*************************************************************************************************************************************
In the 1960s I watched this movie 'My Geisha' in the Netaji Auditorium. It is about a Hollywood producer whose wife (Shirley Maclaine) acts as the lead lady in all his blockbusters and overshadows him in fame. So he grows envious and moves to Japan for making his next movie with a Geisha girl in the lead so he could choose a Japanese actress this time and avoid his wife. But Shirley travels to Japan slyly and disguises herself as a Geisha and gets chosen for the role during auditions...some makeup there! And as you can expect, the hubby falls for this Geisha and all sorts of turmoils result.
During shooting, the hubby happens to get close to Shirley and happens to kiss her. When he asks how she likes it, his Geisha replies in soft Jap-English tones:
"Intheresting!"
That's by way of nostalgia. But I am talking about things interesting as opposed to things boring in our lives.
All kids find life very interesting and novel. This is so for kittens as well. I asked Prof SNB at IIT KGP why he keeps so many kittens as pets. And he replied that just watching them fool around with his one dragged chappal keeps him busy and glad.
So, if kittens too find life interesting, there must be some profound truth behind living beings wanting fun as opposed to non-living things. Perhaps Darwin is not entirely right in his mechanistic view of evolution guided by struggle for existence as opposed to the Upanishadic view that life evolved so it can enjoy the world better and better, with the pinnacle of Evolution called Albert Einstein quoted as saying:
That quote is taken from DC Edit Page Tuesday 5 February 2013...don't blame me if DC got it wrong...
William James in his fat Principles of Psychology says that life is different from the non-living. And illustrates it by the experiment of a magnet and an iron needle separated by a piece of paper and let go. The magnet and her needle fly to embrace each other, hit the road block of the paper, and stay stymied.
But, says James, it is different from Romeo and Juliet separated by a 6' fence and left to themselves. Romeo and Juliet don't just give up when they hit the fence... Romeo (if he has any sense) would climb the fence and jump on the other side.
Talking of non-living things like chalk, they have their own stories to tell, like Feynman quoted Huxley's Essay on a Piece of Chalk which may look dead now but was full of life eons ago when it was being deposited by crustaceans. Chesterton also wrote an essay on a piece of chalk that I had read. Intheresting!
I have to ask Supratim, but I guess color vision also evolved, and, for ages before that, the world was black and white for its residents like Calvin's Dad. Why did it evolve? There can only be one answer...that of Einstein.
Anyway, everyone wants to lead an interesting life rather than a boring one although interests are as varied as men and women, ranging from sex to topology.
All those folks that decide to savor interesting things for good must pay, sometime through their noses.
First, one has to painfully acquire a taste for interesting things like coffee, fags or beer...the first attempts are repelling. If kids don't get educated, their interests remain primitive and they get bored easily and take to drugs and dopes and crime. So the aim of education should be to make things ever more interesting. Like learning a language, especially a foreign tongue like English to Indians. It is painful in the beginning...so painful that many give up. Literature is an acquired taste like nicotine.
Especially classics. I was once carrying my copy of Pickwick Papers to the Department during summer holidays and reading the book and 'smiling inwardly' as Shamik puts it. My roommate DB who was immersing himself in the SU (n,m) was annoyed a bit and asked me what was so funny. And I said, Sam Weller and his father Tony Weller apart from everyone else in that book. So, he borrowed it and returned it the next day saying it is unreadable. I then asked him to try it out again without giving up on the first 50 pages come what may. And then he not only read the tome through but was forcing his wife and daughter to do the same.
Next, interesting things stay interesting only when they are sneaked with boring things. A couple of months of uninterrupted summer vacation with nothing to do but read PGWs would be hell. PGW remains fascinating only when you direly wish to finish that story knowing you ought to be preparing for that QM lecture looming next morning.
Finally, those who decide to indulge their entire lives in pursuit of interesting things not bothering about profitable ones pay a heavy price when the chips are down, like retiring from IIT KGP with a home loan and a car loan pending...
...Posted by Ishani
*****************************************************************************************************************************
During shooting, the hubby happens to get close to Shirley and happens to kiss her. When he asks how she likes it, his Geisha replies in soft Jap-English tones:
"Intheresting!"
That's by way of nostalgia. But I am talking about things interesting as opposed to things boring in our lives.
All kids find life very interesting and novel. This is so for kittens as well. I asked Prof SNB at IIT KGP why he keeps so many kittens as pets. And he replied that just watching them fool around with his one dragged chappal keeps him busy and glad.
So, if kittens too find life interesting, there must be some profound truth behind living beings wanting fun as opposed to non-living things. Perhaps Darwin is not entirely right in his mechanistic view of evolution guided by struggle for existence as opposed to the Upanishadic view that life evolved so it can enjoy the world better and better, with the pinnacle of Evolution called Albert Einstein quoted as saying:
"I finally figured out that the only reason to be alive is to enjoy life"
That quote is taken from DC Edit Page Tuesday 5 February 2013...don't blame me if DC got it wrong...
William James in his fat Principles of Psychology says that life is different from the non-living. And illustrates it by the experiment of a magnet and an iron needle separated by a piece of paper and let go. The magnet and her needle fly to embrace each other, hit the road block of the paper, and stay stymied.
But, says James, it is different from Romeo and Juliet separated by a 6' fence and left to themselves. Romeo and Juliet don't just give up when they hit the fence... Romeo (if he has any sense) would climb the fence and jump on the other side.
Talking of non-living things like chalk, they have their own stories to tell, like Feynman quoted Huxley's Essay on a Piece of Chalk which may look dead now but was full of life eons ago when it was being deposited by crustaceans. Chesterton also wrote an essay on a piece of chalk that I had read. Intheresting!
I have to ask Supratim, but I guess color vision also evolved, and, for ages before that, the world was black and white for its residents like Calvin's Dad. Why did it evolve? There can only be one answer...that of Einstein.
Anyway, everyone wants to lead an interesting life rather than a boring one although interests are as varied as men and women, ranging from sex to topology.
All those folks that decide to savor interesting things for good must pay, sometime through their noses.
First, one has to painfully acquire a taste for interesting things like coffee, fags or beer...the first attempts are repelling. If kids don't get educated, their interests remain primitive and they get bored easily and take to drugs and dopes and crime. So the aim of education should be to make things ever more interesting. Like learning a language, especially a foreign tongue like English to Indians. It is painful in the beginning...so painful that many give up. Literature is an acquired taste like nicotine.
Especially classics. I was once carrying my copy of Pickwick Papers to the Department during summer holidays and reading the book and 'smiling inwardly' as Shamik puts it. My roommate DB who was immersing himself in the SU (n,m) was annoyed a bit and asked me what was so funny. And I said, Sam Weller and his father Tony Weller apart from everyone else in that book. So, he borrowed it and returned it the next day saying it is unreadable. I then asked him to try it out again without giving up on the first 50 pages come what may. And then he not only read the tome through but was forcing his wife and daughter to do the same.
Next, interesting things stay interesting only when they are sneaked with boring things. A couple of months of uninterrupted summer vacation with nothing to do but read PGWs would be hell. PGW remains fascinating only when you direly wish to finish that story knowing you ought to be preparing for that QM lecture looming next morning.
Finally, those who decide to indulge their entire lives in pursuit of interesting things not bothering about profitable ones pay a heavy price when the chips are down, like retiring from IIT KGP with a home loan and a car loan pending...
...Posted by Ishani
*****************************************************************************************************************************
No comments:
Post a Comment