Soumya's Weird Musings

May 19, 2020 There's a reason the idle mind is called the Devil's playground, not the stairway to heaven. मन चिंति ते वैरी न चिंति   is a Marathi proverb. It means that sometimes, we conjure up such negative thoughts or scenarios for ourselves that with a mind like this, who needs enemies? There's also the story of the कल्पवृक्ष that my father told me once. कल्पवृक्ष is a mythical tree that grants wishes. A weary traveler once sits underneath the tree without knowing its power and wishes in passing to have a refreshing meal. The tree grants his wish, but the traveler is terrified, not knowing where the food came from. Is there a ghost here? The mind wonders and the tree delivers. Oh no, there is a ghost here! What if he eats me up? मन चिंति ते वैरी न चिंति  . The moral of the story: be careful what you wish for. "(Noise)...is...for the bereaved and guilty," writes Veronica Roth in her novel, Insurgent . The character she writes about is facing trauma at some level...

शादी होने से पहले एक स्त्री की ज़िंदगी कई आनंद भरे लम्हों की कहानी होती है।    एक बेटी होकर जब मैं अपनी माँ और दादी को देखती हूँ, तब ऐसा लगता है कि शादी होने के बाद भी ऐसे लम्हे मिलें, ये भाग्य का सवाल है। ये महिलाओं की बहादुरी होती है कि वे ये निर्णय लेती हैं (हालांकि कई बार ये उनके हाथों में नहीं रहता), न जानते हुए कि आगे उन्हें आनंद के लम्हे मिलते रहेंगे, या कुछ और. मेरी मम्मी और दादी नहीं जानते थे कि उनकी नई ज़िन्दगी पहले से कैसे अलग होगी, लेकिन ये जान लेने का साहस उनमें था। मुझमें नहीं है। मेरा अब तक ये विश्वास रहा है (और इसके खिलाफ़ मेरे पास सबूत नहीं है) कि किसी से शादी करने की परिभाषा में ही " बंधन " कहीं न कहीं आ जाता है, भले ही किसी भी हद तक। आप केवल एक इंसान से ही नहीं बंध जाते – उनकी विचारधारा आपको अपनानी पड़ती है, उनका परिवार, उनके कर्तव्य, और बहुत कुछ। आपकी इच्छा हो या न हो, आप अपने साथी की शैली और अपने नए वातावरण के अनुसार खुद को ढालने लगते हैं। और जो लम्हे आप पीछे छोड़ आए हैं...वे अब केवल आपकी यादों में घर बनाते हैं, शायद ही आपकी नई ज़िन्दगी को रोश...

There are science fiction writers whose "predictions" of modern-age inventions have come true. Jules Verne predicted video conferencing and submarines. Isaac Asimov predicted robots and artificial intelligence. Arthur C. Clarke predicted artificial satellites and portable music players - what we now know as MP3 players or iPods or whatever else you crazy kids use. He also predicted the Mobius Belt. (And this introduction defines the word "understatement.") Well, okay, the Mobius belt isn't an "invention." It's an incredibly abstract concept that is somehow allowed by the laws of nature. In fact, it's such an anomaly that I'll have to write my ideas from bottom-up: the Mobius belt is a huge spoiler for what's about to come. Two dimensional objects have two sides: think paper, wall, door. In fact, every object we come across is tangible across all three dimensions. We can't imagine a cube having no height , for example, or a pape...

Practically every waking minute, I feel as if I’m under scrutiny. I feel like all eyes are on me. There are many complicated reasons for why I feel this way. A lot has changed, and I really don’t think I have a definition anymore. But what of the people who knew me before I entered this in-between? This one’s for them. I’ve been described as brave, intelligent, creative, focused, determined, mature, leader-like, and a lot of other stuff that I’m proud I was able to display. Certainly, none of that was pretense; I don’t have the energy to do that kind of thing. I’m just left wondering how much of that still describes me as I am right now. I lost contact with a lot of people in a certain timespan, and I think my descriptors have changed since then. The result is that I can’t keep up with the scrutiny whose basis is descriptors from an age where I was very unkind to myself and to the people I care about. The reason I’m thinking about scrutiny is that things didn’t go as...

This post brings back memories of a bookmark that I constantly saw, because I kept it in a book I frequently read. The bookmark had a quote on it, the same quote that opens this little passage. Here is the Hindi translation of "Intelligence and Accepting Fallibility." (English:  https://astronomyamateurs.blogspot.com/2017/08/intelligence-and-accepting-fallibility.html ) दोषक्षमता स्वीकार करने की बुद्धिमत्ता “अक़्ल होना व्यक्तित्व का भाग नहीं है, न ही ये विवाद, विश्वास, मत, या तर्क का परिणाम है। अक़्ल तब आती है जब दिमाग को अपनी दोषक्षमता समझने लगती है, अपनी काबिलियत और औकात समझने लगती है।“ इस विषय पर निबंध लिखने की इच्छा होती है। अक़्ल की सरल परिभाषा तो यही है कि ये आपके पास कितनी जानकारी है, इस बात का नाप है। ग़ौर से सोचा जाए, तो इस परिभाषा में खुद की दोषक्षमता समझना भी जानकारी ही है। दोषक्षमता – हमारी दोष, या ग़लती करने की क्षमता। इसकी समझ होना मतलब इस बात को स्वीकार करना कि हम भगवान नहीं हैं, हमने भी ग़लती की है। इतना ही नहीं, तो ग़लती सुधारने की बहादुरी और आ...

Back in 2016-17, I used to contribute to a blog: astronomyamateurs.blogspot.com Now, I'm trying my hand at translation. To challenge myself, I took an article I wrote on there ( https://astronomyamateurs.blogspot.com/2016/08/mathematical-vomit-i-know-how-charming.html ) and translated it to Hindi. There were three objectives to this: to have a demo of my translation ready, to practice Hindi typing, and, of course, to improve my skills. It's not the famous Kamlesh Dhavale, but I hope you'll enjoy the result anyway. गणित की गणना (मैं समझाती हूँ।) चेतावनी: ये एक लंबा लेख है। नींद लग जाए तो लेखक को मत कोसना। किसी भी एक आँकड़े के बारे में सोचिए। बड़े-छोटे की चिंता मत कीजिए। अपने मन की आँख में उसे देखते रहिए: उसकी बनावट, वो कौन-सी संख्या दर्षाता है। क्या इस अंक से आपको खास लगाव है? अब कल्पना कीजिए, आप इस आँकड़े के साथ क्या-क्या कर सकते हैं। आप इसमें कुछ जोड़ सकते हैं, इसमें से या इसको घटा सकते हैं, गुणाकार कर सकते हैं, इसको या इससे भाग कर सकते हैं। य...

The memories a woman makes before she gets married are fond ones for the rest of her life. And as a daughter looking at her mother and grandmother before her, a marriage as fond as the memories before it is a matter of risk and luck. It is a plunge women are courageous enough to make, not knowing whether the events beyond this horizon will constitute just as fond memories, or something else entirely. My mother and grandmother didn't know what they were leaving their old life behind in favour of, but they were brave enough to find out. I lack that bravery. I grew up believing (and I have seen little to no evidence against this) that marriage has an element, however small, of subjugation attached to it. You're bound to more than just a person: you're bound to their beliefs, their family, their obligations, and a lot more. Unwittingly, you find yourself conforming to the ways of your partner and the new environment that you have entered. And the events that you've had to...