Hello Folks !
Its been ages since I last sent out an update mail, but that does not mean things have not been happening ! There have been many many months of desperate - and sometimes dangerous - hard work, much agonizing thought about the future, a satisfying amount of cricket, some heart burn some success and a few twists in the tale. Not to mention some inspirational teachers - maybe thats a tautology, anyone who's inspirational is automatically a teacher - and so many delightful friends it was an absolute privilege and pleasure to spend time with.
The upshot of it all is that after spending one year in Belgium sweating out some of the toughest coursework in Photonics along with the Belgians (even Caesar appreciated them - "Of all the Gauls, The Belgians are the bravest !") and one year in Scotland fretting about a singularly intractable and tedious masters thesis while chilling at the whey pat tavern with cheesy nachos after village cricket games, I have ended up in Canada at the Perimeter Institute of Theoretical Physics doing (yet another) masters degree (in Theoretical Physics, obly).
Before you ask "Why ??" and "What ????", This is my year off. Other people travel and take it easy, I got a chance to fulfill a childhood dream. I am studying general relativity at the moment and before Im done at the end of 10 months, Ill have gone through cosmology, string theory, quantum gravity and most of the rest of physics - all at someone else's expense. Its a brilliantly conceived and intense course and if you're interested, take a look at it here.
Im enjoying myself and learning a lot. What I will do after this ? Who knows. But I want to travel a lot, and I intend to settle down back in Aurangabad pretty soon. How Im goign to do that without simply abandoning all my random and fairly esoteric pursuits, I do not know, but Ill figure something out :)
Sincerely,
Prasanna
Monday, 14 September 2009
Tuesday, 1 September 2009
Free to Dream
"Be very protective of your enthusiasm. Dont let anything affect that ! If you find yourself getting stressed out, if classes seem too much, take a break. This course is for you to figure out what you want to do with your life....but we have definitely packed it with too much stuff !" (or words to that effect)
- Dr. Neil Turok to the PSI students
There are idealists in the world who create wonderful things, wonderful places, wonderful situations and I am in one of them right now, among amazing people. To bring enthusiastic people together and give them everything they need and give them the freedom to dream, think and create new ideas for mankind....surely we need a lot more such places ! As David Deutsch so eloquently said in this talk, the survival of mankind depends on the ability of our species to create the knowledge that we require to solve the massive (existential) crises that we will face sooner or later.
Im really keen to see if I can actually do what Im supposed to do now that Im here : make a real and significant contribution to my species - Humankind and to my planet - Earth, so that we may hope to live and explore and carry to distant corners of spacetime the me
mories of Earth. We will certainly be extinct one day, but will we leave behind only a few primitive ruins on one planet of one obscure system ? Proof that we never grew up, that we remained small minded and spiteful and primitive ? Or will a million wrecks on a million distant and inhospitable worlds bear testimony to how far beyond its 'natural' mandate this unworthy chemical scum went, exploring the universe simply because it is there !
In The Songs of Distant Earth Clarke mentions a story of a frozen leopard carcass found near the top of Kilimanjaro. (the story happens to be The Snows of Kilimanjaro by Hemingway and almost certainly true) and wonders what the leopard was doing there....what was it seeking in those bleak icy slopes when the plains below - its natural home - abounded with game ?
Image - New Scientist
Im really keen to see if I can actually do what Im supposed to do now that Im here : make a real and significant contribution to my species - Humankind and to my planet - Earth, so that we may hope to live and explore and carry to distant corners of spacetime the me
mories of Earth. We will certainly be extinct one day, but will we leave behind only a few primitive ruins on one planet of one obscure system ? Proof that we never grew up, that we remained small minded and spiteful and primitive ? Or will a million wrecks on a million distant and inhospitable worlds bear testimony to how far beyond its 'natural' mandate this unworthy chemical scum went, exploring the universe simply because it is there !In The Songs of Distant Earth Clarke mentions a story of a frozen leopard carcass found near the top of Kilimanjaro. (the story happens to be The Snows of Kilimanjaro by Hemingway and almost certainly true) and wonders what the leopard was doing there....what was it seeking in those bleak icy slopes when the plains below - its natural home - abounded with game ?
The Earth is the cradle of the mind, but we cannot live forever in a cradle...
Image - New Scientist
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)