Friday, June 19, 2009
The Blue Bus
I clearly remember, there were two kinds of PTC busses in Madras then. The old, rickety, blue bus and the relatively newer, more aesthetic green bus.
Every Saturday, my mother would take me to Nungambakkam in a PTC bus, to my maternal grandmother's house. Back then, green was my favorite color -- maybe it was due the better looking green bus...I don't know. Naturally, I preferred travelling in the green bus. Luckily, since the blue busses where being phased out, there were more green busses than blue busses and it was rare that one gets to travel in a blue bus.
One such Saturday, when I was eagerly awaiting to travel in a green bus, the blue bus arrived. Despite my strong objection, my mother insisted that we get on to the bus as it was getting late. Once I got on to the bus, something happenned...I could not tolerate the fact that I was travelling on a blue bus and I cried for an hour, continuously!
Over the course of my life, I have recollected this incident with amusement. The source of amusement being, how 'naive' I was in my younger days.
Wrong! Nothing has changed over the years. I still have fixed notions of happiness. I would be the same person, until I realise that happiness is just an intinisic quality, not contingent upon the "travelling in a green bus".
Friday, May 29, 2009
Psychoanalysis of Leonardo da Vinci by Sigmund Freud
If there is a person who is both an artist and a scientist, will life be a constant turmoil because these two forces (art and science) oppose each other?
I get the feeling that Sigmund Freud in his psychoanalysis of Leonardo da Vinci seems to implicitly assume the above. Here is a link to this fascinating short book.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Honey Honey (Ayan) <-- Give it to me (Nelly Furtado)
Monday, March 09, 2009
On Left handed Batsmen
I have always thought that "left handed batsmen" in cricket is a misnomer -- since the right hand (top hand) does most of the work.
"both (the right-handers and the left-handers) have been horribly misnamed because the left-hander is really a right-hander and the right-hander is really a left-hander, if you work out which hand is doing most of the work. So from my point of view, my right arm is my strongest and therefore it's the right hand, right eye and generally the right side which is doing all the work. So if there is anything about this, then the left-handers, as such, should be called right-handers...It's the top hand which is doing all the work..."
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Navarasas
The Navarasas are supposed to be nine principal emotions. They are love, comedy, pathos, fury, valour, horror, disgust, wonder, peace.
Red, blue and green are prinicipal colors which means any color can be expressed as a combination of each of them.
(a) Likewise can any human emotion be expressed as a combination of 9 prinicipal emotions?
(b) Red, blue and green are necessary and sufficient to represent all colors. Likewise, are the 9 prinicipal emotions necessary and sufficient?
Some notes:
1. It is worth noting that the minimum value (0 intensity) of red, green and blue corresponds to "black"
2. Lisewise what does the minmum value (0 intensity) of all the emotions correspond to?
Intuitively, I think it should be the emotion "peace". Then, it means "peace" should not be a principal emotion? (Interestingly, there were only 8 prinicipal emotions earlier and "peace" was added later; Maybe it is redundant).
3. I tried some tough emotions and was able to qualitatively describe them. For example:
a. jealosy = fear + pathos?
b. nostalgia = pathos + comedy?
Monday, January 19, 2009
Why is "evil" sexy?
This is because it is a signal of intelligence and/or power. Evil cannot be sustained without intelligence and/or power. A person cannot be consistently evil without possessing power and/or intelligence.
Monday, December 15, 2008
Why does Sachin do well at Chepauk?
a. New ball always skids on to the bat -- even on the 5th day.
Corollary: One can always drive 'on-the-up' if the ball is newish.
b. Bounce is consistent, even if the pitch gets slower as the ball becomes older.
Corollary: One can employ the horizontal bat shots with confidence even if driving becomes harder as the ball becomes older.
c. Eventhough the ball turns a lot, it also bounces nicely and evenly.
Corollary: One can employ the pull , cut or slog-sweep, even if the ball is fractionally shot.
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Surrealist Music
Yesterday, google's homepage showed a surrealist painting of Rene Magritte. This made me wonder why the surrealist movement was geared mainly towards visual arts (Eg. painting , movies).
More specifically I was wondering if there existed corresponding surrealist works on music.
A wiki search led me to this page on surrealist music. However, from that wiki entry it seemed that surrealist movement for music was hardly popoular; In fact, IMO, the article may very well have concluded "To summarize, the idea of surrealist music did not catch on".
So, why didn't the surrealist movement apply for music?
I think this is simply because music, from its conception has always been divorced from reality.
A painting or a film can be realistic, since it depicts something the eye sees in the real world. By the same logic, realistic music should be something consisting of sounds mimicing the natural sounds that a human hears in his/her everyday life.
Clearly, that is not what we refer as music. Music, from the very begining has been something which is imagined with little connection to realistic sounds -- In other words, it is already surreal, I claim.
More specifically I was wondering if there existed corresponding surrealist works on music.
A wiki search led me to this page on surrealist music. However, from that wiki entry it seemed that surrealist movement for music was hardly popoular; In fact, IMO, the article may very well have concluded "To summarize, the idea of surrealist music did not catch on".
So, why didn't the surrealist movement apply for music?
I think this is simply because music, from its conception has always been divorced from reality.
A painting or a film can be realistic, since it depicts something the eye sees in the real world. By the same logic, realistic music should be something consisting of sounds mimicing the natural sounds that a human hears in his/her everyday life.
Clearly, that is not what we refer as music. Music, from the very begining has been something which is imagined with little connection to realistic sounds -- In other words, it is already surreal, I claim.
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Flow, Laya and the Highest Good
If there is some end of the things we do, which we desire for its own sake, clearly this must be the good. Will not knowledge of it, then, have a great influence on life? Shall we not, like archers who have a mark to aim at, be more likely to hit upon what we should? If so, we must try, in outline at least, to determine what it is. (I.1094a18) -- Aristotle
Flow:
Flow:
1. From Wiki: Flow is the mental state of operation in which the person is fully immersed in what he or she is doing by a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and success in the process of the activity.
2. Csíkszentmihályi (the person who proposed this) described flow as "being completely involved in an activity for its own sake. The ego falls away. Time flies. Every action, movement, and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz. Your whole being is involved, and you're using your skills to the utmost"
3. From 'Finding Flow' by the same author "It could be singing in a choir, programming a computer, dancing, playing bridge, reading a good book. Or this complete immersion in the activity may occur in a social interaction, as when good friends talk with each other, or when a mother plays with her baby. What is common to such moments is that consciousness is full of experiences, and these experiences are in harmony with each other. Contrary to what happens all too often in everyday life, in moments such as these what we feel, what we wish, and what we think are in harmony"
Laya:
1. Laya according to hindy philosophy "is a state of mental quietude".
2. " Laya is a stillness brought about by the application of an external force. This `force' may be the sudden upsurge of emotion of which one is unaware or the planned breath regulation of which one is aware. In either case there is an external agency causing the thought vacuum. When the application of this force is withdrawn, the mind returns to its original state"
3. "Whether unconsciously in the act of something as simple as tying your shoe lace, or in a moment of deep joy or sorrow, to a conscious fusion of the mind in the wonder of nature, music, dance, creativity, or through breath-regulation or concentration on an object, laya may occur".
Quoting from my prior post, "I think those actions that let one person forget about himself/herself are inherently good. When a musician performs passionately; when a tennis player gets ready to return a serve; when a scientist discusses the veracity of a theory with his colleague; possibly even when the cashier is in the midst of counting cash -- there is a possibility of the doer of the above actions losing track of themselves.It is possible that they forget their identity and in that instant, whatever they are doing is not for themselves. If that possibility manifests, then I think the action is of highest good"
---------------------------
I am quite delighted that what I currently consider to be the "Highest good" is very similar to the idea of "Flow" in Western philosophy ( a very recent idea, as late as 1990) and the idea of "Laya" from Indian Philosophy. It has reinforced what I consider to be the 'purpose' of life. I now strongly think that I should try and maximize experiences that "flow", according to the above definition of flow.
P.S: Apparently, The guy who proposed flow, Csíkszentmihályi's name is pronounced ('Chick-sent-me-high' :)
Sunday, September 07, 2008
Great Tamil Film Scenes - Sabapathy (or) The Evolution of Tamil Language in Films in the last 6 decades
The above video illustrates how connotations associated with some Tamil words have changed over 6 decades.
In Sabapathy (1941), words like 'thevidiyal' and 'machi' were considered perfectly normal and used by the elite. In fact, the former was also considered auspicious!
It is startling to observe how the connotations have changed! One would think, as times passes, a word that may have had negative connotation would slowly become acceptable in society. One wonders, why this reverse trend in Tamil -- influence of "Tamil-Kalacharam" politics??
Labels: funny, machi, sabapathy
Great Tamil Film Scenes - Guna and 81/2
I have always wanted to write about two of my favorite films: Guna (Tamil) and 8 1/2 (Otto e Mezzo, Italian). It is even better that I can largely express what I wanted to write as a video.
Although the subject matter of the two films are by-and-large different, I have felt there are some striking similarities in the symbolism employed in each of the above films. To appreciate (or criticize), one has to watch both films.
I will come back to this in greater detail, later.
Labels: 81/2, Fellini, Guna, Italian, Kamal Hassan, Otto e mezzo, tamil
Saturday, September 06, 2008
Great Tamil Scenes - Kutty
In this scene from Kutty directed by Janaki Vishwanathan, Kannamma a.k.a. Kutty (Shweta), who is brought from village into the household of Ramesh Arvind, receives a dress as a gift; in return she gives them the toy horse that she had made herself.
Great acting, excellent camera work by Thangar Batchan (edited by Sreekar Prasad) and a brilliant BGM (back ground music) score from Ilayaraja makes this scene a truly memorable one.
In particular, the way in which Ilayaraja transitions into the song with 'thavil' beats is remarkable. It is as though the beats are reflecting the flutter in the heart beats of Kutti. This scene is a prime example of the importance of BGM in films -- Film, like novels, are trying to tell a story; however, in lieu of words to express emotions of people involved, films use other cues such as BGM.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Aasai Nooruvagai --> Naughty Girl
Several of 70's/80's tamil songs are now being remixed.
I wonder why they have not yet remixed Aasai nooruvagai.
Correction: It has been remixed; ironically one of the earlier songs to be remixed! (Thanks Arun) -- Although, it is a kind of simple effort, which retains the original soundtrack.
One of the several "remix solutions" is Naughty girl by Beyonce.
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Sun Sign Astrology
Summary: Here is a link to a simple survey, to determine for myself the validity of sun sign astrology. It consists of 17 questions.
1. Sun sign astrology is highly popular and is still published in main stream newspapers all around the world.
2. The basic premise of sun sign astrology is that people's characteristics are correlated with their birthdays.
3. I know several people (some of them scientists) who believe in sun sign astrology. They typically study the characteristics associated with each sun, and claim to have observed a strong correlation between the sun signs of the people they know and their characteristics.
4. However this kind of reasoning may suffer from the flaw that people typically remember the hits and forget to correctly account for the misses -- similar to why people seem to agree with Murphy's law from their daily experiences.
5. An another reason why astrology is popular may be explained with the Forer effect. It is "the observation that individuals will give high accuracy ratings to descriptions of their personality that supposedly are tailored specifically for them, but are in fact vague and general enough to apply to a wide range of people". (Read Forer's demonstration is the above wiki article...it is quite funny)
5. I have read the characteristics associated with sun signs myself, and when I try to see people around me, I have to concede, it does seem like there is some correlation. Am I falling a prey to phsycological factors or is there really a correlation? Tons of research conducted, as archived here, all conclude that there is no truth whatsoever in astrology. Yet, it would be nice to verify it myself with an objective test...1. Sun sign astrology is highly popular and is still published in main stream newspapers all around the world.
2. The basic premise of sun sign astrology is that people's characteristics are correlated with their birthdays.
3. I know several people (some of them scientists) who believe in sun sign astrology. They typically study the characteristics associated with each sun, and claim to have observed a strong correlation between the sun signs of the people they know and their characteristics.
4. However this kind of reasoning may suffer from the flaw that people typically remember the hits and forget to correctly account for the misses -- similar to why people seem to agree with Murphy's law from their daily experiences.
5. An another reason why astrology is popular may be explained with the Forer effect. It is "the observation that individuals will give high accuracy ratings to descriptions of their personality that supposedly are tailored specifically for them, but are in fact vague and general enough to apply to a wide range of people". (Read Forer's demonstration is the above wiki article...it is quite funny)
6. I am requesting people to take this survey of 17 questions (Thanks to my friend for creating the applet). The survey first asks you your birthdate and then gives 12 sets of characteristics. For each of the set of characteristics, the responder should give a score ranging from 0 to 10; a score of 10 meaning that he thinks his personality fits perfectly with the current set, while a score of 0 means that the current set does not describe the responder at all. Each of the sets of characteristics are those that are associated with various sun signs. The purpose of the experiments is to see empirically, what ratings does the "correct" sun sign obtain. Does it get a relatively high or low score. A high rating would suggest some correlation and vice versa. Of course, the survey would work the best with people who have no exposure to sun sign astrology!
Here is the link.
Thursday, May 22, 2008
On Carribean Names
Caribbean countries like Trinidad and Tobago have significant Indian migrant population.
This explains why Gangadaran became Darren Ganga and Jagannath became Jaggernauth ??
This explains why Gangadaran became Darren Ganga and Jagannath became Jaggernauth ??
Friday, May 09, 2008
Ordinariness
It is depressing to realise one's "ordinariness"
which in itself is "ordinary"
And cause for more depression...
Things get into realms of the comical
when one writes to "escape ordinariness"
But it "works".
which in itself is "ordinary"
And cause for more depression...
Things get into realms of the comical
when one writes to "escape ordinariness"
But it "works".
Wednesday, April 09, 2008
Truth
- a convenience for the "powerful"??
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
The highest Good
The intoxication of self-feeling is the most intense, and the height of this intoxication is most admired
-- Soren Kiekergaard
A: Can you tell me, what is the highest 'good'?
B: Yes, actions that are 'selfless' are of highest good.
A: Are just saying philanthropic actions are good.
B: By selfless actions I don't mean just the so called 'philanthropic' actions. I consider, any action performed for its own sake, as good.
A: What you are saying seems to resemble Aristotle?? What do you exactly mean?
B: I think those actions that let one person forget about himself/herself are inherently good. When a musician performs passionately; when a tennis player gets ready to return a serve; when a scientist discusses the veracity of a theory with his colleague; possibly even when the cashier is in the midst of counting cash -- there is a possibility of the doer of the above actions losing track of themselves.It is possible that they forget their identity and in that instant, whatever they are doing is not for themselves. If that possibility manifests, then I think the action is of highest good.
A: What about "inaction"?
B: Inaction means that the person is not even thinking. When a person does not even think, then by definition he forgets about himself/herself and so inaction would be of highest good. As Ramana maharishi would say, "Of all thoughts that arise in the mind the "I" thought is the first".
A: Then would "suicide" would be of highest good?
B: No it would not. You are probably saying that since it leads to "inaction" and I had earlier considered "inaction" a part of highest good. But note that this is an action done to yourself because you think it will lead to "good". So it is an action where the doer is aware of himself and will not be a part of the "highest good".
A: Any practical significance??
B: One may have different kinds of acquaintances with different people. With some interactions, it seems the focus is more on the self, than others. I would say those kind of interactions, will not lead to "progress".
