Category Archive: Uncategorized

28 years a nation in waiting, almost 20 years since I personally have been, a whole generation which went through the heartbreak every four years for more than 2 decades, and today it happened. And just like that, silently and subconsciously, the world cup was dedicated to the one man who has singlehandedly shouldered the hopes of the nation for the last 21 years. Makes me wonder, who's cutting the onions!

I figure that lately I have been reading far too much literature which makes little sense to my limited understanding. Joyce's 'Portrait of the artist as a young man' and Woolf's 'To the lighthouse' left me fumbling for coherence and made me wish for sentences to be shorter, intentions to be clearer, and flights of imaginations to be slightly more constrained. Since the next book on this list is Ulysses, I thought that it's better to take a break and read something which I would actually understand. So I picked up Wilde's 'Picture of Dorian Gray.' This is the second time I read it because like all great pieces of writings there is much to be discovered in the book by multiple visitations. And I wasn't disappointed.

For those who have never read Wilde, I would introduce him to be a bit like that socially awkward person who doesn't want to talk much and doesn't want to join in your social gatherings, but you know that it's not because he cannot but because life to him is one solid block of glass, its mysteries, its trivialities, its splendor and its hypocrisy are transparent to him, neatly organized in alphabetized folders in his highly competent mind. He has figured out life's vagaries to an extent which most people, with their prejudices and contempt for new knowledge, will never even approach - and this is the chief basis of his reticence and his attraction. We who spurn new knowledge because it often demands stretching the social mores at their seam cannot help but be sinfully drawn to someone who has the courage which we lack.

Wilde's world is one of paradoxes. In his world every concept that one is taught, every idea which is essential to society's survival is turned on its head and presented anew. Presented thus, it has the power to shock one into a state of contemplation and induce in one a better appreciation for the very vague, very gray, and very subjective natures of all the institutions which comprise life. It is possible to view Wilde as a mere smartass who was in a perpetual quest to demonstrate his mental superiority but as Wilde probably would have said, 'it's only smartasses who ever have interesting things to say.' It's futile trying to argue his logic because he speaks to a very select audience, the very people whom he knows would not argue his points. Everyone else, in his eyes, would never get what he's trying to say and hence, by definition, is not worthy of having an argument with. This is not to say that Wilde's ideas are baseless and arbitrary. In fact they are exceedingly precise but Wilde leaves the onus of finding the precise conditions under which his crazy observations hold to the reader. The fact is that almost everything that anyone has ever said has some trace of truth in it. In the craziest of philosophies and the most juvenile of assertions, some part of reality, at some level of approximation, is always present (just like this generalization which I just made). But it isn't worth anything if the existence of this truth is merely an artifact of chance. I have long maintained that intent is more important than action. It's often the only difference between juvenile and brilliant art. While the end forms might be exactly the same, juvenile art creates itself whereas great art is a well thought out and precise expression. And this is why Wilde is special. He manages to say things like 'Those who are faithful know only the trivial side of love; it is the faithless who know love's tragedies,' or 'I love acting. It is so much more real than life.' or 'Faithfulness is to the emotional life what consistency is to the life of the intellect; simply a confession of failure,' and one is left wondering under which conditions these statements might be true, and in doing so realizes that in some corner of his world view, there lay lingering a little thought which, after years of social conditioning, had become invulnerable to questioning. Another support upon which one has built up his shaky understanding crumbles, a few more cracks develop elsewhere, and in some sense, this destruction leaves one more alive than before.

It's instructive to see how nuanced the thinking of some of the greatest minds at the turn of the last century was. There is no incriminating bashing of religion (except by Dirac perhaps), no overconfidence in science, none of the polemic which is so much a part of modern day evangelists of atheism like Dr. Dawkins or Hitchins.

"One evening during the Solvay Conference, some of the younger members stayed behind in the lounge of the hotel. This group included Wolfgang Pauli and myself, and was soon afterward joined by Paul Dirac. One of us said: "Einstein keeps talking about God: what are we to make of that? It is extremely difficult to imagine that a scientist like Einstein should have such strong ties with a religious tradition."

"Not so much Einstein as Max Planck," someone objected. "From some of Planck's utterances it would seem that he sees no contradiction between religion and science, indeed that he believes the two are perfectly compatible."

