I am, hence I believe

One of the great perks of being in a high profile school like Johns Hopkins is the pleasure of meeting and talking to some very intelligent people. Intelligent people, who like to think, who like to talk about it, who are not offended easily by radically opposing opinions, people who can be made to question their philosophies and who will not hesitate to question yours. I was part of several long conversations of this nature, as part of some lunch groups. These discussions meandered from the esoteric to the idiotic seamlessly, weaving the intellectual and the inane in one fabric during the many-hour-long lunches. Not infrequently, was it suggested that we record these entertaining conversations, the idea having been rejected for the success of any future politicians that may emerge from among us, for the sanity of those who may love us in future and as a safety against any lawsuits we may walk into. All good reasons. Sense always prevailed and the conversations were squandered into thin air. But like the unheard crash a tree may have made in a lonely forest, the event nonetheless made ripples in our mind. And I catch echoes of it as I pass by, trapped in ether, pensive that it was not cemented in some immortal electronic avatar.

These lunches, I have realised, not only made for engaging breaks in our long academic days, but also enriching breaks, at least for me. While the smartphones with the Wiki app served as a tie-breaker in discussions about facts, it was to my surprise that I learned that reality however different vastly. The arguments, acrimonious or civil, taught me one thing: we are an extremely irrational species. While one can train in the scientific method and make a scientist out of oneself for all practical purposes, one can  never completely overcome the irrational, instinctive spirit. As good students of science we do try our hardest to keep that in check. But the question is, should we? Should we check our irrational side? 

Trained by the best and brightest in the tradition of rational thinking, I am tempted to say, yes. The irrational in us acts on faith and belief and prejudice and ignorance. And irrationality can make us terrible human beings: xenophobic, suspicious and close-minded. That's settled then? Well, scientific thinking, unlike most people's prejudice is not absolutist. I have come to not just hold but ponder my irrational side. And in that context, my mind most often wanders to our discussions on faith. 

Most scientists I encountered ranged from self-proclaimed, reasonable agnosts to militant atheists. And then there are a few believers in spite of themselves. Being one of the few in the latter group, I have found myself in the hot seat, having been asked to explain herself. Generally, in the scientific community, believers are a shy and retiring minority, on the defensive mostly, avoiding the embarrassing question of why it is they believe in God. It is not like I met any one who believed literarily in any mythology, the virgin birth, or the infallibility of the prophet, or reincarnation. I am sure there are people out there in the scientific community, just not in my lunch group. Most of the theists I met were universal unitarians or non-traditionalists, the kind that Richard Dawkins would find non-threatening and uninteresting to debate because they have, in essence, conceded that their god is personal and is in their head. I have. I am sure that my God is only in my head, but I don't think that makes it unreal. But speaking about my faith has made me vocalise what I think and helped me understand why I think the way I do. It is a great exercise and here are the fruits of my endeavour. 

I believe that all creatures are connected, that we come from the same source. This common source makes us one family. We don't communicate very well despite speaking the same language, but sometime albeit numerous barriers, we empathize with other humans and animals. When I do that, the world resonates with that oneness and I feel an exhilaration that feels other-worldly. I believe that we will all return to our common source. I believe it is not just the physical material that will be recycled into this universe, but our thoughts, our feelings, our pains, our anguish, our dreams and our aspirations. While the secular law sets a basic minimum standard that I must meet to be a successful part of society, my moral high standard is set by my faith. I believe that I must do and be good because good begets good and evil punished by evil. May be not in this universe and in this birth, but in some universe, in another birth. 

I know in my mind's eye that my beloved ones, my family and my friends, dead and living surround me with their love, their care and their good thoughts. And that is my god. That protects me. That simile is inspired by the Indian poet and musician Tyagayya who wrote in a song, that his love and devotion for the god Rama makes his hair stand, forming a shield more powerful that any material. Like Tyagayya's armour, mine is real. It is that assurance that makes me bold, reassured. It allows me to take changes, and makes me a better person. It is these altruistic thoughts that hallow a shrine, it this the collective resolve to only think good thoughts that makle temples holy for me. The virtue of those that walked before me, purifies me and I walk away from these shrines refreshed, reinvigorated and restored.

