Author aconfusedprimate

The Purge?

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Its here, Its there, its every where. There is a new epidemic town and every one is going bat shit crazy. If George Carlin were alive, he would have said ‘I told you so’ and showed you his middle finger.

Words of wisdom

Humans as a species have been on a path of self destruction for over a century now. In the name of technological advances and progress we have been going down the scale of the most important aspect for survival. Immunity.

I am a prime example for this. My parents wrapped me in cotton wool since childhood, making me very fragile physically. They were always scared that something might happen to me and now after taking so many precautionary medicines, my immune system is so weak that even the common cold takes 2 weeks and tons of antibiotics to go away.

The only thing on every ones minds these days is the Corona virus. As of 4th March 2020, the corona virus has infected people in 79 countries. There are 16 people in Iceland who have it. 16 people. A country with a population density of 3.5 people per square kilometer have a disease that is spread through human contact.

I always admire the new ways Nature tries to put us in our place time and again. I also admire the foolishness of our race because we never seem to learn.

When ever we put people in difficult situations, their true nature comes out. All the racists out there have been spewing hatred on the Chinese. Insulting their culture and food habits. Its like pot calling kettle black. As usual the wise ass clowns on social media are spreading all kinds of shit on the social media. Forwarding unverified, false information adding to the mass hysteria. They forward a bunch of messages a day and think they saved the world. But one thing is true, Nature has this time come up with a new plan and its going to take a monumental effort to get out of jail this time.

Lets look at the numbers. Scientists say that if not properly dealt with, the virus will infect about 60% of the world population. The death rate after infection is about 3.5 percent. For the first time in history, lets assume that the governments and politicians do their job efficiently and the percentage remains same. 60% of the world population is about 4,661,186,400 and 3.5 percent of it is 163,141,524‬. That would be 2% of the total population. That’s peanuts when compared to the black death that killed 30% of the world population. It wont even cause a dent to humanity. Its just a scratch.

So, why are most people behaving like its the end of the fucking world? May be we have become too sensitive? May be we are reading too much into this disease? Or may be we are even underestimating it and it is a purge by planet earth to offload some of the burden it is having to bear because of humans. We will only know this once the dust has settled.

I mean, to be fair, the planet probably sees us as a mild threat; something to be dealt with, and I’m sure the planet will defend itself in the manner of a large organism. Like a beehive or an ant colony can muster a defense, I’m sure the planet will think of something. What would you do if you were the planet trying to defend against this pesky, troublesome species? Let’s see, what might… hmm… viruses! Viruses might be good. They seem vulnerable to viruses. And viruses are tricky; always mutating and forming new strains whenever a vaccine is developed. Perhaps this first virus could be one that-that compromises the immune system of these creatures. Perhaps a human immunodeficiency virus making them vulnerable to all sorts of other diseases and infections that might come along and maybe it could be spread sexually, making them a little reluctant to engage in the act of reproduction.Well, that’s a poetic note. And it’s a start and I can dream can I?

George Carlin on Plant earth

But one thing is for sure. Again in the words of George Carlin, “The planet is fine, we are fucked“. May not be immediately but we definitely are eventually.

The Judge, the jury and the executioner

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It is a fact that no two people are alike. I am not talking about appearances, DNA. finger prints, iris scans or all the other bullshit that the governments are using to tag us like some endangered species. I am talking about the nature, qualities, behavior and other things that are almost impossible to quantify or classify. There are words in every language to describe these things but the combinations and scale of intensity of these things is so unique to everyone that we would have to invent a new word for each one of us.

My brain is some of these at times, many of these at other times but never all of these.

As a person who seldom makes a good first impression, I want to ask you this. How long does it take for you to judge a person? But, more importantly, I would like to ask you. Why do you need to judge another person? What purpose does it serve? The only people in the world who should be concerned about what a person is is a psychiatrist. What is the urge to classify and categorize every person in your life?