I was asked what I knew of Planck's views on the subject, and what I thought myself. I had spoken to Planck on only a few occasions, mostly about physics and not about general questions, but I was acquainted with some of Planck's close friends, who had told me a great deal about his attitude.

"I assume," I must have replied, "that Planck considers religion and science compatible because, in his view, they refer to quite distinct facets of reality. Science deals with the objective, material world. It invites us to make accurate statements about objective reality and to grasp its interconnections. Religion, on the other hand, deals with the world of values. It considers what ought to be or what we ought to do, not what is. In science we are concerned to discover what is true or false; in religion with what is good or evil, noble or base. Science is the basis of technology, religion the basis of ethics. In short, the conflict between the two, which has been raging since the eighteenth century, seems founded on a misunderstanding, or, more precisely, on a confusion of the images and parables of religion with scientific statements. Needless to say, the result makes no sense at all. This view, which I know so well from my parents, associates the two realms with the objective and subjective aspects of the world respectively. Science is, so to speak, the manner in which we confront, in which we argue about, the objective side of reality. Religious faith, on the other hand, is the expression of the subjective decisions that help us choose the standards by which we propose to act and live. Admittedly, we generally make these decisions in accordance with the attitudes of the group to which we belong, be it our family, nation, or culture. Our decisions are strongly influenced by educational and environmental factors, but in the final analysis they are subjective and hence not governed by the 'true or false' criterion. Max Planck, if I understand him rightly, has used this freedom and come down squarely on the side of the Christian tradition. His thoughts and actions, particularly as they affect his personal relationships, fit perfectly into the framework of this tradition, and no one will respect him the less for it. As far as he is concerned, therefore, the two realms—the objective and the subjective facets of the world—are quite separate, but I must confess that I myself do not feel altogether happy about this separation. I doubt whether human societies can live with so sharp a distinction between knowledge and faith."

Wolfgang shared my concern. "It's all bound to end in tears," he said. "At the dawn of religion, all the knowledge of a particular community fitted into a spiritual framework, based largely on religious values and ideas. The spiritual framework itself had to be within the grasp of the simplest member of the community, even if its parables and images conveyed no more than the vaguest hint as to their underlying values and ideas. But if he himself is to live by these values, the average man has to be convinced that the spiritual framework embraces the entire wisdom of his society. For 'believing' does not to him mean 'taking for granted,' but rather 'trusting in the guidance' of accepted values. That is why society is in such danger whenever fresh knowledge threatens to explode the old spiritual forms. The complete separation of knowledge and faith can at best be an emergency measure, afford some temporary relief. In western culture, for instance, we may well reach the point in the not too distant future where the parables and images of the old religions will have lost their persuasive force even for the average person; when that happens, I am afraid that all the old ethics will collapse like a house of cards and that unimaginable horrors will be perpetrated. In brief, I cannot really endorse Planck's philosophy, even if it is logically valid and even though I respect the human attitudes to which it gives rise.

"Einstein's conception is closer to mine. His God is somehow involved in the immutable laws of nature. Einstein has a feeling for the central order of things. He can detect it in the simplicity of natural laws. We may take it that he felt this simplicity very strongly and directly during his discovery of the theory of relativity. Admittedly, this is a far cry from the contents of religion. I don't believe Einstein is tied to any religious tradition, and I rather think the idea of a personal God is entirely foreign to him. But as far as [Einstein] he is concerned there is no split between science and religion: the central order is part of the subjective as well as the objective realm, and this strikes me as being a far better starting point.

"A starting point for what?" I asked. "If you consider man's attitude to the central order a purely personal matter, then you may agree with Einstein's view, but then you must also concede that nothing at all follows from this view."

