Cramps, Uscles, Ermas and the Theory of Everything

I was lying in bed, sleep deprived and fatigued.
And then it struck me. A cramp.
And then it struck me. A brilliant insight into the theory of everything.
To cut to the chase, String theory is hokum.
I propose a replacement - Uscle theory (Or simply, U-Theory).

Matter is simply the manifestation of a Cramp on a Muscle. Muscles are tiny fibers that are present everywhere. We'll call them Uscles (for extra coolness).

There are infinite parallel universes. Each universe lies on a Derma, alternatively known as Erma (for ultra coolness).

The Big Bang can be elegantly explained as two Ermas colliding. A large transfer of energy takes place and one of the Ermas expands seemingly forever, as a balloon. As the balloon expands, matter is formed within it. This takes a very long time (about 10^5 times as much as it took for the transfer of energy to occur).

This is what is known as the "birth place of stars". It contains ample quantities of water and other complex organic compounds capable of sustaining life. As this matter grows within the balloon, a star is born. There are 3.6 * 10^5  "stars" being born every day! Of course, some of these will become White Dwarfs, Red Giants or even Brown Dwarfs. Few of them will attract another star and form a partnership with it, tightly orbiting, in what is known as a Binary star system.

The theory is simple, elegant and intuitive, and 11 orders of magnitude cooler than "String Theory". And, as if that weren't sufficient, the mathematics is breathtakingly beautiful and therefore must be right.

On barriers and faith

We often create for ourselves purely psychological barriers that impede creation of magic, musical or otherwise.

Inhibitions are rooted in fear of failure and letting them go is a matter of faith in yourself and your guru(s). 

Of course, that's easier said than done -- I know!

puneri - broadband

On integrity

There's no glory in abandoning integrity.
There are always solutions that uphold integrity.
You just need to be brave enough to try them.

puneri - résumé

On artistry

Artistry is achieving the right composition, in the right amount, at the right time, of order and chaos.

On the nature of Raags

The more I contemplate the nature of Raags, the more I realize that understanding a Raag is not an exercise in Combinatorics, but in contemplating its resonance with the deepest core of Nature.

On habits as masks

Habits usually mask flaws or limitations.
Style is simply the positive side of habit.
Sometimes, style is so impressive, that one blindly imitates it. Even without suffering from the same flaw or limitation!

(Note: the context here is about music, but this is generic enough to be applied elsewhere)

Dr. Sheldon Cooper - A personality study

I just realized, that Dr. Sheldon Cooper is a Builder-Director personality type!
(http://helenfisher.com/)

Samay-chakra Ragamala in Ektaal

This is a Ragamala (or Ragamaalika) composed using 18 Ragas.

 

A traditional Ragamala is created using lyrics that embed the name of the raga in different forms ranging for wispy hints to explicit. This word (and sometimes its lyrical vicinity) is composed in the raga it refers to.


I set out to create a Ragamala that added the following constraints:

1. Every Raga transition must change a small number of variables.
2. Every line must contain at most one reference to a raga name, thus one line composed in one raga.
3. Names of raga must have a subtle reference, not one that's as obvious as an oncoming train. (No "Gavat Raga ___", for example).
4. It must weave its way through the raga farthest from Bhairavi, which is Raga Yaman.
5. It must follow Samay Chakra rules. The Ragamala's cycle from Bhairavi through Yaman through Bhairavi should start in morning ragas, continuing through afternoon, evening, night and midnight ragas, before culminating in Raga Bhairavi.
6. It must start and end with Raga Bhairavi.
7. The lyrics of the ragamala must be semantically coherent towards a single theme.

These extra constraints make the ragamala challening to create and execute, but add the following value:

1. They create an aesthetic and mellifluous piece. 
2. Every line can be improvised without fear of a jarring transition. 
3. A roller coaster of emotion and expression can be experienced. 
4. The resultant soundscape is colorful and traverses the entire swar and shruti spectrum. 
5. The time cycle of raga creates a sympathetic biorhythm that resonates with the human body and mind.
6. Bhairavi, an evergreen raga is traditionally used to end concerts due to its long lasting effects on the listener's psyche. This raga ties the ragamala together, forming both its beginning and end.
7. The themed lyrics will engage the listeners.

The Ragamala is created in praise of the Goddess Durga (also known as Kali, Parvati, Bhavani and Narayani, etc.)

