Out in the Lost Highway.....

i woke u early that morning, might have been one of those records that i neva really cared to make at least ever in my hostel life, holding my yellowish white pillow close.. (my only partner during all the times when i kinda feel low) i kept staring through the window, at the beautiful dark reddish sky expanding out to the infinity( ..too bad the eyes could only follow till the horizon).The beautiful cool breeze was touching deep within n the dead, yet so alive  silence of the sleeping hostel had just struck the perfect chord somewhere inside n guess what, i was feeling kinda revived after quite sometime now....

but i guess the person within had decided to take a new leap, a new step towards the lost sky beyond the the ever so mysterious horizon....

So suddenly somehow someway.. from somewhere within i felt a spark splashing out of the darkness filled inside... n just then i threw my pillow , got up from my bed.. slipped into my grounded jeans... put my camera inside my bag.. the feynman lectures... my mp3 player n a few other things i could find around n i left the wing....

n as i was running through the downstairs.. i felt as if the adrenalin inside was just about to boil out.. oh yeah... i was finally breaking out.... i really was.. as if the world outside my window had finally answered my calls n i finally was making an escape...

n just when i was leaving my hostel... i saw our quantum prof at his morning walk... he threw his car keys at me... i jumped n grabbed them (he has been a great support in this crazy place) n as i turned around to say thanks he smiled back n waved. I entered his sexy black converter n with all the exhilaration i had inside i pressed those freaky accelerators n as i was approaching the iit gate it felt as if  time had diluted itself...  n it was flowing so god damn slow.. but eventually..yeah, i did get outta iit...

i kept driving with all the speed i could n i neva even cared to look back... coz i knew deep within that there was nothing to look back.... i knew i was finally going away.. away from all their well engineered tortures, from all the mess in the wing, from all the feuds i had in the dept... from all those boring lectures.... away from all that crap that were constantly eating up inside my 10 gallon head....

n as i was driving through the highway cutting through the beautiful suburbs... i knew i had finally found my own lost highway, where i was free... where i wasnt shown any directions by anyone anymore... where i was not judged by any pointless tag.... where even i too had a right to choose my own way.... where i was allowed to be me..... . .

"OYE!!.. oye saale!!... utthja... aur kitna soega... bhul gaya akash nahi ja raha aaj proxy dene ke lye... jaldi utth saale.. 10 minute me MAL ka lecture lagnewali hai.... "

"what the.. "

Beautiful, captivating... n yeah a lil bit uncertain...... . .

+1, +2 days were awesome and i think the most beautiful part of those days were the physics tutions... and i still remember how i used to listen to the lectures... pretty much like a little boy listening with a pair of open eyes to his grandma reading him stories of angels and kings of an unknown world...

but frankly speaking.... physics tutions werent just beautiful because of the passion i had for physics... and i guess the  reason they used to get a whole lot more interesting was because of this pretty girl sitting just in front of me in all my physics tutions.... she was beautiful... smart.. not any 36-24-36 H-bomb though... but yeah, she had a beautiful smile ...and this piece is being written on one of those physics classes that i had back in those days...

it was about 8 at night... modern physics was going on... one of my favs... and as usual sir went out to get his evening 'pan' promising us that ounce he returns we were going to see what was known as  'hisenberg's uncertainity principle'....

and yeah i was really excited... almost got loose of a nice mechanics problem i was working on... and just as he walked out... 'she' walked in.. with a long skirt... and a nice top.. and yeah, guess what?? she was looking pretty good... unlike always of course...  and by the time she sat next to me... hisenberg along with  his stupid principle got lost in some lost world i neva cared.. n with him that idiot also took my mechanics problem.. but who cares.. i had a whole new.. nice.. slightly complicated... but a really good looking problem coming my way.... n i was no way going to get busy with some fat bald hisenberg n his principle......

ounce she settled in,  in the bench right beside me... i realised i was staring at a girl just like another idiot with no other real work to do... not that there was no one else after her... and i guess i neva really wanted to fit in any line n all...  by the time sir walked in n started his lecture... i tried hard to concentrate... but nature has its own ways of breaking any monotony... and over here it was me getting distracted by her... n with time i realised that sir was half way done n the idiot was still staring at her like 'the boy' with a pair of open eyes with all the 'wrong' reasons....

