I'm Amazing

The human brain is probably the most amazing thing I have ever come across. Just the other day I went for a long drive with my parents in the car. I'd hardly slept the previous night cause I went to bed at my usual bed time of 2 am and was woken up early in the morning at 530. I was half asleep, but that doesn't mean I shouldn't drive now should it. So I was driving along at a surprisingly brisk speed, and since my mind tends to wander a lot more when I'm half asleep, I found myself analyzing all the things my brain was doing.
Firstly all my "major" functions like respiration, heart beat, digestion etc etc.
Next, my limbs were performing a range of activities. My hands were usually at 10 and 3(yes I know its 10 and 2 but this is my SHTYLE ;) ) on the steering wheel. They were applying just enough pressure to keep it going straight if I wanted to go straight. When there were turns, my brain was able to calculate exactly how much force to apply so as to do the initial turn and also when exactly to straighten and so on. My brain was also compensating for the fact that I was driving a power assisted steering rather than the manual steering I usually do. Thats all my right hand had to do, but my left hand had to change the gears whenever my brain realised I was over-revving the engine or under-revving it. It also had to coordinate with my left leg which was working the clutch. And speaking of legs, my brain had to know exactly when to push and how much to push and how fast to release the clutch so as to not stall the engine and yet keep going at the pace I was. Then my right leg. It had to accelerate at the right amount and also break at the right places. It also had to coordinate with all the other limbs to ensure smooth drive and also me getting shouted at by my parents ;) .
My brain was also constantly getting information from my eyes and ears (sometimes my nose also ;) ) so as to work the other limbs properly. It was also making my neck and eyes move so as to get the best possible information from the three mirrors and also from the windows and the windscreen. It had to decide when to start when to stop when to go faster when to go slower when to overtake from this information available and from its calculations.
How does it calculate so fast? I doubt that the human brain actually measures that the car in front is 1.23213123123123123(+-)10^(-17) m in front like a computer would. It approximates that if I were to slightly go faster I might not hit the car in front. And if I got too close (ie when it estimates I probably would hit the car) it has to slow down. The so called negative feedback. But in negative feedback you'd probably measure the distance each time and reduce it to zero. But thats not the case here. Its simple approximation.
For all the computational capacity of a super computer, could it ever determine whether it would hit the car in front if it increased the speed slightly? Yet my brain did it ! So if my brain was so much better than a super computer, imagine how much better say Albert Einstein or Richard Feynman's brains would be ! Maybe thats the answer to better computation. Stop measuring things. Look at the human brain. Learn to approximate :) . Or at least thats the conclusion I derived in my "sleep-drunk" state.
Woah! I was really impressed with myself now. I continued to observe all the other "great" feats I accomplished like overtaking performing a U turn, reversing etc etc and got home feeling awesome.
And then it hit me. Every one of the thousands of people I'd seen on the road were doing the same thing :( . I realized I'm not that amazing after all :'(

True Lies

What are lies?
This is what webster has to say about them:

Main Entry: 3 lie

Function: verb

Etymology: Middle English, from Old English lEogan; akin to Old High German liogan to lie, Old Church Slavonic lugati

intransitive senses
1 : to make an untrue statement with intent to deceive
2 : to create a false or misleading impression
transitive senses : to bring about by telling lies "lied his way out of trouble"
synonyms:
Lie, prevaricate,equivocate, plater, fib mean to tell an untruth.
Lie is the blunt term, imputing dishonesty "lied about where he had been".
Prevaricate softens the bluntness of Lie by implying quibbling or confusing the issue "during the hearings the witness did his best to prevaricate".
Equivocate implies using words having more than one sense so as to seem to say one thing but intend another "equivocated endlessly in an attempt to mislead her inquisitors".
Palter implies making unreliable statements of fact or intention or insincere promises "a swindler paltering with his investors".
Fib applies to a telling of a trivial untruth "fibbed about the price of the new suit".

lie 1 a : an assertion of something known or believed by the speaker to be untrue with intent to deceive b : an untrue or inaccurate statement that may or may not be believed true by the speaker
2 : something that misleads or deceives

Most of the statements imply that the speaker must know that what he/she is saying is untrue. But what if the speaker believes in what he says totally and yet it is untrue? Are they really lying ? If one were to take the polygraph to be a decent gauge of whether a person is lying or not, then if the person believes it to be true he isn't lying. For example if a person has been told a lie and he tells someone else, it could be taken as he is lying or he's being truthful. He's relatively being truthful and absolutely lying !!
Anyway, coming back to the polygraph, it is based on the assumption that when a person lies his vital signs change significantly when he lies because it isn't normal for him. Two problems, what if someone is so used to lying that for him its normal? or what if he believes what he is saying is true (true relatively) but actually not true ( false absolutely). In both cases the person can beat the test !
Assuming its human nature to be mostly good and all that, the second case is most likely, then what is true to the guy is not really true to someone else and vice versa. So there is really no such thing as a real truth, just what we believe to be true. Like for example that we are actually alive. We believe we are , and hence its true. But if I were to believe I were actually dead , then I might as well be dead !
Moreover, how far are exaggerations from 'lies'? So many times I have exaggerated what I was saying . Does that make me a lier? What if I actually believe what I say even though it didn't happen and even though I came up with it myself. Am I still lying?
When does an exaggeration actually turn into a lie?
One more thing a friend told me that sarcasm could be a sin cause it is very similar to lying !!!
Maybe next time I call someone a lier, I shall think about all this and refrain from it.