माँ भैरवी भवानी [Raga Bhairavi]
जगत जननी ||
रक्षा करिणी || धृ ||
बैरागी मोहिनी || [Raga Bairagi-Bhairav]
बसंत मुख स्वरुपिनी || [Raga Basant-Mukhari]
जय जय भैरव तोशिनी || [Raga Bhairav]
माता ललिता नंदिनी || [Raga Lalit]
माया तोडी संसारिणी || [Raga Gujri-Todi]
मूल चक्र निवासिनी || [Raga Multani]
मधुबन उद्धारिणी || [Raga Madhuwanti]
दुख भय यम-नाशिनी || [Raga Yaman]
पुरण कल्याण करिणी || [Raga Puriya-Kalyaan]
महिषासुरमर्दिनी || [Raga Maarva]
विद्या वाचा कपर्दिनी || [Raga Vachaspati]
माँ कला तपस्विनी || [Raga Kalawati]
राग ताल स्वामिनी || [Raga Rageshree]
गोरख कल्याण करिणी || [Raga Gorakh-Kalyaan]
सुंदर शिवरंजनी || [Raga Shivaranjani]
दरबारी वीणा वादिनी || [Raga Darbari-Kanada]
मूंड़ माल धारिणी || [Raga Malkauns]
नादरंग आये शरण, ( नारायणी ) x ३ || [Raga Bhairavi]

Explanation

O Mother, Bhairavi, Bhavani!
O Mother of the universe,
O protector of worlds, keep us safe!
O enchantress of the great ascetic Lord Shiva (Bairagi),
The beauty of spring shining on your face,
O consort of Lord Bhairav,
O Goddess Lalita, Nandini (both names of Parvati)
O destroyer of desire and illusion,
O Kundalini residing at the base of the spine,
O liberator of Madhuban,
O conqueror of Pain, Fear and Death,
O bringer of fortune and wellbeing,
O killer of Mahishasur the Demon,
O Goddess of Intellect and Speech,
O eternal artist,
O monarch of music, raga and taal,
O uplifter of Gorakhnaath,
O beautiful wife of Lord Shiva,
O player of the celestial veena,
Wearing a necklace of enemies' skulls!
I bow to you, O Mother Narayani!

RIP Steve Jobs

Rest in Peace, Duke of Design, Monarch of Minimalism, Czar of Closure!

Insight of the day - Murphy and the law of changing lanes

Imaging you are driving in a lane too slow for your taste. You wait a while, try to tailgate for a while, with no luck. Finally, you decide to change lanes. And the lane you were in suddenly zooms on ahead!!

Here's my explanation.

Consider the case where you are driving in "autopilot mode" and don't realize you are slowing down. Then, suddenly, the driver behind you changes lanes and you notice this movement in the rear-view mirror. You wonder, and take a peek at the speedometer and realize you are going at 65 mph on a 65 mph road ... Holy Snails!

You decide to correct for your snail's pace and accelerate. The guy behind you now tries to overtake you from an adjoining lane, but can't - you are now moving close to his speed.

From the perspective of the other guy, he just changed from a lane that was too slow, to a lane that was not, and the first lane just moved faster!

If this is indeed true, then turning on your indicator for a lane switch for half a minute should also potentially jog the driver in front to check is speed.

Update: Unfortunately, after having tried this, I was forced to conclude, that most drivers just want to drive slowly in order to annoy folks behind them! 

Bhimpalas, Drut Teentaal (Aug 2011)

Composition

पिया चलो चलो री अब जागो ना ||
दोपहर में कैसी आँख लागी !? || धृ ||

नादरंगीले नींद के प्यासे ||

दिन दिन भोर तक आँख न लागी! || १ ||

Explanation

My wife's favorite hobby is to wake me up when I am fast asleep."Wake up, dear! Why are you asleep in the middle of the day!?"

My response (and justification for sleeping in the middle of the day)"I am sleep deprived, having been awake till the wee hours of the morning, for many a night! Let me sleep!"

Linguistic forms of acupuncture

Some people use language as acupuncture. They jab with sharp words to try and heal you!

Shuddha Kalyaan, Madhyalay Teentaal (July 2011)

Composition

पिया मोसे बो_१लो बोलो बोलो ॥

नादरंगी_१ली तोरी बात सुने! ॥ध्रु॥

तू जब जब मोरे सं_१ग संग हो ॥

हियारा जोर जो_१र और मंद चले ॥१॥

Explanation

Talk to me, my love; I love to hear your melodious voice!