but i guess he couldnt help it... after all when she used to start writing up her notes with a bunch of hair falling around her cheek... with a faint smile( guess she knew i was still staring...) yeah those were few moments i would love to get trapped in... for my entire life.... but then i realised i already got behind by a lot... i really wanted to take the notes from her but i never really wanted to disturb the view... i kept thinking for a while and realised its not really possible... i have got to distort the view a bit to get what i want... and thats it... i again got busy with hisenberg n his principle.....

while going back home in our car i kept thinking about his principle... didnt really make much sense... why is he saying that position n momentum... energy n time... all these pairs in any system can never be calculated precisely??... why do they keep deriving a probabilistic picture??... what might be the basic physical realisation??... confused n thrilled i kept looking out into the open night sky through my window n wondered how wierd n beautiful n mesmerising this world is....

we reached home n climbed the stairs... and before i reached our flat... something really beautiful just sparked within my mind n i asked myself... can i know whether mom is inside??... by not doing anything n not disturbing the present picture... it was much of my own thought experiment... about 2 minutes or so i just stood there before my door n i kept thinking... believe it or not i had my heart beating at a faster rate... i realised a door of a very new world (the one of quantum mechanics) is just about to open for me... after sometime i realised it cant be done... it just cant be done... i have got to distort the picture a bit... i pressed the calling bell... mom ran in n opened the door... the conclusion was weird n yet beautiful... wow..

thats why Hisenberg said like that... thats what he said.. didnt he??.. i just solved the whole fucking riddle... WOW

..in order to know about this natural world... we need to distort it a bit... we need to disturb it n analyses the way the world behaves in response to that specific disturbance... that is the only way we can measure or perceive things... but in the process we dont realise that the view we get is just a disturbed view of this world... thats why its never possible to predict the exact natural parameters in any system with total accuracy... thats how the uncertainties are creeping in....

i took my dinner n said good night to my parents... but all along i felt Hisenberg whispering his ideas into my mind... or may be it was just that lil boy hidden somewhere within me....

as i switched off the lights in my room... and stood beside the window... i felt a cool breeze blowing in... n somehow it felt as if it just went touching my  heart deep within... i kept staring at the beautiful crescent moon in the dark night sky.. n kept thinking of one of the most beautiful lessons of my life that i had learned that night... that this world is beautiful, captivating, mesmerizing n yeah.. a lil bit 'uncertain'..

... . .

A stranger i met in the world within...

I was sitting on a bench in a platform in the Calicut railway station… waiting for the train that was about to take me to Bangalore… somewhere within I did feel bad coz I was about to bid goodbye to a place I stayed for the last whole year… made so many nice friends… spent some really nice time… but at the same time I was really excited that I had made it to iitd… that boy within me who was always in search of new horizons was finally getting a bit more wind beneath his own wings… with many such mixed feelings inside.. I just sat there enjoying the beautiful evening breeze… n waiting for my train…

The train arrived in some time n me n my dad boarded it… settled in our respective seats… mine was a window seat… had a book with me n just as I started reading it… Feynman lectures (awesome book, u guys should give it a try)… a boy of somewhere in the middle of 20s sat right opposite to me(23 or 24 or something…around 6 ft 2 with hair falling around… nice body texture… n got to say… a really different face… )

‘’Feynman lectures huh??... Sure takes me back in time… “

‘Yeah? …awesome read… I love it… I like physics… ‘

“Hehe… me too kid… I love physics too…i have done engineering physics from iitb… “

‘Wow... Bombay huh? Cool… I wanted to make it there too… but Bombay dreams have crashed real bad… have got iitd ep though… I hope it isn’t that bad…’

“Yeah? Great… congrats… n iitd ep’s aint that bad so don’t sweat it… n just in case… being an iitian with ep doesn’t make you passionate in physics kid… I like physics coz I like it… just like that“

‘Wow… powerful lines there…Huh? N just in case… I m no kid’

“Hehe… I m sure you are not… it’s just that seeing you just made me go back to my own jee days… that passion… that intensity… if only I could get those days back…”

‘Well even I have left mine too I guess… I still remember those nights of endless problem solving… n even how we used to spend the whole night trying to track down the logics n realizations behind the theories… how awesome it felt when we saw matter waves flowing before our own eyes… n how the dancing fluctuating electric fields used to give rise to magnetic fields…’

Just then I saw the dude staring at me like some biologist stares at an endangered alien from some other planet or something… kind of freaked me out if you ask me…

‘Dude… wassap??...’