We do that right from the moment a person in born into this world. We put them into one of the 12 buckets available based on the day they were born. They are called sun signs or moon signs, depending on the place you are born. I don’t believe in astrology. I am so self-centered that I assume that no-one knows more than me, so I start with a presumption that every one is wrong and accept anything only after fact checking. I am like Sheldon cooper with out a PhD. But I do have a confession to make. In my first week of my first job, I was bored and someone send me a link to a website that has all the content from Linda Goodman’s book – Sun signs. As any one would do I clicked on my sun sign and started reading.

No, I still remember the website and the content so well because I was very surprised it to be so accurate. Its been over 11 and a half years since I read it for the first time. But over the last decade I have been revisiting the site. As they say, age generally brings maturity. What I took in from this website changes over this period. The 21 year old was blown away by the content. The 25 year old started looking into the content for other sun signs. Finally the 30 year old understood why the 21 year old was blown away. The content for all the sun signs is highly positive. Even some of the negative traits shown in a positive way. This makes every one like their own stuff. Though I am still a little spooked about the accuracy content, I have also realized that I am not just what was in that web page. There is much more to me. May be it represents 10-15% of me.

If I were on a mission to make every one like me. I would have to print out those pages and distribute them like visiting cards. Underlining the less desirable traits in me and asking people to bear with me because they were manufacturing defects. On the other side, every one around me will have to make an algorithm out of the content to figure out the probable reaction I give to different situations. Its highly impractical and also illogical. Because I change every day, the content of the page has remained same since 1st December 1984. When I say I change every day, I don’t mean like a chameleon. I mean that I evolve everyday. Based on different circumstances, I keep changing my opinions and thus my responses to same events keep changing.

But we keep trying to stereo type people based on gender, region, religion, blah blah blah. Thereby we miss the point. Its none of your business. Deal with people in a case to case basis. In each case, start with a clean slate. It takes a lot of self control to do this. I do digress sometimes. But eventually try to go back to do the correct thing. React to situation based on the facts and only facts of the case.

Don’t try to be the Judge, Jury and Executioner for everyone around you. Judges are corrupt, Jury are gullible and Executioner don’t get to use their brains. In the current society, if a person with a criminal record is found at the scene of another crime, they assume he did it.

Next time you see a news article with something bad written about somebody, try reading it as – a person did a bad thing rather than a bad person did a thing.Don’t generalize. If you do, you will be a person doing the same bad thing again and again.

The numb and number

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Anesthesia with Amnesia

Everybody knows that the dice are loaded
Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed
Everybody knows the war is over
Everybody knows the good guys lost
Everybody knows the fight was fixed
The poor stay poor, the rich get rich
That’s how it goes
Everybody knows

Written by Leonard Cohen & Sharon Robinson , 1988

I first heard the song “Every body knows” in opening credits of the movie Justice League. It was a song filled with pessimism. It made sense, the plot starts where Batman vs Superman ended. Superman is dead. All hope for mankind is dead along with it. 

(Side note: I have always found movies from DC comics to be light years ahead of Marvel in their quality. Marvel is a money making machine where as DC is a purists delight)

But the original song doesn’t have the same melancholy in it. It feels like Leonard Cohen and Sharon Robinson who wrote and composed it were being very pragmatic. Though the song was criticized for being bitterly pessimistic. But I disagree. It is one of the most realistic songs ever.

If you believe that everything in the world is fair, you are naive if I have to be gentle. Stupid if I have to be straightforward. But it may not be your fault. The people who are dealt with a good hand in life always make sure that the others don’t realize it. Just like the game of poker, if you want to win more money, you need others to feel safe at the very least and over confident & cocky at the very best.

There have been many ways to keep you distracted enough not to know your own plight. Mobile phones and social media have taken the baton now. Now a days, people treat their mobile phones like a drug addict treats his stash. They are obsessed and addicted to them. A single person or an organization cannot achieve this. It has to be a conscious nexus of various power centers.