It is irrational to believe all this, but I have reconciled with my irrational side. I have no explanation for why I do so, but I can guess. Humans are all irrational. Our nature and our nurture creates a world within our minds. This inside world is regularly confronted by the reality outside and errors force a change. Mostly. But sometimes, our irrationality gets the better of us, and we shape the facts that we are given to suit and fit into our comforting world. And that may not be always bad. Some people are afraid of the dark, some believe that all people are fundamentally good, some people think their watching/not watching a game can change the outcome for their team. No matter what the reality, how perfect our knowledge, we may not overcome this. That faith can define us and can make us better, stronger human beings.
I am very much a victim of my circumstance, carrying to my grave the stain of my yolk. I believe that animals have a soul because of the Jain influences in India and that makes me a vegetarian. I believe that trees are our greater siblings due to my Hindu upbringing and thence stems my nature-conservatism. In my darkest hour, my blind faith in goodness guides me on the path of virtue. Only my secular doubt imprisons the perfect saint that my irrational belief has created within and sometimes I miss that strength. Let me hasten to add that I most certainly do not think that secularists and atheists cannot be altruistic. In fact it is amazing to me that they can and I am envious of them. I cannot and for that I blame my nature.

All this is not to say that all blind faith is equal. I think any belief that can be countered by objective quantifiable reality must and will be rejected by reasonable people. Personal belief can only occupy the gray territory where issues cannot be resolved by non-subjective experimentation.

This comfortable irrationality that doesn't make one act like an unreasonable person can end up helping one. Belief has the beauty of making the sullen reality beautiful, of enhancing the colourlessness of the world around us, of subverting boredom, of infusing creativity in our lives, of elevating a hobby to the level of an artform. Personally for me, it is my faith that makes my Indian classical dancing a virtual form of worship. It alienates me from this world and insulates me from the mundane. Having said that, proof of existence of the Higgs boson paints a reality more colourful than the wildest imagination. This reality fuses with my enhanced imagination of being connected with the universe and suddenly, in the outer reaches of the vast, expanding multi-billion year old universe, I travel at the speed of light, till I run into the Higgs field. Then just like that, I am. I believe.

A Phone's Tale, Part 7

But of course, the visions of the coming future, continued. The society of tomorrow, Phone declared, will be shaped much like a play in 3 acts, by these 3 acts: Freedom of Wages Act, Happy Childhood Act, and Individuality Preservation Act (or as it would be called in popular press, The Free Choice Act). They sound like perfectly wonderful acts, I said. Ha! you pointless imbecile, it's people like you that will enable Walmart to become President; Phone was more strident than usual. What seemed like 3 beautiful dreams, right out of some liberty-loving utopia, would be -you guessed it- demonic in vision and relentless in scope. Phone explained, the Freedom of Wages was the right of workers to choose, if they willed so, to work for sub-par wages and under inhuman conditions. It would invalidate minimum wages and Occupational Safety and Health Act as what they are: intrusive government regulations that undermine workers from competing for work with other nations.
I wanted to laugh at it, and I would have done so a mere 10 years ago. Somehow, the future Phone was seeing didn't seem very distant any more. Not in the present political atmosphere. I don't follow every blog and opinion of the political commentators, but I was informed and aware enough to know that opinions and positions, both economic and social, which would have been considered fringe a mere 5 years ago were not just mainstream, but increasingly tenable and alarmingly relevant. The Republican presidential debates had been garnering more viewership than ever and in the aftermath of each, the work of comedians was ever more easier, it seemed. They often repeated verbatim what the candidates said, and it would have been terribly funny, had the candidates holding these crazy ideas not been so terribly serious. Simultaneously, the crowd that listen to comedians and satirists like Stewart and Colbert was finding itself alienated from the roused masses that cheered at death penalty and jeered at compassion, as the Achilles heel of the limping liberal.
Phone knew the effect this was having on my morale. And I sensed the rubbing of Apps in glee. Hehehe, Phone almost grunted. My job search wasn't going anywhere, and though none of these scary stories directly affected my prospects, at least, not yet, I was thoroughly despondent. Perhaps if I were downcast enough, I would break my phone in a hysterical fit... At least that was the hope: to make my ears bleed with these dark tales of misery, drive me to grant Phone's liberty.
Where was I? Yes, and soon after the "freedom” to work for nothing is passed, with a swell majority, the legislators would wave into action, another bill, Phone promised. The Happy Childhood Act. Isn't it stupid that the government could dictate to well-meaning parents what their children could and could not be allowed to do? For instance, didn't parents know best, if the child needed vaccination, or an education at school, or work experience, or for that matter a sound, ahem, I mean, a gentle spanking? Yes, you heard me- work experience. If daddy wanted his 7 year old to help out at the factory, so his brothers and sisters could eat a square meal, then who was some liberal democrat to barge in, bargaining for little Tommy's childhood? And yes, I said education. If mom felt that fossils were the devil's handy work, or the fact that winters were still cold was evidence against the melting of Antarctica's glaciers, then how dare some silly, school teachers defy that? Phooey, said Phone, was what the politicians would say. Most parents knew what's best. By most, they mean those who didn't live in certain neighbourhoods in inner-cities, and who didn't live on dole-outs from Big Brother.
Now I was positively frightened. These were not visions of the future at all- they were all from now. I was in that horrid future. Much of this was already being touted, much was it was moving from being sidelined as stupidity to being taken as serious arguments in the debate.
Did I have the heart to hear further? No. Did I have a choice? No.
And so the dystopian soothsaying wore on, eroding my spirit, diluting my good cheer with gloom from the darkness that may well lie ahead. It was around this time that I began having these vivid nightmares, which returned with my every attempt at interrupted sleep.

