I am currently suffering from a rather annoying head cold, which has caused my sinuses to be blocked up for a few days. I am currently breathing through my mouth, which is causing my throat to go dry, which makes me thirsty and so I frequently drink water and thus have to go to the bathroom often. While there are many things I wish I have right now (such as an instant cure for this stupid cold) this is not the season for self centeredness. There are indeed many things I am thankful for, including:
Penn State's week long thanksgiving break (meaning I get to spend 9 days at home)
painkillers
indoor heating
christmas lights that are wired in parallel rather than in series
external memory storage
short hair
carpet
a private bathroom
a holiday season that occurs when the weather is terrible
and the fact that my family and friends like to celebrate every holiday in the world, especially with food
I am at home right now, as you might have guessed, after having gotten here on Friday night. I don't have much to write about since I haven't done anything exciting yet, but I'm sure there are many exciting adventures to come when the rest of my friends get out of school some time in the middle of this week.
Sunday, November 22
Monday, November 16
Subs = wisdom
HI FRIENDS
I am in a good mood since my toe isn't hurting that much anymore and I just drank hot chocolate while watching a funny movie. Many of you may not be surprised as to why I am blogging at 3:35, but I shall explain to those who are less familiar with my wayward sleep schedule. I have been desperately trying to normalize my sleep cycle all weekend, and I think this may work. So I stayed up the whole night studying for Immunology and went to sleep at 5 PM. I woke up at around 11, so I am going to stay awake as long as I can one more night, perhaps taking a nap in the morning. And then by 10 PM tomorrow, I will be sufficiently tired to go to sleep and wake up at a normal time! Theoretically, it should work very well.
By the way, if you were curious to see what last week's dance performance looked like, you can view my Facebook album entitled Post-Aghaaz Photoshoot.
So...on Friday evening, Ramya, Arthi, Moksha, and I went to Subway for some late night veggie delites ended up immersing ourselves in a deep discussion about fate and determinism for four hours. Many points of view changed that night. I for one do not believe in "fate" in the traditional sense: the idea that my opinions and actions have no role in determining what happens to me in the future and that I should just stop being proactive and let time run its course. I do however believe that there is only one possible course of events in time--only one path on which all things will eventually occur. I was annoyed by this idea at first, but it makes a lot of sense. "Every event, including human cognition, behavior, decision, and action, is causally determined by an unbroken chain of prior occurrences" (Wikipedia).
Think about it this way.
A particular event, such as me rolling a die and coming up with a 4, can only happen in one way. You might think of a dice roll as a random event, but it's really not: the outcome is causally determined by many things, one of which is: the precise amount of torque and force I exert on the die, which may be determined by my present mental state as defined by a certain pattern and number of firing neurons, which may in turn be determined by a variety of things including my genetic makeup as well as what I had to eat that day...you can go on and on back into time until you extrapolate the causes of my rolling a 4 to the one event in the beginning. We don't know for certain what that is (a big bang?), but it's like the push that starts a very long line of dominoes.
You are but one domino in this very long sequence. You don't decide to fall, rather, you are caused to fall by a previous event and you don't really have a say in whether or not you would like to fall.
It's not a very likeable idea, I admit. All this time, you thought you were a being capable of making and decisions and determining your own future. The idea that everything you do was bound to happen anyway is really unsettling. Do you have any free will at all? Technically you don't--so why not just give up everything you're doing right now? It's faulty to think about it that way, because in letting the idea of determinism influence your current "decision" will put you in a bit of a paradox.
What do you think about this? I would like to hear your comments
I am in a good mood since my toe isn't hurting that much anymore and I just drank hot chocolate while watching a funny movie. Many of you may not be surprised as to why I am blogging at 3:35, but I shall explain to those who are less familiar with my wayward sleep schedule. I have been desperately trying to normalize my sleep cycle all weekend, and I think this may work. So I stayed up the whole night studying for Immunology and went to sleep at 5 PM. I woke up at around 11, so I am going to stay awake as long as I can one more night, perhaps taking a nap in the morning. And then by 10 PM tomorrow, I will be sufficiently tired to go to sleep and wake up at a normal time! Theoretically, it should work very well.
By the way, if you were curious to see what last week's dance performance looked like, you can view my Facebook album entitled Post-Aghaaz Photoshoot.
So...on Friday evening, Ramya, Arthi, Moksha, and I went to Subway for some late night veggie delites ended up immersing ourselves in a deep discussion about fate and determinism for four hours. Many points of view changed that night. I for one do not believe in "fate" in the traditional sense: the idea that my opinions and actions have no role in determining what happens to me in the future and that I should just stop being proactive and let time run its course. I do however believe that there is only one possible course of events in time--only one path on which all things will eventually occur. I was annoyed by this idea at first, but it makes a lot of sense. "Every event, including human cognition, behavior, decision, and action, is causally determined by an unbroken chain of prior occurrences" (Wikipedia).
Think about it this way.
A particular event, such as me rolling a die and coming up with a 4, can only happen in one way. You might think of a dice roll as a random event, but it's really not: the outcome is causally determined by many things, one of which is: the precise amount of torque and force I exert on the die, which may be determined by my present mental state as defined by a certain pattern and number of firing neurons, which may in turn be determined by a variety of things including my genetic makeup as well as what I had to eat that day...you can go on and on back into time until you extrapolate the causes of my rolling a 4 to the one event in the beginning. We don't know for certain what that is (a big bang?), but it's like the push that starts a very long line of dominoes.
