Monday, March 09, 2009

Three Qs













Elections are round the corner in the country. I have three questions in mind.

Ever wondered, how you are being controlled by the society, by the leaders and more so, by the business bigwigs?

Since the onset of money in our civilization, money became the ruling power indirectly or directly? Agree?

Shakespeare said, "The world is a stage...". Shouldn't it be, the world is a stage, majority of the humans are puppets in the hands of few powerful and ruthless beings?


Thursday, March 05, 2009

Pirates of Silicon Valley

I just happened to see this movie - "Pirates of Silicon Valley".

These are the opening words --
"I don't want you to think of this as just a film, some process of converting electrons and magnetic impulses into shapes and figures and sounds. No. Listen to me. We're here to make a dent in the universe. Otherwise, why even be here? We're creating a completely new consciousness, like an artist or a poet. That's how you have to think of this. We're rewriting the history of human thought with what we're doing."

Read more on wiki here.

More on Steve Jobs here and here.

Thursday, February 26, 2009

A lovely gift!



My mathematical artist friend "Karl Kempton" sent me this lovely gift on my b'day today. Thanks Karl!
BTW. I share my b'day with Levi Strauss, Victor Hugo, Micheal Bolton and a dutch artist friend. Incidently, all have had artistic capabilities.
;-)

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Gulzar

I'm happy that my favourite lyricist got an Oscar for "Jai Ho". :D So, I thought of translating my favourite song "Tujhse Naaraaz .." from the movie Masoom.

Here it goes..

I'm not displeased by you, O! Life, I'm perplexed!
I'm perplexed!
I'm worried by your innocent questions;
I'm worried!


I had never thought, I'd have to hold pain to live;
If I smile, I would have to get rid of a debt for that smile;
When I smile sometimes, I feel..
A debt on my lips.
I'm not....

If they got filled today, drops would pour down;
Who knows? Eyes may yearn for them tomorrow.
Don't know where it got lost, disappeared whither?
I had hidden a tear.
I'm not....

O Life! Your sorrows have made me understand new relations;
What we get! We get cold shadows under sun.
I'm not....

[I have written about him earlier too.]

Monday, February 23, 2009

How good are my symmetrical drawings?





I did an Image processing analysis of my symmetrical drawings on MS Paint (by writing an image processing application in C++ ofcourse) using the IPL98 library. I did a statistical analysis for 12 ambigrams (which is a small sample space). You can see some of them on my Ambigrams link.

Surprisingly, I didn't get any result to be a perfect one (that means an ambigram). All the pictures had some error which is quite practical as I was analyzing on the basis of pixels and all the pictures have been hand drawn. The average percentage error which I got is 16.3467 which is quite high.

I think I still have to go a long long way to get that perfection.

[Please Note: There is a bug in the compilation of the IPL98 Library. If you download it and try to compile it, it would give an error in one of the classes. I tried to report the bug, but I didn't get any response. I solved it though. ;)]

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Thought!



Purpose of Life--
Differentiate grief;
Integrate happiness!

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Haiku!



Circle to point,
Recur back to back--
To infinity.
(5+5+5) 15 syllables only. :(

Thursday, February 12, 2009

Unfinished work

If you have an unfinished work, you should come back from hell to complete it.
[Note: The space in Heaven got filled up with the onset of Kaliyuga almost 5000 years back]
:P

Pretty much the same

“There will still be things that machines cannot do.
They will not produce great art or great literature or great
philosophy; they will not be able to discover the secret springs of
happiness in the human heart; they will know nothing of love and
friendship.” - Bertrand Russell

"Computers are useless. They can only give you answers." - Pablo Picasso

Fractals

One of the most fascinating aspects of recursion - fractals. I thought of sharing a link which I like. Take a look here at the Wolfram's fractal collection.

Also, I remember "The Fractal Crystal No. 1" by Robert Fathauer, Nicholas Duchnowski and Hank Kaczmarski which I had the privilege to see in Leeuwarden.