A: Are you saying that one should limit such kinds of interactions? At a more general level, are you saying one should limit actions that are not part of the "highest good"?
B: I am not sure.
A: Your theory doesn't seem to be very useful. OK, what about this conversation, is this a part of "highest good"?
B: I have been aware of myself in this discussion -- in other words, there seems to be slight pride when I am proposing this theory -- this is like "MY" theory. No, this would not be a part of highest good.
-- Soren Kiekergaard
A: Can you tell me, what is the highest 'good'?
B: Yes, actions that are 'selfless' are of highest good.
A: Are just saying philanthropic actions are good.
B: By selfless actions I don't mean just the so called 'philanthropic' actions. I consider, any action performed for its own sake, as good.
A: What you are saying seems to resemble Aristotle?? What do you exactly mean?
B: I think those actions that let one person forget about himself/herself are inherently good. When a musician performs passionately; when a tennis player gets ready to return a serve; when a scientist discusses the veracity of a theory with his colleague; possibly even when the cashier is in the midst of counting cash -- there is a possibility of the doer of the above actions losing track of themselves.It is possible that they forget their identity and in that instant, whatever they are doing is not for themselves. If that possibility manifests, then I think the action is of highest good.
A: What about "inaction"?
B: Inaction means that the person is not even thinking. When a person does not even think, then by definition he forgets about himself/herself and so inaction would be of highest good. As Ramana maharishi would say, "Of all thoughts that arise in the mind the "I" thought is the first".
A: Then would "suicide" would be of highest good?
B: No it would not. You are probably saying that since it leads to "inaction" and I had earlier considered "inaction" a part of highest good. But note that this is an action done to yourself because you think it will lead to "good". So it is an action where the doer is aware of himself and will not be a part of the "highest good".
A: Any practical significance??
B: One may have different kinds of acquaintances with different people. With some interactions, it seems the focus is more on the self, than others. I would say those kind of interactions, will not lead to "progress".
A: Are you saying that one should limit such kinds of interactions? At a more general level, are you saying one should limit actions that are not part of the "highest good"?
B: I am not sure.
A: Your theory doesn't seem to be very useful. OK, what about this conversation, is this a part of "highest good"?
B: I have been aware of myself in this discussion -- in other words, there seems to be slight pride when I am proposing this theory -- this is like "MY" theory. No, this would not be a part of highest good.
Monday, February 04, 2008
A real fast track
The brisbane pitch for the India v Srilanka one dayer is a real fast track. In fact it is so fast that is giving an illusion of lesser bounce.
With no seam movement, it is a battiing beauty.
With no seam movement, it is a battiing beauty.
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
Introspection or Narcissism?
The following may be an interesting (entertaining?) exercise.
Imagine you are writing screenplay and write the dialogue for the following scenarios:
1. A and B are introduced to each other.
2. A and B have been roomates for a month and enter the house after work and have nothing to do.
3. Same as 2, but A and B have been roomates for 3 years.
In each of the above scenarios, assume both A and B are different instances of yourself. By 'instance' here, I don't mean exact physical replicas -- I just envision the scenario in which A and B have similar mental attributes as yourself. You are ofcourse, free to assume the extent of replication.
Note: The film Prestige explores this idea slightly, coming to think of it.
Imagine you are writing screenplay and write the dialogue for the following scenarios:
1. A and B are introduced to each other.
2. A and B have been roomates for a month and enter the house after work and have nothing to do.
3. Same as 2, but A and B have been roomates for 3 years.
In each of the above scenarios, assume both A and B are different instances of yourself. By 'instance' here, I don't mean exact physical replicas -- I just envision the scenario in which A and B have similar mental attributes as yourself. You are ofcourse, free to assume the extent of replication.
Note: The film Prestige explores this idea slightly, coming to think of it.
Sunday, December 30, 2007
My Violin Guru's Father
I saw the tamil movie called salangai oli -- it has its share of moments that have aged, but its central theme is quite enduring: that excellence does not necessarily imply popularity.
I remember my violin guru's father, who attempted to teach me the "art of raga aalapana". An extraordinarily talented musician, he spent most of the time contemplating about music, and would make notes in his diary. Equally adept at both carnatic and hindustani music, his music, in some sense, attempted to unify both classical forms -- not unlike the protagonist of salangai oli. A simple, and a straightforward person, he did not have a "successful musical career" and hence was not popular among the masses. It is all easy to become philosophical and question the importance of popularity. But...
I will remember Sri Thirugogarnam Ramabhadran most, for showing me how to be a good "rasigan".
I remember my violin guru's father, who attempted to teach me the "art of raga aalapana". An extraordinarily talented musician, he spent most of the time contemplating about music, and would make notes in his diary. Equally adept at both carnatic and hindustani music, his music, in some sense, attempted to unify both classical forms -- not unlike the protagonist of salangai oli. A simple, and a straightforward person, he did not have a "successful musical career" and hence was not popular among the masses. It is all easy to become philosophical and question the importance of popularity. But...
I will remember Sri Thirugogarnam Ramabhadran most, for showing me how to be a good "rasigan".
Friday, December 28, 2007
Melbourne Test
The pitch in which the ongoing Melbourne test is played, bears an uncanny resemblance with the pitch of the recently concluded bangalore test against pakistan.
Both venues experienced a lot of rainfall during the lead-up to the match, which affected the pitch preparation. This meant the pitches could not dry out and hence were quite soft. This in turn meant the pace and the bounce of the pitches were lower than what the curator would have ideally wanted.
If you observed the Bangalore test match, experts expected the pitch to play worse in the 4th and 5th days. Eventhough the pitch kept extremely low at times, it did not affect the batsmen greatly since the pace of the pitch was so slow. It was a case of batsmen getting themselves out, and not otherwise.
Likewise, if you observe the 3rd days play of the Melbourne test, only one dismissal (that of Symonds) was caused by the bowler -- in this case reverse swing from zaheer khan. All other dismissals, were due to errors on the part of the batsmen.
Hence, I would say that there is a realistic chance of India surviving 2 days in this melbourne pitch (and hence winning the test). The only real threats are reverse swing and hogg's variation. For all their talk before the match, I am not sure if the Indians actually are picking Hogg's variations.
Both venues experienced a lot of rainfall during the lead-up to the match, which affected the pitch preparation. This meant the pitches could not dry out and hence were quite soft. This in turn meant the pace and the bounce of the pitches were lower than what the curator would have ideally wanted.
If you observed the Bangalore test match, experts expected the pitch to play worse in the 4th and 5th days. Eventhough the pitch kept extremely low at times, it did not affect the batsmen greatly since the pace of the pitch was so slow. It was a case of batsmen getting themselves out, and not otherwise.
Likewise, if you observe the 3rd days play of the Melbourne test, only one dismissal (that of Symonds) was caused by the bowler -- in this case reverse swing from zaheer khan. All other dismissals, were due to errors on the part of the batsmen.
Hence, I would say that there is a realistic chance of India surviving 2 days in this melbourne pitch (and hence winning the test). The only real threats are reverse swing and hogg's variation. For all their talk before the match, I am not sure if the Indians actually are picking Hogg's variations.
Monday, December 03, 2007
No Country for Old Men
/********Mild Spoilers***********/
The protagonist fights hundreds of minions before he meets the big boss in the final battle; In the final battle he may come on top in three out of 4 films (the 'happy' ending ones) and loses out in the other (the 'tragedies').
But what about the case in which he is overcome by the 76th minion???
/********************************/
I am still trying to whether this is a "good" movie...but riveted and entertained I was throughout the movie...so isn't it already a good movie?
The protagonist fights hundreds of minions before he meets the big boss in the final battle; In the final battle he may come on top in three out of 4 films (the 'happy' ending ones) and loses out in the other (the 'tragedies').
But what about the case in which he is overcome by the 76th minion???
/********************************/
I am still trying to whether this is a "good" movie...but riveted and entertained I was throughout the movie...so isn't it already a good movie?
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Polladhavan
I enjoyed watching polladhavan today -- the director has done a great job with the story and the screenplay -- the dialogue also deserves special mention which is teeming with wit, at the same time maintaining the nativity and realism.
The story which is essentially the bond that an youngster forms with his bike is refreshing.
The screenplay is engrossing (minus the songs) and the director employs a nice technique of shifting the narrative when the two protagonists criss-cross with each other.
However, the thing that impressed me the most about the movie is the fact that it is refreshingly non-judgmental -- the director clearly does not thrust his opinions on us, instead, letting us decide if we like the characters. The reason the director is able to achieve this is mainly because of the script -- the script lets most of the people behave in a "reasonable" fashion.
Consider the two gangster chacters 'selvam' and 'out' who are almost portrayed as following the hindu philosophy of 'karmayoga'!! (although some may allege they are glorified) Or consider the police, who sure take bribes from gangsters, but show common-sense throughout the movie, expecially in the scence in which they let dhanush go since he has a proper alibi.
The only character that is clearly 'evil' is the villain -- but one can easily empathize with this character even.
------------------------Digression starts---------------------------------------------------------------
What do you do when you are constantly under the shadow of a more "powerful" (as the villain sees) guy. If you fail to reconcile with this fact, how do you gain your own 'self-respect'? Ofcourse, the answer is
by resorting to "villainous" deeds to regain "control".
-----------------------Digression Ends-------------------------------------------------------------------
Polladhavan is an entertaining movie with an intelligent script, great screenplay, impressive acting and mildly irritating songs.
The story which is essentially the bond that an youngster forms with his bike is refreshing.
The screenplay is engrossing (minus the songs) and the director employs a nice technique of shifting the narrative when the two protagonists criss-cross with each other.
However, the thing that impressed me the most about the movie is the fact that it is refreshingly non-judgmental -- the director clearly does not thrust his opinions on us, instead, letting us decide if we like the characters. The reason the director is able to achieve this is mainly because of the script -- the script lets most of the people behave in a "reasonable" fashion.
Consider the two gangster chacters 'selvam' and 'out' who are almost portrayed as following the hindu philosophy of 'karmayoga'!! (although some may allege they are glorified) Or consider the police, who sure take bribes from gangsters, but show common-sense throughout the movie, expecially in the scence in which they let dhanush go since he has a proper alibi.
The only character that is clearly 'evil' is the villain -- but one can easily empathize with this character even.
------------------------Digression starts---------------------------------------------------------------
What do you do when you are constantly under the shadow of a more "powerful" (as the villain sees) guy. If you fail to reconcile with this fact, how do you gain your own 'self-respect'? Ofcourse, the answer is
by resorting to "villainous" deeds to regain "control".
-----------------------Digression Ends-------------------------------------------------------------------
Polladhavan is an entertaining movie with an intelligent script, great screenplay, impressive acting and mildly irritating songs.
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Waves
Waves.
I was recently just working on this piece, editing and putting together parts from our different versions.
Credits:
Guitar and main idea: Don
Violin: Vijay
Mridangam: Sharat
All other instruments: Matt
I was recently just working on this piece, editing and putting together parts from our different versions.
Credits:
Guitar and main idea: Don
Violin: Vijay
Mridangam: Sharat
All other instruments: Matt
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Invisibility
My friend was talking to me about a spoof-super-hero movie called "Mystery Men" in which there is a super hero called "Invisible boy".
He has the 'power' of invisibility, but only when nobody is observing him.
He has the 'power' of invisibility, but only when nobody is observing him.
Saturday, November 10, 2007
5 favourite ragas...
If I was asked to choose 5 ragas
In alphabetical order,
karaharapriya, ritigowla, saraswati, shanmugapriya, thodi
In alphabetical order,
karaharapriya, ritigowla, saraswati, shanmugapriya, thodi
Saturday, November 03, 2007
"When you hit a cover drive, a straight drive or a cut, the feeling touches your soul.": Sachin
Sachin has hit the ball on the center-of-mass of the bat -- figuratively, that is.
I can totally relate to it.
It is in fact, true for all 'ball-bat' sports for me.
I can totally relate to it.
It is in fact, true for all 'ball-bat' sports for me.
Friday, November 02, 2007
Carnatic Music Theory
I found this nice collection of carnatic music theory.
I need to read these articles thoroughly and these will be the baseline of anything I present in the future regarding carnatic music theory.
This seems to be from a guy from cs Wisconsin, written around 15 years ago.
Interestingly, a lot of problems I (and my friends) have considered earlier have been attacked by this person.
For eg. compare this, which is my attempt to attack the sruti/graha bedham problem, and this., which is his attempt. At first glance, one may find the similarities quite surprising (he has also used the equivalence class approach). More thought leads me to the following conclusion: it is the simplicity of the subject matter that is cause for the similarity.
After my brief stint with research over the past 2-3 years I will make this half-baked statement, which I hope to re-vesit in detail in the future : It is meaningless in the truest sense of the word to "claim ownership of a general idea" -- if something seems "novel", you are just not searching enough.I need to read these articles thoroughly and these will be the baseline of anything I present in the future regarding carnatic music theory.
This seems to be from a guy from cs Wisconsin, written around 15 years ago.
Interestingly, a lot of problems I (and my friends) have considered earlier have been attacked by this person.
For eg. compare this, which is my attempt to attack the sruti/graha bedham problem, and this., which is his attempt. At first glance, one may find the similarities quite surprising (he has also used the equivalence class approach). More thought leads me to the following conclusion: it is the simplicity of the subject matter that is cause for the similarity.
Finally,
Endaro Mahanubhavulu Andariki Vandanamulu.
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Paris: la féminité
Can there be a city that is more feminine compared to Paris?
Can there be a language/culture more feminine than the french?
Here was a city where I enjoyed being stuck in a traffic jam...gave me a chance to watch closely and admire the city and its inhabitants.
Can there be a language/culture more feminine than the french?
Here was a city where I enjoyed being stuck in a traffic jam...gave me a chance to watch closely and admire the city and its inhabitants.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
What is Ilayaraja's favourite raga?
He has composed scores of songs in Madyamavati, Kalyani, Natabhairavi etc.
But I think his favourite raga is Shanmugapriya.
It plays an important part in all his non-film albums -- I could see traces of Shanmugapriya in 3 songs in "How to name it". Even in "Thiruvasagam", he ends "Pollavinayen" with a rousing Shanmugapriya.
But I think his favourite raga is Shanmugapriya.
It plays an important part in all his non-film albums -- I could see traces of Shanmugapriya in 3 songs in "How to name it". Even in "Thiruvasagam", he ends "Pollavinayen" with a rousing Shanmugapriya.
Tuesday, October 09, 2007
Love 2
In this post, I am going to follow up Love-1 with a simple definition for love and try to explain some observations with this definition. In hindsight, none of the conclusions of this post seem earth shattering to me -- but it took me some time to arrive at it, and I thought I will log it.
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For any A, such that A has the capacity to think and/or feel; and any X,
The love of A towards X, is the measure of how strongly (or how much) A thinks/feels that X and A are one and the same.
In this sense, it is the measure of how much (or how strongly) A identifies with X.
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Discussion
1. Self Love (Love of A towards A itself):
Of all the thoughts that rise in the mind, the thought 'I' is the first thought. -- Ramana Maharishi, from Nan Yaar? (Who am i?)
Typically people identify with one selves -- For example, a person or an animal A thinks that he/she/it is actually A. Subject to this self identification, the love of an object towards itself is obviously the maximum possible value.
I don't think anybody will disagree with me about the fact that people identify with one selves. It is nature's way of making the person associate with his/her/its body so that he/she/it can take care of it and live. It is also easy to see how the personal/anaimal associates with its body ("here is something which gives me some signals about the world and something which I can control...so it is me").