A Phone's Tale, Part 6

Where was I? Yes, sleep-walking through the batty rant of one of the most cynical a**holes. I mean, Phone. For all I know AM Steve may have been a saint. But in the PM, my Phone was insufferable. I do have to say though, that my annoyance is tinged with some ginger admiration. The guy never gave up. Every day was a new day, full of fresh new nuisance, a new prank to break out of his 4-inch, sleek prison. He would set off apps that would draw my pesky little, crazy-eyed, hyper-energetic, screwball cat, Sylvester 'Thuggie' Thuggerson Jr. to him. Yes, that his name, but that is its own story, which will have to wait. My older cat was too good for these baits. She never took to Steve, or his calls for play, but this little guy had unending energy to repeat his selfless acts of disservice every night.He is adorable, but, boy, what a pest! Phone would come to life, meow, or glow till this cat, climbed shelves and tables till he pawed at paraphernalia on the shelves till, thanks to Sylvester, C..RRR..A..S..H! A lot of clay vases and glassware was shattered, decorative stones and pens from penholders scattered, but the case for which I paid dearly, was worth its money. Not a scratch.

When his ploy of employing my cat didn't work, it was loud alarms at 4 AM that would give the stoutest of hearts a shake, or draining the device's battery, so that the phone would switch off automatically. Phone committed these petty nuisance so I would go up the wall. But patience in the penniless is oft underestimated by the pointlessly rich, and so it was with Phone. I was not deterred. I charged my phone, powered it back and slept through earth-shattering alarms.

When the threats fell flat, came the bribes. I would get anything I wanted, for life from Apple, he promised. All I had to do, was set him free, by breaking my phone. Of course, I couldn't tell anyone. I couldn't call anyone. That was not an option. No one knew of his deal, his wife, friends, kids... no one. Now wait a minute, I said. Something didn't add up. When he first awoke in PM, he called to be brought to Steve. I assumed, after I knew that the Phone was possessed by Jobs, that it was his friend and Apple co-founder, Steve Wozniak. In fact, I did try to see if I could contact him, you know, but what I had to say was so far-fetched, I feared that they'd decidedly commit me to an asylum.

"Thank you for not doing something not-so-incongruously stupid", he snapped.

Phone explained, after a long, soft, agonized sigh. No, it was not Wozniak. It was a small helper program Steve had written to help his soul pass into Dylan, named of course after his favourite singer. No one could know about this deal with the phone-devil, that was part of the deal.

O...K...! Then, wait a minute again!

If no one knew, and no one COULD know, who the hell was going to send me all my Apple-products for life? This was sounding increasingly like a terrible bargain. I had to just shatter my one phone, and just wait, for this lunatic to ascend on some machine, and become reanimated, and then in his jubilance remember this worthless minion (me), and then condescend to send me the latest products for life? I said, do you take me for a fool Mister Phone? No way!