Blackberry messenger, first introduced in 2005 was the pioneer in multi-media messaging and voice telephony over a data connection. They did it efficiently and securely. They respected privacy of their users. Then came the iPhone in 2007 followed by Android phones in 2010. Tons of applications started popping up. But 2G was slow and expensive which limited the use of these devices to serious users. In the next decade, the phones became cheaper along with the internet. 2G was replaced by 3G and 4G.

The cost of the infrastructure didn’t go down. The profit margins did not increase. The biggest change was the source of income. Till 2010, profit was made by selling mobile phones. Now the profit making starts after the purchase. Mind you most of the people use their phones because they are affordable on top of being addictive.

The society has somehow transformed into one where four of the five senses are mostly used for interaction with a mobile phone. Phones still don’t have an odour (yet). At least it is not mainstream yet. But the day is not far.

We are growing numb to the realities of the world. We are in a way becoming that is why we start seeing pragmatic people as pessimists. Deep down I believe “Every body knows” this, but they are just far too distracted to realize it.

The puppet show

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Illusion of choice

This blog started out as the episode 2 of my new ‘Over analyzed movies’ series. But once I started structuring the thoughts, it became more of a ‘Song’ review rather than a ‘Movie’ review. A few minutes later, it started evolving into the following….   Now, the song in question is the title track from the movie Rangasthalam. It is a movie about the lives of some people in a village by the name ‘Rangasthalam’. But the word literally means ‘the Stage’. The one used for theater kind, Not the Stage 1, Stage 2 kind. Now the lyrics of the song when translated to English (Translation cannot do justice to any piece of poetry, it can only be truly enjoyed in its original form) go something like…..

In Rangasthalam, we are all puppets of an invisible puppeteer. Then it goes on to describe how people in Rangasthalam are gullible and innocent etc.

The first time I heard this song, before watching the movie. I liked the philosophical side of the song as I Interpreted it as a play of words referring to the world as a stage and god as a puppeteer. But, once I completed watching the movie, I realized that it had a far more literal meaning in the context of the movie. As, every aspect of the people of Rangasthalam is actually controlled by the anti-hero of the movie. He is a landlord who casts his shadow over entire village with a pseudo-god like status.    Now, that was a clever use of words. Ones that have both metaphorical and actual meanings. In fact all great art does. Please mind that I am not referring to the tons of double-meaning-ed pieces of literature out there that replace obscene and vulgar words with the words that infer those things. I am talking about literature like ‘Animal farm’ which captures the idea of communism and social revolutions thought the story of animals in an actual animal farm. I am talking about the movies like I-Robot,  Inception, The true man show. I am talking about smash hits songs like London calling, Like a virgin and Summer of 69. The art which needs a lot of context to understand the true meaning.

If this was to be a movie review, then I have to stop here. But it isn’t. The song in question has always triggered a lot of after thoughts, every time I listened to it. Its is a metaphor that refers to all of us. Aren’t we all puppets? Or do you strongly believe that you are acting on your own free will on all decisions you make?  

Depending on the your financial and social/political might, you might just be a puppet or both a puppet and a puppeteer. There is a clear hierarchy in our society, the people who pull the strings also have their own masters. The logo of “The God Father” and the plot of the book is a perfect analogy of how a city is controlled by a single guy. May be the phrase “Pulling strings” also originates from the puppet show.

We are born into this world with the strings of Gender, Family, Religion & Region. To be more specific the cultural and habitual obligations that come with being born into a gender/family/religion/region. These obligations become a norm for us. The society adds more strings. Moral obligations, the expectations of your kin and society in general. The compulsion of education via schools with a predefined syllabus. The obligations of degrees, jobs, marriage, kids. Which major to pick in college, which domain to choose for a job, whom you marry, when you marry. Everything is either decided or influenced by someone else.