"Perhaps it does," Wolfgang replied. "The development of science during the past two centuries has certainly changed man's thinking, even outside the Christian West. Hence it matters quite a bit what physicists think. And it was precisely the idea of an objective world running its course in time and space according to strict causal laws that produced a sharp clash between science and the spiritual formulations of the various religions. If science goes beyond this strict view—and it has done just that with relativity theory and is likely to go even further with quantum theory—then the relationship between science and the contents religions try to express must change once again. Perhaps science, by revealing the existence of new relationships during the past thirty years, may have lent our thought much greater depth. The concept of complementarity, for instance, which Niels Bohr considers so crucial to the interpretation of quantum theory, was by no means unknown to philosophers, even if they did not express it so succinctly. However, its very appearance in the exact sciences has constituted a decisive change: the idea of material objects that are completely independent of the manner in which we observe them proved to be nothing but an abstract extrapolation, something that has no counterpart in nature. In Asiatic philosophy and Eastern religions we find the complementary idea of a pure subject of knowledge, one that confronts no object. This idea, too, will prove an abstract extrapolation, corresponding to no spiritual or mental reality. If we think about the wider context, we may in the future be forced to keep a middle course between these extremes, perhaps the one charted by Bohr's complementarity concept. Any science that adapts itself to this form of thinking will not only be more tolerant of the different forms of religion, but, having a wider overall view, may also contribute to the world of values."

Paul Dirac had joined us in the meantime. He [Paul Dirac] had only just turned twenty-five, and had little time for tolerance. "I don't know why we are talking about religion," he objected. "If we are honest—and scientists have to be—we must admit that religion is a jumble of false assertions, with no basis in reality. The very idea of God is a product of the human imagination. It is quite understandable why primitive people, who were so much more exposed to the overpowering forces of nature than we are today, should have personified these forces in fear and trembling. But nowadays, when we understand so many natural processes, we have no need for such solutions. I can't for the life of me see how the postulate of an Almighty God helps us in any way. What I do see is that this assumption leads to such unproductive questions as why God allows so much misery and injustice, the exploitation of the poor by the rich and all the other horrors He might have prevented. If religion is still being taught, it is by no means because its ideas still convince us, but simply because some of us want to keep the lower classes quiet. Quiet people are much easier to govern than clamorous and dissatisfied ones. They are also much easier to exploit. Religion is a kind of opium that allows a nation to lull itself into wishful dreams and so forget the injustices that are being perpetrated against the people. Hence the close alliance between those two great political forces, the State and the Church. Both need the illusion that a kindly God rewards—in heaven if not on earth—all those who have not risen up against injustice, who have done their duty quietly and uncomplainingly. That is precisely why the honest assertion that God is a mere product of the human imagination is branded as the worst of all mortal sins."

"You are simply judging religion by its political abuses," I objected, "and since most things in this world can be abused—even the Communist ideology which you recently propounded—all such judgments are inadmissible. After all, there will always be human societies, and these must find a common language in which they can speak about life and death, and about the wider context in which their lives are set. The spiritual forms that have developed historically out of this search for a common language must have had a great persuasive force—how else could so many people have lived by them for so many centuries? Religion can't be dismissed so simply as all that. But perhaps you are drawn to another religion, such as the old Chinese, in which the idea of a personal God does not occur?"

"I dislike religious myths on principle," Dirac replied, "if only because the myths of the different religions contradict one another. After all, it was purely by chance that I was born in Europe and not in Asia, and that is surely no criterion for judging what is true or what I ought to believe. And I can only believe what is true. As for right action, I can deduce it by reason alone from the situation in which I find myself: I live in society with others, to whom, in principle, I must grant the same rights I claim for myself. I must simply try to strike a fair balance; no more can be asked of me. All this talk about God's will, about sin and repentance, about a world beyond by which we must direct our lives, only serves to disguise the sober truth. Belief in God merely encourages us to think that God wills us to submit to a higher force, and it is this idea which helps to preserve social structures that may have been perfectly good in their day but no longer fit the modern world. All your talk of a wider context and the like strikes me as quite unacceptable. Life, when all is said and done, is just like science: we come up against difficulties and have to solve them. And we can never solve more than one difficulty at a time; your wider context is nothing but a mental superstructure added a posteriori."

And so the discussion continued, and we were all of us surprised to notice that Wolfgang was keeping so silent. He would pull a long face or smile rather maliciously from time to time, but he said nothing. In the end, we had to ask him to tell us what he thought. He seemed a little surprised and then said: "Well, our friend Dirac, too, has a religion, and its guiding principle is: 'There is no God and Dirac is His prophet.'" We all laughed, including Dirac, and this brought our evening in the hotel lounge to a close."

