A happy window

There is a certain innocence and optimism in thinking that Science has all the answers. We live in 2021 how can it not?! There is such beautiful naivety in that belief. Nowadays, many of us  are conditioned to be evidence based and we should be thankful to our education system for that. Generally, we don't make decisions in life without data backing it. At work or at home we make well-researched decisions backed by data and evidence, and when we do not have enough data, we generate forecasting data models and hypotheses to answer the questions using the power of the mind. To the ancient humans, when they saw the Solar Eclipse, they didn't have the scientific explanation behind it - so they had other hypotheses - wild ideas. As humans in 2021, of course we know why the solar eclipse happens, we know the science behind it. So for all the things we do not know, one could draw the conclusion that all the things we do not know or do not understand are just scientific evidence waitin...

When I was young, I had a book on the solar system that explained concepts of outer space - the joy I felt looking through the pictures and reading all about the stars and planets as a young child! It was thrilling. Ever since then, I wanted to go to Outer Space until I experienced 2020. Ah 2020 - I'll get to that year in a bit. Separately, I also recently watched this film - This is Mars - compiled from NASA's Perseverance Rover on Mars. In the film, Mars looks just like some parts of the Earth. So if it is all just the same, why do I want to go Space? Isn't Space on Earth too? Am I not in Space already? I'm already on the third planet revolving around the brightest star in our Solar System. Then why am I so charmed with the idea of visiting Outer Space when Space is right here on Earth?! To add to that, I already throw around space a bunch in my daily life -  "I need some space. " "I want to go to Space! " "I hit space to see a space betwee...

What a sporting weekend we got to witness this past summer weekend. Heart thumping, nail biting, edge of the seat thrill and heartbreak. Both sides (Federer vs Djokovic in the Wimbledon final, England vs New Zealand in the Cricket World Cup final) put their best foot forward. In my assessment, there was only one winner in both matches: luck triggered by artificially constructed human rules. This is my opinion, I’m not a tennis or cricket expert, but as an audience member, I could not walk out saying one side was clearly better than the other. I’d argue that the losing side deserved to win as much as the winning side. Without going into the technical aspects of the game (sorry this piece doesn’t explore that aspect), I’d love to explore and challenge the binary concept of ‘you win or you lose in sport’ in this opinion piece. In the matches the past weekend,  based on a sample size of my friends and family, the losing side were as much the winners as the actual winners of the tourna...

One of the main reasons I am passionate about science (specifically physics) is because it brings me closer to the objective truth (or I think it does). Science is my obsessive curiosity, be it geeking out on "Physics girl" on YouTube or constantly trying to drill down on Einstein's relativity during my shower, I'm usually science-ing and asking questions when I get a little time to myself. If I'm being honest, I get very little time to myself nowadays, but whenever I do, I spend it trying to understand the world around me through science. Although, I'm not a science graduate, I am a passionate student of science. My love for science was something I only discovered about myself in my early/mid 20s. I was reading a philosophy book which talked about science and proof. Next thing I knew, there I was watching Neil DeGrasse Tyson on Netflix. So clearly I'm not the real deal PhD in physics nerd (wish I was though), but I'm curious. I was mindlessly ...

Today, I did something I never thought I would get to do in my lifetime. I walked on the moon and saw what the earth and sun looked like from there.  To be clear, I wasn't technically walking on the moon (and it wasn't a dream).  Virtual reality (via Google Cardboard) gave me a walking on the moon experience today. My mind was blown. The earth looked like a big beautiful blue spherical jewel in the sky. The sight of our big blue planet triggered introspection in my mind on how human beings live (and fight), but maybe we'll get to those thoughts in another blog post. Thanks to the progress of virtual reality, I was able to visualize what our planet looks like from another perspective. For the first five minutes, As I "stood" on a crater of the moon, I couldn't stop looking at the blue ocean filled sphere in the sky and the stars around it. Apart from walking on the moon, I also rode on a rollercoaster, saw the Eiffel tower, went into an i...

Astrophysics mixed with philosophy, these were the two lenses through which I ended up interpreting Einstein’s theories. A few months ago, I stumbled upon Einstein's theory of relativity. I read a blog online about how Einstein’s theories are deeply connected with philosophy and spiritualism that got me hooked. After spending a lot of time trying to understand the theory, watching videos, reading blogs, reaching out to people who I thought were experts, I thought I could at least to an extent understand the broad concept of the theory.  Now this piece really isn't about astronomy or Einstein, I'm not even going to try to explain the theory here as I feel like I don't understand the nuances of the theory. Just the broad concept was enough for me, and that's what I'll live with for now. I have to give a lot of credit here to Neil DeGrasse Tyson’s documentary on Netflix called ‘Cosmos – A spacetime odyssey’. That series left me in pure wonder, gave me perspec...

Maybe, I'm linking variables that shouldn't be linked. Maybe, I'm seeing patterns where I shouldn't. But I am convinced that Van Gogh's starry night has had a tremendous impact on how I perceive the sky. Here's a little story. This painting allowed me to see the sky from Van Gogh's perspective or opened my imagination to another world. As humans, when we look up at the sky, all we see is- 1) Blue 2) Stars 3) Sun 4) Moon 5) Clouds 6) Darkness But our minds and imagination can truly move through different intersections of space and time to look beyond the obvious. We are currently overdependent on our eyesight. When we look at the sky, all we are 'capable' of seeing is the 5 things I mentioned above. But why don't we have the 'natural' ability to understand that we are rotating along with the Earth and revolving around the sun in a Universe where we cannot see the edge, nor the end or beginning. We are part of something that...