According to hindu philosophy, an "enlightened person" does not identify with himself. The way I look at it, hindu philosophy argues in the following fashion...that there is no real reason for us to associate with our body, on the contrary disassociating with our body can lead us to eternal happiness.
(To get an intuition as to why there is no real reason for us to identify with our body, recall the scenario in the matrix movie.)
Disassociating with one self, will cause the person to lose his self love, but then this will cause the person to then love all entities in the world, equally and maximally, argues hindu philosophy.
2. Parental (esp. maternal) love
Again, nobody will disagree with me, when I say that maternal love is one of the strongest feelings of love. I think the reason for this strong love, the strong identification of the mother with the child, can be explained in the following way...since the mother knows that the child was a part of her body, it makes it easier for the mother to identify with the child. In other words, since the baby is a part of the mother physically, the mother impulsively thinks (to some extent) the the child is really her. This is the cause of the strong love.
3. Love through sexual relationships:
Sex has been accorded high importance in relationships...to such an extent that relationships often terminate when a person involved in a relationship indulges in sex with a person outside the relationship. In this sense, sex is linked to the loyalty in the relationships.
On the contrary, one can view sex just as yet another pleasurable activity. There are several other pleasurable activities possible, for example two people can derive great pleasure by playing chess together. But relationships seldom end because a person in a relationship plays chess with a person who is not in the relationship...you get the point.
I think the reason for this high importance given to sex, is because it helps in the process of each one identifying with the other -- when two bodies come into such close contact, each body tends to think that the other body is really itself.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
For any A, such that A has the capacity to think and/or feel; and any X,
The love of A towards X, is the measure of how strongly (or how much) A thinks/feels that X and A are one and the same.
In this sense, it is the measure of how much (or how strongly) A identifies with X.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Discussion
1. Self Love (Love of A towards A itself):
Of all the thoughts that rise in the mind, the thought 'I' is the first thought. -- Ramana Maharishi, from Nan Yaar? (Who am i?)
Typically people identify with one selves -- For example, a person or an animal A thinks that he/she/it is actually A. Subject to this self identification, the love of an object towards itself is obviously the maximum possible value.
I don't think anybody will disagree with me about the fact that people identify with one selves. It is nature's way of making the person associate with his/her/its body so that he/she/it can take care of it and live. It is also easy to see how the personal/anaimal associates with its body ("here is something which gives me some signals about the world and something which I can control...so it is me").
According to hindu philosophy, an "enlightened person" does not identify with himself. The way I look at it, hindu philosophy argues in the following fashion...that there is no real reason for us to associate with our body, on the contrary disassociating with our body can lead us to eternal happiness.
(To get an intuition as to why there is no real reason for us to identify with our body, recall the scenario in the matrix movie.)
Disassociating with one self, will cause the person to lose his self love, but then this will cause the person to then love all entities in the world, equally and maximally, argues hindu philosophy.
2. Parental (esp. maternal) love
Again, nobody will disagree with me, when I say that maternal love is one of the strongest feelings of love. I think the reason for this strong love, the strong identification of the mother with the child, can be explained in the following way...since the mother knows that the child was a part of her body, it makes it easier for the mother to identify with the child. In other words, since the baby is a part of the mother physically, the mother impulsively thinks (to some extent) the the child is really her. This is the cause of the strong love.
3. Love through sexual relationships:
Sex has been accorded high importance in relationships...to such an extent that relationships often terminate when a person involved in a relationship indulges in sex with a person outside the relationship. In this sense, sex is linked to the loyalty in the relationships.
On the contrary, one can view sex just as yet another pleasurable activity. There are several other pleasurable activities possible, for example two people can derive great pleasure by playing chess together. But relationships seldom end because a person in a relationship plays chess with a person who is not in the relationship...you get the point.
I think the reason for this high importance given to sex, is because it helps in the process of each one identifying with the other -- when two bodies come into such close contact, each body tends to think that the other body is really itself.
A friend in riverside gave me a Yamaha keyboard -- I have now begun to understand chords better and I am liking it very much.
Sunday, September 30, 2007
All through my life, I have been surrounded by "goodness" of friends and others around me; Sometimes, I wonder whether I "deserve" it.
Monday, September 10, 2007
Infinitas
Today we got the desktops we purchased at UCR -- intel core 2 duo 2.66 GHz with 4 GB Ram and a 22 inch wide screen monitor.
We also got to name our own machines (what a privilege!) and I named it infinitas.
I thought hard between infinity and infinitas ('infinitas' is latin for 'infinity') and settled for the latter.
Afterall, what is in a name without its share of "sophistication"?
We also got to name our own machines (what a privilege!) and I named it infinitas.
I thought hard between infinity and infinitas ('infinitas' is latin for 'infinity') and settled for the latter.
Afterall, what is in a name without its share of "sophistication"?
Sunday, September 09, 2007
Srikanth has created this nice wiki page called Sahityam, that has the lyrics and the meaning of carnatic varnams and krithis.
Using the translipi tool (which he also created), he is able to automatically display the lyrics in several different scripts including roman, devanagiri, tamil, telugu.
Since it is a wiki page, users are free to add their own content to it.
Using the translipi tool (which he also created), he is able to automatically display the lyrics in several different scripts including roman, devanagiri, tamil, telugu.
Since it is a wiki page, users are free to add their own content to it.
Friday, September 07, 2007
We should not pretend to understand the world only by the intellect; we apprehend it just as much by feeling. Therefore, the judgment of the intellect is, at best, only the half of truth, and must, if it be honest, also come to an understanding of its inadequacy.
-- Carl Jung
-- Carl Jung
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Excerpts from Wikipedia:
This distinction is important. For example, a man M can be sexually/romantically attracted to a feminine ideal; but, in practice, some men may exhibit some of the charecterestics that are a part of that feminine ideal, and consequently, in practice he (M) may be attracted to such men. According to wiki's definition this would make this man bisexual. It seems to me that this man is not an exception, but the common case(?)
I know I have not considered the second definition in detail; I have not even defined what I mean by a masculine/feminine sex ideal.
- Bisexuality is a sexual orientation which refers to the romantic and/or sexual attraction of individuals to other individuals of both their own and the opposite sex or gender.
- Bisexual people are not necessarily attracted equally to both sexes.
- In 1995, Harvard Shakespeare professor Marjorie Garber made the academic case for bisexuality with her 600-page Vice Versa: Bisexuality and the Eroticism of Everyday Life in which she argued that most people would be bisexual if not for "repression, religion, repugnance, denial...premature specialization.
- Sigmund Freud theorized that every person has the ability to become bisexual at some time in his or her life.
This distinction is important. For example, a man M can be sexually/romantically attracted to a feminine ideal; but, in practice, some men may exhibit some of the charecterestics that are a part of that feminine ideal, and consequently, in practice he (M) may be attracted to such men. According to wiki's definition this would make this man bisexual. It seems to me that this man is not an exception, but the common case(?)
I know I have not considered the second definition in detail; I have not even defined what I mean by a masculine/feminine sex ideal.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Tucson
Blue clear skies, very low humidity (as low as 5% at times), mount lemmon, roomates and friends, cricket with wildcats -- santa rita park: a belter of a batting track, music with sruti -- matt's recording studio and last but not the least, the distinct manvasanai...
Thursday, August 02, 2007
Bergman is no more.
I have seen 3 of his films: wild strawberries, persona and seventh seal.
The first film is one of my favourites and had a profound impact in my life. I am still trying to understand persona, but it "clearly is a great film".
I have seen 3 of his films: wild strawberries, persona and seventh seal.
The first film is one of my favourites and had a profound impact in my life. I am still trying to understand persona, but it "clearly is a great film".
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Love, Ordinariness and the Hysteresis loop
Is it an excellence in your love that it can love only the extraordinary, the rare? If it were love’s merit to love the extraordinary, then God would be — if I dare say so — perplexed, for to Him the extraordinary does not exist at all. The merit of being able to love only the extraordinary is therefore more like an accusation, not against the extraordinary, nor against love, but against the love which can love only the extraordinary. Perfection in the object is not perfection in the love. Erotic love is determined by the object; friendship is determined by the object; only love of one’s neighbor is determined by love. Therefore genuine love is recognizable by this, that its object is without any of the more definite qualifications of difference, which means that this love is recognizable only by love-- Søren Kierkegaard
Ideal World
Kierkegaard says that love, in its purest form, should not depend on the excellence of the object in question. To justify this he (who btw is also a theoligian) uses the accepted theological fact that 'god loves all' in his arguments. I agree with Kierkegaard and I also believe that ideally, love should not be a function of the object's charecterestics.
Let me give you another reasoning for this. Suppose a person A claims that he/she 'loves' B because B posesses some quality x. Now I ask, if suddenly B loses this quality x, will A stop 'loving' B?
case 1: No, A does not stop loving B
Then clearly the quality 'x' is not important and A is 'capable' of loving any person even if that person may not posess the quality 'x'.
case 2: Yes, A stops loving B after B loses 'x'
The clearly A does not love B, he/she only loves 'x' in B.
Note:
Based on the above I think it is possible to categorize different kinds of love, in decreasing order of the quality of love:
1. Unconditionally loving every person in the world: I think this is what people mean by 'love your neighbour' - i.e loving all people we encounter. Since true love is not a function of the object's charecterestics, true love implies that one should love everybody.
2. Love between child and the Parents, siblings: In all these cases, love just exists due to the relationships; it does not depend on the charecterestics of the people. In other words, we do not pick and choose our parents, yet we love them. If we were to replace our parents with people with a different set of charecterestics, we would still love them.
3. Friendship, Erotic love : In these relationships the 'love' exists because we gain some physical, emotional or intellectual benefit.
Practical World
In the practical world, it is not possible categorize love into clear-cut subdivisions. For example, consider two friends. The driving force of the 'love' between the two friends might be the intellectual pleasure they derive by interacting with each other. Supposing, suddenly one of the friends develops amnesia (or some other mental deficiency), because of which the two friends can no longer interact with each other and gain the same kind of pleasure as before. But this may not prevent them from interacting with each other. In other words, 'love' between them does not terminate as soon as one of them develops amnesia.
I think in the practical world, the charecterestics of the object does play a part in love. So, consider a person A and for the him/her let X be the defining set of charecterestics that love is a function of. In other words, the love of A towards any B is proportional to the amount of X contained in B. But supposing due to the passage of time, B loses some of the charecterectics that made A love B, i.e X in B decreases, the love of A towards B does not exactly follow the curve backwards. This phenomenon is not unlike magnetic hysteresis. It is a phenomenon in which a metal is magnetized when a magnetic field is applied to it and alternatively gets demagnetized when the field is removed. But interestingly, when the magnetic field is reduced, the demagnetization does not follow magnetization curve. In some sense, it resists the process of demagnetization and consequently the magnetization/demagnetization curve is actually a loop.
The analogous resistance exhibited to stop loving, when the apparent 'reason' for love ceases to exist is commonly referred as "commitment". Commitment is one of the situations in which love in the practical world tries to attain the ideal. In my opinion, the area enclosed by this loop is measure of the quality of the love.
Ideal World
Kierkegaard says that love, in its purest form, should not depend on the excellence of the object in question. To justify this he (who btw is also a theoligian) uses the accepted theological fact that 'god loves all' in his arguments. I agree with Kierkegaard and I also believe that ideally, love should not be a function of the object's charecterestics.
Let me give you another reasoning for this. Suppose a person A claims that he/she 'loves' B because B posesses some quality x. Now I ask, if suddenly B loses this quality x, will A stop 'loving' B?
case 1: No, A does not stop loving B
Then clearly the quality 'x' is not important and A is 'capable' of loving any person even if that person may not posess the quality 'x'.
case 2: Yes, A stops loving B after B loses 'x'
The clearly A does not love B, he/she only loves 'x' in B.
Note:
Based on the above I think it is possible to categorize different kinds of love, in decreasing order of the quality of love:
1. Unconditionally loving every person in the world: I think this is what people mean by 'love your neighbour' - i.e loving all people we encounter. Since true love is not a function of the object's charecterestics, true love implies that one should love everybody.
2. Love between child and the Parents, siblings: In all these cases, love just exists due to the relationships; it does not depend on the charecterestics of the people. In other words, we do not pick and choose our parents, yet we love them. If we were to replace our parents with people with a different set of charecterestics, we would still love them.
3. Friendship, Erotic love : In these relationships the 'love' exists because we gain some physical, emotional or intellectual benefit.
Practical World
In the practical world, it is not possible categorize love into clear-cut subdivisions. For example, consider two friends. The driving force of the 'love' between the two friends might be the intellectual pleasure they derive by interacting with each other. Supposing, suddenly one of the friends develops amnesia (or some other mental deficiency), because of which the two friends can no longer interact with each other and gain the same kind of pleasure as before. But this may not prevent them from interacting with each other. In other words, 'love' between them does not terminate as soon as one of them develops amnesia.
I think in the practical world, the charecterestics of the object does play a part in love. So, consider a person A and for the him/her let X be the defining set of charecterestics that love is a function of. In other words, the love of A towards any B is proportional to the amount of X contained in B. But supposing due to the passage of time, B loses some of the charecterectics that made A love B, i.e X in B decreases, the love of A towards B does not exactly follow the curve backwards. This phenomenon is not unlike magnetic hysteresis. It is a phenomenon in which a metal is magnetized when a magnetic field is applied to it and alternatively gets demagnetized when the field is removed. But interestingly, when the magnetic field is reduced, the demagnetization does not follow magnetization curve. In some sense, it resists the process of demagnetization and consequently the magnetization/demagnetization curve is actually a loop.
The analogous resistance exhibited to stop loving, when the apparent 'reason' for love ceases to exist is commonly referred as "commitment". Commitment is one of the situations in which love in the practical world tries to attain the ideal. In my opinion, the area enclosed by this loop is measure of the quality of the love.
Wednesday, July 04, 2007
Birthday Distribution
How do you think are birthdays distributed over the days of the year? Do you think certain months (days) will have significantly more (less) births than others?
Here is the distribution in the United States. (Source Hallmark)
Note that the expected value for months with 31 days is 8.49% and for months with 30 days is 8.21% and 7.67% for february.
Rank Month Percent
1. August 9.07 (+0.58)
2. July 8.80 (+0.59)
3. September 8.62
4. October 8.60
5. March 8.51
6. May 8.30
7. January 8.25
8. June 8.15
9. April 8.12
10. December 8.07 (-0.42)
11. November 7.96 (-0.25)
12. February 7.55 (-0.12)
Given the data, Do you think this is a random distribution, or is there a bias?
Ok here are two more facts:
October 5 is supposedly the most popular birthday and May 22 is the least popular. (source wikipedia)
I seem to remember this as a joke, but it is worth noting that October 5 - 9 months = approximately New years eve!
Looking at the table again, the birthdays probably are not randomly distributed - seems like there is a bias caused by more conceptions happening in colder months??
Here is the distribution in the United States. (Source Hallmark)
Note that the expected value for months with 31 days is 8.49% and for months with 30 days is 8.21% and 7.67% for february.
Rank Month Percent
1. August 9.07 (+0.58)
2. July 8.80 (+0.59)
3. September 8.62
4. October 8.60
5. March 8.51
6. May 8.30
7. January 8.25
8. June 8.15
9. April 8.12
10. December 8.07 (-0.42)
11. November 7.96 (-0.25)
12. February 7.55 (-0.12)
Given the data, Do you think this is a random distribution, or is there a bias?