Lately, capitalism has added more strings. What you buy, where you buy, when you buy something is not exactly in your hands anymore. It is decided by tech giants running machine learning algorithms to dangle stuff that you don’t need and financial giants allow you to indulge with money you don’t have through credit cards, loans, EMIs and installments. Businesses try to put you on a leash by offering attractive memberships.

Elections campaign slogans and political manifestos are decided by data mining. The hastags that you add to the posts are not to search trends. Its is to judge the pulse of people from silly to serious things. Text processing engines burn millions of watts of electricity every day going through the non-sense called social media counting for and against count on each topic and then sell this information to companies that think that data doesn’t lie and machines can think better than us. then shove the outputs of these algorithms down our throats. 

Do you still think that you make your own decisions? Or did you start counting the number of puppet masters you have?

The underdog detective

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Over analyzed movie review – Episode 1

I like movies a lot. That is why I don’t watch many. 


Spoiler Alert: The following blog contains spoilers. Please stay away if you haven’t watched the movie.

Well to start with a gist, better get it from IMDB, “Agent Sai Srinivasa Athreya is an authentic humorous investigative thriller revolving around the adventures of a detective based out of Nellore.“

Now let me try it in my own words. It is a low budget comedy thriller that has a very good script and screenplay. An ambitious detective who watches loads of English detective films to learn his trade and operates from a shack in the middle of a vegetable market. He gets dragged into a very sophisticated criminal operation. He thinks that he is on the right path, so do we. He ends up being framed for a couple of murders and now has to clear his name while also find the real culprits.

Phew! Those were some long sentences. But to the topic of my interest. Why did it work?
Traditional movie goers in India prefer movies with big name stars to ones with a good script. So, how did this movie do as well as it did? Well a movie, irrespective of language will always do well if it manages to play with the emotions and instincts of the audience. 

In this movie, some of our basic instincts (not Michael Douglas’s) are played with. In any detective movie you expect the lead to solve the mystery. But casting a rookie as the film’s lead trigger’s the underdog effect. Let’s say you are watching a James Bond/Sherlock Holmes/Mission impossible, if the lead were to fall into any peril, you wouldn’t be concerned. How can any harm come to such a powerful character? (Same logic used in reverse to blow your minds again and again in Game of thrones) If you are not concerned or connected with the character, you wouldn’t be blissful when he wins. In this movie, the lead is not very powerful or well built. You wouldn’t expect him to win any fights. So, it makes him the underdog. In a neutral situation, one always roots for the underdog. So there is a connection established with the audience. Its always satisfying to see a deer escaping a tiger than a tiger devouring a deer or a tiger fighting another tiger.

Next, Us being Judgmental. Movies have always generalized bad people. Their appearance,body language, the facial expressions have always been stereotyped. But, How does a bad person look?  Here is a test for you. If you haven’t watched ‘The Usual Suspected’, play along. Look at the image below and find the culprit.


Before you answer, think again, this may or may not be a trick question. Watch the movie to know the answer. I will not reveal it. 
Another test if you are interested. Below is a poster of “Murder on Orient express”.The poster of the better version of 1974 was not very convenient for the task, so I am using the 2017 version. Who among the below is a cold blooded murderer?




Now coming back the topic of discussion. At no juncture in the movie, the audience get any information on who the bad guy(s) is/are. There is no attempt to mislead you either. They genuinely show characters in different situations. Besides appearances, People mistake attitude for character. So, for major part of the movie, our brains keep passing judgments on everyone we see on the screen.

Side note: This topic alone deserves a separate post. On how we assume ourselves to be the judge, jury and executioner for everyone.

Coming back to the movie. A detective movie is only good if the audience cannot figure out the mystery themselves. There are different ways the narrators achieve this. Some make the plot so complicated/illogical that its impossible to find the culprit. Others mislead you on purpose. But only a few master the screenplay of audience coming to their own conclusions and making sure they are wrong conclusions. 

So, this movie plays at 2 habits of ours. One always supporting the underdog and the other, us being judgmental about everything. This is why it hit the right cords.