During my last 5 years of stay in America, the one thing that has always managed to perplex me about this country is how much of a dichotomous heart it manages to hide under its own twinkling skin. This dichotomy is in its simultaneous sanctuary to the conservative and the ultra liberal, the billionaire and the homeless, the free spirit and the suicidal. While in a country like India which is only now beginning to take its first steps towards what can be termed intellectual enlightenment, we can expect ignorance and poverty to linger on for a bit. Its irrationality is justifiable. Its stupidity can be explained away. But finding such elements on a large scale in America, a country which literally leapfrogged ahead of everyone else during the 20th century and basically rode the crest of the wave intellectualism for much of the last two centuries, can only be termed anomalous. Specifically, I am speaking about the latest rally that FOX channel's Glenn Beck spearheaded at the Lincoln memorial. Glenn Beck as a phenomenon is actually easy to explain. In a sufficiently large group of humans, there are bound to be lunatics who have convinced themselves of all sorts of theories. Their nature must necessarily imply a predilection for falsities, irrationality, ignorance, insecurity, and mental derangement. They must necessarily believe in a lost golden age when 'concepts were simple', when issues could be easily resolved into 'right and wrong', in other words, when heart spoke the truth and the brain was looked at with skepticism. They must also necessarily believe that an age which is defined by shades of gray isn't so because it has to be so but because there is something seriously wrong with it - something which needs forced correction. I believe that this is an essential stage of social development and is bred by a lack of exposure to new ideas. Knowledge with its sweeping broom is expected to clear away such simplistic notions. And America is no stranger to great ideas and all forms of knowledge. In such a situation what I find most amazing is the fact that Glenn Beck's rally was attended by 500,000 people. The truth is that there is a deep divide within America. It is a highly, almost dangerously heterogeneous society and this society is being stretched at its seams. Maybe it has to do with the huge size of the country coupled with its relatively recent history - this ensures that intermingling, which is so essential for the exchange of ideas, proceeds at a slow rate. Maybe it has to do with the initial crop of people who came and inhabited this land - those who by their very origin were deeply religious. When you couple these factors with an environment where parts of the society and the country believe in an almost radical version of free though (if there is such a thing) you begin to understand how the deep divide and the insecure skepticism may arise. The result is a country divided between those who still cling to their Bibles because they have been left behind in the mad rush of progress and those who have crossed the chasm and now cannot understand what they perceive as a lack of basic rationality in the former. They are separated not only by geography but by time and while geographical homogenization may occur quite quickly, the temporal one has a mind of its own.

I am not saying that the coastal regions of the progressive part of the society are more rational compared to the religious midwest. They have their own concrete beliefs and they also view scientific thought (which, differentiated from mystical thought, is the only form of rational thought) with a cross-eyed skepticism. Their new age delusions are as amusing as the idea of a God who keeps a constant eye on you. They might be having different assumptions but their failing is the same - that their assumptions are final. Anyway, in a country which is segregated in so many different groups of people who have their beliefs sacred, I am amused that the one thing that all of them are deeply skeptical towards is the thing that made the country great in the first place. It is not really science because it is too narrow a term but a disposition towards inquiry. For a country which is seen as the beacon modernity, which must necessarily be accompanied by a welcoming attitude towards change, so many of its people cling on to their provincial notions. Is it true of all societies? Am I being too harsh on America? I don't know...

I have lately been in an unusually experimental mood. One of the main reasons for this is my renewed fascination with research which has encouraged a resurgence of the 'curious character' in me - which, by the way, is also behind the continuing lull in updates on this blog.