When you are with me, my heart beats slower and faster at the same time!

puneri - Work

A fly in a tornado (a Haiku)

I can be the fly,
Or the eye of the storm; calm.
Life's but a ripple.

The Heisenburger

If you taste it, you can't see it.
If you see it, you can't taste it.
If you see it and taste it, you'll feel ill.
It's the Heisenburger!

puneri - hike

Raga Veenavadini, Drut Teentaal

Composition

आज शुभ दिन महुरत मनावो, मंगल गावो रे ||

जनम/ब्याह/धन्य दिन मुबारक बदिया बरसावो (मंगल गावो रे ...) || धृ ||

चीर आयु  समृद्धी पावो ||
सबल मनोबल सिद्धी पावो ||
'नादरंग' शुभ दिन महुरत मनावो (मंगल गावो रे ...) ||१|| 

Explanation

A very happy birthday/Anniversary to you to! Let us celebrate this joyous occasion!
May you live long and prosper! May the force be with you! 'Naadrang' wishes you the best on your day.

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A quantum leap of faith

For a while now, I have been making a conscious effort to understand this fuzzy concept called Consciousness. Many people have approached it from many angles, and it still remains a mystery. I have an instinct - those that truly understand consciousness also understand that it is indescribable, and hence refrain from making any comment. I am, however, not remotely at that stage, and this leaves me free to theorize wildly and share my opinions.

One concept that holds appeal is that Consciousness is outside of the space time continuum. This gives it unique power over certain physical parameters, like the ability to influence probabilities of the quantum wave function, the ability to navigate time and space and the ability to influence time and space.

As Roger Penrose conjectures in his book "The emperor's new mind", Consciousness has the ability to collapse the quantum wave function, thus influencing reality as we perceive it. This is interesting on several levels.

One, it has close parallels with the Vedanta philosophy as well as the Bhagwat Geeta's teachings, that this universe is "Mithya" or an illusion (also known as "Maya"), and that the truth is outside of this realm.

Two, it has the properties of a simpler abstraction, one level higher than that of the known physics, which as we know, is too complex anyway. Many have quested for decades for the Theory of Everything (TOE) or the Grand Unified Theory, the holy grail of physics. These quests hold similar appeal, as one tries to simplify to the point beyond which there is no more simplification possible.

Three, if indeed conscious thought can collapse the quantum wave function, then we can influence the probabilities of creation, thus giving the thinker control over his universe, literally. This is an empowering concept.

So far, so good. But, if all conscious beings have the ability to change their realities, why is it that all our dreams and wishes do not come true?

Well, maybe we do make every wish come true. Maybe, we just don't realize what we are wishing for!
It has been said that attachment to the outcome can play havoc with the outcome itself. This makes sense to me. Attachment creates fear of failure. And as the great Yoda says, “Fear is the path to the dark side." (This logic is found the Bhagwat Geeta, one of the texts that inspired George Lucas).

Let us say we think consciously "I will achieve X". However, attachment to the outcome X will cause us to be fearful of not achieving X. Now, the conscious thought (fear) is "I will not achieve X", (and of course, we are not attached to not achieving X) and lo and behold, that's exactly what happens. Without fear of failure (and thus without attachment), the statement is never negated, and dreams come true.

This logic also explains the power of a positive thought. It also gives weight to the phrase "fear clouds judgement".

Of course, at some point, one has to believe that there is such a thing as consciousness and that it creates reality. Then again, given that Consciousness is potentially outside of space and time, it is very difficult to describe it with text, which is formed inside of space-time. Kurt Godel got it right. His famous Incompleteness Theorem states that in any formalism, a statement can be constructed that cannot be proven either true or false. This is where the "leap of faith" comes in.

Faith, or belief is a strong conscious thought, and this, it seems, may influence reality.

Thus, Reality may be nothing more than a Placebo Effect! 

* Poof *.

puneri - Online

puneri - Wife

puneri - Mobile

puneri - Technology

puneri - Lovers

puneri - smartphone

Knowledge, Wisdom and Intuition

First comes knowledge, from study.

Then comes wisdom, from applying knowledge and learning from mistakes.

And then comes intuition, from true oneness with the subject. 

This is the ultimate accomplishment!

