Sleeping Cat in Eagle Nebula

A composite photo of Pillars of Creation in Eagle Nebula

Eagle nebula is about 6,500 lights years away from us.  How big was this nebula? Our entire solar system would comfortably fit into one of the ears of the sleeping cat (highlighted in the photo)! It was a star factory where the star were being born (I keep using the past tense as we don't know what is happening now, as we are seeing the light that left the nebula a long time ago).  Just as plants leave seeds for continued creation, stars leave dust after their death (i.e., when all the hydrogen is gone through fusion) which will again form stars.

These are the words (not verbatim) of the (awesome) presenter of the Twilight Program at McDonald's Observatory on Dec.26.09.  This sure reminded me of our insignificance in the grand scheme of things.  Rama and I had a great time with the tour of the 107-inch Harlan J. Smith telescope, the Twilight Program, and the Star Party (star gazing through powerful telescopes) in the amphitheater - a whole day of Astronomy 101.

Texas (which is larger than France) has very little public land from what I heard.  Most of the mountains and vast empty lands are owned by the ranchers.  I was told that Mt. Locke (on which HET is located) was donated by a lady to UT-Austin!

Some other things we did during post-Christmas Holidays of year 2009:

We went to see Marfa Lights - three nights, with no luck of sighting; it was hard to maintain motivation and wait for the lights, when wind was blowing and temperatures were below freezing.

Visited Big Bend National Park and hiked Lost Mine Trail and Pinnacle Trail.

Visited Alpine, Fort Davis, and Hotel Paisano in Marfa.

Once in a while, I think that it is good for the spirit to be at least 100 miles away from the nearest Walmart.

Pulking Flowers and Cigrette Buts

One of the things I enjoy while in Vizag is, walking a couple of miles to Kailasa Giri early AM, hiking up 840 steps, roaming around Shiva-Parvathi statues on the hill, and walking back home. 

This sign post atop Kailasa Giri (shot in March'09) cracks me up.

Here Comes Another Bubble - The Richter Scales

Loved this spoof of We didn't start the fire. My Sea Sands buddy Seenu sent this to me like two years ago - I still love it.

Journalism or Political Pamphlets?

After a rather long hiatus in blogging, I thought I should take baby steps, and refrain from pouring all the ideas that have been struggling to get out my head (creating cyberspace junk). Here are a couple of AP newspaper headlines; shot while in Vizag (March'09).

It is not uncommon for private news organizations to endorse political candidates. But I wonder if this kind of blatant bias would qualify as "journalism".

A New Hope

It is wonderful that a record crowd has attended the presidential inauguration. It is a good start of new hope, and an excellent source of inspiration for all minorities. The only thing better than this, is when only a small crowd shows up for similar events in the future!

When I watched images of thousands of people at the presidential inaugural on TV, I was thinking of how we Andhrites proudly claim that Telugu language is Italian of the East! What has that to do with this historic event? A lot.

Apparently, an Italian made this observation long time ago, and some Englishmen thought so too. We, the gultis, take it as a big complement. I see it as in interesting observation; nothing beyond it. I would start feeling proud, probably when Italians begin boasting that their language is Telugu of the West! Right now, I have a feeling that 99% of Italians probably have no clue about "Telugu"language.

Similarly, we can truly celebrate equality when, say, a one-eyed ex-convict Afghan-American women takes oath as the president of the United States by swearing-in on Qur'an, and people don't see it as a big deal :-) Then, we will have a good reason to claim that equality is deeply ingrained in the populace. Obama's inauguration definitely is a great start in the right direction, but we are not there yet. Right now, we have too many differences between each other (short, tall, man, women, black, brown, yellow, white, jew, ...) and we manage to see them clearly!