Anyway, it has always seemed fascinating to me as to how much we take the brain for granted. From its myriad neurological firings spring our love songs and our cold revenges, in its labyrinthine corridors lurk fascinating undiscovered potentials, and it holds our personalities with the death grip of a few electric signals. With a few fires here and there, it has the potential of changing the perception of reality and how we see ourselves with respect to the reality. It truly is a worthy subject to be curious about. I have always wondered how interesting it would be if I could simulate a condition where the brain is forced to perform in a way in which it is not used to performing. One way to achieve something similar is by tiring it so that it has to make some prioritizing decisions. I figured it would be interesting to see what happens when I tire it, for example, by sleep deprivation. My goal was to go at least 48 hours without sleep and I began by waking from Friday through to Saturday. I noticed that the most difficult hours in my effort to keep awake were between 5 and 7 but there was no major lack of coordination. I did notice that in my effort to play the Moonlight sonata's 1st movement, I felt much less inclined to complete the more complex parts on Saturday morning than I was on Friday night. I went with Khatri bhai to have an early breakfast on the beach but I noticed that even after just 24 hours it was taking me significantly more effort to engage in rational arguments. I was more inclined to agree with Khatri bhai's contentions although I did not have much trouble understanding him. It wasn't until 4 in the evening on Saturday that I could start feeling noticeable signs of mental tiredness. It was a nightmare (!) trying to keep awake through the afternoon and I had started having a slight burning sensation in my eyes. I called Nikhil and asked him if he would come with me to watch a movie in the theater so that I could keep awake and we decided to watch 'Get Low.' I rode my motorcycle to his place at 8:30 and we proceeded to the theater. It was then, after 36 hours, that I started feeling a definite incoherence in thought. It was taking me significantly more time to understand what he was saying and to respond to him. My voice was trailing off and I felt like I had to consciously spend effort in order to formulate basic ideas and sentences. My chain of thought would break down and it became an effort even to maintain balance while walking. While in the theater I could not understand the slight accent of the actors when Nikhil could do it easily. I felt definite irritation from the constantly changing lights on the screen. Most importantly, though, I felt the onset of serious palpitations. Even the slightest movement while sitting on the chair would send my heart racing and I had the constant urge to stretch my legs and hands. The movie finished at about 11:30 and I asked Nikhil to drop me home because I did not think motorcycle was an entirely safe idea then. I came back home at about 12:00, having done 40 hours now. By this time I had started feeling serious dizziness and a significant lack or coordination. I tried playing the Moonlight sonata but I kept making the simplest of mistakes. I would forget how to go from one bar to another and the notes on the sheet music just did not make sense. There was barely any coordination between the left and the right hands and my eyes had turned red from the effort. A few more hours (3:45 in the night - ~44 hours) and I felt the kind of anxiety I have never felt before. I had started blinking much more than normal, my fingers were shaking, and there was a constant urge to stretch. I had started breathing through my mouth because I felt that I could not get all the air I needed with each breath. My heart was pounding at a worrisome rate and I could just not fix my thoughts on any one subject. It was then that I decided that there is no way I could make it to 8 in the morning without taking rest. Through the last 44 hours I had not even laid down for the fear of going to sleep and ruining the experiment so I thought I would lay down for a bit. The next thing I remember- it's 12:00 on Sunday morning. I have very little recollection of yesterday's movie - I am certainly not sure how it ended, although I was awake through it all and I have no idea when exactly I slept.

I think it was a very interesting weekend. If nothing then it at least convinced me that I never want to do it again!

Then take me disappearin’ through the smoke rings of my mind,
Down the foggy ruins of time, far past the frozen leaves,
The haunted, frightened trees, out to the windy beach,
Far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow.
Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free,
Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands,
With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves,
Let me forget about today until tomorrow.

-D

So I got the following mail today (copied here as is),

---------------

Dear friend,

My name is (MR Emmanuel Kone) i am the manager of auditing and accounting department Bank of African, I need your urgent assistance in transferring the sum of ($10.5m us dollars immediately to your acocunt.

upon your reply I will send you full details on how the business will be executed,send me your contact information.

1.Age.........................

(2)Residential adress......................

(3) occupation....................

--------

Now I'm not a stickler for formalities and I no longer get worked up over missed apostrophes and dropped letters but this! This, my friend, is completely unacceptable. It's unacceptable because while Mr. Emmanuel Kone seems to be making a business proposition to me, it seems that he is taking my business far too lightly. Maybe it's the effect of the yuppie generation with their demand for instant gratification, their short attention spans, and casual weekdays. Maybe it is a precipitate of a culture hopelessly addicted to the quick fixes of easy technology but to think that such an ill prepared mail with such glaring grammatical errors will secure my favors for Mr. Kone is nothing less than preposterous. And it's not just the grammatical errors which I find supremely disturbing. Here are my other objections regarding the mail,

1. I'm not your friend.

2. I'm generally suspicious of people who have round brackets in their name. They remind me of Charlie Brown. Not that Charlie Brown had curly brackets in his name or was suspicious. In fact being suspicious of people who have round brackets in their names and getting reminded of Charlie Brown are mutually exclusive events. But I thought I'll mention this while I'm at it.

