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Samsung, the world’s leading TV brand for 18 consecutive years, continues to redefine home entertainment with its latest line of AI-powered televisions. The new models, equipped with cutting-edge technology, are now available in the Nepali market, offering an immersive and sustainable viewing experience.

At the heart of Samsung’s latest NEO QLED TVs is the NQ4 AI Gen2 processor, which leverages 20 AI neural networks for enhanced performance. Powered by Tizen OS, these TVs are designed to act as smart entertainment hubs, seamlessly integrating a range of apps, streaming services, and content in one place. The Tizen OS also ensures smooth navigation, making it easier than ever to access favorite shows and movies.

One of the standout features is the 4K AI Upscaling technology, which delivers crisp visuals even when the content is not originally in 4K resolution. Combined with AI Customization Mode, Auto HDR Remastering, and Real Depth Enhancer Pro, viewers can enjoy vivid and detailed images like never before. Motion Xcelerator, with its Pantone-validated colors and up to 144Hz refresh rate, ensures smooth, life-like visuals for those who appreciate clarity.

In terms of audio, the TVs feature OTS+ (Object Tracking Sound Plus) with eight strategically placed speakers, delivering surround sound that tracks on-screen action. Dolby Atmos technology and the Active Voice Amplifier Pro further enhance the auditory experience, ensuring clear dialogue even in noisy environments.

Security remains a priority for Samsung, with Knox security providing multi-layered protection against cyber threats. The built-in security system blocks harmful websites, offers regular updates, and ensures personal data remains safe. Certified by Common Criteria, Knox Matrix guarantees that both personal information and connected devices are secure.

For smart home integration, Samsung’s SmartThings app enables easy control of connected devices. The Mobile Smart Connect feature allows users to control their TV via Samsung smartphones with simple proximity. Additionally, the TVs are compatible with Galaxy Buds Bluetooth earphones for a 360° audio experience.

Samsung’s commitment to sustainability is evident through its AI Energy Mode, which optimizes power usage. The feature adjusts settings based on whether the TV is in use, reducing energy consumption and minimizing the carbon footprint without sacrificing performance.

In Nepal, the newly launched Neo QLED models QN85D and QN90D, featuring sleek Neo Slim Design, combine elegance and functionality with minimal cables and a low profile. These models are part of Samsung’s broader vision to provide users with immersive and sustainable home entertainment solutions.

The Kathmandu-Kalinga Literary Festival was recently held in Kathmandu, celebrating the shared literary and cultural traditions of Nepal, India, and South Asia over two days. An extension of the Kalinga Literary Festival, originally founded in Bhubaneswar, India, the event aimed to foster cross-cultural dialogue and promote the exploration of art, literature, and heritage across borders. In this context, ApEx spoke with Ashok Kumar Bal, CEO of the Kalinga Literary Festival. Excerpts:

As the CEO of the Kalinga Literary Festival (KLF), what are your key responsibilities?

As Patron and CEO of KLF, I oversee the planning and execution of the various festivals we organize throughout the year. My responsibilities include resource mobilization, session planning, logistics, and coordination with speakers, organizations, and the press. While it’s primarily a team effort, my role focuses on oversight, advice, and overall coordination. This year, our team in Nepal did an excellent job in organizing the Kathmandu KLF.

From your perspective, how successful was the latest Kathmandu-Kalinga Literary Festival?

The 3rd Kathmandu Kalinga Literary Festival was a tremendous success. The two-day event featured over 60 sessions, with a strong emphasis on Nepali literature, art, and culture. The enthusiastic response from the audience and their active engagement were particularly encouraging. We were especially pleased to see the large turnout of young students from colleges and universities in Kathmandu. Their participation means a lot to us, and we are committed to doing even better in the next edition of the festival.

In what ways does the Kalinga Literary Festival promote literature, arts, and culture in the South Asian region?

