Thursday, October 13, 2005

About Anne Frank's Diary

A few days ago, I once again got my hands on the book - Anne Frank's Diary. Having forgotten the exact words of a quote which had touched me very deeply, I had been desiring to obtain this book for quiet some time. At last, I got it from a friend who had come down from Hyderabad, and I could have it for only one night. Though I was thoroughly tired that day, I spent quiet some time that night reading extracts from various parts of that book.

I count this book as one of the best I have ever read considering that it was written by girl about 14 years old! The utter simplicity and the simple yet obvious rationale of many observations she makes, which seemingly are missed by many adults (both now and then), is amusing, surprising and satirical. There is an excellent sense of satirical humour throughout. Also, at many places, she makes some simple statements which actually goes very deep into some of the very rare truths, and which digs out some deep human psychology. Also, she has absolute honesty in her writings and an educated acceptance of her true self, which are very rare and appreciable qualities, and which draws respect from me, myself knowing how hard both of these are from my own experiences, and also how rare.

I wonder about the writings she would have produced had she grown up and lived. I'm sure they would have contributed to the literary world - I kind of miss them.

Monday, October 10, 2005

Patchwork For Last Post

Disclaimer: This attempt to write is for no reasons at all, except to put some better and (hopefully) more coherent materials at the top of my blog, rather than the last posting which now reads like a badly written disconnected meaningless text. I guess I'm loosing my writing skills day by day. My spoken skills being below the adequate mark, I took console over my written skills, but will those too be gone now?? Hope not. I Hope its just a temporary affair:

"I pray to god that it wont be long..." (courtesy: Madonna).

Ok, so I have been listening to lot of Madonna songs lately, and have been influenced by some of her lyrics. But at least, she has got some lyrics. Most of the others these days just shout out rubbish at the top of their voices. They sound like frustrated bunch of guys bitten by dogs yelling back at the (poor) dogs. I wonder how they would sound without the special audio effects, enhancements and instrumentals!

That's enough of text to serve my current purpose - patching my blog. Lets hope this text reads ok after maybe a day when I come back and go through this!!

Thursday, October 06, 2005

Scribbles: 6th October, 2005

"Candle in the Wind". Princess Diana. Elton John thought so. He expressed it beautifully in his song "Candle in the Wind". He called princess Diana, England's Rose, a Candle in the Wind. She lived her life like one.

Everyone, at some point I guess, gets touched by a flame or finds the beauty and scent of a rose.

The flame is beautiful. It gives you warmth and lights the life around it. But its selfish - it devours whatever tries to touch it. All it leaves are the charred remains of your former self. And it consumes mercilessly the very same fuel which keeps it burning.

The rose is also beautiful. It has a lovely scent. Its beautiful to look at. But its best left alone - whoever would try to pluck it is welcomed with thorns. You bleed.

You are so consumed with how much you get (courtesy: Madonna).

All the world is a stage where every man must play a part. And what is mine - I'm still trying to find out. (Apologies if I didn't get the words correct in that quotation.)

Tuesday, October 04, 2005

Of Mind and Reality: Part 2

Firstly, as I stand today, before venturing into any further speculative theories of any kind, I must apologise for the most parts of my previous post, especially the latter parts where I tried to logic out how everything is pre-determined. Reading over that piece of article today again (and also having done so many times after the day when I actually posted that), after having chanced upon some authoritative texts on this area in the meantime, I clearly see the utter superficiality of most of what I have written. It appears like some adamant schoolboy trying to get his word about everything. As I write this today, I am aware that this attempt today to continue that topic might again end up as another such text, but I'll try to be as prudent, careful and short as possible. The topic being of such an abstract and complex nature, which have been mystifying the elite minds through the ages, I humbly realise and acknowledge that whatever I write is likely to be a very naive and amateurish stuff again. Nevertheless, I shall write, primarily in attempt to conclude this since I had ended the original post with an anticipation of a sequel. And also since I feel to write a bit today.

In my last extract on this topic, I stated two main theories. First was about human nature - that often what a man says does not express his true feelings and of which true feelings he might not himself be aware of. Second was a theory on destiny, astrology and the similar, where I mentioned that all things 'happening' or all that we see existing are results of precise reactions between different 'forms' (of matter and energy) and hence everything is predictable - consequently, there is nothing as free-will or freedom or choices as such in the absolute sense.

Also, I'll repeat what I stated at the foremost in the last post before venturing into any speculations - and this is of utmost importance - that I believe only what I see, and what I can reason with logic. Anything beyond that, I neither believe, nor disbelieve. It may, or may not be, but unless its proved with reason, mathematics and logic, unless its deciphered and predictable, I wont make my decisions based on those.

Let me now review some stuff, actually the loopholes, from the reasoning in my previous post about how all things are pre-determined. I stated that everything is made up of particles. How do we know that its true - the only thing we know is that all we have come up so far are particles. While writing that, from what I was thinking then, I should have written that all our science have come up so far are these particles. But there is probably nothing to suggest anything further. And what are these "particles" anyways, if some kind of them do form the smallest units? Besides, now I state that its not the particles either which make up things. Further researches have brought forward the likes of "string" and "superstring" theories, which state that it's not particles, but strings, which make up everything. Again, what are these "strings" and what are they made of?

And directly challenging the 'pre-determined' theory, I ask, what is there to prove that everything is not just random? We don't have any concrete evidence against that either. So, everything might very well be absolute random stuff. Everything happening might be actually totally random and accidental, getting determined just at the moment of happening. That is, everything is actually absolute free-will, and at every instant things to happen get determined then and there.

Well, I'll end this discussion with that. Currently, I am reading Hawking's "A Brief History of Time" and it's an excellent stimulating book. It is taking time to read. Also, I have chanced up some good psychology atricles (www.guidetopsychology.com). All these are probably amalgamating possible new stuff in my existing theories (which I confess, are themselves rather in a mess). So, presently, I conclude this topic and post.