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puneri - advise

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Puneri

Puneri

[Poo-nay-ree, पुणेरी ]

-noun

1. To make puns, word play.
2. To employ cutting humor devices like (but not limited to) oxymoron, irony, satire, sarcasm.

-verb

1. To taunt with maximal effect and minimal effort.

- adjective

1. Having or displaying idiosyncrasies of a person from Pune (also known as Punya-Nagari), the most glorious city in the universe. (Stereotypical characteristics involve extravagant hubris for unimportant details,  having an acute sense for spotting differences and then dramatizing these differences using a special brand of disdainful sarcasm).

Ruminations on Riyaaz

Riyaaz is the "art of practice" and  "practice of art".

Riyaaz is getting into the habit of voluntarily breaking involuntary habits.

Riyaaz is the discipline of creating complexity from simplicity and simplicity from complexity.

Vedic vs.Trumpet Scales

Vedic music had 3 notes, Komal Nishad (Ni), Shadja (Sa) and Komal Rishabh (Re). Shlokas composed in the Vedic scale make the mind calm and introspective, but never sleepy.

On the other hand, a typical Trumpet "alert" call has 3 notes too - Shadja (Sa), Shuddha Gandhar (Ga) and Pancham (Pa). This has the effect of waking the mind up, drawing attention, creating a sense of urgency.

The question is, why this difference?

I will put forth a conjecture:
Human speech undergoes inflections according to emotions. Perhaps, the reverse is true also. 

When we are calm and talking with stable emotions, upward and downward inflections are relatively small. As an example,
- When we say"Uh-huh". "Uh" is at Komal Ni and "huh" is at Sa.
- When we ask "So?", The inflection starts at Sa and ends in a Komal Re.
Thus, the Vedic scale represents normal human tonic structures, codified as relative upward and downward changes in notes. (Svarita - baseline, Uddatta - higher, Anudatta - lower)

When we want to call out to someone, or call someone to us, our inflections are relatively bigger. As an example:
- "Anybody home?" - can be approximated to a Sa-Pa transition.
- "Come here" - can be approximated to a Pa-Ga transition

Choosing a pen-name for my compositions

I have more than thirty compositions to my name till date (May 2011), except there is no name! My good friend and advisor Vivek Datar pointed this out a few months ago. Since then, I have been trying to come up with a neat pseudonym for me to sign my compositions...

Historically, there are a lot of "Ranga"s (colors) - Sadarang (Niyamat Khan), Adarang(Firoz Khan), Ramrang (Ramashreya Jha), Sabrang (Ustaad Bade Ghulam Ali Khan), Manrang, Hararang, Dilrang, Sur-rang, Shyamrang, Navrang, Rasarang, Premrang, Gyanrang, Dinrang, etc...

There are a lot of "Piyas" (meaning, lover) - AkhtarPiya, PremPiya, Sugharpiya (Bhaiyya Ganpatrao), DarasPiya, PraanPiya, etc.

There are a lot of "Das" (meaning, servant) - Ramdas, Gunidas, Premdas, etc.

And then some clever ones like Darpan (means mirror, Yunus Hussain Khan), Chatur Sujaan.

And then deep, disturbing ones like Shoka (means mourning, Pt. Kumar Gandharwa).

The ideal pen-name will reflect my personality, my personal ideology, but also have other shades of meanings that can be woven into different semantic contexts while creating the poetry.

Early morning today, I had a flash of inspiration: Naad (नाद) means [the cosmic] sound, music. Rang (रंग) means color. 'Naadrang' (नादरंग) thus means "The color of music", a multi-sensory experience! Another variant, Naadrangeele (नादरंगीले) means "one engrossed in music".

I hereby declare Naadrang' (नादरंग) as my nom de plume. 

Deva Tuze Naam

Lyrics - Suresh N. Shukla, Shubha S. Shukla
Composer - Suresh N. Shukla and Sandeep Ranade

देवा तुझे नाम, घेता प्रथम ॥
पूर्ण होते काम, गणराया ॥ध्रु॥

या संसारात, सुटे झंझावात ॥
धरी माझा हाथ, गणराया ॥१॥

तन तुला अर्पण, मन तुला अर्पण ॥
धन तुला अर्पण, गणराया ॥२॥

गाता अभंग, मन होई दंग ॥
नको सोडू संग, गणराया ॥३॥

Shuddha Sarang, Drut Ektaal, Tarana (April 2011)

दिर दिर तानी (तोम तनन, तोम तनन, तोम तनन), तन देरेना ||

रीदानी तदानी , तननननन  ||

ओदनी तन तनन दीम, तनन दीम, तनन दीम || ध्रु || 

रीदानी  तन, तोम तनननन  ||
तन तनन देरेना  ||
ओदनी तन तनन दीम, तनन दीम, तनन दीम || १ ||

Always follow your bliss

Life's too short to be feel unhappy, unappreciated, frustrated or trapped.

