Life coach - Kaikaku - 14 - Numb3rs

This blog starts on 4 different tracks only to merge on the intent of this blog.

1. President Obama in his recent press statement said India and China are fast covering the economic ground because they are good at Maths and Science.
2. My favorite shows on TV are House, Medium, Numb3rs apart from History Channel and Discovery Channel. Numb3rs is about a mathematician named Charles who uses maths to help FBI to solve cases.
3. In CME Professor Mohanty was teaching us summation of an infinite series that randomly either increases or decreases. I stopped him and asked him where is this useful in real life. Everything that I learnt had to be related with real life or it meant I simply did not understand it (my mental block in learning). He explained it in simple terms. An electric fuse is designed to work within a range of varying voltage. The fuse should trip between a set of values to avoid damage to the equipment. The voltage at any time is a random fluctation around the mean of 230V. The series will help to identify the lower and upper ratings and design an optimal fuse.
4. Geographic profiling is an investigative support technique for serial violent crime. The process was developed from research conducted at Simon Fraser University, and the methodology is based on a model that describes offenders' hunting behavior. The patented criminal geographic targeting algorithm produces jeopardy surfaces, which are 3-D probability surfaces that indicate the most likely area of offender residence.The models are displayed through 3-D and 2-D color isopleth maps that provide a focus for investigative efforts. Read more on http://www.txstate.edu/gii/geographicprofiling.html

The ability of maths to solve problems in business and defence is well known. We use standard formulaes for statistical sampling, confidence ratios, rejection of hypothesis, EOQs, trajectory paths for missiles, etc. But I haven't seen the defence forces using them to solve the problems which could make our life easier and effective.

Let us take a simple example of militants in J&K. There are so many groups operating in J&K and each group has teams of various sizes. The areas for operation are roughly well defined between the members of a particular group. Based on the interceptions and intelligence gathered from the locals / informants, using mathematics we should be able to create geoprofiles of the various groups and the exact areas of operations. Groups typically stay within their areas due to availability of local support and familiarity of terrain. If I were to add the factor of voice recognition to the intercepted calls and the geoprofile of the group, I can come up with 90% confidence interval of the group operating, the number of members and other sundry details. Will it help me catch militants - that is the point of doing all this? Maths wont catch the militant but will increase the probability.

If I can match the geoprofile with voice recognition and triangulation of the origin of voice, I can cordon and search the areas in a focussed manner. It is no wonder that most of our cordon and search operations end up busting the knee grease especially if we are in a place like Doda - all mountains and valleys.

Extend the logic of numbers and I could predict which vehicles or weapons will fail inspection. The power of mathematics is amazing if we learn to apply it to our daily life duties. Sometimes I feel that what we lack is the awareness that we can use knowledge that we have.