Ok here are two more facts:
October 5 is supposedly the most popular birthday and May 22 is the least popular. (source wikipedia)
I seem to remember this as a joke, but it is worth noting that October 5 - 9 months = approximately New years eve!
Looking at the table again, the birthdays probably are not randomly distributed - seems like there is a bias caused by more conceptions happening in colder months??
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
The Illusion of free will
I am going to give a very simple inductive argument and claim that 'free will' is an illusion.
The crux of the argument is as follows. Any decision a person takes is a function of the body of knowledge and experience the person posesses (and some random factors). The body of knowledge and the experiences that a person pocesses is the sum total of past decisions the person has already taken. Thus using inductive methods, we can show that a person does not have direct control of any decision he/she takes and thus 'free-will' is really an illusion.
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A person's actions can be viewed as a sum total of several decisions he/she takes in his life. (This is somewhat analogous to how in computation theory, one can reframe anygiven problem as a 'yes'/'no' problem).
So what I need to show is that the person 'does not have control' over any of his decisions.
Let P(i) : Man does not have direct control over his ith decision.
Base Case: P(0) is true.
'Proof': First of all, what is P(0), the first decsion that man takes. It is the decsion to manifest as himself/herself ( as such and such a person). Although I can not prove this, I think most of us will agree that the person does not have control over this step.
By the inductive hypothesis, let us assume P(i) is true for 0But his current decision is a function of his previous decisions and random factors.
Thus P(m) which is P(i+1) is true.
Note : I know I have not presented this as well as it could have been, but you get the idea.
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Wednesday Jun 20, 6.45 PM
Please refer Free will for a comprehensive account on this topic. Thanks to balaji for indirectly pointing out this. As one can see, there has been a lot of work on this; let me assimilate whatever that has been already done and get back later.
The crux of the argument is as follows. Any decision a person takes is a function of the body of knowledge and experience the person posesses (and some random factors). The body of knowledge and the experiences that a person pocesses is the sum total of past decisions the person has already taken. Thus using inductive methods, we can show that a person does not have direct control of any decision he/she takes and thus 'free-will' is really an illusion.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A person's actions can be viewed as a sum total of several decisions he/she takes in his life. (This is somewhat analogous to how in computation theory, one can reframe anygiven problem as a 'yes'/'no' problem).
So what I need to show is that the person 'does not have control' over any of his decisions.
Let P(i) : Man does not have direct control over his ith decision.
Base Case: P(0) is true.
'Proof': First of all, what is P(0), the first decsion that man takes. It is the decsion to manifest as himself/herself ( as such and such a person). Although I can not prove this, I think most of us will agree that the person does not have control over this step.
By the inductive hypothesis, let us assume P(i) is true for 0
Thus P(m) which is P(i+1) is true.
Note : I know I have not presented this as well as it could have been, but you get the idea.
-----------------------------------------
Wednesday Jun 20, 6.45 PM
Please refer Free will for a comprehensive account on this topic. Thanks to balaji for indirectly pointing out this. As one can see, there has been a lot of work on this; let me assimilate whatever that has been already done and get back later.
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
Ten
Yesterday, I saw a remarkable Iranian movie, Ten by the well known director Abbas Kiarostami. In one of my earlier posts, I had wondered about acting:
Can any given person "act" well...Afterall acting is something that everybody does all the time. For example, if we had an imaginary camera filming the daily lives of people, certainly the "acting" will be realistic!
The movie ten, which came in 2002, has a similar idea. Basically, the whole film shows close-up shots of the driver and the passenger of a car. While the driver of the car, a middle aged iranian lady ( breathtakingly beautiful ) who is also a divorcee, is constant in the movie, there are 4 different passengers (one at a time) including her (real) 10 year old son who argues with her on why she is not a good mother! All the "actors" play their real life roles!! Ofcourse, the 'actors' were aware of the camera. Apparently, the director would set the camera in the car and the 'actors' would just drive across the streets of tehran and play out their real life parts. 23 hours of footage, across 5 days, was collected and edited into a 90 minute movie.
A week or two ago, I saw the french movie Cet obscur objet du désir, by Luis Bunuel. I greatly enjoyed this as well. The interesting thing about this movie is that the director had used two actresses to portray one character.
Can any given person "act" well...Afterall acting is something that everybody does all the time. For example, if we had an imaginary camera filming the daily lives of people, certainly the "acting" will be realistic!
The movie ten, which came in 2002, has a similar idea. Basically, the whole film shows close-up shots of the driver and the passenger of a car. While the driver of the car, a middle aged iranian lady ( breathtakingly beautiful ) who is also a divorcee, is constant in the movie, there are 4 different passengers (one at a time) including her (real) 10 year old son who argues with her on why she is not a good mother! All the "actors" play their real life roles!! Ofcourse, the 'actors' were aware of the camera. Apparently, the director would set the camera in the car and the 'actors' would just drive across the streets of tehran and play out their real life parts. 23 hours of footage, across 5 days, was collected and edited into a 90 minute movie.
A week or two ago, I saw the french movie Cet obscur objet du désir, by Luis Bunuel. I greatly enjoyed this as well. The interesting thing about this movie is that the director had used two actresses to portray one character.
Saturday, June 02, 2007
Hell and Heaven
While the former is eternal suffering, the latter is eternal boredom - a tough choice indeed.
Srotaswini
This is a pentatonic raga : S G2 M1 P N3
A very attractive raga, has a very unique emotion. Was used by Ilayaraja in two songs: Oh Vasantha raja and Sindhiya Venmani.
Random notes:
0. I am not aware of any old carnatic krithis is this raga; there are one or two krithis composed by contemporary musicians. This leads to the question: Did Ilayaraja discover this raga with his 1984 song?
1. In both of the songs, ilayaraja mixes another raga -- was this because of lack of posibilities in srotaswini?
2. I first encountered this raga when I was playing Shanmugapriya and tried graha bedham with the notes G2 M2 D1 N2 R2 G2, with G2 as S.
A very attractive raga, has a very unique emotion. Was used by Ilayaraja in two songs: Oh Vasantha raja and Sindhiya Venmani.
Random notes:
0. I am not aware of any old carnatic krithis is this raga; there are one or two krithis composed by contemporary musicians. This leads to the question: Did Ilayaraja discover this raga with his 1984 song?
1. In both of the songs, ilayaraja mixes another raga -- was this because of lack of posibilities in srotaswini?
2. I first encountered this raga when I was playing Shanmugapriya and tried graha bedham with the notes G2 M2 D1 N2 R2 G2, with G2 as S.
Labels: pentatonic raga
Friday, May 11, 2007
Partitioning Melakarta Ragas into Equivalence Classes based on Sruti Bedham Relation
Overview:
In this post, I will examine the sruti bedham (aka graha bedham) relationship among ragas. I will show that ragas can be classified into different equivalence classes such that any two ragas belonging to the same class can be transformed into one another using graha bedham. To illustrate this, I have generated the equivalence classes for the melakarta ragas. I have used this classification to draw some conclusions and some interesting hypotheses.
Informal Treatment:
Sruti/Graha Bedham is the technique in which a new raga can be derived from the original raga, by changing the sruti (shadjam) . For example, if a singer is singing the raga mohanam (aro: S R2 G3 P D2) and he/she makes the rishabam (R2) of mohanam as the shadjam, then we get the madhyamavati raga (aro : S R2 M1 P N2 ). This is because (R2 G3 P D2 S) is equivalent to (S R2 M P N2) when R2 is assumed to be s. This is the essence of graha bedham.
Let me define a simple notation. Suppose A and B are two ragas, and it is possible to derive the raga B from A by assuming the swara j of raga A as shadjam, we denote this by A*I --> B. For example Mohanam*R --> Madhyamavati. This work hinges on three important facts which I will formally prove later. The two important facts are the following:
(1) Graha bedam relationship among ragas is symmetric: If the raga B can be derived from A through graha bedam then raga A can also be derived from B via graha bedham. That is, A*I-->B implies B*J--> A for some swara J. For example, we saw earlier how madhyamavati can be obtained from mohanam. Likewise, we can also obtain mohanam from madhyamavati by letting the nishadam of madhyamavati (N2) as shadjam.
(2) Graha bedam relation among ragas is transitive: If raga B can be derived from A and raga C can be derived from B then raga C can be derived from A. That is, A*I-->B and B*J--> C implies A*K-->C for some swara K. For example, madhyamavati can be derived from mohanam (by letting R of mohanam be the S) and hindolam can be derived from madhyamavati (by letting the R of madhyamavati be the S). This implies that hindolam can be derived from mohanam -- this is true. (by letting G of mohanam be the S).
(3) Graha bedam relation amon ragas is reflexive: This just says that the same raga can be derived from itself - which is trivially true, by not performing any sruti bedam and letting the shadjam be itself.
The above 3 facts imply that the sruti/graha bedham relation is an equivalence relation. This means that ragas can be partitioned into equivalence classes, such that any two ragas within the same equivalence class is related (they can be transformed into each other), but any two ragas from two different equivalence classes are not related. I wrote a program to find the equivalence classes across the melakarta ragas and this is the classification.
Equivalence Classes for Melakarthas:
Equivalence class of 6 ragas: (6x1 = 6)
(8,20,22,28,29,65): Thodi, Natabhairavi, Karaharapriya, Harikambodi, Shankarabharanam, Mechakalyani
Equivalence class of 4 ragas: (4x3) = 12
(9,35,56,66) : Dhenuka, Sulini, Shanmugapriya, Chitrambari
(10,23,26,64): Natakapriya, Gaurimanohari, Charukesi, Vachaspati
(14,21,58,71): Vakulabharanam, Kiravani, Hemavati, Kosalam
Equivalence class of 3 ragas: (3x6 = 18)
(2,19,53) : Ratnangi, Jhankaradvani, Gamanasramam
(3,54,55) : Ganamurthi, Viswambari, Shyamalangi
(7,17,63) : Senavati, Suryakantam, Lathangi
(15,57,72): Mayamalavagowla, Simhendramadyamam, Rasikapriya
(16,27,59): Chakravakam, Sarasangi, Dharmavati
(30,34,44): Naganandhini, Vagadeeshwari, Bavapriya
Equivalence class of 2 ragas: (2x10 = 20)
(1,51) : Kanakangi, Kamavardhini
(4,25) : Vanaspati, Mararanjani
(5,61) : Manavati, Kanthamani
(11,62): Kokilapriya, Rishabapriya
(13,69): Gayakapriya, Dhatuvardini
(18,43): Hatakambari, Gavambodhi
(24,32): Varunapriya, Ragavardhani
(33,60): Gangeyabhushani, Nitimati
(36,45): Chalanata, Subhapantuvarali
(46,70): Shadvidhamargini, Nasikabhushani
Equivalence class of 1 raga: (1x16 = 16)
(6,) : Tanarupi
(12,): Rupavati
(31,): Yagapriya
(37,): Salagam
(38,); Jalarnavam
(39,): Jhalavaraali
(40,): Navaneetam
(41,): Pavani
(42,): Raghupriya
(47,): Suvarnangi
(48,): Divyambari
(49,): Davalambari
(50,): Namanarayani
(52,): Ramapriya
(67,): Sucharitra
(68,): Jothiswaroopini
You can view this larger file, that lists in detail, through what swaras the transformation between the ragas occur. This information will be very useful to a carnatic musician.
Observations and Analysis:
1. Observe that the biggest equivalence class is the the one with the 6 ragas and it includes the widely acknowledged six major ragas in carnatic music. (Actually bhairavi instead of natabharavi and kambodhi instead of harikambodhi are part of the 6. But they are very close janya ragas). This leads me to propose that a raga is more 'stable' if it can be transformed into several additional ragas by performing sruti bedam. Here, the 'stability' refers to how long one can explore the raga. The rationale behind this claim is as follows: For a raga to be explored, one needs to be able to perform alapanai anchoring on several of the ragas swaras. By anchoring on a swara, it can be viewed in some sense as changing the sruti to that note. The fact that a raga arises ('stability') out of this anchoring, as opposed to no raga arising ('instability') means one can anchor on that particular note, while performing the alapanai. I know I am hand waving a little here, but let me explore this is detail in another post.
2. There seems to be a correlation between the how common a raga is and the cardinality of its equivalence class. We arleady saw how the 6 major ragas formed the biggest equivalence class. It is worth noting that relatively major ragas like shanmugapriya, kiravani, charukesi, hemavati are all from the equivalence class of cardinality of 4. Note that several prathi madhyama ragas (ragas with M2) are the ones which are alone and they are not in practical use.
3. Two ragas that are surprisingly alone : jalavaraali (janaka raga of varaali which is in wide use) and jothiswaroopini.
4. These equivalence classes of ragas have an important consequence for an automated raga identifier. If a naive identifier worked by finding the swaras in the composition, supposing it found the notes corresponding to say kharaharapriya, then how can the identifier be sure its is not any of the other 5 ragas from the same class? Thus I claim, any automated raga identifier must first identify the sruti (the shadjamam) of the composition, before it can identify the raga.
Formal Treatment:
In this section, I will prove the 3 facts that have been used in the informal section.
This post is becoming very long and I am also getting bored, let me do this in the next post.
Related Work (2nd Nov 2007):
I came across this work, which is very much related to the above work.
In this post, I will examine the sruti bedham (aka graha bedham) relationship among ragas. I will show that ragas can be classified into different equivalence classes such that any two ragas belonging to the same class can be transformed into one another using graha bedham. To illustrate this, I have generated the equivalence classes for the melakarta ragas. I have used this classification to draw some conclusions and some interesting hypotheses.
Informal Treatment:
Sruti/Graha Bedham is the technique in which a new raga can be derived from the original raga, by changing the sruti (shadjam) . For example, if a singer is singing the raga mohanam (aro: S R2 G3 P D2) and he/she makes the rishabam (R2) of mohanam as the shadjam, then we get the madhyamavati raga (aro : S R2 M1 P N2 ). This is because (R2 G3 P D2 S) is equivalent to (S R2 M P N2) when R2 is assumed to be s. This is the essence of graha bedham.
Let me define a simple notation. Suppose A and B are two ragas, and it is possible to derive the raga B from A by assuming the swara j of raga A as shadjam, we denote this by A*I --> B. For example Mohanam*R --> Madhyamavati. This work hinges on three important facts which I will formally prove later. The two important facts are the following:
(1) Graha bedam relationship among ragas is symmetric: If the raga B can be derived from A through graha bedam then raga A can also be derived from B via graha bedham. That is, A*I-->B implies B*J--> A for some swara J. For example, we saw earlier how madhyamavati can be obtained from mohanam. Likewise, we can also obtain mohanam from madhyamavati by letting the nishadam of madhyamavati (N2) as shadjam.
(2) Graha bedam relation among ragas is transitive: If raga B can be derived from A and raga C can be derived from B then raga C can be derived from A. That is, A*I-->B and B*J--> C implies A*K-->C for some swara K. For example, madhyamavati can be derived from mohanam (by letting R of mohanam be the S) and hindolam can be derived from madhyamavati (by letting the R of madhyamavati be the S). This implies that hindolam can be derived from mohanam -- this is true. (by letting G of mohanam be the S).
(3) Graha bedam relation amon ragas is reflexive: This just says that the same raga can be derived from itself - which is trivially true, by not performing any sruti bedam and letting the shadjam be itself.