“Hehe… nothing… Continue… how do the electric fields dance??… “

‘What the hell… c’mon… that was just one of my Shakespearian touches… I meant how a continuously fluctuating electric field gives rise to magnetic fields…”

“Really? Go on… tell me… how??”

‘Great… I have just made a joke out of myself, haven’t I… it’s alright… the jokes over… I am not saying a word now…’

“Kid… u don’t really get it... Do you? You are way too afraid to get it wrong… to make a mistake… it’s our mistakes that teach us… it’s our questions that make us who we are… people think Einstein knew a lot… how many of you know that he was the one to have the most number of questions too… n it doesn’t matter even if you get it all wrong… it’s the intensity of your attempt that keeps the momentum alive… it’s never about finding solutions kid… it’s about asking questions… the destiny doesn’t matter… it’s the ride that matters…”

Okay now… got to tell you… most of the part of that highO lecture of his did go 'over' my head… then I was like-

‘Umm… okay…. So like what should I do now??’

“Well… tell me about the fluctuating fields… “

Now I always like it when someone wants to know something from me… not really into giving awesome lectures… but I do love explaining things from my own perspective…

‘Wow… so you really want me to set it all up… huh??’

“Yeah kid… set it all on fire”

‘Cool… so it all works in this way… most of the time physicists try to come up with equations that can explain natural phenomena… but many times they seem to be less interested in the reasons behind their occurrence… just the way how electric fields fluctuate and why the magnetic fields apear aczactly of those specific properties…’

“Nice start… go on…”

‘Now imagine a charge continuously oscillating at its point… so the linear separations from every point in space is changing continuously and hence the fields are continuously fluctuating… but there will always be a time lag in space… so that’s how you can realize that a wave will continuously flow from the charge to all around… so if you can deeply imagine the picture you will find out that the continuously fluctuating electric field is very different from a static electric field…’

“yeah... you are right..But then kid... That still doesn’t explain how the magnetic fields appear right??”

‘Yeah I know… now here comes the twist… if you can imagine the whole picture… you will realise that we just cant imagine continuously fluctuating electric fields to be static but different eletric field at different instants… do you get it??... If you do it’s like imagining a continuously moving car to be a static car at different places at different instants… which doesn’t make any sense…’

“Yeah… u are right kid…It’s like quantizing time n breaking the time line into bits of time… but you can’t do that coz time is a physical realization n time is continuous… right??”

‘Absolutely… so we need to consider continuously fluctuating electric fields to be static but a different electric field  at every instant  ..p l u s …a field that can give rise to the continuity… the one that eventually gets named as the magnetic field…’

“Wow kid… you did make some sense over there…nice, guess what??... You are doing well for a kid… keep up the good work…”

'DUDE!!... FOR CHRIST'S SAKE STOP CALLING ME A KID!!... n even though I came up with a basic realization… but I kind of suck in mathematically modeling it…. So I guess there’s no use…’

“You are still a kid, aren’t you??… mathematicians play with logic and manipulations… but physics is just not about finding equations kid… its where we see the equations come alive… where every variable keeps a story hidden within it… mathematical modeling is important… but the physical realization is what it’s all about… n as for the mathematics… think with Fourier analysis….” [Winks… n tries to get the bottle from the bag kept underneath the seat]

‘Fourier??... what he has to do with all this??’[Kind of dumb question to ask… but I guess that’s what it’s all about… never stop asking!!!]

“Well… Fourier analysis helps us to look at non differentiable functions as a function which is ‘hardly’ differentiable by turning it into a sum of infinite differentiable component functions… n differentiability is continuity at the 2nd internal dimension of calculus… so might just help you out…”

'didnt quite get you... how can non differentiability be 'hardly' differentiable??'

"its like how you use limits... the differentiabily is so low with the vertical tangent almost getting perpendicular... that its like tending towards non-differentiability... got it??"