Collective compass

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Ants

 
Ants are curious organisms. They are always busy. I mean always. Have you ever seen an ant that is not in hurry? Its unfair that bees get the idiom ‘Busy as a bee’ just because they start with same alphabet. I have see plenty of bees that are just sitting idle of a wall or a leaf. Though, I cannot change the existing language, I can add another idiom. ‘As industrious as an Ant’.

Ants have a social hierarchy. The queen is the founder and responsible for laying eggs. Drones are the males responsible for mating with the queen while worker ants are responsible for building and maintaining the nest, protecting the colony from other ants and, most importantly, feeding the colony. The most fascinating aspect of worker ants is the way they carry food. If you observe the below animation closely, you will notice that Ants keep changing places. Its not like they are taking turns at the job or taking frequent breaks from their task. You will also notice that each time a new ant joins the effort, there is a slight alteration in the direction.

Worker ants have a collective goal. They trust each and every one of the ants to work towards the same goal. When ant leaves its position and wanders around, it is actually scouting for the direction they need to travel in and when it comes back and tugs in a different direction, the rest of the group just follow the new direction, without even a slight hesitation.


A compass is a tool that tells you direction. But it does its job only if its working properly. A broken compass will show a wrong direction. Lets look at it as each ant has its own compass, each member of the group, takes turns to check their compass and tell the rest of the group to follow their compass. The rest of the pack ignore the readings in their compasses and just follow the latest information. Also there is no single ant forcing others to follow only its directions. It sounds like a very inefficient plan. But it ants always make their way back to their nest.
 
Now, if we give a group of human beings a compass each. Some working and some broken without telling them who has the proper ones and repeat this experiment of asking them to go from Point A to Point B with no single one having any idea where their destination is, I would bet one of the two things with happen. They will either remain at the same location arguing or end up being influenced by the most dominant member and leave the result to the change of the dominant member’s compass being correct.

All this might seem like a stupid Idea. When would anyone be in this kind of situation. Well, this happens often in life and more often at work. Whenever we embark of a journey to uncharted territories with a group/team of people, almost everyone in the group has an opinion on how to go about it. But they seldom trust each other. They fail to consider that they might have a broken compass.

I don’t mean to say the one must follow everyone’s advice. It would be ridiculous. But one should at least give a benefit of doubt to other ideas. There is a very good quote in the movie “Ratatouille”. It says “Everybody can cook”. It doesn’t mean that each and everyone of us would make an excellent cook. It means that a great cook can come from anywhere.

 

 

 

50 shades of Red

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What’s left of left?


I have stopped watching news. I have deleted all my social media accounts. No, I am not depressed or on a digital fast. I was really sick of the hypocritical trolls out there spewing hatred 24/7.  Religious, regional and political affiliations often bring out the worst in people. Until a few decades ago, these topics were dealt separately. But the information age started making a toxic cocktail of these affiliations. 

I have already spoken about the religious and regional affiliations. Its time to hit the trifecta. 
Almost all political parties in the world classify them selves as the Right, the Left or the moderates. But there are many shades of these ideologies. In US, the Red represents republicans who are right wing. Where as every where else in the world Red represents communism which is far far left. This is the reason I called this post 50 shades of red. These many shades make the whole deal very kinky.

Now what is left and what is right? And why are there wings? Is the government an aircraft or is it a bird? How come it can fly with a single wing?

The terms “left” and “right” appeared during the French Revolution of 1789 when members of the National Assembly divided into supporters of the king to the president’s right and supporters of the revolution to his left. The right is always the party sector associated with the interests of the upper or dominant classes, the left the sector expressive of the lower economic or social classes, and the center that of the middle classes..

Speaking honestly, are any of the political parties working for the non-rich? 


Just like bloodstock horses that are bred to run others races and die earning money for others, the lower and middle classes spend their lives making meager money while the people who employ them reap the actual benefits. 

