The girl in the rain

Ravi was the quiet and reserved kind. Having lived through most of his life away from family and friends he had learnt to keep himself immersed in himself and his surroundings. He was keenly observant of the things around him and found unbridled amusement in the most mundane of things. But beneath the aloofness he had an intelligent mind and had done quite well academically. He spent his time preparing for the civil services examination.

He had a loving nature that endured him to many.The owner of the single bedroom that he occupied on the 1st floor of an old decrepit Benaras haveli were specially fond of him. Enduring the loss of their single offspring to a hapless accident years ago Mr and Mrs Kumar were now all but living through their meagre pension and the rent from Ravi. And they were grateful to him for staying with them. They occupied the rooms on the ground floor.

The haveli was old belying the glory of its heydeys. It was crumbling down and was almost beyond repair. The rainy days were specially bad as water seeped through the walls at many places. It had many rooms but most were unworthy of habitation without significant overhaul. Few people would want to rent this place. And so, they were happy to have Ravi staying with them who on the other hand was equally happy with the small rent. He could hardly afford anything more lavish then that.

Ravi was practically a family member of the Kumars. Kumar Auntie would cook all his meals and get his clothes washed by the maid. She would clean his room every morning and generally treated her like her own son. Ravi was grateful for this service as it freed him to concentrate on his studies.

There was one habit Ravi had formed through the years. He thoroughly enjoyed going out for a walk along the banks of the Ganges after dinner. It had a calming effect on him. The full moon nights were particularly special to him. And he did this without fail. Mrs Kumar observed that Ravi almost always returned peacefull and calm after such a noctural walk. She felt good for him and thought she should go herself sometimes, her arthritis permitting.

Time went by and the monsoon came in. But, Ravi's noctural walk did not give way. He insisted on going out even in the rain with an umbrella in hand. Mrs Kumar tried to discourage him on many occasions but finally had to give in to his adamance. She couldnt understand this behavior but did not think much of this at that time. Mr Kumar was quite aloof too. They dismissed it of as a strange insistance of some kind.

The first time she noticed something alarming was when she saw blood stains on his shirt one night. He was thoroughly drenched from the rain and the blood was smeared across his left sleeve. The umbrella he had carried was nowhere to be seen. At first she thought he must have been hurt. But he walked straight and showed no pain. In fact, he seemed to be in a strange trance like state. He gave no answers to her queries and headed upstairs to his room and bolted it.

The next morning Mrs Kumar decided to confront him. But she found him very quiet even by Ravi's standards. When she questioned about the previous night he could summon no recollection of what could have put the blood stains on his shirt. By his account it was just a routine walk with nothing interesting to report. But, yes he did come across a very beautiful girl in the rain! Then he went up to study leaving behind a very puzzled and concerned Mrs Kumar.

........contd...

Fiction to Fact

Here's an interesting BBC article about how scientists are now talking about robot ethics and their repercussions on human-robot interactions. Have we really reached that point yet when we could be sued for "inhumane" treatment of robots? Are we going to be seeing the surge of robot-rights movement in line with animal-rights movement? Not yet! I am sure but the real question is are we heading there faster than we can realize it? This article talks about moral, ethical questions that such an event will give rise to.
But, my question is not whether that will happen or not and if that happens what could be the result? My question is do we have a choice?

In my humble opinion, popular science fiction already determines what is going to happen and what is not. It points the direction in which scientific endeavour will advance in time and being popular ideas human innovation measures up to lead us there. The only elements of uncertainity I see in this is that of the idea getting unpopular through time, in which case science will change to the direction of a more popular idea (possibly another product of science fiction) or the amount of time it will take to reach there.

So, it doesn't surprise me that issues as those pointed out by the article are knocking our doors now. It will be with us even before we know it. Robots are here to stay!
Ever since they were made popular by Issac Asimov's novels the direction of science has been firmly oriented towards their invention and use. Indeed the last half century has seen immense progress in this direction. I am not an expert in this field but I do know from my engineering education that making robots walk was one of the biggest challenge in robotics. That was some 10 years ago and since then I have seen the bi-pedal robot from Honda named Asimo that not only walks with poise but also dances too.
And soon we are going to be having robots that can laugh at your jokes or cry at your insults. We better start learning robotiquettes !!!

Time and Change

I had an interesting dialogue with a friend of mine a few days back. The topic was time and its relation to change.
My friend postulated that Time is Change and vice-versa. He argued that our perception of time is associated with the change of state of our universe.
Which means that we can only perceive the flow of time if and only if the universe changes its state. And by state of universe he of course means the representation of the position and momentum of all the particles in the universe which though uncertain has a notional value.

In effect, I was in agreement with his statement. But, then I started to question it. How can you determine this relationship?
I suggested the following experiment:

"Assume that everything in the universe is frozen around you. There is no change. Would you still feel the passage of time?"
"Yes, because though everything around you is frozen you arent. So, you would feel your body go through changes and that would give you the feel of time".
"But wait a minute, if everything around you is frozen, why would your body go through changes?
There is no change in atmospheric temperature, there is no wind, there is no change in humidity. You should feel nothing?"

"Yes, but what about your heart beats, your blood flowing through your veins, you breathing?"

"Ah! breathing....how would you be breathing if the universe is frozen outside? How would you suck in air without disturbing the air pressure outside and how would you exhale?"
"Hmmmm...!"
"Same thing goes for your heart beats. You know your chest expands and contracts with your heart beat. Wouldn't it displace air when it does that? Wouldn't that violate the assumption that the universe is frozen."
"Ya I see your point."
"The point is if the universe is frozen, then so are you. Your heart wont beat, your lungs wont breathe and your mind wont read. And wow! that rhymes!
Anyway, the thing is even your neurons wont fire in that state. So, while nothing is changing you are not in a state to perceive that it isnt. What does it tell us?"
"That this experiment is pointless."
"No, that the relationship cannot be determined."
"Cummon, just because this experiment doesnt work does not mean there are no other means."
"There could be, but I strongly doubt it. We can understand it this way

To determine the equivalence of time and change we have to prove that

whenever time flows there are changes
and
whenever there are changes time flows

This is basically showing that "time flows" => "there are changes" and vice versa.

Now, we are clear about the first one. But, the reverse is what is a little dicey.
Does
there are changes => time flows ?
Coming back to our experiment,
what happens when our universe changes but nothing changes in our near neighbourhood?
This means that though something in the universe changed, we could not perceive it because of the localized frozen state. Our neurons didn't fire!!
This is something similar to the old "Does the moon exist if no one is looking at it?" question.

Even though something changed, if we are not in a position to perceive that change then how can we say that time has flown.
The relationship,
there are changes => time flows is a big question mark.
And there are various positions on it ranging from quantum theory to philosophy to misticism to cognitive sciences.
So, my position is: I strongly doubt this relationship can be shown as equivalent."

My friend agreed and we decided to keep the time flowing for the time being.