‘Are you kidding me??... That’s awesome… thanks.. it might just help me track down mathematically how the continuous fluctuations give rise to te magnetic fields… n guess what… it might even combine the two natures of light… by considering particle nature which is discontinuous into a special case of wave nature… bringing in the continuity…’

“Really??…never thought of that… Hehe!!... Seeing you I remember my own days i left behind… never lose the spirit kid... if you really want to stand before the mirror and be happy “

‘Well… thanks… n I sure hope that was a compliment [Felt I cracked a nicely timed joke over there in the train but now it seems so gay!!]

Just then the train started shaking and people around got a bit nervous n all… but he stayed calm… n said…

“Remember one thing… it’s not the world around you that can help you to break out someday… it’s the one that lies within you…”

it was getting a lil loud then... but after listening to that... i just kept staring at him... the line didnt make much sense but it did strike right within....

The train started shaking like hell after that… n then the next moment I saw Rahul shaking me n saying-

” DUDE!… WAKE UP!!… stop sleeping in the class… that math’s mam is like a whole big Hitler without the thing down there( ;-] )… she will kill you”

‘Oh shit man!!... Uaahh [yawning] ..stayed up the whole night to finish off magnetism… not much time left… jee is in 2 months… I don’t know how big an egg I am going to lay in iit-jee this time… AAAAaaauuhh[yawning again!!]…

“Hehe!!... Don’t worry… you will make it…

fuck you Fourier!!… eeuuuhhh!!"[While solving a problem going on in the class…]

‘Hehe!!… C’mon..Fourier’s not that bad…’

The boy who got 3 outta 10...

kind of weird... isnt it??.. you wake up in the morning n walk to the basin for brushing your teeth... n just when u r going to look at the mirror... mom calls out.. 'hi, iitian'[with all the evil leg pulling expressions at her face.....] n then you turn around with a smile n say 'huh... ' like u dont care or something but just then you look into the mirror again n try to find the iitian out of yourself....

yeah thats how my morning was today... n guess what??.... staring at the mirror with all those poses didnt really come of any help... just showed my yellow teeth which i felt required some brushing n of course the fact that my moms deep affection had driven my size zero to all the double-tripple digits possible.... god!! n they still say home food is great....

then i sat for the breakfast n.........[ !!lets just skip the boring parts.. it seems the guys beyond this lcd screen are all getting kind of sleepy.... but that is alright i guess... i am just a 5-notes-writer u see..:-P..] so here i was with the glass of cold coffee in my hand standing beside our long window n enjoying the morning breeze... n trying to turn around all those pages of my life that has somehow someway driven me into this so called hyped tag of an 'iitian'.....

u see guys even though they call me an iitian... but guess what.. i dont really have a past or the pattern that every iitian must have left behind him.... n if someone goes back to my schools and tells the teachers that.. that last bencher useless worthless mad fellow has made it into one of the best 5 iits n that too with engineering physics... i am pretty sure that it will hit them like some guy has beaten a bloody drum on their black bald heads n their slimy tounges will surely drop out.... "WHAT?!! HOW? WHEN? no way......."

acads were always quite below average.... i still remember how my mom cried after i failed in bengali in my 3rd standard in the mid-term... mom always wanted to see great marks... n good positions in the class.. but i always used to end up somewhere below the list... n i still remember how the guys left out my name when all the rkm fellows used to make a list of top aggregate marks to see how the charts going in the class... n often it used to be difficult to even get my name in it...(it used to be really competitive back then in rkm)...

too bad i could never make mom understand that education is just not about getting marks n jobs n stuffs... its a communication of ideas... where u learn to grow in the world within n know about the world outside... but i guess lil dodo was way too little n way too afraid to say all that....

i still remember how the classes used to seem like cages n how i used to struggle to find my own piece of the sky... n no matter how much i tried... it always used to be the last bench or the stupid punishments that awaited me.... every time i used to stand up for an answer or a question... either i used to be laughed at or eyed at... as if some alien has come n speaking its own bla bla language... n as for the teachers.. i still remember how i used to be the biggest useless menace to be talked about in the staffrooms... n what that guy said when the group went out to bunk a class....