The above 3 facts imply that the sruti/graha bedham relation is an equivalence relation. This means that ragas can be partitioned into equivalence classes, such that any two ragas within the same equivalence class is related (they can be transformed into each other), but any two ragas from two different equivalence classes are not related. I wrote a program to find the equivalence classes across the melakarta ragas and this is the classification.
Equivalence Classes for Melakarthas:
Equivalence class of 6 ragas: (6x1 = 6)
(8,20,22,28,29,65): Thodi, Natabhairavi, Karaharapriya, Harikambodi, Shankarabharanam, Mechakalyani
Equivalence class of 4 ragas: (4x3) = 12
(9,35,56,66) : Dhenuka, Sulini, Shanmugapriya, Chitrambari
(10,23,26,64): Natakapriya, Gaurimanohari, Charukesi, Vachaspati
(14,21,58,71): Vakulabharanam, Kiravani, Hemavati, Kosalam
Equivalence class of 3 ragas: (3x6 = 18)
(2,19,53) : Ratnangi, Jhankaradvani, Gamanasramam
(3,54,55) : Ganamurthi, Viswambari, Shyamalangi
(7,17,63) : Senavati, Suryakantam, Lathangi
(15,57,72): Mayamalavagowla, Simhendramadyamam, Rasikapriya
(16,27,59): Chakravakam, Sarasangi, Dharmavati
(30,34,44): Naganandhini, Vagadeeshwari, Bavapriya
Equivalence class of 2 ragas: (2x10 = 20)
(1,51) : Kanakangi, Kamavardhini
(4,25) : Vanaspati, Mararanjani
(5,61) : Manavati, Kanthamani
(11,62): Kokilapriya, Rishabapriya
(13,69): Gayakapriya, Dhatuvardini
(18,43): Hatakambari, Gavambodhi
(24,32): Varunapriya, Ragavardhani
(33,60): Gangeyabhushani, Nitimati
(36,45): Chalanata, Subhapantuvarali
(46,70): Shadvidhamargini, Nasikabhushani
Equivalence class of 1 raga: (1x16 = 16)
(6,) : Tanarupi
(12,): Rupavati
(31,): Yagapriya
(37,): Salagam
(38,); Jalarnavam
(39,): Jhalavaraali
(40,): Navaneetam
(41,): Pavani
(42,): Raghupriya
(47,): Suvarnangi
(48,): Divyambari
(49,): Davalambari
(50,): Namanarayani
(52,): Ramapriya
(67,): Sucharitra
(68,): Jothiswaroopini
You can view this larger file, that lists in detail, through what swaras the transformation between the ragas occur. This information will be very useful to a carnatic musician.
Observations and Analysis:
1. Observe that the biggest equivalence class is the the one with the 6 ragas and it includes the widely acknowledged six major ragas in carnatic music. (Actually bhairavi instead of natabharavi and kambodhi instead of harikambodhi are part of the 6. But they are very close janya ragas). This leads me to propose that a raga is more 'stable' if it can be transformed into several additional ragas by performing sruti bedam. Here, the 'stability' refers to how long one can explore the raga. The rationale behind this claim is as follows: For a raga to be explored, one needs to be able to perform alapanai anchoring on several of the ragas swaras. By anchoring on a swara, it can be viewed in some sense as changing the sruti to that note. The fact that a raga arises ('stability') out of this anchoring, as opposed to no raga arising ('instability') means one can anchor on that particular note, while performing the alapanai. I know I am hand waving a little here, but let me explore this is detail in another post.
2. There seems to be a correlation between the how common a raga is and the cardinality of its equivalence class. We arleady saw how the 6 major ragas formed the biggest equivalence class. It is worth noting that relatively major ragas like shanmugapriya, kiravani, charukesi, hemavati are all from the equivalence class of cardinality of 4. Note that several prathi madhyama ragas (ragas with M2) are the ones which are alone and they are not in practical use.
3. Two ragas that are surprisingly alone : jalavaraali (janaka raga of varaali which is in wide use) and jothiswaroopini.
4. These equivalence classes of ragas have an important consequence for an automated raga identifier. If a naive identifier worked by finding the swaras in the composition, supposing it found the notes corresponding to say kharaharapriya, then how can the identifier be sure its is not any of the other 5 ragas from the same class? Thus I claim, any automated raga identifier must first identify the sruti (the shadjamam) of the composition, before it can identify the raga.
Formal Treatment:
In this section, I will prove the 3 facts that have been used in the informal section.
This post is becoming very long and I am also getting bored, let me do this in the next post.
Related Work (2nd Nov 2007):
I came across this work, which is very much related to the above work.
Labels: equivalence class, graha bedham, melakartha, raga, sruti bedham
Wednesday, April 18, 2007
Beauty and Goodness
Is there a correlation between "beauty" and "goodness".
Specifically, there are two obvious questions:
(1) In general, Are Beautiful people good? (More "good" than people who are not perceived beautiful)
(2) Do people, in general, think that beautiful people are good?
It is important to observe the subtle difference between the two questions. While the first question concerns a truism about beauty and goodness, the second question merely asks if people, in fact, have stereotyped
notions of the personality traits possessed by individuals of varying attractiveness. In this sense, the second question is more well defined and seems simpler to find out.
It is precisely the second question that Dion et al. sought to answer in their work titled, What is beautiful is good. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
I have quoted the abstract of their work. You can get the full paper by doing a google or scholar search. It is short and interesting.
A person's physical appearance, along with his sexual identity, is the personal
characteristic that is most obvious and accessible to others in social interaction.
The present experiment was designed to determine whether physically
attractive stimulus persons, both male and female, are (a) assumed to possess
more socially desirable personality traits than physically unattractive stimulus
persons and (6) expected to lead better lives (e.g., be more competent
husbands and wives, be more successful occupationally, etc.) than unattractive
stimulus persons.
...
The present results indicate a "what is beautiful is good" stereotype along the physical attractiveness dimension.
...
Specifically, there are two obvious questions:
(1) In general, Are Beautiful people good? (More "good" than people who are not perceived beautiful)
(2) Do people, in general, think that beautiful people are good?
It is important to observe the subtle difference between the two questions. While the first question concerns a truism about beauty and goodness, the second question merely asks if people, in fact, have stereotyped
notions of the personality traits possessed by individuals of varying attractiveness. In this sense, the second question is more well defined and seems simpler to find out.
It is precisely the second question that Dion et al. sought to answer in their work titled, What is beautiful is good. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
I have quoted the abstract of their work. You can get the full paper by doing a google or scholar search. It is short and interesting.
A person's physical appearance, along with his sexual identity, is the personal
characteristic that is most obvious and accessible to others in social interaction.
The present experiment was designed to determine whether physically
attractive stimulus persons, both male and female, are (a) assumed to possess
more socially desirable personality traits than physically unattractive stimulus
persons and (6) expected to lead better lives (e.g., be more competent
husbands and wives, be more successful occupationally, etc.) than unattractive
stimulus persons.
...
The present results indicate a "what is beautiful is good" stereotype along the physical attractiveness dimension.
...
Saturday, April 07, 2007
Extroversion and I
Wikipedia has a great definition of extroversion - of the 'hit-the-nail-on-the-head' kind.
Extroversion is "the act, state, or habit of being predominantly concerned with and obtaining gratification from what is outside the self"
I have been always confused about my levels of extroversion. Recently, I was reading about the 'big 5 personality traits' and took the associated test for fun. I was slightly suprised to find that I was as extroverted as the average person.
Then the definition of extroversion really gave me some clarity. I now realise that I always was, and probably "knew" that I was, as extroverted as the average person. But the problem was , I never wanted to be a person who seeks gratification from the outside - It didn'nt make sense to me to be seeking gratification from the outside (even now it does not make sense).
But ofcourse there is (and has to be, otherwise there is no reason to exist) a gap between what we are and what we want to be.
Anyway, I am currently in a state where I have reconciled myself to my extroversion.
Extroversion is "the act, state, or habit of being predominantly concerned with and obtaining gratification from what is outside the self"
I have been always confused about my levels of extroversion. Recently, I was reading about the 'big 5 personality traits' and took the associated test for fun. I was slightly suprised to find that I was as extroverted as the average person.
Then the definition of extroversion really gave me some clarity. I now realise that I always was, and probably "knew" that I was, as extroverted as the average person. But the problem was , I never wanted to be a person who seeks gratification from the outside - It didn'nt make sense to me to be seeking gratification from the outside (even now it does not make sense).
But ofcourse there is (and has to be, otherwise there is no reason to exist) a gap between what we are and what we want to be.
Anyway, I am currently in a state where I have reconciled myself to my extroversion.
Saturday, March 31, 2007
Musical Bliss
I happenned to hear the krithi "Gaanamuda Paanam' by Sanjay accompanied by karaikudi mani, in rhapsody. For those in USA, rhapsody is a great place to hear high sound quality music for free. They have a great collection of music from around the world.
It is actually a live recording from the december 1999 season. Charsur deserves special praise for the superior audio quality. I suspect they also gave a slight eq boost around the lows (100-200 hz); this causes the 'thopi' of the mridangam to sound better, in my opinion.
Words cannot describe the bliss I experienced listening to this piece - especially in the charanam when he sings ' jyotiswaroopini shakthi vel arulal amayum..'
It is actually a live recording from the december 1999 season. Charsur deserves special praise for the superior audio quality. I suspect they also gave a slight eq boost around the lows (100-200 hz); this causes the 'thopi' of the mridangam to sound better, in my opinion.
Words cannot describe the bliss I experienced listening to this piece - especially in the charanam when he sings ' jyotiswaroopini shakthi vel arulal amayum..'
Sunday, March 11, 2007
StrangeHope: or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Continue Producing Rubbish
"A subtle thought that is in error may yet give rise to fruitful inquiry that can establish truths of great value."
-- Issac Asimov
P.S: On a rather 'unrelated' note, yes I did watch it the second time, if I may; (The first time, I was on a 'high ' and dozed off after watching just the first 20 minutes.) But this time I found it outrageously funny and the laughter I experienced rivalled that of 'Michael madhana...' 16 years back. I now have a newfound respect for Kubrick (I also watched 'eyes wide shut' ) - maybe movies are like songs or beer, sometime it takes time to appreciate it.
-- Issac Asimov
P.S: On a rather 'unrelated' note, yes I did watch it the second time, if I may; (The first time, I was on a 'high ' and dozed off after watching just the first 20 minutes.) But this time I found it outrageously funny and the laughter I experienced rivalled that of 'Michael madhana...' 16 years back. I now have a newfound respect for Kubrick (I also watched 'eyes wide shut' ) - maybe movies are like songs or beer, sometime it takes time to appreciate it.
Labels: issav asimov, Strangelove
Monday, February 19, 2007
Are all art-forms algorithms?
It's absolutely impossible to improvise. Making a movie is a mathematical operation. It is like sending a missile to the moon. It isn't improvised. It is too defined to be called improvisational, too mechanical. Art is a scientific operation, so I can say that what we usually call improvisation is in my case just having an ear and eye for things that sometimes occur during the time we are making the picture.
-- Federico Fellini , Italian Director
In Computer science, an algorithm is a set of instructions for accompishing a task. Furthermore, if the instructions are executed correctly the task will be accomplished in finite time.
Is there an algorithm for each and every art form?
I think so. I strongly subscribe to fellini's notion of all art actually being science. I think there are several reasons for art being separated and given a different status.
(1) The general quest of people to experience something incredible, amazing i.e some performance that does not have any apparent "algorithm" for they themselves accomplishing it.
A classic example is magic. People are attracted to magic just because they do not know the "algorithm" behind the trick. But do note that every magic trick has a plausible explanation. If the explanation is known to the public they will not want to pay and watch the show.
I think all art forms are like "magic" in that they have a well defined procedure for accomplishing the art form, which if known to people will diminish their amazement about the art form.
(2) In most art forms the algorithms are complex because of which the performer is not aware that he is merely executing an algorithm; His subconcious self is obviously aware of the algorithm which is why he is able to perform in the first place
(3) The randomized nature of most art forms gives as impression of improvisation. In most cases the actual algorithm may be a randomized algorithm. For example each time a singer executes a raaga aalapana (of the same raaga), it is different. If a batsman faces identical deliveries (pace, length, line, conditions are identical) he may yet play two different shots. Note that a randomized algorithm is still an algorithm.
As a proof of concept, here is a very simple algorithm for music composition.
Inputs: The emotion of the song. (Eg happiness , pathos etc...)
Output: The composition
-------------------------------------------------------------
Algorithm:
1. Consult look up table and obtain raaga, tempo.
If there are more entries for the emotion, pick randomly.
Note the look-up table is of the following form:
Mood Raga Tempo
death Subapanthuvaraali 40BPM
...
happiness Mohanam 120 BPM
happiness shankarabaranam 160 BPM
.....
.....
2. Chose a tala at random.
3. Emit notes from the raga randomly such that it fits the tala.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Thats all...we are done. My intuition says that this ridiculously simple algorithm is enough for composing "good" songs. Ofcourse, the algorithm's caomplexity can easily extended/increased in practice.
I need to try and build this software and get the general public's opinion on the "quality" of music.
-- Federico Fellini , Italian Director
In Computer science, an algorithm is a set of instructions for accompishing a task. Furthermore, if the instructions are executed correctly the task will be accomplished in finite time.
Is there an algorithm for each and every art form?
I think so. I strongly subscribe to fellini's notion of all art actually being science. I think there are several reasons for art being separated and given a different status.
(1) The general quest of people to experience something incredible, amazing i.e some performance that does not have any apparent "algorithm" for they themselves accomplishing it.
A classic example is magic. People are attracted to magic just because they do not know the "algorithm" behind the trick. But do note that every magic trick has a plausible explanation. If the explanation is known to the public they will not want to pay and watch the show.
I think all art forms are like "magic" in that they have a well defined procedure for accomplishing the art form, which if known to people will diminish their amazement about the art form.
(2) In most art forms the algorithms are complex because of which the performer is not aware that he is merely executing an algorithm; His subconcious self is obviously aware of the algorithm which is why he is able to perform in the first place
(3) The randomized nature of most art forms gives as impression of improvisation. In most cases the actual algorithm may be a randomized algorithm. For example each time a singer executes a raaga aalapana (of the same raaga), it is different. If a batsman faces identical deliveries (pace, length, line, conditions are identical) he may yet play two different shots. Note that a randomized algorithm is still an algorithm.
As a proof of concept, here is a very simple algorithm for music composition.
Inputs: The emotion of the song. (Eg happiness , pathos etc...)
Output: The composition
-------------------------------------------------------------
Algorithm:
1. Consult look up table and obtain raaga, tempo.
If there are more entries for the emotion, pick randomly.
Note the look-up table is of the following form:
Mood Raga Tempo
death Subapanthuvaraali 40BPM
...
happiness Mohanam 120 BPM
happiness shankarabaranam 160 BPM
.....
.....
2. Chose a tala at random.
3. Emit notes from the raga randomly such that it fits the tala.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Thats all...we are done. My intuition says that this ridiculously simple algorithm is enough for composing "good" songs. Ofcourse, the algorithm's caomplexity can easily extended/increased in practice.
I need to try and build this software and get the general public's opinion on the "quality" of music.
Labels: algorithm, art, compose, music
Friday, January 05, 2007
sachin
The best batsmen in contemporary cricket as far as batting skill is considered.
Not strong mentally.