The Art of Negotiation

Alphabetical Prejudice

In one intriguing study, California researchers analyzed death records to find out whether there was any correlation between people's initials and how long they lived. They divided their subjects' initials into positive and negative groups. The good-initial group included ACE, WIN, WOW, and VIP; the bad contained RAT, BUM, SAD, and DUD. Then they matched up initials with lifespans and looked for any correlation. The results were stunning (and also hotly debated): A person's initials actually may influence the time and cause of his or her death. "A symbol as simple as one's initials can add four years to life or subtract three years," the researchers wrote. They speculated that bad initials were irritants, or stressors, which over the course of a person's life can add up and contribute to health problems. 

In related news, last names that begin with letters occurring later in the alphabet can be associated with a phenomenon that Scottish researchers call "alphabetical prejudice." They found that when medical teams in a brain-injury rehabilitation center met to discuss patients, people with surnames that came early in the alphabet tended to receive three to four minutes' more attention than people with names later in the alphabet. This difference may be critical. Said the investigators, "more time devoted to the early cases clearly results in a better quality of care."

సంక్రాంతి శుభాకాంక్షలు - రమ & గోప/సత్య

The Basics of Hinduism

Image Source: Yoga USA

Yesterday, I attended a lecture titled the Basics of Hinduism at Austin Hindu Temple, delivered by Sri. Swami Nikhilanand (SN).  Here are a few things I learned. 

(1) Vedas basically teach two aspects of dharma - (a) Aparadharma, which is 94% of Vedas, gives instructions on conducting ourselves and (b) Paradharma, which is 6% of Vedas, tells us how to attain God.  Why so much attention for Aparadharma, when attaining the God is our main goal? Swami's explanation with an analogy - In typical universities, there will be many undergraduate students, a few graduate students, and a very few doctoral students.  So, the lesser the level of education, the more is the availability for it.  Vedic knowledge is designed along the same lines.  As the majority of us are concerned about the material pleasures (which are inferior desires), the majority of vedic knowledge provides guidance on behavior in this material world.  The few people who conduct themselves well, tend to develop (true) spiritual urge, and they automatically will read and follow Paradharma.

(2) God originally created ten rishis, who spread the vedic knowledge.

I asked SN "why didn't God put a couple of rishis say, in Norway and a couple in Australia, so that this vital knowledge would be well disseminated?  He said that it was because of the location of India.  Due to its geographic location, India is protected from ice ages.  So, the knowledge will be preserved in this spiritual capital of the world, even when civilizations perish during ice ages; true seekers of knowledge can travel to India and get it.  I was not convinced with this answer.  But it was an excellent lecture and I enjoyed it.

Born in Bondage

Some more philosophy from the movie, The Matrix.    

Agent Smith: Did you know that the first Matrix was designed to be a perfect human world? Where none suffered, where everyone would be happy. It was a disaster. No one would accept the program. Entire crops were lost. Some believed we lacked the programming language to describe your perfect world. But I believe that, as a species, human beings define their reality through suffering and misery. The perfect world was a dream that your primitive cerebrum kept trying to wake up from. Which is why the Matrix was redesigned to this: the peak of your civilization.

One thing that nobody seems to have mentioned (though its not surprising) is the underlying Buddhist theory behind The Matrix. When Mr. Smith, one of the agents, is describing the evolution of The Matrix, he mentions a prior version. One in which all suffering and pain cease to exist. All of humanity was "living" in a perfect world devoid of unhappiness. The odd part, he says, is that it failed. Mr. Smith's theory is that suffering define's human experience. This is a parallel to the buddhist notion of suffering. From The Art of Happiness, "Within a Buddhist context, when one reflects on the fact that one's ordinary day-to-day existence is characterized by suffering, this serves to encourage one to engage in the practices that will eliminate the root causes of one's suffering." Taking this concept further, we find that the true goal of life is to, in fact, eliminate suffering (in the Buddhist context). With no suffering to eliminate, the mind has nothing to do. It cannot define the passage of time (think about it, only when suffering do we keep track of time), and has nothing to work on (self-improvement, etc). If there is nothing to do, the mind would quickly rot away (again in Buddhist context) and probably die. Sound like Mr. Smith's speech?