' go n hide behind that bush... we dont want that teacher to see you in the group... we ll say we are having a games class now... cmon.. get going.. ll u??'

my 50s n 60s were never good enough for mom... i used to get scolded like hell... primary n middle school went out in that darkest of the fears... i always used to leave my test copies either in the desks or slide them into a classmate's bag...[a cheap thing to do.. still]... every thing used to be better then getting scolded or may be beaten.... n that long walk from bus stop to home with those suicidal bombs hidden in my bag... it used to feel as if am walking on a curve and the rate i am going towards home is just asymptotic... the more i go towards.. the slower the walk used to get... slow enough at the end to even cross the gate.... n then all of a sudden i used to get the papers out n dump them right in the drain... did it many times[ especially with unit tests.. u dont need to give them back to teacher... so;-) ]

n sometimes all my crimes used to even hit the wanted list... ounce there was this bengali-test in the class... [standard-6 i guess]...  n i got a brilliant 3 outta 10... but my hitlerised osama like teacher never found that equally brilliant so he wrote a note at the end of my answers n told to get it sighned by my gardian... n i was terrified to take this love letter home... sighned it myself n left it at the bench... next day when he saw my dad's err... okay my so called dad's signature... he matched it with my leave applications from before.... n the guy just got infuriated n took me to the principal n then my parents were called.... i got into some serious trouble that day... got beaten.. scolded.. thrashed like you do it to some over grown cow to get it out of the roads.... n all that because of that hitler... i sure hope i dont see him again in life....

but i guess all those torture n all that darkness taught me to close my eyes n try to look at the world within rather than looking at the world outside... n i guess thats why i could develope in all the few ways that lil dodo could find... it was only because i found a passion in geometry when i was in at the end of eightth that my logic started improving... and i did well in olympiads n in science... but even then i guess i havent been able to circle out my childhood out of my past.... people say n write a lot of things about their childhood... but i guess that piece of the sky was never meant to be mine...

by the time i finished my coffee... n went to the kitchen to keep the glass...

'thanks mom,.. the shake was good... ll miss your cold coffees in iitd....'

mom smiled back n animated a flying kiss... [ too bad i only get it from my mom these days].... i laughed n was about to get back to my room....

'hey.. i wanted to tell you something.... i want you to know that we are proud of you... do well in iitd.... n dont again end up with a 3 outta 10 like u did in nitc..'[with that trademark smile in her face]'

hehe.. i understand mom... i wont..'

The wings that wanted to go wild....

n sometimes when i try to look back at the days i left by.... i still see him in that silent corner of the classroom... sitting beside that large window.. staring at the world outside with a pair of open eyes... n yeah even though he didnt have any idea of how tough n brutal the world outside can be... but the fire within his eyes... was enough to show his aspirations... his dreams of going independent... of checking out the world out there... of discovering new horizons....

n even though he is just one of those characters who are walking away into that fog of my distorted memories.... but still dont know why i do share a strange connection... after all he is just me....

n just like everyone has their own childhood dreams.... i was totally obsessed with wings.... it used to feel as if someone have trapped us all in this plane... that this absence of wings was much more of a curse or something to us from above....

n still now i remember how mesmerizing it used to be to see those flocks of birds flying up above in the sky... n slowly how they used to get lost amongst the clouds.... as if they have escaped our world n have entered the other side....

i guess this obsession of wings n flight n.. independence was much more than just a dream or fantasy for me at that time.... but as i have left my childhood days behind... this silly lil question still persists somewhere within me.... n if someday i meet someone like god n all... i ll ask him why he didnt give us the wings... like why is it that we are meant to be enclosed within this two dimensional world... why is it that..  that very last degree of freedom is denied to us??...

[n yeah i do hope god is no biologist... then he might just make fun of a lil kid's question n then of course i would tell him to spare the kid the boring bla bla lecture on Darwin's theory that ll obviously follow.... funny, isnt it??.. darwin tried to understand god's ways... n now its turning the other way around... ]

but then again... those silly questions back from my boyhood days have taken all the new versions within me now.... now when i see a middle aged girl come n clean my hostel room... n when i m in a bus n see through the window that large slum of Delhi... when every time a kid comes n asks for a penny in the railway platform... i feel like asking is this world really independent?.... can a wing really come n blow away all the blackness in this world?.... i doubt...

n i guess every one will be having his own bad times... sometimes it used to feel as if it doesnt matter how much i try to break out of the cage... doesnt matter how hard i try... i ll still find them switching off the big bright sun... n then they ll paint the beautiful blue sky all black.... n might just take away all the nice stars left out in the blackness of the sky above... n the moment i ll be breaking out n spreading my beautiful white wings all around to take off... they ll cut the wind supply... if you dont give air... it doesnt matter how hard i flap my wings.... i wont be getting any reaction from the air around to get the lift.... if only there could be a bit more wind beneath my wings...... . .