-------
23rd march 2007
I am not entirely sure about the above comment. When I made the above comment I was comparing sachin with somebody like warne -- but the comparison may be unfair; warne's family (if he has one) is not threatened if doesent perform well.
Not strong mentally.
-------
23rd march 2007
I am not entirely sure about the above comment. When I made the above comment I was comparing sachin with somebody like warne -- but the comparison may be unfair; warne's family (if he has one) is not threatened if doesent perform well.
Saturday, December 02, 2006
This is A too much
I am as muddled as the sweet ordered by Janakaraj in 'sirippo sirippu'.
This is after watching movies by woody allen, satyajit ray, almodovar etc.
I am in dire need of some ilaya thalapathi movies...
This is after watching movies by woody allen, satyajit ray, almodovar etc.
I am in dire need of some ilaya thalapathi movies...
Friday, December 01, 2006
Realism to the core
Had the good fortune of watching "Pather Panchali" by sathyajit ray yesterday. At the same time I ask myself why I hadnt watched it earlier. It really is one of the most realistic films that I have ever watched. Each and every small movement of the "actors" has some meaning. Most of the "actors" were not professionals (only one was a professional)- maybe thats the reason it was so life-like.
At this point, it is interesting to think about the actual skill of acting. I ask myself whether it is conceptually different from other skills such as painting, dance, singing, sculpture. Can any given person "act" well...Afterall acting is something that everybody does all the time. For example, if we had an imaginary camera filming the daily lives of people, certainly the "acting" will be realistic! Ofcourse the skill lies in reacting to situations when the sitautions are imaginary. This is what people like Sivaji, Kamal are good at. But I think this as more of an aptitude rather than skill. If one constantly observes people (or observe ourselves) certainly one can become better at this.
Infact, one does not even need to pocess this aptitude to act well. He/She just needs to be taught exactly what he needs to do. I think this is what Satyajit Ray must have done; he must have explained it to the actors in such a fine grained level.
I am not sure...I need to think more about this...
At this point, it is interesting to think about the actual skill of acting. I ask myself whether it is conceptually different from other skills such as painting, dance, singing, sculpture. Can any given person "act" well...Afterall acting is something that everybody does all the time. For example, if we had an imaginary camera filming the daily lives of people, certainly the "acting" will be realistic! Ofcourse the skill lies in reacting to situations when the sitautions are imaginary. This is what people like Sivaji, Kamal are good at. But I think this as more of an aptitude rather than skill. If one constantly observes people (or observe ourselves) certainly one can become better at this.
Infact, one does not even need to pocess this aptitude to act well. He/She just needs to be taught exactly what he needs to do. I think this is what Satyajit Ray must have done; he must have explained it to the actors in such a fine grained level.
I am not sure...I need to think more about this...
Sunday, October 22, 2006
Every effort under compulsion demands a sacrifice of life-energy.
-- Nikola Tesla
What an appropriate word -- Life energy. I want to lose as little of my life-energy as possible, lets see...
Saw the movie , Prestige. (and hence the tesla quote). Found it a little contrived...not nearly as good as memento. But certainly was not boring. Would give it 6.5/10.
-- Nikola Tesla
What an appropriate word -- Life energy. I want to lose as little of my life-energy as possible, lets see...
Saw the movie , Prestige. (and hence the tesla quote). Found it a little contrived...not nearly as good as memento. But certainly was not boring. Would give it 6.5/10.
Two Movie recommendations
Dersu Uzala:
A heart rendering story about friendship and nature, by Kurosawa.
This film also greatly helped me appreciate (and believe) a well known theory in history and linguistics.
I am talking about the Aryan Immigration theory - which hypothesizes that the speakers of Indo-Aryan languages (including sanskrit) migrated into India around 1500 BC near the end of (what is now called) the Indus Valley civilization.
But this would mean that a bunch of nomads from central asia spoke a form of proto-sanskrit. This was really hard for me to digest as I thought sansrit to be too "classy" and "sophisticated".
In "Dersu Unzala" , the lead character is a siberian tribal who speaks russian with an accent that I find so similar to sanskrit. This is enough to clear all my "doubts" reagarding the aryan-immigration theory!!
The Decalogue:
The first episode of this movie has got to be one of the most tragic films that I ever saw. I really liked the style of the director (Kieslowski) , especially the camera angles. (Some very intresting postitions and so close to show even the slightest of emotions).
A heart rendering story about friendship and nature, by Kurosawa.
This film also greatly helped me appreciate (and believe) a well known theory in history and linguistics.
I am talking about the Aryan Immigration theory - which hypothesizes that the speakers of Indo-Aryan languages (including sanskrit) migrated into India around 1500 BC near the end of (what is now called) the Indus Valley civilization.
But this would mean that a bunch of nomads from central asia spoke a form of proto-sanskrit. This was really hard for me to digest as I thought sansrit to be too "classy" and "sophisticated".
In "Dersu Unzala" , the lead character is a siberian tribal who speaks russian with an accent that I find so similar to sanskrit. This is enough to clear all my "doubts" reagarding the aryan-immigration theory!!
The Decalogue:
The first episode of this movie has got to be one of the most tragic films that I ever saw. I really liked the style of the director (Kieslowski) , especially the camera angles. (Some very intresting postitions and so close to show even the slightest of emotions).
Monday, October 16, 2006
Finnish Tamil Connection - 2
Following is the paper that proposes connection between dravidian (of which tamil is a part) and uralic languages. (of which finnish is a part).
The paper mainly has a list of mappings between a set of uralic and dravidian root words.
If the link does not work, search for "Dravidian and Uralian: The Lexical Evidence" in google or scholar.
The paper mainly has a list of mappings between a set of uralic and dravidian root words.
If the link does not work, search for "Dravidian and Uralian: The Lexical Evidence" in google or scholar.
Labels: dravidian, finnish, tamil, uralic
Tuesday, September 05, 2006
God's Debris
A friend of mine sent me the link of this free ebook God's Debris.
Its a short book of about 140 pages. (Even I was able to read it)
The crux of the book is contained in the first 60 pages.
/*********************spoilers********************/
The book discusses several things that were also discussed in some of the posts of this blog. Thus reading the book was a very exciting and a pleasurable experience for me. Infact, in several places it was as if I was reading my own thoughts.
The crux of the book is based on the following hypothesis: An omnipotent being has only one challenge, the challenge of destroying itself. (What a beautiful hypothesis). Read the book for the discussion of this.
So the author claims that big bang is really 'god destroying itself' and creation was caused because of this. Thus it claims we are all god's debris. Further it hypothesizes that we are all trying to unite and become the omnipotent being again. The books cites human' being's instinct to communicate as an evidence for this.
On the other hand, the book begins to drag after 70 pages and becomes montonous trying to "explain" everything using probability.
Its a short book of about 140 pages. (Even I was able to read it)
The crux of the book is contained in the first 60 pages.
/*********************spoilers********************/
The book discusses several things that were also discussed in some of the posts of this blog. Thus reading the book was a very exciting and a pleasurable experience for me. Infact, in several places it was as if I was reading my own thoughts.
The crux of the book is based on the following hypothesis: An omnipotent being has only one challenge, the challenge of destroying itself. (What a beautiful hypothesis). Read the book for the discussion of this.
So the author claims that big bang is really 'god destroying itself' and creation was caused because of this. Thus it claims we are all god's debris. Further it hypothesizes that we are all trying to unite and become the omnipotent being again. The books cites human' being's instinct to communicate as an evidence for this.
On the other hand, the book begins to drag after 70 pages and becomes montonous trying to "explain" everything using probability.
Sunday, July 16, 2006
On the fickle nature of "Self-Confidence"
What are the ways in which we typically derive/maintain our "self-confidence"? Some of the avenues are "Good-looks", "Achievements", "talents", "character" etc. The reason I put each of the items in quotations, is to emphasize the fact that each of qualitites are those that the world has bestowed upon the party under consideration.
In each of the following examples consider a person who derives his/her self-confidence based on good-looks, talents, character respectively.
For example consider a person that is considered good-looking. Suppose he/she and her friend 'B' meets another person 'C'. For some reason if the person 'C' only pays attention to B more than A, naturally this would cause some discomfort in A. The extent of this discomfort is related to the emotional stability of A -- but even to the most stable of people, the repetition of such incidents will certainly cause a drop in (what we call) the self-confidence of A.
Actually this idea was illustrated , quite brutally, in the film, American Beauty. (Well, this was not the main theme of the film but one of the things.).
The same idea can be applied to other such qualities. For example, suppose a person is a good violonist ( the world considers him/her). But for some reason, he gives a recital and the audience thinks what he played was crap. Again depending on the stability of the original person, this may or may not cause significant discomfort. But repeated such incidents will cause a drop in self-confidence.
Finally consider a person who is considered a very moral person with good character. Suppose suddenly something happens to the world and rules of the world are changed and now "right" is "wrong" and "wrong" is "right". (Here I am emphasizing the fact that moral are but rules). Again the person will now become "bad" and his confidence will drop.
...I just gave this rather improbable example for variation...A more practical example in line with the first two is still applicable for "character".
So, I wonder, how something called "self-confidence" can be a function of something the world percieves of us.
Thus I conclude in the ideal world, self-confidence is a quantity that should be possessed without a reason. But in such an ideal state, the person may not have any need to posess self-confidence.
The last two statements of the previous paragraph do not contradict each other.
In each of the following examples consider a person who derives his/her self-confidence based on good-looks, talents, character respectively.
For example consider a person that is considered good-looking. Suppose he/she and her friend 'B' meets another person 'C'. For some reason if the person 'C' only pays attention to B more than A, naturally this would cause some discomfort in A. The extent of this discomfort is related to the emotional stability of A -- but even to the most stable of people, the repetition of such incidents will certainly cause a drop in (what we call) the self-confidence of A.
Actually this idea was illustrated , quite brutally, in the film, American Beauty. (Well, this was not the main theme of the film but one of the things.).
The same idea can be applied to other such qualities. For example, suppose a person is a good violonist ( the world considers him/her). But for some reason, he gives a recital and the audience thinks what he played was crap. Again depending on the stability of the original person, this may or may not cause significant discomfort. But repeated such incidents will cause a drop in self-confidence.
Finally consider a person who is considered a very moral person with good character. Suppose suddenly something happens to the world and rules of the world are changed and now "right" is "wrong" and "wrong" is "right". (Here I am emphasizing the fact that moral are but rules). Again the person will now become "bad" and his confidence will drop.
...I just gave this rather improbable example for variation...A more practical example in line with the first two is still applicable for "character".
So, I wonder, how something called "self-confidence" can be a function of something the world percieves of us.
Thus I conclude in the ideal world, self-confidence is a quantity that should be possessed without a reason. But in such an ideal state, the person may not have any need to posess self-confidence.
The last two statements of the previous paragraph do not contradict each other.
Saturday, July 01, 2006
Intresting/scary dream
Dreams typically occur during the REM (rapid eye movement) phase of sleep, which is not a considered a deep stage of our sleep. I thus interpret this stage of the sleep (and I may be technically wrong) where our "input, output devices" (the sense organs) are relatively active. This explains why it is easier to awaken people when they are in the REM stage. This also explains why several dreams interfere with the reality. For example, several times I have dreamed of chocolates and end up waking trying to open the 'wrapper'. I also remember some bed-wetting episodes I have experienced in my childhood where in my dream I'd actually be urinating (supposedly in a toilet). The last example is a clear case of the external impulse, the need to urinate, interfering with the dream's "screenplay".
A couple of weeks ago I had a similar episode. I was sleeping and was probably in the REM stage and was apparently dreaming. Apparently I had also felt a need to urinate. (when I was dreaming/sleeping). So I remember, (in my dream) I was going to a toilet and was planning to urinate. Just as I was starting, a person entered the toilet(I had forgotten to close the door. )
A person entering when one is about to pee, is a fairly common incident. But what generally happens next is the person leaving at once with a sorry or something, and then we are allowed to continue. But in my dream, the person just would not leave. Even after me literally howling at the person, the person would not budge. Have you ever experienced the need to stop when you have just started peeing...it is one of the most uncomfortable experiences. Naturally due to the "discomfort", I was awoken and I had not urinated in the real world.
Now these are the interesting questions:
1. Will I have urinated in the real world, if the person left the toilet at once?
(or if the person did not appear in the first place) -- I think yes.
2. Was the incident of the person entering the toilet and refusing to leave a coincidence? -- No I dont think so.
Then who 'planned' the whole situation of the person entering? -- A tough question. I am not really sure...but I think it is what people call the 'subconcious'.
But the intresting thing is the fact that above work of the subconcious (i.e planning to prevent my peeing) is what people would consider "intelligent". So this shows that the subconcious is capable of "intelligent" activities. The scary part is the following: there is something within us which is (by the very definition) not under our control, but capable of "intelligent" activity.
Now, it was my firm belief (and is still is) that whatever "progress" one could achieve in life is only achieved via pure "reasoning" within us. But now, it is very easy to think of a situation in which the subconcious (whoever that is) could easily corrupt this reasoning within us, thereby stalling/reversing our "progress".
Probably I should start doing 'sandhya vandhanam' now :)
A couple of weeks ago I had a similar episode. I was sleeping and was probably in the REM stage and was apparently dreaming. Apparently I had also felt a need to urinate. (when I was dreaming/sleeping). So I remember, (in my dream) I was going to a toilet and was planning to urinate. Just as I was starting, a person entered the toilet(I had forgotten to close the door. )
A person entering when one is about to pee, is a fairly common incident. But what generally happens next is the person leaving at once with a sorry or something, and then we are allowed to continue. But in my dream, the person just would not leave. Even after me literally howling at the person, the person would not budge. Have you ever experienced the need to stop when you have just started peeing...it is one of the most uncomfortable experiences. Naturally due to the "discomfort", I was awoken and I had not urinated in the real world.
Now these are the interesting questions:
1. Will I have urinated in the real world, if the person left the toilet at once?
(or if the person did not appear in the first place) -- I think yes.
2. Was the incident of the person entering the toilet and refusing to leave a coincidence? -- No I dont think so.
Then who 'planned' the whole situation of the person entering? -- A tough question. I am not really sure...but I think it is what people call the 'subconcious'.
But the intresting thing is the fact that above work of the subconcious (i.e planning to prevent my peeing) is what people would consider "intelligent". So this shows that the subconcious is capable of "intelligent" activities. The scary part is the following: there is something within us which is (by the very definition) not under our control, but capable of "intelligent" activity.
Now, it was my firm belief (and is still is) that whatever "progress" one could achieve in life is only achieved via pure "reasoning" within us. But now, it is very easy to think of a situation in which the subconcious (whoever that is) could easily corrupt this reasoning within us, thereby stalling/reversing our "progress".
Probably I should start doing 'sandhya vandhanam' now :)
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
Vikram Dharma
"Unfortunate", that he had to die at the age of 50.
His stunt-choreography was certainly a class apart.
He even made rajni's fights look realistic. (Dharmadurai)
His stunt-choreography was certainly a class apart.
He even made rajni's fights look realistic. (Dharmadurai)
Thursday, June 08, 2006
A Nude World
What is the root cause of all the "problems" in this world?
It is the ability of a person to hide his thoughts, I claim.
(In other words, the inability of a person to access other's thoughts)
(Consider the analogy of the cameras at the road intersections which actually makes the people obey the traffic rules. )
Suppose each and every one of us can access other's thoughts*, then how will the world be?
