Playing with electrons

Twenty tiny, little kids were gunned down in Newtown, Connecticut a few days back smearing the sometime serene and peaceful atmosphere of Newtown with raw blood of innocent kids who probably were eagerly waiting for Santa Claus to give them gifts in the ensuing Christmas which was just a couple of weeks away. Their parents were probably planning on some merry and colorful Christmas celebrations with their beloved children, perhaps hoping for a clear sunny sky on December 25 th in between typical snowfalls that accompany this time of the year. Those parents instead had to bury the lifeless bodies of the tiny little kids, a grief so heavy that the earth should have sunk by now being unable to lift the weight. Santa Claus can no longer give them gifts, for they are now in their eternal sleep, six feet below the ground. The world’s largest democracy with a 5000+ year old culture interestingly also boasts of a rape of a woman every 20 minutes, and that is just official record. ...

Living in the moment, it is said, defines intrinsic happiness. Planning to soak in happiness in a stipulated time or an event in the future is an illusion. Whatever we do, if we put our heart and mind in to it and if we live in ‘that’ moment, we become happy. Worries never cease to exist, even unconsciously and unintentionally. Whether you are the president of the United States or you are a newspaper hawker in India, whether you are Bill Gates or you are a homeless person, worries will never leave you. Reflecting over the past to rectify ourselves for the future is a wise thing to do. But living in the past isn’t. Similarly, planning for the future is a practical and realistic thing to do, like life insurance, saving money for our kids and for medical emergencies, etc. But living in the future isn’t. Reflecting on the past and dreaming on the future should just be our assets which should enable us to soak in happiness and fulfillment in the present moment . Now I am sounding...

Robert J. Hastings had written an extra-ordinarily nice poetic piece titled ‘The Station’ which was a massive hit among readers years back. It can be read here: http://robertjhastings.net/ Hastings, in this crisp and touching piece, correctly points out that ‘the station constantly outdistances from us’. There is no ‘eventual’ station which when reached will make us happy, rather, it’s the journey to the ‘station’ which needs to be enjoyed and lived fully before the ‘station’ arrives. It is very true for each one of us for the simple reason that anxieties and uncertainties in our life never cease to end. We run out of time and embrace death soon enough in the hassles of our daily life which we cannot avoid, paradoxically. It is indeed the journey, seriously, which needs to be lived – to climb more mountains, to swim more rivers, to enjoy more morning sunshine, to listen to birds’ chirps, to take more evening walks, to hug our dear ones more – all these truly embellish our ...

The daily life of almost any person is pretty packed with work, worries, anxieties, etc. and almost every one of us is pre-occupied with myriads of thoughts. We need to worry about our next project deadline, our next assignment, our health, our family members’ health – kids, wife, parents, etc, our bank balance & savings, the economy, the rising fuel price, our career concerns, the weekly groceries - and the list  never ends. In present times, almost no individual has the luxury of sitting idly for hours and pondering philosophically-incomprehensible and scientifically non-provable questions such as ‘Why do we exist?’ or ‘What happens to us after death?’ or ‘What happened before the universe was created?’ and so on. Oftentimes however, when I’m traveling in a bus to a nearby lab within the university campus or just walking to/from my department, I keep wondering some of these bizarre and seemingly silly questions. It’s not a very fun idea because it tends to transport me t...

There’s always been comparison of research in India to those in China and in USA, and we always end up realizing how much we lag behind those two giants, be it research in basic sciences or in technology, be in the number of papers published (in journals of international repute), be it number of patents filed, be it number of PhDs awarded and so on. Some people blame it on lack of funding, some people blame it on poor resources (equipments for experiments, etc.) available and some people blame it on the inability of the government and research institutes on attracting the talent pool towards research in India. There’ve been lots of discussions, debates and proposals in this regard, both at the blog/media level as well as at the institutional/academic/governmental level. To my understanding, the amount of funds released for research in India (by the government) presently is not so less as it used to be; I heard somewhere that it’s 1% of GDP or something like that. So, funding may not...