but i guess life comes up with its own challenges n its own tests.... n may be they wont give us the air to fly high... may be they dont want us to reach the other side.... but if we work on our own... if we improve our ideas... our skills... our ways...if we believe in our passion.. then no one can stop us from getting our own piece of the sky.... n thats what i learnt from that lil kid sitting at that corner... that the wings are not meant to fly in the sky in the world around us... but its for the world within us.... that its meant to discover ourselves in their broken mirror...

that it doesnt matter how hard they try.... the wings are wild n ll be wild forever..... . .

 .

.....in search of a world unknown..

....n how it all started..

ever since i started studying physics in my +1, Einstein's world always used to sound like an unknown land of fantasies... with many, many mysteries... somewhere hidden behind those enormous doors.. just waiting to get unlocked...

even the amazing outlines of those dark stories used to drive us wild... how the time slows down.. how the space starts contracting in.. n how even matter seems to grow within particles... n all that just when u see something moving... all of that just when that curious pair of eyes of yours perceives a motion....

n after a quite a hell of a ride of about 3 years i have ended up in iitd engineering physics... but even now... Einstein's world still neva fails to get all my wild dreams a pair of wings of its own... n still now when i see a car rushing in a Delhi expressway... it feels as if its running into a contracting crunching piece of the nothingness blowing in with it... n sometimes when i sit in the platform waiting for my train.. n i see a guy getting his lighter out of his pocket n lighting his cigarette standing inside a train rushing by... it all seems to go a lil slow...

but i guess its all just mind-games played by the sub-conscious of an obsessed mind....

even then i do believe that its just not the weirdness n abstractness of these phenomena that drives me... but deep down.. i always wanted to see Einstein's world from my own eyes...

why does it really happen the way it happens??... what is it thats driving space to contract itself?... whats making time run slow?... what really is time?... how can matter grow out of motion?... is matter just not what n how we think it is?... how did Einstein ever think of all these?... n yeah, what did he see that made him tell the things he said??....

the reason why Einstein's world looks kinda weird is not coz it doesnt exist... but coz we are living in a very small world... not just in terms of size.. but in terms of probabilities... the fact that we dont really get to perceive such high speeds n such immense motion in our everyday life... n i guess thats why the effects stay hidden...

but if you really want to track down the reasons behind these amazing mysteries of his world... we need to track down the mathematical trail left behind... n ounce you start going straight up the whole food chain of mathematical manipulations... you realize that the world of Einstein starts getting lost into that immense fog of misconception right from the time he starts to use his postulates... especially his 2nd postulate (the principle of invariance of light speed)...

'...light is always propagated in empty spaces with a definite speed 'c' which is independent of the emitting body."

weird, isnt it??... it doesnt matter how much u run away from a light pulse... u ll always see it going after u with c!!...

n the 'fact' that a photon runs with c even if you set it free sitting inside your moving car!!...

it is this very postulate that sets Einstein's world far apart from normal human imagination... it is this very thinking of his that took his world far beyond normal human perception.....

n even though they have always said that its just an assumption to keep theories synchronized with experiments... but i have always believed that science at its very base is not based on some useless assumptions.... but its based on perceptions... on the realizations deep within..... . .

the whisper in the winds..... ( part-1)

even though the questions n the thrill to track down Einstein's world was always there somewhere within me.. but i guess it all came alive after i was done with jee... no more problem sets.. no more omr sheets.. no more stop clocks.. it was as if they had set me free... free to walk out n see the world on my own.. free to to make the sky all my own...

n hence.. i was free to go out there n search for those enormous doors that had Einstein's world locked deep within...

in my free times after jee.. i spent quite a long time with Feynman's lectures on relativity.. (Feynman is one of the greatest quantum physicists of all times)... even though i kept going through the lines.. equations.. experiments again n again... but something big seemed to be missing... as if Feynman had kept it hidden in between his lines... never did i knew that it was only in these empty spaces that Einstein had preserved all the clues that would help in tracking down his 2nd postulate ['the principle of invariance of light speed in empty space'] which can ultimately unlock the doors to his world.....