The Kalinga Literary Festival stands out from similar events by fostering cross-border and cross-civilizational partnerships. These collaborations are vital for nurturing a global culture of peace, understanding, and sustainable development. Our mission began three years ago, with Kathmandu as the stepping stone. Nepal’s long-standing traditions of wisdom, enlightenment, and resilience align with KLF's vision to unite people through the power of literature and the arts. This year’s theme, ‘Nepal—The Gateway to Asian Art, Culture, and Literature,’ reflected this goal. The KLF in Kathmandu is more than just an event—it continues a centuries-old dialogue reaffirming shared values and aspirations between India and Nepal.

Do you have plans to organize the Kalinga Literary Festival in other parts of South Asia?

Yes, as part of our South Asian initiative, we’re encouraged by the success of our Kathmandu festival over the past three years. We plan to expand to other locations, such as Bali and Colombo, with which we share ancient cultural bonds.

How can Nepal’s literature and arts community benefit from the Kalinga Literary Festival?

KLF serves as an excellent platform for dialogue and exchange between writers, poets, authors, and artists from India, Nepal, and gradually, the broader South Asian region. Nepalese students, in particular, stand to gain from these cultural and literary interactions. We’ve been inviting Nepali writers, poets, and artists to participate in KLF events in Bhubaneswar, and over time, this exchange will be mutually beneficial, fostering greater connection, communication, and collaboration.

The weather today will be partly to mostly cloudy across the country with a possibility of light to moderate rain at some places in Koshi, Bagmati, Lumbini and Karnali provinces and few places in the remaining provinces.

Likewise, heavy rainfall is also possible at one or two places in Koshi, Bagmati, Gandaki, Lumbini and Karnali provinces. There is a possibility of windstorms in some places of Madhes and Koshi Province, according to the Department of Hydrology and Meteorology.

Tonight, the weather will continue to remain partly to mostly cloudy over the country. There is a possibility of light to moderate rain with thunder and lightning in some places in the hilly areas of Bagmati, Gandaki and Karnali Provinces and one or two places in the remaining provinces. There is also a possibility of thunderstorms in some places of Madhes and Koshi Provinces.

The Department has predicted light to moderate rain with thunder and lightning at some places in Koshi, Bagmati, Lumbini and Karnali Provinces and some places in the remaining provinces in the next 24 hours. Heavy rain is also possible at one or two places in Koshi, Bagmati, Gandaki, Lumbini and Karnali.

The Inter-Generational Feminist Forum (IGFF) organized the Anupam Yatra on Saturday, with participants walking and cycling from Maitighar to Ratnapark. IGFF, a feminist NGO focused on women's empowerment, held the rally to unite leaders and raise awareness from diverse perspectives.

A key IGFF initiative, the Anupam Abhayyan (2023–2027), aims to promote women's equal participation to foster equitable and independent development in Nepal. Currently, the initiative has over 2,000 members across 76 regions.

Following the rally, women and representatives from various organizations gathered to amplify feminist voices in all sectors. The event included participants with disabilities and people of diverse genders.

“This is our 41st rally in Kathmandu, and I plan to complete at least 500 rallies by March 2025 across Nepal,” said IGFF Chairperson Rita Thapa. She added, “We must create more opportunities for women in politics. Although there's still much to be done, we are committed to supporting illiterate and impoverished women in rural areas.”

Executive Director of Mitini Nepal Sarita KC noted, “IGFF feels like home to us. With Mission 84 as the rally's motto, we aim to emphasize that LGBTQIA+ individuals deserve greater political, social, and economic rights.”

Stella Tamang, co-coordinator of IGFF’s Steering Committee, expressed gratitude to all participants, including the police, volunteers, and organizational representatives.

A one-day Talent Show was held in the capital recently. The event was organized by Association of Pre-school Educators Nepal (APEN) Gokarneshwar Municipal Committee in connection with the International Children’s Day. More than 250 students of different schools, teachers, principals and parents were present in the program.