Really a beautiful piece.

Wednesday, February 11, 2009

To Mumbai

Heading to Mumbai for a short trip this weekend. Hope to see the charred "Taj" hotel.

:(

Monday, February 09, 2009

Mathematical poetry

In this post, I would like to mention two of my friends who have given me an insight into the world of visual mathematical poetry.

Thanks Karl and Kaz.

Kaz Maslanka
www.kazmaslanka.com
www.mathematicalpoetry.blogspot.com

Karl Kempton

http://www.thing.net/~grist/l&d/kaldron.htm
See this link for Karl's works (many of 'em) - http://mathematicalpoetry.blogspot.com/2006/07/karl-kempton-links.html

Also, to inform my readers, I did the translation of mathematical poems by Kitasono Katue in Hindi for Karl Young. Have a look here and if you know Hindi, please feel free to point out my mistakes, if any.

Sunday, January 04, 2009

Friday, November 28, 2008

IRON MAN

"When will the IRON MAN inside the comman man rise to the occasion. When will we realize our responsibilities. When will we (the common man) realize our powers. Vote for the right people and get rid of the CHALTA HAI attitude?" This is the first thought which comes to my mind when I think about the heinous acts of terrorism which took place at Mumbai recently (continues as I write this post). The IRON MAN of India, Late Sardar Vallabh Bhai Patel would be rather ashamed of the situation India is in these days. This situation is not because of the politicians but because of the people of India and the Indian society.

We talk about racism, regionalism, castism and all kinds of CRAP dividing the society. And yes, we follow it bindfolded. Isn't it true. Yes it is. At all levels of society, we follow the dividing policy which somehow has crept into our society. I wonder should we blame Britishers for our current pathetic condition? Not at all. In the last so many years, we still are trying to bind and divide ourselves at the same time. Ironical and disturbing?

How is it that a small group of people can disturb the peace and harmony of a huge country like India? How is it that the element of fear keeps overcoming the feeling of integrity and values of the nation? How is it that time and again we fall on our knees and start begging at false shadows of Satan aka terrorists? How is it that we come under the impression of some cynic politicians and start dividing the country on the basis of the part of the country we have come from? The North Indians, the South Indians, the West Indians, the East Indians and what not? Aren't we weak? Yes we are.

I appreciate the resilience of Mumbai at this moment. The spirit of Mumbai has always been of the highest level. But still I want to ask a question? Those people who say that Mumbai is only for Maharashtrians, where are they now in these difficult times? Are those dying solely natives of Mumbai? Are those brave rescuers only Mumbaikars? They are human beings first and then Indians and then anything else.

One of my friends Sameer messaged me, "We are a bunch of castrated males!", Aren't we?, "We are in a matrix the same one.. situation controlling us rather than we controlling the situation."
Another actor friend, Manish, who has worked in the movie, "A Wednesday", messaged, "I think 'A WEDNESDAY' should release twice or thrice every year to make people understand their responsibilities and to avoid terrorism. As the reason for terrorism is nothing but the reflection of the fear within the population."

These are comments which have come out of fear, hatred, anger and sympathy. This is just the reflection of what is going on inside the mind and heart of an average Indian. This common man should realize his misdoings and start afresh. He is responsible for all that has been done and will be in the future. Any country is built by the common man and the unfortunate part is that when such incidents happen, the common man has to bear the brunt of it. This is ridiculous as well as saddening.

How is it that any religion allows killing of innocent human beings? If it does, then it is the most unfortunate thing I've ever heard. The religion of humanity is the greatest religion and will continue to do so until the apocalypse. It is just that realization which is stopping the common man to take actions. When he does so, things will start to change. We will change. Our world will change.

I hope, the IRON MAN inside every human being ascends to counter these barbaric acts and people for establishing a civilized society and a better world to live.
Please read KK's view here. He has written an outstanding post on the situation.