These are the charecterstics of the system:
1. Person 'A' just has to "think" about another person 'B'and instantly he will have acces to what 'B' is thinking currently and also B's previous thoughts.
2. Also person just has to think about a
"subject" and he gets access to information on what other people are currently thinking, (and have previosly thought) about that subject.
The following are very interesting questions:
1. How will the society be?
My intuition: This is the perfect world where "goodness", will reign.
It is almost like perfect unity- a single conciousness.
2. Will there be "progress"?
Absolutely! Consider this, Wikipedia is a big success. This is the pinnacle of the Wikipedia concept.%
3. Will this happen in the future?
This is the big question. My answer is yes. Infact I think this will happen sooner than later.
We just need to have technology to read a person's mind and some advances in storage and retrieval of humungus data.
* : A story "Bubbles" that I studied in 8th std/grade comes to my mind.
%: This is in some sense like Web-infinity! At this point we also need to consider a more mundane but important issue of the effect of internet in "research".
It is the ability of a person to hide his thoughts, I claim.
(In other words, the inability of a person to access other's thoughts)
(Consider the analogy of the cameras at the road intersections which actually makes the people obey the traffic rules. )
Suppose each and every one of us can access other's thoughts*, then how will the world be?
These are the charecterstics of the system:
1. Person 'A' just has to "think" about another person 'B'and instantly he will have acces to what 'B' is thinking currently and also B's previous thoughts.
2. Also person just has to think about a
"subject" and he gets access to information on what other people are currently thinking, (and have previosly thought) about that subject.
The following are very interesting questions:
1. How will the society be?
My intuition: This is the perfect world where "goodness", will reign.
It is almost like perfect unity- a single conciousness.
2. Will there be "progress"?
Absolutely! Consider this, Wikipedia is a big success. This is the pinnacle of the Wikipedia concept.%
3. Will this happen in the future?
This is the big question. My answer is yes. Infact I think this will happen sooner than later.
We just need to have technology to read a person's mind and some advances in storage and retrieval of humungus data.
* : A story "Bubbles" that I studied in 8th std/grade comes to my mind.
%: This is in some sense like Web-infinity! At this point we also need to consider a more mundane but important issue of the effect of internet in "research".
Thursday, May 25, 2006
Impressive Action
Saw a tamil film called "Kokki". The first half of the film is really nice -- features very realistic
action sequences. One other film that I saw recently, "A history of violence" is also very good
in this regard.
A sore point is the re-recording (Dheena) , which has been lifted liberally from films like Kaaka Kaaka and from Rahman's Chinese film.
action sequences. One other film that I saw recently, "A history of violence" is also very good
in this regard.
A sore point is the re-recording (Dheena) , which has been lifted liberally from films like Kaaka Kaaka and from Rahman's Chinese film.
Wednesday, May 10, 2006
What a tool!
This is a really interesting tool.
Go here and get to know what people are searching.
For example:
1. Computers are searched most by people in Chennai.
2. 'Sex' is searched most by people in Cairo
3. 'Tomorrow' is more important to people than 'yesterday'?
4. In Australia losers are more popular than winners?
Go here and get to know what people are searching.
For example:
1. Computers are searched most by people in Chennai.
2. 'Sex' is searched most by people in Cairo
3. 'Tomorrow' is more important to people than 'yesterday'?
4. In Australia losers are more popular than winners?
Sunday, April 30, 2006
Decisive Evidence?
Stone axe with Indus Valley script found near Mayiladuthurai
From the hindu article,
Mr Mahadevan read the first sign as "muruku" and the second sign as "an." In other words, it is "Murukan." The earliest references in Old Tamil poetry portrayed him as a "wrathful killer," indicating his prowess as a war god and hunter.
BTW, the axe was discovered by a Mr.Shanmuganathan! Ironic?
From the hindu article,
Mr Mahadevan read the first sign as "muruku" and the second sign as "an." In other words, it is "Murukan." The earliest references in Old Tamil poetry portrayed him as a "wrathful killer," indicating his prowess as a war god and hunter.
BTW, the axe was discovered by a Mr.Shanmuganathan! Ironic?
Monday, April 10, 2006
Journalists' favourite party
See Todays hindu headline.
With a party called DIC(K), what do you expect.
My question is the following. Atleast someone in the
party should have thought about this at the time of party naming.
So, did they go ahead for publicity?
Q. What will be the headline if there is really a hung assembly?
A. Karunakaran's DIC(K) causes hung assembly
With a party called DIC(K), what do you expect.
My question is the following. Atleast someone in the
party should have thought about this at the time of party naming.
So, did they go ahead for publicity?
Q. What will be the headline if there is really a hung assembly?
A. Karunakaran's DIC(K) causes hung assembly
Monday, April 03, 2006
Asking for treat...A cheap trait?
I am never a fan of the concept of "asking for treat" in an ideological level.
(Ofcourse I like to get treated for the shear pleasure getting free food.)
Let us examine this...Something happens to a person A for which he is happy.
(Like getting a job, birthday, graduation etc.) Then he proceeds to
treat his 'friends'. Agreed, this is a way of sharing person A's happiness with
his friends.
But clearly this protocol reeks of materialism. It is as if, person A is bribing his friends
with free food to make them artificially happy. It is like a person (Indian) betting for
Pakistan to win a cricket match, so that either way he is happy!
Again Nothing inherently bad about this...just full of materialism.
It is ironic that here in USA (which is accused by Indians of being a materialistic
country) when something good happens to a person A. (like birthday , graduation)
, he is treated by his friends!
This is clearly a "better" protocol according to me.
P.S: No, My approaching birthday dint motivate me to write this :)
(Ofcourse I like to get treated for the shear pleasure getting free food.)
Let us examine this...Something happens to a person A for which he is happy.
(Like getting a job, birthday, graduation etc.) Then he proceeds to
treat his 'friends'. Agreed, this is a way of sharing person A's happiness with
his friends.
But clearly this protocol reeks of materialism. It is as if, person A is bribing his friends
with free food to make them artificially happy. It is like a person (Indian) betting for
Pakistan to win a cricket match, so that either way he is happy!
Again Nothing inherently bad about this...just full of materialism.
It is ironic that here in USA (which is accused by Indians of being a materialistic
country) when something good happens to a person A. (like birthday , graduation)
, he is treated by his friends!
This is clearly a "better" protocol according to me.
P.S: No, My approaching birthday dint motivate me to write this :)
Tuesday, March 14, 2006
Worth Pondering...
A sport can lose its essential greatness over generations without ever losing its mass appeal.
-Nirmal shekar in the hindu.
Only sports?
-Nirmal shekar in the hindu.
Only sports?
Monday, March 06, 2006
If women were dressed like the men at the oscars,
They would all be wearing red nine yard sarees.
On the contrary, if men were...
(my line of thought stops here.)
On the contrary, if men were...
(my line of thought stops here.)
Saturday, March 04, 2006
Pace vs Bounce - 2
In the previous post, I talked about pitches with good pace but not bounce. I gave Sabina park as an example.While the shiny Sabina park pitch, beacuse of its lesser friction, offers pace, I dint explain why the 'bounce' of this pitch is not steep.
The Sabina park pitch is hard; this means its coefficient of restitution is high. Then why no steep bounce? Curiously the reason for this is beacuse of its pace! Lets see why...
The Sabina park pitch is hard; this means its coefficient of restitution is high. Then why no steep bounce? Curiously the reason for this is beacuse of its pace! Lets see why...
First, what do we mean by bounce? It is the angle (with the horizonatal) with which the ball rises after it hits the ground. Greater the angle, steeper the bounce.
Now consider two pitches A and B. Both the pitches have identical values of coefficient of restitution.But pitch A is faster (has lesser friction) than pitch B. Now suppose a bowler bowls identical balls (around the good-length area) with the same speed on two pitches.
Pitch B being slower pitch, reduces the horizontal component with which the ball leaves pitch B, much more compared to pitch A. This causes the ball in pitch B to rise at a greater angle, compared to pitch A. The slower the pitch, the greater the angle with which it rises!!
Pitch B being slower pitch, reduces the horizontal component with which the ball leaves pitch B, much more compared to pitch A. This causes the ball in pitch B to rise at a greater angle, compared to pitch A. The slower the pitch, the greater the angle with which it rises!!
Formally,
Uah = Horizontal component of velocity with which ball hits pitch A
Ubh = Horizontal component of velocity with which ball hits pitch B
Uan = Vertical (Normal) component of velocity with which ball hits pitch A
Ubn = Verical component of velocity with which ball hits pitch B
Uah = Ubh
------------------------------------------------(Since the deliveries are identical)
Uan = Ubn
The corresponding V values are the velocities with which ball leaves the pitch.
Vah = Horizontal component of velocity with which ball leaves pitch A
Vbh = Horizontal component of velocity with which ball leaves pitch B
Van = Vertical (Normal) component of velocity with which ball leaves pitch A
Vbn = Verical component of velocity with which ball leaves pitch B
Van = Vbn ----------------------------------(Since the restituitions for the pitch are identical)
But Vah > Vbh ----------------------------(Pitch A is faster than pitch B, hence the latter reduces the
horizonal component more)
(Tanof the) Angle with which ball rises on pitch A, Tan A = Van/ Vah
(Tan of the) Angle with which ball rises on pitch B, Tan B = Vbn/Vbh
Tan B > Tan A
==> B> A
Hence ball bounces more steeply in the slower pitch!
Consequences
- This means that sometimes (when the coefficient of restitution are the same) the faster pitch, has a less steeper bounce. (which is very non-intuitive).
- Then why is there good correlation observed between pace and bounce in pitches around the world.This is beacuse there is a good observed correlation between coeffcient of restitution and the lack of friction in the pitch.
- This explains why it is very awkward to play spin bowling in a tennis ball. Have you ever observed somebody driving "on the up" against slowly bowled tennis ball. I havent...People either go to the pitch of the ball or stay back and play against slow tennis ball bowling. This is because of the steep
bounce at which the ball rises after it hits the ground. That is why this is called tennis-ball bounce.
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
Pace and bounce
"Pace and bounce" is almost treated as a single word by several cricket writers/commentators.
But the truth is the following: Although pace and bounce are correlated quantities, the presence of one does not guarantee the other. I will show both empirically and deductively that this is the case.
The bounce in the pitch directly relates to the the coefficient of restitution between the cricket ball and the pitch. Intuitively it is a measure of elasticity of the collission between the cricket ball and the pitch.
On the contrary, pace of the pitch is related to the coefficient of sliding friction between the cricket ball and the surface of the pitch. The greater the friction, the greater the decelaration of the cricket ball on contact and lesser the pace of the pitch. (Note that the "spin" the pitch offers is again directly related to the
friction of the pitch -- greater the friction, the greater the ball would grip and thus greater the turn)
Clearly these (friction and elasticity) are independent quantities and thus one does not guarantee the other.
Now I will give you real world examples: Consider the pitch in Durban, South Africa. This is a pitch which has real steep bounce. (Infact I would say this is the bounciest pitch in the world--along with perth). But the durban pitch, unlike perth, lacks pace. Recall the instance when Sachin nonchalantly hooked Andrew caddick for a six in the 2003 world cup, remember how the ball sat up after pitching--there was bounce but it was slow bounce. I would group the pitches in Mumbai (Wankhede) and Harare into this category.
The other case , pace but not bounce is relatively rare to find. But I think the Sabina Park, Jamaica and the Basin reserve, Wellington pitches are good examples. Recall the "glassy" Sabina Park pitch, where the ball zips off the surface albeit without steep bounce. This pitch really behaves as if it were hard glass. A glassy surface, being really smooth does not decelerate the ball on pitching and hence the fast pace. Even the subcontinental pitches (example chennai, Lahore) have good pace in them, when there is some dew in the pitch. The dew in the pitch is like the "lubricant" that reduces the friction of the pitch, increasing the pace considerably. This phenomenon is widely observed in the subcontinent in the day and night matches.
Recall the latest icc champions trophy finals (rained off) held in Colombo. The khettarama stadium is an inherently slow surface. The Srilankans struggled in the first half because of the sluggish surface making only 200 or thereabouts. But recall when the Indians batted, how the ball was coming on to the bat making shot making more easier. The two square cuts by Sehwag off Dilharo Fernando are still etched in my memory. (Unfortunately both the finals were rained off).
But I have to accept , on an average, there is good correlation between pace and bounce and this is what justifies its usage.
My ranking of pitches according to "pace+bounce" factor : (descending)
But the truth is the following: Although pace and bounce are correlated quantities, the presence of one does not guarantee the other. I will show both empirically and deductively that this is the case.
The bounce in the pitch directly relates to the the coefficient of restitution between the cricket ball and the pitch. Intuitively it is a measure of elasticity of the collission between the cricket ball and the pitch.
On the contrary, pace of the pitch is related to the coefficient of sliding friction between the cricket ball and the surface of the pitch. The greater the friction, the greater the decelaration of the cricket ball on contact and lesser the pace of the pitch. (Note that the "spin" the pitch offers is again directly related to the
friction of the pitch -- greater the friction, the greater the ball would grip and thus greater the turn)
Clearly these (friction and elasticity) are independent quantities and thus one does not guarantee the other.
Now I will give you real world examples: Consider the pitch in Durban, South Africa. This is a pitch which has real steep bounce. (Infact I would say this is the bounciest pitch in the world--along with perth). But the durban pitch, unlike perth, lacks pace. Recall the instance when Sachin nonchalantly hooked Andrew caddick for a six in the 2003 world cup, remember how the ball sat up after pitching--there was bounce but it was slow bounce. I would group the pitches in Mumbai (Wankhede) and Harare into this category.
The other case , pace but not bounce is relatively rare to find. But I think the Sabina Park, Jamaica and the Basin reserve, Wellington pitches are good examples. Recall the "glassy" Sabina Park pitch, where the ball zips off the surface albeit without steep bounce. This pitch really behaves as if it were hard glass. A glassy surface, being really smooth does not decelerate the ball on pitching and hence the fast pace. Even the subcontinental pitches (example chennai, Lahore) have good pace in them, when there is some dew in the pitch. The dew in the pitch is like the "lubricant" that reduces the friction of the pitch, increasing the pace considerably. This phenomenon is widely observed in the subcontinent in the day and night matches.
Recall the latest icc champions trophy finals (rained off) held in Colombo. The khettarama stadium is an inherently slow surface. The Srilankans struggled in the first half because of the sluggish surface making only 200 or thereabouts. But recall when the Indians batted, how the ball was coming on to the bat making shot making more easier. The two square cuts by Sehwag off Dilharo Fernando are still etched in my memory. (Unfortunately both the finals were rained off).
But I have to accept , on an average, there is good correlation between pace and bounce and this is what justifies its usage.
My ranking of pitches according to "pace+bounce" factor : (descending)
- WACA, Perth -- (What a pitch!!! how I wish to watch Sachin bat on it more frequently...)
- Wanderers (Jo'burg) Gabba(Brisbane), Oval (London)
- Sabina Park, Basin Reserve, MCG, Durban, Mumbai
- Chennai, Lahore, Karachi, SSC colombo (only when there is dew), SCG, Lords
- Bangalore, Adelaide, Trinidad, Auckland
- Sharjah, Calcutta, Colombo (Khettarama)
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
Finnish-Tamil Connection
While I was browsing the yuvan shankar raja page from itwofs, I came to know about the Swedish/Finnish band Hednigarna. Later on, I was looking for more finnish folk music, when I came across Varttina. (yes the same varttina, that is colloborating with rahman in LOTR).