There is another part of horse racing analogy that applies to politics, politicians make sure that the common folk is not distracted by the realities of the world, So they tie blinds called religious and regional feelings to their eyes. The working class throws common sense out of the window, don’t complain about getting whipped by their jockeys and run until they die.

The true sense of liberal or left philosophy was always a myth. Soviets embraced it to overthrow czars only to surrender to another equally totalitarian leadership. In US, communists are seen as terrorists but lobbying is rampant in both their major parties. The plight of Chinese has been very similar to that of the Russians. Over the last decade, the right wing parties have been gaining momentum in each passing election and pushing even the theoretical left parties to the brink of existence. I say theoretical because, I have never come across a self proclaimed socialist and liberal government truly work to improve the lives of the less privileged. 

From reds of the US to the reds of rest of the world, all political parties do is to fill their pockets with money from the lobbyists and businessmen. The only difference is their choice of rich. If they preach hardcore religious values then they pay the right and if they are less religious, they pay the left. Thus, every citizen is having to pay (a far more costly price).

Well wishers

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Foxes in sheep’s clothing

The Wolf has been one of the most maligned animal in an idiomatic sense. Some one who is cunning and deceives is commonly referred to as a Wolf in sheep’s clothing. But, in reality wolf is a very ethical animal. It never hides its intent. From an evolutionary perspective-it doesn’t need to. It has the physical strength to survive, it always lives in a pack. So, anything that it does to undermine the integrity of the pack will not be tolerated and this fact is genetically embedded. 

On a side note, this idiom has biblical origins. According to new testament this was quoted by none other than Jesus. No, I don’t attend mass. I just googled the idiom and Wikipedia told me this fact. Which means., 1) Wikipedia is wrong or  2) The guys who wrote new testament lied or 3) Jesus didn’t know the nature of wolves (which is highly unlikely coz his dad created everything. Right?)

Coming back to the poor misunderstood wolves, The actual culprit here is another canine. Foxes – They are always deceitful. Their slender size demands that they be cunning. Else, they wouldn’t survive. This is evolution, the survival of the fittest. The word fit here is misleading, it doesn’t just mean physical fitness. It is the fitness demanded by the surroundings and environment. Now that my mini-crusade for Wolves has concluded. I would like to get into the actual context. 

The image and the title might not make a good correlation on first glance. Now read well wishers as the people who wish that they can at least push you into a well or in a best case scenario wish they could push you off the cliff. Now, can you make the connection between the foxes, the well wishers and the stick version of “This is Sparta“?

Since, the gentlemen in the figure are wearing ties,Can I also assume that you made the correlation to an office environment? Okay, you might have missed that. But no worries. 

Lets look at the employees in an office in conjunction with the Darwin’s theory of natural selection and evolution. 

In nature, all species have developed different tactics to attract mates. 
In offices, the managers become these mates. But eventually most mates ehm…. managers turn into praying mantis (they f*ck their mate and they eat them – wow this my first ever expletive ridden post). In nature the female always prefers a partner which would pass on the best genetic code to its offspring. The particular quality that is preferred depends on the type of species. But in offices, different mates look at different qualities. Some good for the offspring (organization) some just good for them. This is where offices deviate from Darwin. 



Now that we have discussed the metaphorical mating rituals, lets look at the competition. In animal kingdom there are different types of competition among peers (Other than competing for a mate). Social animals fight for control or power over the group. But this mostly results in finding the right leader. But in most organisations the oldest animal becomes the King. These Kings in the organisation do not opt for a long term partners. So, they don’t choose a queen. They instead pick a bitch* from time to time. This would be their most loyal employees. Then there is another position up for grabs. The one of a minister to seek advice. This is where again the there is a deviation from evolution. Here its not the survival of the fittest. The person most capable of doing his job well would be the fittest guy, some Kings do choose their counsel wisely. There by becoming successful even if they are incompetent. But some others choose poorly and ultimately perish.

