Once I suggested my friend who was fatigued from office work to take a short break and start again when feeling fresh. She replied that she can’t even think of sitting idle, doing nothing. Nothing — ‘doing nothing’, ‘saying nothing’, ‘thinking nothing’ — is something that scares people off, for some it is something inconceivable. But this nothingness, whether of space or time, is something interesting and opens doors to new and interesting experiences and insights.
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Today I will share with you the summary and my views on the book Penny, The Engineering Tail Of The Fourth Little Pig by Kimberly Derting and Shelli R. Johannes, and illustrated by Hannah Marks, which is the third and final book from Capstone Editions that I have recently received for review. While going through these books, I spent some time scrolling through Twitter timeline of Capstone Editions, and came to know the wide spectrum of popular science books published by them. It is indeed a commendable job and worth appreciating. The future of society lies in the hands of future generation, and how the future generation would look like is decided by the type of investment we make in them. Considering the change in brain activity with age, it is important to ‘catch them young’, inculcating habits from an early age. Science is not just about learning facts and understanding the world around us; instead, it teaches us to go beyond superficial appearances, dig below the surface, and examine everything logically and rationally. It is these concerns that make the contribution of Capstone Editions and similar publishers all the more praiseworthy.
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In this post, I would share my opinion about the second out of the three books meant for children that I have received for review. The book is titled Moving To Mars, written by Stef Wade and illustrated by Erin Taylor. The title is self-explanatory to a certain extent. This book is meant for children and is part picture book and part story book. Here space science or rather space exploration is presented as a potpourri of art, science, and humour. I haven’t yet come across any other book of this nature and never thought that science in general and space science in particular could be presented in such a charming manner. This book is unique on all accounts.
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In my early youth, I loved strolling on my terrace looking at stars, enjoying cool breeze and letting my mind wander off in random thoughts. This favourite pastime got interrupted when I entered PhD. But I remember that day when, without any thought or intention, I climbed up the stairs to the hostel terrace and spent not just couple of minutes, instead around 2 – 3 hours. However, this time they were not random thoughts, instead I was looking at my life lived till that day. It had been a long journey and hopefully I still had a long way to go. To my own surprise, I had a strong memory and recollected quite well all the major and minor incidents of my life. It was a refreshing experience as it put my whole life into proper perspective showing the journey of life as a single showreel.
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In my conversations with parents concerned about their children’s future, I always advise them to make their children invest in arts and books. Here I use art in the broadest possible sense, which includes fine arts as well as performing arts. If you indeed love your children, you must think of their future, and provide them with something which would support them whole life.
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Everyone has a vision for the future — how to change the world and how to make it a better place to live. We are nobody to challenge anyone’s personal views, but some ideas look more sound and workable. For example, Nehru was of the opinion that the progress of India can be achieved primarily by science and technology. Post-independence, Prof Sarabhai envisioned harnessing space technology for India’s progress and growth. Indeed, if one looks forward to a bright future for oneself, society, nation or the world, then there doesn’t seem to be any other way than to invest in scientific temperament. Note that by scientific temperament I do not simply mean scientific and technological innovations and inventions, instead I use the term in a rather broad sense which implies looking at the world logically, critically and sensibly.
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Image Source: Amazon
You have heard about scientists who were artists. In some of earlier posts, I have talked about collaborative efforts between artists and scientists. For example, the book Periodic Table presented scientific knowledge accompanied by beautiful graphic illustrations. Likewise, I talked about scenes from the movie 15 Park Avenue, which depicted struggles in the life of a physics professor. Continue reading
सुकुमार राय (1887-1923), स्रोत – विकिमीडिया
पहलवान मुखेमारी का बडा नाम था – कहते हैं कि उसके जैसा पहलवान और कोई नहीं था । ठुकेमारी सचमुच का बडा पहलवान था, मुखेमारी का नाम सुनकर उसकी ईर्ष्या का कोई अंत न था । आखिर एक दिन जब ठुकेमारी से रहा नहीं गया, तो वह कम्बल में नौ मन आटा बाँधकर, उस कम्बल को कंधे पर डालकर मुखेमारी के घर की ओर चल दिया ।
रास्ते में एक जगह बहुत प्यास और भूख लगने पर ठुकेमारी ने कम्बल को कंधे से उतारा और एक पोखर के किनारे आराम करने के लिए बैठ गया । Continue reading
Pradyot 