Empty spaces were always believed to be a medium of its own.. 'the Ether'.. they thought that the ether is some mysterious medium within which the whole world is suspended.. it is in this hypothetical medium that light moves with c...

but ounce you look deep within the last statement.. you realize that light just doesnt move in ether with c.. but it moves with c with respect to the ether itself... so it is this 'Ether' that should qualify to be our ultimate absolute frame... it is within this ether where everything is embedded... it is believed n perceived to stay static... the same static nature which you feel when you try to think of the motion of the frame by staying in the frame itself!!...

many scientists.. physicists.... experimentalists they all tried to find the absolute speed of earth with respect to the ether... in other words.. thinking from the earth... a 'wind' of ether should be blowing by.... they tried all sorts of optical.. mechanical experiments to discover the ether wind... but none of the experiments gave any result...

after all sorts of trials of finding matter in the ether wind... trying to even detect the speed of the ether wind... they all gave sometimes anomalous n sometimes useless obvious results... like after a hell lot of calculations... u end up with 3 +3=6!!!

for some reason or the other... the ether wind stayed hidden.. as if nature is in a conspiracy of its own n is not letting mankind discover the ether wind....

after all sorts of trials... they gave up on the idea of ether... they discarded the whole concept... n the papers written on the investigation of the ether wind were thrown out of the window.. dumped in a dustbin... or were left unnoticed, unrealized under the piles of paper work in the tables of theoretical physicists........... . .

but they never realized that you might discard the ether from your paper work.. from the books.... but the real ether lies in our mind!!...

the concept of ether will develop on its own in the mind of any student who has done classical mechanics from all the depth of his heart... coz classical mechanics is like an illusion of its own... its an image that develops in our very subconscious by understanding physics, by looking n perceiving the world around....

n the empty space.. the nothingness.. the 3D space thats so extensively mathematically modeled in classical mechanics is a very big part of the world we look around us....

so the concept of ether might have been discarded by physicists... but if you have ever believed in classical mechanics... the ether has got to be there.. might not be in the world around us.... but somewhere still there in the world within us... as if somehow our very ears are still able to listen to the whispers in the winds... in the ether winds............ . .

the whisper in the winds.... (part-2)

till i came to iitd the concepts of ether winds n the realization of Einstein's 2nd postulate was still lost somewhere within the fog of distorted conceptions...... until that day of course.......  

after i was done with my 3rd days' classes in iitd... i was sitting in the library trying real hard to figure out all my confusions with ether winds n invariance of c...

just then i saw that about two tables away a really beautiful girl was sitting... she was facing me... just beside the window ..reading a book.... n yeah.. she might just be the most beautiful girl i had seen till then... wow.... . .

she had long open hair..brown n straight.. she was fair.. a bit too fair to be an Indian i guess... might be an European in an exchange program...  her looks had a really different genre... definitely not like the Northies over hea... long face... sharp long nose.. engraved deep eyes...  natural.. smiley lips..... . .

words just simply fall short to describe her...n they still say that girls are an endangered species in iits.. huh!!....

she just sat there deeply lost in her book.......... n i was staring in all the half eyed ways..

not that i m the kinda guy who stares at girls... but i guess i couldnt help it...

i neva could realize how quickly n... how spontaneously my mind had bid good bye to Einstein n his theories... to all those ether winds n to everything else of course... yup... after all... the brains a male brain u see...;-)

just then a strong wind from outside hit us... n her dark brown hair... went all air borne.. flew all across her face... n just then it really really felt as if time has just stopped by... i somehow.. someway got trapped right within the timeline!!.... she looked so damn enchanting then.. wow!!..

but she was so deeply into her book that it took her sometime to realize n get her hair from her face... by the time i realize that i am just being stupid... got busy with my thing again.... finding it hard to catch the wave again.. i decided to take a break n left the library.... just under the library theres this small shop for coffe n all.... i ordered a cold coffe n stood there.... thinking of what exactly am i supposed to think......

then just from nowhere something struck my mind.... something so damn captivating that i almost felt like reaching the edge of my excitement.... i came up with a thought experiment of my own....

