Neon Nagaram - A musical novel

What is the future of books? While the digitterati are busy envisioning infinite possibilities amidst critics who frown at diminishing attention levels of today's multi-tasking youth, I recently discovered one interesting possibility which seems perfectly suited for the Indian sensibility and adds another dimension to the reading experience. In a  nation which is mad about its film songs, imagine a fiction novel that lets us create the magic of movies in our mind through songs which project the emotions the words are waiting to paint in broad strokes. You are in full liberty to define your experience with the book.  Do you want to enjoy the songs marked for the chapter and then read the book to weave the story sketched entirely on the emotions stirred? Or do you want to read the book entirely and then let the music convey the feelings the words enticed you with? 

I recently got acquainted with the superbly talented Paadhai team who have put their heart and soul in actualizing this possibility. Neon Nagaram, the group's second musical novel was launched in Sathyam Cinemas  in Chennai on July 10th by Director Cheran and Actor Prasanna.

The Inner Dimensions of Climate Change

I shifted to a new city recently. I am beginning to come to terms with the antagonism which revels in me versus parasitical urban denizens. How can I internalize this bitterness to redesign my lifestyle to lead an earth-friendly life rather than letting it dissipate in reactive negativity against my fellow city-dwellers? How can I lovingly embrace the little green efforts made by millions who are oblivious to the urgency of the ecological crisis, while remaining fully aware of the momentous work to change our unsustainable modes of living? How can I personalize the ecological crisis to see it clearly arising out of the perceived disconnect between myself and the environment? 

As a blogger who is passionate about the World Wide Web among other things, I am also eager to share my enthusiasm about the networked world we are beginning to inhabit, and how its innate wiredness can help us appreciate, wily-nily, the web of life and the power of local communities.  I am also very much eager to connect with like-minded individuals who share my passion.

 

 I am traveling to Himalayas for the first time to find answers to these personal questions by participating in the Inner Dimensions of Climate Change retreat from Sept 6th - 11th in Rishikesh. This retreat is organized by the Global Peace Initiatives of Women. and PurnaVidya Trust. 

Tuesdays with a farmer - Real Time - The end of surrogates

This post is under the series of posts I have been writing about the phenomenon of surrogates. You may want to check the first post here to appreciate this post better. I have further written about the prevalence of surrogates in every sphere of lives here.   I have also explored the relationship between science and surrogates here.

Farmer: If you look at ethics per se , one of the problems we have is that we can circumvent the system by following the rules once a certain numeral/metric is taken care of. But the spirit is gone. Because of surrogates, we have been flexible towards values. Ecologically speaking , surrogates have led us to the disaster of the highest order.  All that the rich people do is bad for the planet. Can you imagine? How much power they have. Everything you students are thriving to do is bad for the planet. It may stand for some value. You may never get that value by doing that. The planet is destroyed for sure!!

The return of the polymath

Remember Young's modulus? Remember those physics lessons we took while we studied the wave nature of light? I had a wonderful opportunity to revisit my physics lessons when I attended a workshop on Quantum Mechanics. While I was studying Young's double-slit experiment, I also had a chance to learn about Thomas Young. 

Born in 1773, he was reading fluently when he was just two years in age, and had mastered the Bible by the time he was six. He became an outstanding doctor, mastered more than a dozen languages, and made important contributions towards deciphering the Egyptian hieroglyphics. In addition to all of this, Young did wonderful work in the field of physics.

What I learned about him made me curious. While we were kids, we always dreamed of becoming a pilot, scientist and actor all at once. As we grew up, why did we simply brush away those naive dreams and began chasing degrees which earned maximum ROI?  Isn't it strange that our choices to pursue our careers narrowed down as we got ourselves more degrees?

Tuesdays with a farmer - Science and Surrogates

This post is under the series of posts I have been writing about surrogates. You may want to check the first post here to appreciate this post better. I have further written about the prevalence of surrogates in every sphere of lives here. 

Farmer: Most of the science is a play of human mind. It isn't real. Euclid once said "Let's assume there is a line". The entire realm of human design was based on one guy saying let us assume a line. There are no lines in nature. There are no dimensions except our lens. 

Innovation is a joke!

Somebody once asked a mystic of the networked world, "What is Innovation?". Laughing heartily, he quipped, “Innovation is like a joke! It is like a fish in the ocean searching for the ocean". He then narrated a story.

"Once upon a time, there was a congregation of fish, who got together to discuss who among them had seen the ocean. None of them could say they had actually seen the ocean. Then one fish said, “I think my great grandfather had seen the ocean!” A second fish said, “Yes, yes, I have also heard about this.” A third fish said, “Yes, certainly, his great grandfather had seen the ocean.” So they built a huge temple and made a statue of the great grandfather of that particular fish! They said, “He had seen the ocean. He had been connected with the ocean.”  ****

When I look at innovation today, I often wonder, how could we talk about networked age and in the same breath, talk about innovation in the traditional way. Check out what people are talking about with #innovation. More often, you would come across these words: radical, disruptive, game-changing,challenging the status-quo. 

Tuesdays with a farmer - The death of surrogates - Part II

This is a continuation of my earlier post, The death of surrogates. While you can read this post individually, you might want to check it out  to appreciate this post better.

Farmer:  Just because an engineer's son might have imbibed some learning from the influence of his parents, do we let him call himself an engineer? Any surrogate, at some point of time, becomes illogical. Isn't it surprising that a planet full of rational people continue to build more and more robust structures of surrogates?