I just couldn't resist

House M.D is supposed to be a drama on fox. Somehow, the main character played by Hugh Laurie ( a Brit playing an American perfectly) and his sarcastic comments make it one of the funniest things I've ever seen . I just couldn't resist putting down some of my fav quotes .

*Everybody lies

*Truth begins in lies

*Humanity is overrated

*There's no I in 'team'. There is a me, though, if you jumble it up

* I choose to believe that the white light people sometimes see... they're all just chemical reactions that take place when the brain shuts down.... There's no conclusive science. My choice has no practical relevance to my life, I choose the outcome I find more comforting.... I find it more comforting to believe that this isn't simply a test.

*Treating illnesses is why we became doctors, treating patients is what makes most doctors miserable

*Occam's Razor. The simplest explanation is almost always somebody screwed up

*The eyes can mislead, the smile can lie, but the shoes always tell the truth

*There is not a thin line between love and hate. There is --- in fact --- a Great Wall of China with armed sentries posted every 20 feet between love and hate.

*And humility is an important quality. Especially if you're wrong a lot.... Of course, when you're right, self-doubt doesn't help anybody, does it?

*If you talk to God you're religious. If God talks to you, you're psychotic

*Perseverance does not equal worthiness. Next time you want to get my attention, wear something fun. Low-riding jeans are hot.

*I asked you what two plus two equals and a day later you tell me, 'Not twenty-five'.

*And find out the truth about who he's been dating. No way a Marine goes a year without getting some blood on his bayonet

There are loads more ! :)

Math

The Heisenberg uncertainty principle is probably one of the most beautiful results in science , yet when stated in its usual form , it sounds so boring. Normally, it is stated us the product of uncertainties in positions and momentum always exceeds h/2*pi . Of course, it does imply that if you try to increase the precision of one of the two the other gets affected. Even though this seems quite easy to be mathematically understood, maybe the extent to which it could affect normal life can never be understood unless its stated differently. The form that appealed most to me was "The closer you try to observe something, the more likely you are to disturb it, hence not be able to observe it in its natural state ! " . This was in a tv show called numbers, which i find awesome cause its how to use math to solve crimes ! Sounds cool ! Anyway, like i was saying, this form of the law makes a lot of sense. In the show, the guy is trying to analyse data of how the robber is robbing banks, then just before they are apprehend the guy, he realises because he has been observing them so closely and because of the law they should be aware that he is observing them ! Of course when he tells the guy in charge, he uses the information that the robber knows that the police know to his advantage ! Anyway, if the law is thought of in this form, it seems to affect more things than just some dumb electrons flying around. For example, observation of animal behaviour in their "natural" habitat. Obviously because of the law, the more closer we observe animals, the more they are affected by us, and hence the purpose is no longer served. Hence we have to find an optimum as to how much we observe and how much we disturb. If we could somehow measure the quantities , maybe we can find a different constant like Planck's for animal behaviour. Giant panda's constant anyone?
Anyway , this kind of gets me thinking on why people insist on making mathematical statements of all these laws of "nature" ( Of course , they need not be actual laws. Again Feynman. He said that all the laws that we know off, are like some guy who doesn't know chess observing people play it. He makes up rules, until they're broken, after which he makes up new rules . ) The non-mathematical statement to me anyway seems to make a lot more sense. Another example would be newton's third law. "In an interaction between two objects, the force applied by one on the other is equal and opposite to the force applied by the second on the first". I prefer "Every action has an equal and opposite reaction" . This is true for so many things and sounds as a better law than the first did . Abstraction is a beautiful thing, though I've grown to hate it thanks to MA 203 . Of course there are subjects like topology which have abstraction at their core , which i still find amazing. KSR (Great mathematician, taught me math for jee . This guy takes geometry using just his hands ! Without a board. ) spoke about topology and I've been amazed by it ever since. Imagine trying to define a point. I have always wondered how to do it. Turns out everything can be defined working downwards. A point is the intersection of two lines, and a line of two planes and so on. But since we can't imagine the 4th spatial dimension, it could be difficult, though mathematically its quite easy. That is probably the greatness of math. When we can't even imagine the question properly, math seems to have an answer for us . Of course , it poses a lot of problems, but then thats another thing.