Students aged below eight from 15 Montessori schools participated in the program. They gave group and individual performances during the talent show. The students performed dances, sang songs and played music. 

The Chairperson of the Parliamentary Finance Committee and Member of Parliament Santosh Chalise was the chief guest of the event. Meanwhile, the Deputy Chief of Gokarneshwar Municipality Sannani Lama, General Secretary of APEN Center Krishna Bohora, Central Member Nirmal Nepal, Praveen Jang Thapa and others were also present in the event.

The participants were given medals, letters of appreciation and tokens of love during the event. Congratulating APEN for organizing such a beautiful program, Chalise said that he is ready to cooperate with the organization in the future.

Lama said that the municipality was ready to coordinate with APEN to help students get education while learning with fun.

Coherent consciousness refers to the phenomenon where multiple individuals share a unified mental state, characterized by aligned thoughts, intentions and cognitive processes. Recent advances in neuroscientific research have highlighted the relevance of brain wave synchronization, where collaborative individuals have similar patterns of neural activity. 

Unified consciousness allows those individuals to reap the advantages of mirror neurons, letting collective creativity prosper. Consciousness as a unified experience is the notion that our experiences and perceptions form a cohesive and continuous reality. All the sensory information, knowledge and environment that we are exposed to, shape our cognition. 

There are multitude of parameters that define our cognitive process, and on this edifice, it is easy to conclude that outcomes of diverse individual cognitive processes are idiosyncratic and unique. When these diverse idiosyncratic cognitive processes merge, they form a unified field of consciousness—a creativity pool with unprecedented levels of creativity and highly enhanced problem solving. 

Neuroscience of like-minded thinking

Mirror neurons and shared mental models play a crucial role in shaping the thoughts of like-minded individuals. It can cause mirrored yawning, which is contagious. When we watch someone yawn, events of us repeating or responding to the person with the same behavior are likely. When a friend of yours cracks a joke in class—though it is not that funny and isn’t worth uncontrollable laughter—you will likely be in a situation of losing control of your behavior and responding to the situation with laughter; this laughing contagion traverses the entire class, and the person sitting on the first desk—totally unaware of the cause of laughter—responds to the circumstance with laughter too.

Mirror neurons’ ability for collective mental states could transcend to a higher degree of cognition. A friend of mine and I were working on a graph theory problem for hours—we lost count of time. Being exposed to one another’s thought process for over two years and, very recently, working on the same project trying to optimize the shortest path between two junctions, our brain could not be called anything other than synchronized brains. We didn’t have to communicate to change a line of code on our computer; no communications were required to increase junction density at specific areas; we both had the same thing in our minds, and at this point, the communication was as if made telepathically. The cognitive productivity becomes superior with diverse thoughts contributed in coherence to a single idea; the result was produced after traversing through diverse concepts of the field and aligning to multitude of theories that one puts forth. 

Advantages of coherent consciousness

The world’s best universities tend to invest tremendously in increasing diversity on campus. The reason for this is to bring ideas, backgrounds, identities, and many more from around the different corners of the world. When diverse and unique cognitive processes, fed with idiosyncratic data, bundled together, forming collective creativity, there is a pooling of creative aura. 

These universities, which are able to achieve coherence out of diversity, reap the advantage of increased creativity due to more dynamic exchange of ideas, innovative solutions, efficient problem solving, etc. They achieve strengthened social bonds, which in turn help prosper more collaboration and develop a familial environment on campus. As a result, they have the highest research activity, the highest number of publications, and the highest scholarly productivity.

Corporations tend to invest huge amounts of time and capital in their workforce to build collective intelligence. They organize multiple programs that demand collaboration, either through recreation or corporate tasks. Formation of collective awareness helps employees to not only build better social relations but also streamline decision-making and help maximize performance with productive collaboration.