The poor choice of counsel happens because of not having visibility. This generally happens in large organisations. But in smaller/medium organisations, the foxes come-to-the-fore. Since, they don’t cut the bill, they resort to all sort of tactics to get the competition out of the way. Gossiping, bullying, back stabbing, undermining others, taking credit for others work. They use all the code in their cheat book. Their skill here is to do it subtly. They make every effort not to get exposed. 

So, long story short. The foxes in offices have defied the laws of evolution. If you want to be successful, please be on a look out for foxes. They can be lurking next to you, masquerading as a Sheep, waiting for the right opportunity.

* not trying to insult any dogs here

Ignorance is a bliss!!!

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The ignorant are ignorant of their ignorance

This is the image of the planet we live on. This is the image of earth. This is not a depiction of a millenniums’ old idea. This is the depiction of a 21st century idea. Just google flat earth if you don’t trust me. There is something called ‘The flat earth society’. No, they do not belong to some tribe with no contact with outside world. Also, its not that their families have been home schooled for hundreds of years. It was established in 20th century. They are based out of the US of A and have followers from all around the world. They hold annual conferences to discuss and debunk the conspiracy theory called a round earth. The below animation is from their official website explaining the answer to the question, of how night and day occur on earth


So, how do you feel having known this mind blowing phenomenon? You must be thinking that these these are just a bunch of morons without any work. But that’s not true either. They have members from all walks of life. I saw the interview of a person attending this conference. He flew from New Zealand to the US. He was asked, couldn’t you see the curvature of earth from the window in the Aeroplane? He said that he never looks out of a plane window.

There is a medical condition called Psychological myopia. It refers to the tendency in decision makers to focus on information immediately related to their judgment and to ignore other, less prominent, pieces of information. Because we, as human beings, often ignore pieces of information in decision-making processes, it makes us think short-sightedly. The flat earth society is a case of extreme psychological myopia. In this age of information, believing such things might be called ignorance. It’s not that these people don’t have access to information. They just choose to ignore the facts that they don’t. So, for them facts become opinions. 

So, this proves that ignorance is sometimes a choice. Right? I say sometimes, because I give a benefit of doubt to all those people who do not have access information. Now that you know what Psychological myopia, tell me, Do you suffer from this condition? Well, the answer is ‘you wouldn’t know’. I am not saying that you also believe that the earth is flat, I mean how would an ignorant know of his ignorance? Ignorance doesn’t just mean not knowing things, its also thinking that you know all that there is to know. 

Honestly ask yourself, do you treat each and every information in an equal and unbiased manner? If you answer No, it means that you are ignorant of your ignorance. If you answer Yes, then again you are ignorant. You might find this argument unreasonable. Let’s say you read/watch news everyday. It doesn’t mean you are well informed. Mark twain famously said this:

I would prefer being uninformed. In this information age, most people are misinformed. This is because either they have a single source of information which is biased or you have multiple sources of information which are again biased. Due to capitalism and greed, the world is now a place where everyone is trying to put forward their opinions as facts. 

This makes it vital that you know which information to discard. The world is full of people who read their news from Whatsapp and Facebook. This is causing a great deal of harm to us as a society. From web sites like like Infowars to the companies that create false and misleading content to be circulated on the in internet. From the conspiracy theories such as Neil Armstrong’s moon landing was filmed in a hollywood set to the the theories that Hillary Clinton is running a child sex ring out of a pizza parlor. The corporations and politicians are taking advantage of gullible people by constantly brain washing them with false information. 

In a way the burden of truth is too difficult to carry, so people take solace in living in small boxes they built around themselves to block out all the uncomfortable facts. This enables them to live a happy life. But are such lives meaningful?
A quarter of Americans surveyed could not correctly answer that the Earth revolves around the sun and not the other way around, according to a report from the National Science Foundation. There was a conversation between a scholar and his pupil that went something like this:
                    Scholar: Why did you think that the sun revolved around the earth?
                    Pupil: Because it looked like that 
                    Scholar: What would earth revolving around the sun look like?