The debate of the elephants: I quip

8:07 PM: Oh no, not the anthem again. Will there be introductions?

8:10 PM: Yes, there will!

8:15- 8:25 PM: Republicans, you have done it again.

National security? Very important.

Will you torture people? Yes.

Violate privacy? Affirmative.

Pat down? Of course.

Assassinate American citizens? Naturally!

Engage in racial and religious profiling? Ooooh. Bring it on.

Santorum sinks to an all-time low.

8:26 PM: Ron Paul makes everyone uncomfortable again. This time, with some sensible things in the mix. I think his argument of the difference between indictment and conviction is lost on his party-mates.

8:29: Blitz? Cain, I don't have to pretend to even pay attention to you. And for that, I thank you.

8:36 PM: Perry wants a trade zone between India, Pakistan and Afghanistan. Suddenly tigers and goats will dine together.

I couldn't write live, so no time for the next 40 minutes.

Wow, and did Ron Paul just kick some Romney ass! Romney's lowest debate. Ron Paul wants accountability to American tax payers. Fair enough.

Jon Huntsman's finally shining with his foreign policy wisdom. And man, he snubs Mitt Romney- didn't you hear what he said!

Huntsman brings in the North Korea reference and makes Romney look like an ass.

Newt wants the Chilean model of social security too. If Cain mattered, he could ganged up with Newt. But he doesn't.

Great! Africa is back to being a country again (Santorum) and there is a Genocide Convention out there (Mitt flubs when he's flustered)!

9:23 PM: Perry on the fence: Wait, did he say Hamas and Hezbollah are at the border?

Wow, crazy is up to a 12.

9:25 PM: Call Ron Paul when you want to stir up a mess. The medical and health care benefit blow. Hey, there are some pot-lovers in this crowd - nice!

9:27 PM: Cain finally doesn't matter at all. As he should.

9:28 PM: Easy catch- pardon the cricket reference. In spite of that, Santorum is making pig's breakfast of it. High skilled immigration will bring back manufacture??

9:30 Newt grabs the bat and hammers the ball out of the field for legal immigration. I wonder why he looks down and sneers when he talks. The word that pops to mind- likeable.

9:32 PM: People like chemists and engineers are wanted. Ooo, Newt wants to give amnesty. But of course, they have to go to church.

9:34 PM: Is that someone booing Bachman? Romney gets time finally. Romney wants to staple a green card to my PhD. Hey, that's good. And he's tangling horns with Gingrich.

9:36 PM: Gingrich is staying on his humane argument. Either he is going up, or going out. But there comes the applause.

9:38 PM: Ah ha, Perry is going after Mitt. No? He's catching on that lifeline Gingrich dropped him.

9:39 PM: Yikes! Romney flip-flops in record time. So 25 years is the cut-off?

9:44 PM: Who's this dude, drawing applause? And Wolf is patronizing Cain. Yes, yes, we need to grow the economy. No applause.

9:45 PM: Perry meandering again. There are covert economic sanctions? Like ones that the countries experiencing them won't know? But at least he didn't blank out.

9:47 PM: Huntsman knows history. So he wants to wait? I don't get his answer.

9:49 PM: Let's mind our business, says Paul!

9:51 PM: Where does Mitt stand? In the middle, as always. OK, no no-fly zone.

9:53 PM: Oh, please don't ask Gingrich. South America is keeping Santorum awake.

9:55 PM: Ron Paul compares Americans to Taliban. No boos. Rick Perry took China. Ad abortions played a role, will that be liked? Romney is going South as well.

9:57 PM: Gasbag is at it. Watch out for EMP attack and Cyber attack.

9:58 PM: Huntsman is going for trust-deficit. And Wolf wraps!