Sounds simple enough, but it's not!
Many times, the pain gets pushed to the background by more urgent tasks at hand.
Recording happiness levels is a good test of whether life is "on-track".

Always follow your bliss!

Choosing a better metaphor for Life

"Life is a game" places you at the mercy of Life.

An empowering metaphor was suggested to me by my friend and colleague Shivakalyani Ankam.

"Live is a movie, you are the director". This places you in control of Life.

Context switches and context context switches

I am modal. I work in modes and switching between modes is a context switch, hence energy draining.

Once in a while it is important to move from "pixel mode" to "big picture mode".

The problem is that I need a context switch to realize when I need to context switch!

Working styles explained using system software metaphors

Negative Work (Disruptive)

Overactive Assert: The original issue is long since fixed, but you keep disrupting the process.
Deadlock: Unclear priorities can cause things to come to a grinding halt
Timer Callback: You can only do useful work in the context of someone else making you do it.
Memory Leak: You leak resources through mismanagement, causing imbalances in the system load, eventually having it crash.
Memory Corruption: You take sides, whisper different things to different people, word messages to be ambiguous. This causes failures in random places. It is often difficult to trace the root cause to you.
Thrashing: Too many page faults decreases effectiveness
while(1) Complain(); All you can do is be angry and complain about everything. You don't offer any solution to the problem.
while(1) Oppose(); All you can do is oppose everything that's going on around you.

Zero Work (Wasted Resources)

Spin-lock: You keep spinning on a task and never get any useful work done.
Zombie Process: You are long done with your assigned work and no one cares you exist.
Signal / Exception Handler: The only work you do is in response to an emergency condition. Only when the going gets tough, you get going!

Positive Work (Better use of Resources)

Semaphore: You work through a list of N items one at a time. When N drops to zero, you go to sleep.
Thread pool + Notification queue + No Throttle: You have a queue of items that you can work through in parallel, but cannot say no, leading to a nervous breakdown.

Best Case (Best use of Resources)

Thread pool with Priority Queue, Internal Resource Limits, Fairness, No memory Leaks/Corruption: You can multi-task. You know the relative importance of tasks.You pace your work and always make forward progress. You work with maximum integrity and efficiency, with minimal disruption to the system.

Credits:
Thanks to Dilip M. Ranade (dmr's blog) for his suggestions for adding Thrashing and Deadlocks.
Thanks to Shivakalyani Ankam for her suggestion about Zombie Processes.

Music of the subconscious mind

Have you ever been woken up from the deep slumber of the wee hours and asked to sing in concert for three hours?

It happened to me on January the 8th, at 5pm, in Palo Alto, California.

I returned to California from India after a 12 week trip and got severely jet lagged. I have almost always gotten jet lagged travelling against the spin of the earth, but never in the reverse direction. One of life's little mysteries ...

So, here I was, waking up in the middle of the night, very awake, and falling asleep at noon. 5pm would, in this shifted sleep cycle, correspond to 3 or 4am.

I landed on the night of the 4th and had a concert in Palo Alto on the 8th evening.

As I said, this was the first time in my life, that I experienced what it was to wake up from Slow-Wave sleep (the deepest stage) and sing in concert for 3 hours!

I thought this would be an discordant, disoriented, dizzy disaster! What happened instead was akin to pinning a microphone directly to my subconscious mind. I performed things in the concert that I had never consciously known or thought. It was, in hindsight, like being hypnotized on stage!

Now, keep in mind that in most concerts with an energetic audience, I usually channel tremendous amounts of energy from them and amplify it musically. But this time, it was not only effortless, it was untainted by the barriers erected by conscious thought.

The conscious mind creates filters based on fear -- of failure,  being misinterpreted, crossing some musical line, of being misperceived.

Music of the subconscious mind is beautiful, pure, personal and unpretentious because the ego is divorced.  I wonder how I can make this divorce permanent!