I would encourage people to hear the music from these bands. They have sample mp3 files in their respective web pages. Also amazon has 4 free varttina tracks for free download.
Tune/Melody:
Most of the tunes seemed like Kharaharapriya. Some of the tunes were similar to vedic chanting.
For example: Tielle.mp3 (or) go here and click track 2 Lepiainnen.mp3 (or) go here and click track 8.
Here I want to point out that in sama veda the three major swaras are s,r2,g2 - as in kharaharapriya.
(Just a little digression here, I would view the swaras of yajur veda as n2,s,r1. One could have easily (using shruthi transpose) viewed this as s,r2,g2 but I (we) dont do this. Why? The answer has to do with the way we identify the 's' note. More on this topic, shruthi bedham and vivadhi swaras on a later post)
And, these two tunes seem very similar to some film songs. I cant think of the particular songs. If it strikes for somebody please tell me. Kylan.mp3 and Ottajat.mp3
Rythm:
I was abosultely astounded by the rythms because of the use of unconventional time period. For example the following song is a 51 beat /cycle song!!(13x3+12) - ikki.mp3. (or) go here and click track 4.
This, when the world is filled with 8 beat montony! Ofcourse, Carnatic exploits these curious rythm patterns in Pallavi singing.
The sounds of finnish language , especially the names, (to me) sound a lot like tamil. Consider the following names : Illmarinen, Hakkinen, Raikkonen, Makkinen and how does {Kannan, Hariharan, Subramanian} go with the group? The first name ,Illmarinen, is a an important character in 'Kalevala',
the national epic of finland, which was recently translated to tamil.
Here I will adangufy a little before hypothesizing a finn-tamil historical connection, because there is a finn Asko Parpola who has extensively researched sanskrit and tamil. Infact, he has come the closest ,deciphering the harappan script. If there was a historical connection between the languages, he would have found it definitely!
( I remember encountering a paper describing the possible relation between tamil and an european language (forgot the language) an year ago. The argument was based on a large overlap of root-words. For some reason, I cannot find it now. If somebody finds it, can you please send me the links)
Last but not least, Nokia is comming to chennai.
P.S: If you have problems listening to the mp3 links, (if you get some server error), then go the immediate parent webpage and click (or download) on the mp3 track in that page.
I would encourage people to hear the music from these bands. They have sample mp3 files in their respective web pages. Also amazon has 4 free varttina tracks for free download.
Tune/Melody:
Most of the tunes seemed like Kharaharapriya. Some of the tunes were similar to vedic chanting.
For example: Tielle.mp3 (or) go here and click track 2 Lepiainnen.mp3 (or) go here and click track 8.
Here I want to point out that in sama veda the three major swaras are s,r2,g2 - as in kharaharapriya.
(Just a little digression here, I would view the swaras of yajur veda as n2,s,r1. One could have easily (using shruthi transpose) viewed this as s,r2,g2 but I (we) dont do this. Why? The answer has to do with the way we identify the 's' note. More on this topic, shruthi bedham and vivadhi swaras on a later post)
And, these two tunes seem very similar to some film songs. I cant think of the particular songs. If it strikes for somebody please tell me. Kylan.mp3 and Ottajat.mp3
Rythm:
I was abosultely astounded by the rythms because of the use of unconventional time period. For example the following song is a 51 beat /cycle song!!(13x3+12) - ikki.mp3. (or) go here and click track 4.
This, when the world is filled with 8 beat montony! Ofcourse, Carnatic exploits these curious rythm patterns in Pallavi singing.
The sounds of finnish language , especially the names, (to me) sound a lot like tamil. Consider the following names : Illmarinen, Hakkinen, Raikkonen, Makkinen and how does {Kannan, Hariharan, Subramanian} go with the group? The first name ,Illmarinen, is a an important character in 'Kalevala',
the national epic of finland, which was recently translated to tamil.
Here I will adangufy a little before hypothesizing a finn-tamil historical connection, because there is a finn Asko Parpola who has extensively researched sanskrit and tamil. Infact, he has come the closest ,deciphering the harappan script. If there was a historical connection between the languages, he would have found it definitely!
( I remember encountering a paper describing the possible relation between tamil and an european language (forgot the language) an year ago. The argument was based on a large overlap of root-words. For some reason, I cannot find it now. If somebody finds it, can you please send me the links)
Last but not least, Nokia is comming to chennai.
P.S: If you have problems listening to the mp3 links, (if you get some server error), then go the immediate parent webpage and click (or download) on the mp3 track in that page.
Tuesday, September 27, 2005
Hard to compose "bad" music?
"I think when you are hungry you relish anything. It's the same with music. Only when you are in the right mood can you appreciate a kriti."
-- Lalgudi Jayaraman, in Hindu Take-two
I always had this view that composing songs that were bad was a really hard task. Because of the simple fact that we "get used" to the song and start liking it after repeated listenings.
So what exactly do we mean when we say a partticular song/music is good.
It can only be governed by the following function H(t) : The 'happiness' (due to lack of a better word) we
derive from the song/music as a function of time. Four parameters for this function govern the quality of the song. The rate at which the function reaches its maximum value, the maximum value, the rate at which the function decays from the maximum value and finally "hysterisis",the rate of slow trace back(increase of happiness function) of the curve due to long periods of not listening to the song.
Let us look at the parameters individually:
1) Attack : (rate of increase): This , I guess, is dependant on the level of musical expertise of the person.
For example consider the song "Azhagana Ratchasiye.." -- If this song is heard by a person who is familiar with the raaga reetigowla, then the the attack will be higher for that person. The next obvious qustion is why? I think the answer has to deal with psychological reasons which I would reserve for a future post.
2) Decay (rate of decrease): After listening to a song repeatedly, we tend to lose interest in the song. Again I think the reasons for this are psychological. I think this phenomenon may be independent of the musical expertise of the person.
3) Maximum value: How good a song is should depend on the maximum value. But based on my personal experience it is very hard to distingush the maximum values of two good songs/music. (I get the same "kick" from all songs when I am enjoying it the greatest!)
4) Hysterisis: Suppose we hear a song continually for a week. By this time, the H value would have increased to its maximum value and would have started falling say to value 'l' (say) after a week. Then
if we we wait for a year and again hear the song. Now the H value will not be 'l' , but a much higher value beacuse of the trace back in the periods of non-listening.
Now let us explain the reasons for the following using our theory:
i) Common men enjoy film music more than classical music.
Based on two reasons:
a) Musical expertise of common man is low. So often the attack (rate at which H(t) increases) can be low.
b) Common man listens to (is forced to listen) to film songs in the initial stages, (even when the H for that songs has not risen).
ii) The old melodies dont die, the newer songs die a quick death:
This is a fallacy. Again explained using the frequencies of listening and hysterisis. (The old songs are heard at a mush lesser frequency compared to new songs).
iii) Carnatic music is of inherently higher quality than film music
I would have say no and yes to this.
I would say inherently there is no difference in the quality of music. (All the four parameters are probably not much better than film music)
But the reason for carnatic music's speciality is "manodharma" (the creative part, or the improvising part). By having this we have ensured we are not hearing the same (ditto) song/music again and again.
Each time we are hearing an improvisation. That is the reason ragas and krithis dont decay at all.
Wednesday, September 21, 2005
Strange feeling present
I experience this very very strange feeling. It is a feeling of realization.
When I am immersed in a thought, suddenly there is a context switch:
I ask myself and "realize" whatever I am experiencing is the "present".
However there is a strong sense of disbelief accompanying this realization
and hence the strangeness of the feeling.
These feelings thereby strengthen my belief that there is more in this
world - much more...
When I am immersed in a thought, suddenly there is a context switch:
I ask myself and "realize" whatever I am experiencing is the "present".
However there is a strong sense of disbelief accompanying this realization
and hence the strangeness of the feeling.
These feelings thereby strengthen my belief that there is more in this
world - much more...
Friday, September 09, 2005
'ps' Command for Brain
A technique that could continually or continuously track what exactly a person thinks...
Note:
1) By technique, I dont mean any external means...i.e not using some fancy bio-electronic gadget that reads the electric signals of our brain...
2) I have assumed we only think of only one thing at a time. Sub question: Is it possible for a person to
think more than one thing at a time? Why or why not?
i) Do you think, that this can indeed be implemented?
Note:
It seems 'continually' may be possible. For example consider this technique:
--- We have an alarm that goes off every hour and we decide the following: whenever the alarm
goes off we 'interrupt' our brain and think about what we are thinking. --- Again, is this method
implementable? It has some caveats:
a)Suddenly if somebody asks us what we are thinking, will we be able to?
b) This technique may affect our 'normal' thinking.
ii) Assume this technique can be implemented. What are the ways in which this technique can be used?
Friday, September 02, 2005
Subjective? - Part 2
This is related to the earlier post subjective.
If we assume all people who vote are equally intelligent, (not sure
if this is the correct word) then there is
no asnwer for the "Subjective" question. (I am not explaining
the answer...A little thought will lead to this result).
But if we pose this question to general public, will we recieve
uniformly distributed votes?
To test this, I did pose this question in my college e-group.
I recieved about 10-12 responses and the results were not uniformly
distributed! Far from it. Most of the votes were for
sachin...I think. (People hate to spend time and analyse things!)
Now coming to the main reason for this post:
I want to draw an analogy between this question and the
the importance of 'news' in stock market.
Suppose there is a bad news, : For example: A natural calamity.
Generally there is a general trend of selling because of this. I claim
that in an equally objective world selling is as likely as buying because
of this news. In other words I claim that most of the 'news' should
not trigger anything in the stock market - but in the actual world it does
which I claim is because of the inherent subjectivity of people.
(I know the explanation is not good...Sorry I am bored to explain more)
If we assume all people who vote are equally intelligent, (not sure
if this is the correct word) then there is
no asnwer for the "Subjective" question. (I am not explaining
the answer...A little thought will lead to this result).
But if we pose this question to general public, will we recieve
uniformly distributed votes?
To test this, I did pose this question in my college e-group.
I recieved about 10-12 responses and the results were not uniformly
distributed! Far from it. Most of the votes were for
sachin...I think. (People hate to spend time and analyse things!)
Now coming to the main reason for this post:
I want to draw an analogy between this question and the
the importance of 'news' in stock market.
Suppose there is a bad news, : For example: A natural calamity.
Generally there is a general trend of selling because of this. I claim
that in an equally objective world selling is as likely as buying because
of this news. In other words I claim that most of the 'news' should
not trigger anything in the stock market - but in the actual world it does
which I claim is because of the inherent subjectivity of people.
(I know the explanation is not good...Sorry I am bored to explain more)
Sunday, August 21, 2005
Idea
Idea
1. There is an idea, the rest are just redundancies.
(Redundancies)
2. For the discerning, the idea suffices.
3. The redundancies use/waste time,space, bandwidth...
4. Do the redundancies serve a purpose...maybe...entertainment.
5. The redundancies are called as implementation, presentation...
6. Even the Thirukkural has sets of ideas followed by 9 redundancies.
Tuesday, June 14, 2005
A Question of time
Historically "solar time" was followed because of which even nearby cities had different local times.
Then the world adopted time zones where times vary at a granularity of 7.5 degrees in logitude or .5 hours.
Will it be a better design decision to have only one time ("zone") for the whole world?
Ofcourse this will have several side effects, for example the universal correspondence between the state of the sun and the time will be lost. For example at one place sun may rise at 0600 hrs and other place at 1400 hrs. Similarly the change of the day (date). If we assume the change of the day to happen at 2400 hrs then this may happen for one place in the morning and another place in the night.
Then the world adopted time zones where times vary at a granularity of 7.5 degrees in logitude or .5 hours.
Will it be a better design decision to have only one time ("zone") for the whole world?
Ofcourse this will have several side effects, for example the universal correspondence between the state of the sun and the time will be lost. For example at one place sun may rise at 0600 hrs and other place at 1400 hrs. Similarly the change of the day (date). If we assume the change of the day to happen at 2400 hrs then this may happen for one place in the morning and another place in the night.
Tuesday, June 07, 2005
Subjective?
The following are the rules of an online poll in which you are a participant.
Poll question : Pick the least popular player among { Sachin, Damien Martyn, Pommie Mbwangwa} -- (Note that these are three people whose popularity levels are "well known" and quite non-arguable - I dont expect an australian or zim to comment this blog!!)
The poll in conducted over a sample of people which represent an average world (or indian) population.
1. There is a group of people (among the n people) who are "winners"
2. These are the set of people whose answers are the least popular. ( For example if 10,20 and 30 ( n = 60)
are respectively the votes recieved for A,B and C then the people who voted for A are the winners.
Suppose you want to maximize your chances of winning, whom will you vote for?
(I will try to explain the importance of this seemingly convoluted-silly question in the next blog)
Poll question : Pick the least popular player among { Sachin, Damien Martyn, Pommie Mbwangwa} -- (Note that these are three people whose popularity levels are "well known" and quite non-arguable - I dont expect an australian or zim to comment this blog!!)
The poll in conducted over a sample of people which represent an average world (or indian) population.
1. There is a group of people (among the n people) who are "winners"
2. These are the set of people whose answers are the least popular. ( For example if 10,20 and 30 ( n = 60)
are respectively the votes recieved for A,B and C then the people who voted for A are the winners.
Suppose you want to maximize your chances of winning, whom will you vote for?
(I will try to explain the importance of this seemingly convoluted-silly question in the next blog)
Monday, May 16, 2005
Survivor
This is the simplified version of the survivor series.
Rules of Survivor series:
1. Initially there are 'n' people
2. Each round there is an 'immunity' game and the winner gets 'immunity' (meaning explained later).
3. After each round (after the game) there is an election in which all the remaining survivors vote.
4. The "winner" of the election is kicked out.
5. The person with immunity can vote but cant be voted out. (nobody can vote for him as he has 'immunity')
6. In the final round (of 2 people) , the winner of immunity game, "wins" and is the survivor.
Given:
There are 'n' equally intelligent people in the survivor series.
Each person has a strength value that varies linearly. The strength value
is a measure of the probability of the person winning any 'immunity' game .
(For example
n =5 , strength(1) = 1, strength(2) = 2...strength(5) =5
meaning the first person has the least strength and the last person
has maximum.)
Problem:
1. Find the person who has the maximum chance of winning the survivor series.
Subproblem:
1. What would be the algorithm that each person follow to vote out people?
(Thanks Srini for conversation leading to this problem)
Rules of Survivor series:
1. Initially there are 'n' people
2. Each round there is an 'immunity' game and the winner gets 'immunity' (meaning explained later).
3. After each round (after the game) there is an election in which all the remaining survivors vote.
4. The "winner" of the election is kicked out.
5. The person with immunity can vote but cant be voted out. (nobody can vote for him as he has 'immunity')
6. In the final round (of 2 people) , the winner of immunity game, "wins" and is the survivor.
Given:
There are 'n' equally intelligent people in the survivor series.
Each person has a strength value that varies linearly. The strength value
is a measure of the probability of the person winning any 'immunity' game .
(For example
n =5 , strength(1) = 1, strength(2) = 2...strength(5) =5
meaning the first person has the least strength and the last person
has maximum.)
Problem:
1. Find the person who has the maximum chance of winning the survivor series.
Subproblem:
1. What would be the algorithm that each person follow to vote out people?
(Thanks Srini for conversation leading to this problem)