The Matrix

Reeves plays the perfect robot ! Ever seen him emote in the movie? Or any movie for that matter? Even in "The lake house" which was supposed to be a "romantic comedy" he did not . Anyway who cares about that!! But the story really made me think. Isn't it an awesome idea? That we are all not really living but imagining ! Yeah sure ! I know I am living ! I can see hear feel ! Really? Can I ? The only reason I "know" I am touching the keyboard is because when I touched it the first time, I got a certain signal in my brain which has been registered as "keyboard touching". But what if the first time signal itself was bogus? But have I not "seen" the keyboard and know that my fingers are touching it? But have I really? Even sight is just some arbitrary signal to the brain ! As soon as we were born , we got some signal and assumed it was sight. How do we know if what we see is the same thing someone else sees? We can always point to the object but what is red to you might not be red to me ! And pain is another thing which is even worse because it can't even be pointed at. Only I can feel it! The movie(s) ! Oh yeah . What action sequences ! What graphics . What awesome "acting" . Keanuexperience my pain. When a doctor asks me to describe the pain, I feel like slapping him ! What the hell am i supposed to say? Yet they diagnose based on the patients description of pain. They must really be brilliant then ! How do we really tell if we are really living and are not imagining? This is really a lot worse than Einstein's box. At least there I couldn't tell if I was moving or at rest . This is infinitely worse ! Maybe we are not really seeing or moving or feeling and are just stuck in a box with wires connected out. Or even worse, what if there are no such things as bodies, but just brains , or just minds ! Maybe we are all just brains who have been punished to live in a "world" where we are forced to believe we have bodies , and there are free brains out there somewhere. Out where? Well anywhere for that matter. Wouldn't this thought at least give some purpose to our aimless existences? I mean what are we existing for? We are born, we live we die and the fortunate ones get remembered for something or the other but then you are dead and for you that is the end. Of course the biologists say the aim of life is to proliferate the species! So, sex is the ultimate aim of life huh? Then why do we have to do so much to get it? And once you've actually done "it" isn't life over? Why continue existing?
This is where I suppose religion steps in. Nearly every religion has a theory of what happens after death. Hindu philosophy is very similar to what I have said, as in our "souls" are trapped in the human form and have to be released by attaining "moksha". What then ? No clue.
Of course another theory I can think of is the "Its turtles all the way down". I read something like this in "Surely you're joking Mr.Feynman". A must read if you ask me. The book is just awesome and is non-technical unlike his lecture series which is obvioulsy brilliant . Anyway, in the book, an old lady tells Feynman that the world is supported by a giant turtle. And when he asks what supports this turtle, she says, "Ah you are clever, but its turtles all the way down". So as an analogue, suppose instead of being attached to some big machine , we are all cells of a huge organism, and we each perform what it wants from us, that time for us begins(the big bang if you will ;) ) at the point of conception. Also each cell in our body is similar, all connected yet have no idea they are, because if a nerve cell looks at a red blood cell, I doubt it would recognise it as another cell! I mean obviously to every cell in the body, the first point in time is conception as it has record of nothing else.
Well right now, these thoughts actually make me feel I might have some other purpose in life than to increase the ever growing population and make the rigours of life that much more tolerable cause I might be helping some big all powerful organism ;)

Memory

Well. Long time no see. I really have no idea why I have not posted in such a long time. Guess I forgot about my blog. Memory is such a weird thing. I love this quote "I've had memories for as long as i can remember". I mean , how can one justify the fact that he/she can always remember the exact words that special someone said yet forget where he put the keys. How does that happen? An even worse example- I really don't remember writing what I have written in the past posts! How did i manage to forget? Well that just raises a fundamental question. How does memory work? If we look at the size of the human brain , and the size of the "high-funda" memory devices, and their relative capacities, the difference is phenomenal! But then, does the brain work like conventional storage? Or is it totally different? Remember also that the brain not only stores but processes! How are bits of data connected in the brain? How do chains of thought proceed? How can a smell trigger a memory which triggers another and so on? Another thing to consider, is it really fair to compare the brain to a conventional memory device? Because a conventional device is loss-less. But a brain storage is not. We forget don't we? But do we forget chunks of data or just remember bits of it ? Many a time, something that we seem to have forgotten seems to come back with little effort. Of course, if I really want to remember something I forgot I can guarantee that I just will not remember it and it'll come to mind only a lot later.
So getting back to the point of memory, No one knows how exactly its stored. There are many speculations but nothing concrete. Are there brain cells which can be 1 or 0 ? Or more advanced quantum levels? Hmmm . Why should memory be digitised? Couldn't it be analog? Analog memory? How is that accomplished? How is it used? I can't even begin to imagine the possibilities of what would happen to computations if we had analog memory. But then, nothing in nature is digitised, so why should memory be? Maybe all we really are, are complex video cameras who can add! NO! Wait, that can't be right ! We're much more advanced . We have Emotions! Yet emotions are considered to be a "weakness" and the best is the guy who can "let go" of them and strive to push beyond everything. So the best guy is a robot huh? With digital memory !! So we can never be "The best" if we had an analog memory ! So is that why trying to mime human behaviour is so hard? Cause we are not digitised and everything we use is?
Or is that why robots are one day gonna take over ?? Terminator?? Matrix?? Hmmm.
EEKS. Too many questions ! Where did I start and where am i now? That show how bad memory can be! I forgot about what I was writing about during the post ! Hmmm ! Now if I had a digital memory would I have forgotten? Cause there are only 2 levels. What the topic is and what the topic is not !!!