3. I doubt if there is a Bank of Africa. I have graver doubts about Bank of African.

4) That your list is inconsistently numbered bothers me.

But more than being just a train wreck of a mail as far as consistency and grammar are concerned, it has deeper philosophical implications. The world as we find ourselves in today is getting increasingly less appreciative of individuals. As our population inches towards the 7 billion mark, every single one of us matters just a little lesser than what he used to. In times of such grave objectification, can we not  expect a slight indulgence even from those whose only source income is our own gullibility? I find it insulting that someone whose only job is to write purple proses, lace our clarity in sugar coated dreams, and appeal to our humanity and greed with rosy visions of dead people with irrational wills is not willing to spend the requisite effort at cooking up a decent story. Mutual respect, while long dead at the hands of the virtuous, has now lost its final haven in the debauched.

I have fond recollections of Burkina Faso where rich men died in plane crashes. How wonderful! Death has the notorious habit of being mainly superficial except when it happens to those who are completely unrelated to us - in which case it often generates sympathy. But in Burkina Faso, death was beautiful and benign. Rich men were getting killed in plane crashes and their money was being left to me. Millions of dollars were sitting at the doors of the Burkina Faso bank, palpitating, waiting impatiently to be transferred to my account if only I replied. I never did of course, mainly because I was not a dumbass but it was nice being pampered like that. That such selfless and inexplicable good could exist in the world was always a hypothetical notion but there was something good about its fake honesty. Mr. Kone, you disappoint me. That you expect me to be a retard and give you my bank account  number is insulting enough. The fact that you expect it all without putting in any effort from your side is just plain wrong.

-------

p.s. There is actually a Bank of Africa!

We caught the tread of dancing feet,
We loitered down the moonlit street,
And stopped beneath the harlot's house.

Inside, above the din and fray,
We heard the loud musicians play
The "Treues Liebes Herz" of Strauss.

Like strange mechanical grotesques,
Making fantastic arabesques,
The shadows raced across the blind.

We watched the ghostly dancers spin
To sound of horn and violin,
Like black leaves wheeling in the wind.

Like wire-pulled automatons,
Slim silhouetted skeletons
Went sidling through the slow quadrille.

They took each other by the hand,
And danced a stately saraband;
Their laughter echoed thin and shrill.

Sometimes a clockwork puppet pressed
A phantom lover to her breast,
Sometimes they seemed to try to sing.

Sometimes a horrible marionette
Came out, and smoked its cigarette
Upon the steps like a live thing.

Then, turning to my love, I said,
"The dead are dancing with the dead,
The dust is whirling with the dust."

But she--she heard the violin,
And left my side, and entered in:
Love passed into the house of lust.

Then suddenly the tune went false,
The dancers wearied of the waltz,
The shadows ceased to wheel and whirl.

And down the long and silent street,
The dawn, with silver-sandalled feet,
Crept like a frightened girl.

--Oscar Wilde

Blinded by his razor sharp wit, it is easy to forget what a magician Wilde was with words. How exquisitely he has used 'automatons', 'quadrille', 'saraband', 'marionette', and cigarette'! Without being specific and direct (a trait only worthy of those who cannot do better. In words of Wilde himself, 'a man who calls a spade a spade should be compelled to use one. It is the only thing he is fit for.') he has painted a dying, decadent, smoke infested, blurry, immoral and stylish picture. And then 'Love passes into the house of Lust' and slowly and beautifully, 'the dawn, with silver-sandalled feet' creeps like a 'frightened child'.

This is what I enjoy in literature, as in anything else in fact. This urge and ability of making things more beautiful, more luxurious, more delicious, than mandated by mere utility. This is probably the essence of being human - that our luxuries and our necessities are indistinguishable at their confluence.