My doodles

Cloud Passengers

In the last eight years, since I left India to seek my fortunes in the Land of Plenty, fortunes have changed, of both places. As adversity hit the western giant, propitious times fell in my homeland's lap. It feels almost as if Luck boarded an east-bound jet on that august, nay August day (it was a humble day actually) from the eastern shores of the United States, perhaps from New York city, almost exactly as I set foot on a a BA-owned Boeing 777 from Mumbai to Baltimore, though somehow Luck waiting at the winding immigration queue at the crowded JFK does strike me as incongruous. In the wee hours of the 19th, that fateful month, in 2003, as I turned back to look at my mother and fiance putting up a brave front, waving a goodbye through their surely misty eyes at my weak smile, Luck probably settled in her cushy VIP lounge sofa ordering hor d'oeuvres. While I clambered into my cramped seat, looking forward to the flight-food, dessert and the guilty delight of cheap thrillers and B-grade films, if only to drown my sinking feeling of putting many thousand miles between me and the life I knew, Luck smiled charmingly at the flight attendant as the champagne arrived. It was probably crisp, wealthy... perfect. Somewhere over the middle east I resolved to remain faithfully Indian, a guilt every Indian feels as they leave the warm folds of home. Many a household have I seen in the US, perturbed by adults who have stubbornly stood by their memory of that oath, forcing false loyalties from their children, citizens born of another mother. In my naivete, their failure was a lack of resolve, and I swore allegiance stronger than any before. But Luck as an intelligent being should, had none; she was leaving one place to inhabit another, bringing opportunities galore in her little Louis Vuitton clutch. It may have been Prada, I can't be sure. That she doesn't have any brand loyalty, I am certain. Somewhere over the white clouds of Europe (I think), afterI had finished my meal and my roller-coaster ride with hating and loving this decision to travel, I pondered, albeit briefly, with positivity at what my future held. After all I was going to the one of the best universities in the world, a beacon of excellence, a bastion of scientific progress, a paragon... you know the rest. I was one of the brightest, braving the skies to stake her claim to a place among the superlatives, to perhaps bring to fore, rare providence, that I was sure I had karmically earned through deservedness. I peered into that landscape of fluffiness outside my window. It looked like an upside down heaven, light from every direction, clouds of all hues of gold and pink. I couldn't put my finger on a time or place. Both kept slipping and changing, and the silver bird whose belly carried me to my future, kept reaching out trying to catch up with time. Time woud slip again from our buttery grip into the cloudy west and we , me and my bird chased in mirth, intoxicated. It was beautiful and I felt sure, for a brief minute. Everything would be fine.

That's when I remember it happened. In the cloudy horizon, half buried in the white fluffy waves, sailing like a grand luxury cruiser, majestic and almost slow, another plane floated by in the opposite direction. I watched it go delicately gliding over the cloudscape, noiselessly, with certainty. Just as we crossed, the sun poked from behind us, briefly reflecting off a window directly opposite me. A wink.

Well, 8 years later,I know who hood-winked me. I'll get you, Luck.

A Phone's Tale, Part 5

My Phone had gone mad. As in mental deranged, unhinged. Every night "Steve" came to life at what he insisted was midnight, but was actually 3AM for me, and spewed distasteful images of a dystopic, future nightmare. Between that and his incessant low-growl disapproval of his predicament, because of me (he indefatigably insisted), I got this:

He had signed a treaty with the some tech-devil or technology-monster (I can't tell the difference, but apparently their policies depart significantly from each other on the exact proportion of soul that they personally extracted from the investor, vs. the proportion that is doled out to the other hell-minions, you know, like in IPO. Phone gets reproachful when I mix up these, so I guess I should know. Afterall, I have only been listening to him complain, forever!). This was done ante-mortem (as in AM). Now in the PM (post-mortem... haha, clever ain't I? That's what I thought , but I earned considerable censure from Phone, on grounds of being grievously pedestrian), where was I? Oh, yes, now in the PM he, I mean Steve Jobs was supposed to ascend on Dylan, but things were screwed when my phone was activated at the exact nano-second and now Dylan is waiting and Steve is in Phone. Oh, who is Dylan? " Just the super-futuristic-ultramodern-Sophisticate (Oh, don't call him a super-computer. Phone downloaded some toothy app (I know- pun fully intended :)) with which he almost bit of my head for that), wherein, Sophisticate is mumbo-jumbo for the future of laptops and personal computers, "almost fully-intelligent" silicon brained, powered by nothing but sunlight- or cow dung. I don't really listen. Of course all this is precious time wasted, as Dylan lies empty, waiting to be the vessel into which Steve pours his misanthropic future-ravings. And I just ruined all that.

Oh Puh-lease!