Coherent consciousness transcends the limitation of geography

There are numerous examples of inventions that occurred nearly simultaneously by multiple individuals working independently on similar ideas or inventions. Most notably, the formulation of calculus is a prime instance of this phenomenon. Both Isaac Newton and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz developed the principles of calculus in the late 17th century, each working independently of the other. Alexander Graham Bell and Elisha Gray both filed patents for the telephone in 1876. Charles Darwin and Alfred Russell Wallace independently formulated the theory of natural selection in the 1850s. There are many more such examples, including the discovery of oxygen, X-rays, the law of conservation of energy, the Krebs cycle, etc. Even before the globalized era, most of the independent inventions occurred nearly at the same point in time.

Global coherent consciousness for world peace and advances in humanity 

One of the pioneers of the idea of a unified field of consciousness is the founder of Transcendental Meditation (TM), Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. The transcendental meditation technique is proven to have significant neural activity amelioration in a person. It is claimed to enhance individual consciousness for better collective consciousness and strengthen conscious bonds in a unified field. A key aspect of Maharishi’s theory is the notion of “super radiance,” a phenomenon suggesting that a small percentage of the population engaging in TM can influence collective consciousness on a larger scale.

On a global scale, there are multiple efforts for global coherence; for instance, in Dec 2023, nearly 11,000 participants from 139 countries congregated in Hyderabad, India, for the “10,000 for World Peace” assembly to reap advantage of coherent consciousness in achieving global ambitions of peace. Many scientific symposiums, conventions, etc. tend to bring global effort for achieving global ambition via global coherent consciousness. For instance, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), CERN, Geneva, Switzerland is the world’s largest and most powerful particle accelerator, which is home to about the majority of theoretical particle physicists on this planet. The idea of concentrating professionals from around the world is to unify the consciousness of the brilliant minds to support the progress of particle physics. 

In a nutshell, the notion of consciousness is the subject of neuroscience and spirituality together. The idea of coherent consciousness is experienced by people around the globe in their daily routine; there are tremendous examples of global coherence and efforts to manifest this novel idea. This is the pathway for continuing the progress of the most powerful cognitive being on earth. Collaboration and teamwork habits should be developed in students right from kindergarten to achieve new heights for the progress of the human race. Diverse consciousness should be coalesced to pool creativity from around the globe for achieving global ambitions of prosperity for humanity.

Manish Adhikari

St Xavier’s College, Maitighar 

Non-Resident Ambassador of Romania to Nepal Daniela Mariana Sezonov Tane paid a farewell call on Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli at the Office of the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers in Singha Durbar today.

In the meeting, PM Oli thanked the Romanian envoy on completion of her term in office in Nepal and contributing to the bilateral relations between Nepal and Romania.

Various matters of bilateral interest and exchange of cooperation were discussed on the occasion.

Similarly, the proposal on each country opening its embassy in the other also came up during the discussions.

Honorary Consul General of Romania to Nepal, Narayan Bajaj and officials at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs were also present on the occasion.

Similarly, Ambassador Tane paid a farewell call on the Minister for Foreign Affairs Arzu Rana Deuba at her office in Singha Durbar today.

The Foreign Minister thanked the Ambassador for her efforts in further strengthening Nepal-Romania relations.

The Romanian ambassador also paid a courtesy call on Foreign Secretary Sewa Lamsal.

Minister for Foreign Affairs Arzu Rana Deuba is leaving for Canada tomorrow evening to attend the Meeting of Women Foreign Ministers to be held from 19 to 20 September 2024 in Toronto, Canada.

The meeting is being co-hosted by the Governments of Canada and Jamaica.

The Foreign Minister is scheduled to address the meeting of Women Foreign Ministers in Toronto, stated a press release issued today by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

On September 21, 2024, Foreign Minister Rana will join a Nepali delegation led by the Prime Minister to the 79th Session of the UN General Assembly in New York.

Leading a Nepali delegation, the Minister for Foreign Affairs will attend the Third Summit of Asia Cooperation Dialogue being held in Doha, the State of Qatar during 2-3 October 2024.

The Foreign Minister will return home on October 4, 2024.