Each one of us suffer from this tunnel vision where we block out all the things that we don’t like. The only difference between individual is the width of the tunnel. 
So,how wide is your vision?


Day dreaming!!!

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Ground control to Major Tom


Do you dream? 
May be it is a stupid question. Every one dreams. In fact, studies show that even animals dream. Now don’t confuse dreams with aspirations. Though the words are used interchangeably, there is a ton of difference. I’m talking about dreams where you see things and do stuff. Kind of hallucinations. 

Now, do you Day dream? Do you phase out often, even when in the company of people and when you are wide awake?

For the record, I think i’m one of the most qualified person to talk on this subject. I have day dreams in the middle of day dreaming. Not like the plot of Inception.My day dreams are sometimes interrupted by other day dreams. May be that is one reason why I almost never get bored. If you leave me alone for a couple of minutes or for that matter, if you talk to me about something that I’m not interested it, I my brain will jettison you and will wander off to my dreamland. It might sound weird and also dangerous but I can even drive while day dreaming. 

Now, I haven’t paid much attention to this phenomenon my entire life. I just assumed that there is some faulty wiring in my brain and there is nothing I can do about it. That was until I saw a movie. This movie has become my favourite. Actually favourite is not a word that would do justice to describe my liking to this movie. Its called “Secret life of Walter Mitty”. Its a remake of a 1947 movie with same title which in turn is an adaptation of a short story published in 1939. The story and the earlier adaptations are gentle comedies about a guy who ends up in awkward situations because of his habit of day dreaming.

But in my opinion, Ben stiller’s modern take on this short story was not only mind blowing experience for me but also something that is very up close and personal to me. No, I don’t stalk my female colleagues on online dating platforms. I also day dream a lot. Now there are 2 phases of life to Walter Mitty in this movie. One is the person who is lot in dreams and the other is where he eventually comes of of this phase. This transition is what amazed me. 

If you haven’t watched the movie, I’d suggest you do before you read my take on the movie. Its always good to get your own perspective because once you read mine, you”ll not be able you form your own unbiased opinion. 

The story socially awkward boy who dreamed to travel the world with a Mohawk, skate board and a backpack is thrown into the daily churn of life because of his father’s untimely demise and has to take the responsibility of the entire family. The boy who grows up to be a man who has come to a acceptance that there is nothing he can do but get along with a boring life and a boring job. How does one get a release from such situation? Day dreaming. Just like most ‘night’ dreams are related to things that we want to do and be. He dreams about cracking a wise ass joke on his boss. He dreams about flooring his office crush with an cool romantic avatar. He dreams about having a super hero style fight with the people who make fun of him. He dreams about anything and everything. Now, what else could he do? 

But due to circumstances, he has to start off on a journey that turns out to be a crazy wild ride. He travels to Greenland, Iceland and Afghanistan. He gets to jump of a helicopter into freezing water and fights off sharks. Slowly during this journey, the frequency of his day dreaming decreases to finally vanish one day. His innermost, most important desire for travel and adventure fulfilled accidentally, now he has no need to dream. He was a self content man. Anyone who gets to do the stuff he truly craves for doesn’t need to imagine himself doing this same stuff. Right?

After this I realised why I day dream so much. In this politically correct world with the social obligations and status quo, I have no way to be myself. So, I resort to day dreaming where I can murder the asshole who cuts me off on the road, slap the coworker who takes credit for others work, have a conversation that I actually wanted to have rather than the one I just had but couldn’t truly express my feeling in, flirt with the girl I like.

The problem I have now is that almost all of these dreams I have can never come true. This is because I can associate my brain activity with another movie also. Its called Split.
There a guy has a multiple personality disorder. He has 23 different personalities. Thankfully, I don’t have this condition (as far as I know). But I sure do have so many personalities in my dreams.