You are but one domino in this very long sequence. You don't decide to fall, rather, you are caused to fall by a previous event and you don't really have a say in whether or not you would like to fall.
It's not a very likeable idea, I admit. All this time, you thought you were a being capable of making and decisions and determining your own future. The idea that everything you do was bound to happen anyway is really unsettling. Do you have any free will at all? Technically you don't--so why not just give up everything you're doing right now? It's faulty to think about it that way, because in letting the idea of determinism influence your current "decision" will put you in a bit of a paradox.
What do you think about this? I would like to hear your comments
Friday, November 6
It's possible to bruise a bone.
This has been a rather filled week, but rather fulfilling as well. It was filled with two exams, three quizzes, two dance performances, and a bruised bone. I shall elaborate:
On Wednesday night, in a fit of rage, I accidentally kicked the brick wall in front of Thomas Building. As a result, I suffered from a swollen big toe the entire next day. An X-ray at UHS revealed that there was fortunately no fracture (though the doctor calls it a "bruised bone"). But here's the thing...I have never looked at an X-ray of myself before. Call me strange, but I genuinely experienced one of those profound oh-my-god moments when I saw the bones of my right foot. Maybe that's how a pregnant woman feels when she sees the ultrasound images of her baby. I saw my metatarsals. They were beautiful.
I am truly grateful to my body. I frequently put it through all sorts of trauma and torture: all-nighters, double shot espressos, dance practice, and the occasional stupid injury. It's always been resilient to the crap to which I subject it. But I am especially thankful to the big toe on my right foot. This is the toe that got gashed open by one of the front doors of Bedford High School right before a lacrosse game and the same toe that suffered a subungual hematoma (blood under the nail) after a particularly klutzy dance-jump for Bhavayami this past summer. Today was the Indian Grad Student event at Alumni Hall called Aghaaz, where PSU Natya performed a Thillana (the one that I choreographed =D). Instead of listening to the doctor, I swallowed two advils and danced on the bruised phalange. Yet I feel no permanent damage. I love you, toe.
Other than to exhibit the gratitude I have towards my toe, I would also like to use this post to express how much I appreciate Penn State. Having come from a graduating class of 160, I remember being really apprehensive about attending a huge school where I thought it would be impossible to feel comfortable around so many people I didn't know. But I was, of course, wrong. A big school means that there are endless opportunities to connect with your surroundings and it's pretty much guaranteed that you will find the right group of people who share your interests. I had never dreamed that I would use college as an opportunity to indulge my passions in stuff like music, history, astronomy, nature, and the performing arts. You just have to open up a little bit, take some chances, and before you know it, you will find your comfort zone and college starts to feel like home.
...And before I go, an interesting tidbit from HIST 176: Did you know that Persian was once the official language of the Indian subcontinent? It was established so by the Mughal emperor Akbar. Before Persian, the official language was Sanskrit. But today, we can clearly observe Persian influences on North Indian languages. In fact, Persian + Hindi resulted in Urdu, which is the modern day official language of Pakistan as well as that of many Muslims that live in India.
That's all. Thanks for reading!
On Wednesday night, in a fit of rage, I accidentally kicked the brick wall in front of Thomas Building. As a result, I suffered from a swollen big toe the entire next day. An X-ray at UHS revealed that there was fortunately no fracture (though the doctor calls it a "bruised bone"). But here's the thing...I have never looked at an X-ray of myself before. Call me strange, but I genuinely experienced one of those profound oh-my-god moments when I saw the bones of my right foot. Maybe that's how a pregnant woman feels when she sees the ultrasound images of her baby. I saw my metatarsals. They were beautiful.
I am truly grateful to my body. I frequently put it through all sorts of trauma and torture: all-nighters, double shot espressos, dance practice, and the occasional stupid injury. It's always been resilient to the crap to which I subject it. But I am especially thankful to the big toe on my right foot. This is the toe that got gashed open by one of the front doors of Bedford High School right before a lacrosse game and the same toe that suffered a subungual hematoma (blood under the nail) after a particularly klutzy dance-jump for Bhavayami this past summer. Today was the Indian Grad Student event at Alumni Hall called Aghaaz, where PSU Natya performed a Thillana (the one that I choreographed =D). Instead of listening to the doctor, I swallowed two advils and danced on the bruised phalange. Yet I feel no permanent damage. I love you, toe.
Other than to exhibit the gratitude I have towards my toe, I would also like to use this post to express how much I appreciate Penn State. Having come from a graduating class of 160, I remember being really apprehensive about attending a huge school where I thought it would be impossible to feel comfortable around so many people I didn't know. But I was, of course, wrong. A big school means that there are endless opportunities to connect with your surroundings and it's pretty much guaranteed that you will find the right group of people who share your interests. I had never dreamed that I would use college as an opportunity to indulge my passions in stuff like music, history, astronomy, nature, and the performing arts. You just have to open up a little bit, take some chances, and before you know it, you will find your comfort zone and college starts to feel like home.
...And before I go, an interesting tidbit from HIST 176: Did you know that Persian was once the official language of the Indian subcontinent? It was established so by the Mughal emperor Akbar. Before Persian, the official language was Sanskrit. But today, we can clearly observe Persian influences on North Indian languages. In fact, Persian + Hindi resulted in Urdu, which is the modern day official language of Pakistan as well as that of many Muslims that live in India.
That's all. Thanks for reading!
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