i was standing right within the ether... in the middle of just shear nothingness.... a 3D space completely mathematically modeled.. with every point having a coordinate.... n like some 3 meters away... i saw her table with she sitting n reading her book.... only this time i was seeing her frame moving in a certain direction.... so if she is moving through the ether.. she must be able to feel the ether wind.... she should be able to feel all the numerically marked points blowing around her.... but then i realized that she actually wont!!....

yeah she wont.... coz this time its no ordinary wind... its the ether wind!!.... this time even if she closes her book n tries to look around n feel the wind... but she wont!!....

coz the moment she tries to imagine the ether around her.... its 'her mind' that ll work n project the ether before her eyes this time... n since she is thinking with respect to herself.... in her frame... she is static... her mind doesnt know that she is moving... n if her mind itself doesnt know she is moving..... how can it project a dynamic.. blowing ether...  how can it show something that ll help her know she is moving.... so even if she is moving... she is going to see a static ether before her eyes....

n since we both are seeing static ether around us.... we both ll see light pulses to move with c.... coz we know that in the static ether... light moves with c...

so in all the frames... doesnt matter if its a static frame or a moving frame... the light speed remains just the same.... n hence Einstein's 2nd postulate gets proved.....

n i was so so SO DAMN EXCITED!!... i just proved Einstein's bloody postulate before our coffee shop.... i felt like saying...

'fuck u Einstein!!... i just kicked ur bloody white ass...'

hehehe!!...

sorry for the last part... but i m no Shakespear.... couldnt really find a good way of expressing the bloody excitement n the adrenalin rush i felt within me.. at that very instant.... i finally opened up the world of Einstein!!.... oh yeah\w/

i drank my coffee n went back to the library to give back the issued book.... i did look for her in the library.. yeah i did.. i searched for her everywhere.... but i couldnt find her....

i walked towards the librarian to give back the book... a call came... some of the guys back in the hostel were asking for going out somewhere..

aise hi... just to chill out for a while n all...

while returning the book i did look excited i guess... i mean i had to.... i did open up the world of Einstein... something that i dreamt about for so long... now i can freely go across all his equations n theories without any kinda prob....

just when i was about to leave.. the librarian mam called out....

'why do you look so excited??... huh??  new girlfriend in Delhi!!?'

i smiled back n said... 'aisa kuchh nahi hai mam.... its just that i have found out a new place to hang out!!' ;-)

the whisper in the winds.... . .

Walking within god's dreams.... . ..

days back in +1,+2 were simply awesome... those days had a fire of their own... during the iit-prep..many a times we used to even forget that iit's up ahead... n somehow someway we used to get lost in a world of problem solving... where every problem used to be like a new case n we used to be 'the' bond, James bond... every new chapter used to open up like a new ocean n we used to be the pirate of the Caribbean... and sometimes all those weirdly sounding questionable questions used to be our own windows through which we used to escape into a world of our own... . .

n just a few days ago i came across such a question ...seeing the one i felt as if someone just inverted the time line inside out... as if i m back in my own summer of sixty-nine....

" is the existence of mankind just like god is sleeping and dreaming???.... "

in other words is our world just a dream of god... as if god's dreaming and the true essence of this world is nothing but a dream of god???

initially it just looks like a philosophical question with no scientific base... but the truth is that science at its very base is nothing but  a logical analysis of a person's perceptions... of his realisations... and if you look deeply into the question... you ll find a tinch of reasoning still left hidden within....

and in search of that reason i had to come across a very basic observation... the fact that this world is symmetric... i mean  just look around you... every thing is having a beautiful pattern... a systematically disrupted unique symmetry... from the swarm of insects hovering around the street light to the crack in the sky due to the lightning.... from the pattern hidden within the leaves falling from a tree in a winter to the pattern in which pieces of glass arrange themselves on the floor when u let go of a glass of water... from the dynamics in a mother running after her three naughty kids to Messi trying to break through the defense of three defenders....  every single thing bears a beautiful symmetry....

now if that is true then what is the symmetry hidden within the line 'existence of men is just a dream of god.... ' well, if one puts it in this way... god knows us just through his dream or the world of dreams is where god meets men n men meet god... or in other words... existence of god is just within the dreams of men.... isnt it???

now if you think deeply... its true... god is that realization that gives people hope, strength, relief, reason, conscience, and so much more... but at the very end its just a realization... more precisely like a beautiful dream... that makes you happy n keeps you going.... . . .