 to 15 people for $1,500 for members of the R.E.I. co-op (a one-time $10 fee). The company will arrange custom-designed trips as well. Purchasing Equipment
Double boots cost between $180 and $480. A comfortable fleece-lined inner boot goes inside a rigid, impermeable plastic outer boot. Expect to pay between $50 and $110 for crampons, and from $50 to $70 for an ice ax. The following outfitters can supply all three items: Eastern Mountain Sports, 20 West 61st Street, New York; 212 397-4860.
International Mountain Equipment, Post Office Box 494, Main Street, North Conway, N.H. 03869; 603 356-7064.
R.E.I. has three stores: 1525 112th Avenue, Seattle, Wash. 98122 (206-323-8333); 279 Salem Street, Reading, Mass. 01867 (617-944-5103); 500 Main Street, New Rochelle, N.Y. 10801 (914-632-9222). H. T.
photos of Mount Elbrus (Howard Tomb)
New clues in search for elixir of youth - life - 09 July 2009 - New ScientistThe march of old age may be unstoppable, but two new studies in mice and monkeys suggest we can at least tinker with the ageing process – and offer a glimpse at how anti-ageing medications could work.
"You want something that's going to give you 10 more years of relatively good health and not 10 more years of frailty," says Matt Kaeberlein, a biochemist at the University of Washington in Seattle, who studies ageing, but was not involved in either study.
Scientists probably haven't stumbled on that drug yet, but a drug called rapamycin, already used to suppress the immune systems of organ transplant recipients, comes close. In tests conducted at three researcher centres, mice that began taking the drug at a relatively old age lived substantially longer than other rodents.
Fungus find
The researchers, led by David Harrison at the Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor, Maine, had initially planned to begin feeding the mice rapamycin around middle age. But due to difficulties in manufacturing food that contained adequate amounts of the drug, the hundreds of mice didn't start taking the drug until they were 600 days old – about the equivalent of a 60-year-old human.
Mice on rapamycin, which was first discovered in soil fungus from Easter Island, lived about 10 per cent longer than other mice.
Kaeberlein says that the drug's ability to extend lifespan when taken late in life is "exactly what you'd want from an 'anti-ageing drug'".
"It's set a high bar for the field," agrees David Sinclair, a molecular biologist at Harvard University Medical School in Boston. "It's also the first time that a drug has worked so late in life"
Rapamycin is not perfect, however. It makes a good transplant drug because it slows the expansion of immune cells and stops rejection of the implanted tissue. So scientists will need to determine whether lower doses of the drug can offer humans anti-ageing effects without compromising their immune systems, Kaeberlein says.
Diet clue
Pharmaceutical companies would also be wise to hunt for drugs that act on the same biological pathway as rapamycin. Called TOR, this pathway is involved in a cell's response to nutrients.
Researchers had previously implicated TOR in some of the anti-ageing effects of a sparser diet that have been seen in some animals. Now, in a second study on ageing, there is the first evidence that "caloric restriction" has the same effect in primates.
For up to 20 years, a team led by Richard Weindruch, a biologist at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, followed 76 rhesus macaques, half of which consumed 30 per cent fewer calories, beginning around adulthood. Today, 37 per cent of the animals on the restricted diet are still alive, compared to just 13 per cent of monkeys who ate a normal amount of food.
"It suggests to me that the fundamental biology of caloric restriction being studied in mice, flies, worms, blah, blah, blah seems to apply nicely to primates," says Weindruch.
"It's to the point now where, if caloric restriction does not extend human lifespan, we're an exception on the planet," Sinclair agrees.
Healthy ageing
Not only did the calorie-restricted animals live longer than other macaques, they also led healthier lives. They were less likely to suffer from heart disease, cancer, neurodegeneration, and diabetes. The monkeys appeared healthier too, says team member Ricki Colman. "Their coats are shinier; they have a younger-looking posture."
The breadth of these improvements is an important sign that calorie restriction slowed the process of ageing and did not simply prevent diseases related to food intake such as diabetes, Weindruch says.
Healthy ageing will also be the metric by which medicines like rapamycin are tested against in humans, says Kaeberlein. "You're never going to do a clinical trial for an anti-ageing drug. You're going to do a clinical study for Alzheimer's or diabetes."
Role of mirror neurons may need a rethink - life - 26 May 2009 - New ScientistDoubt is being cast on the true role of brain neurons that are said to explain empathy, autism and even morality.
Mirror neurons fire both when we perform an action and when we see someone else doing it. The theory is that by simulating action even when watching an act, the neurons allow us to recognise and understand other people's actions and intentions.
However, Alfonso Caramazza at Harvard University and colleagues say their research suggests this theory is flawed.
Neurons that encounter repeated stimulus reduce their successive response, a process called adaptation. If mirror neurons existed in the activated part of the brain, reasoned Caramazza, adaptation should be triggered by both observation and performance.
Theory 'overturned'
To test the theory, his team asked 12 volunteers to watch videos of hand gestures and, when instructed, to mimic the action. However, fMRI scans of the participants' brains showed that the neurons only adapted when gestures were observed then enacted, but not the other way around.
Caramazza says the finding overturns the core theory of mirror neurons that activation is a precursor to recognition and understanding of an action. If after executing an act, "you need to activate the same neurons to recognise the act, then those neurons should have adapted," he says.
Caramazza's results support similar findings by Ilan Dinstein at New York University and his team in 2007.
However, mirror neuron researcher Marco Iacoboni, at the University of California, Los Angeles, thinks the study's basic assumption is flawed. "There is no evidence that mirror neurons adapt," he says.
Journal reference: Proceedings of the National Academics of Science (DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0902262106)
