American Superheroes, Hypocrisy and Lesson to Indian cinema

 Names like Captain America, Wonder woman, Batman, Superman, Ironman, etc. are very famous indeed in Indian households now. Cinematic universes are being created which has released many successful movies and series', even many more are in pipeline. The whole American culture being spread through such comic books earlier then it was all converted into animation series' and now multi million franchise' of live action movies, series and animation and much more. Even just for sake of entertainment I also watch these movies and series' and as it's work of fiction, at first it has nothing to do with anything around us. So why this question of hypocrisy? Have you watched Captain America or Wonder woman? Let's go in little detail: They have shown that Captain America is savior of world and started his journey as superhero by fighting against tyranny of Nazis and imaginary group called Hydra. It is shown that Steve Rogers is epitome of humanity, questioned some big weapons developed by SHIELD but same fellow wearing stars and stripes have nowhere utters a word against use of nuclear weapons against Japan by his home country! Wonder woman finds a British spy, falls in love with him and fight against axis forces and supporting Britain, yes the same Britain which captured many nations and treated people of these nations as slaves and yet no word against it? This is how subtle white washing works. American comics and their new avatars are being glorified as protectors of humanity while many of fictional characters being shown as fighting Nazis or Russians kept mum about British slavery, Vietnam war atrocities and Nuclear attack on Japan. This is how from childhood children becomes sure of whom to call hero and whom to call evil. This is one of the reason for American influence over the life of many youngsters as for them Nazi means evil while war being fought in dirty way by both side and no one was hero indeed. Hitler who killed many innocents in gas chambers rightly labelled as evil but Churchill and Elizabeth who caused famine in India as they took everything to fight war and let millions of Indians die been given clean chit by history and by such fictional writers too. These so called heroes created by their writers works on the agenda to build an image and they have done it successfully, on the other hand Indian cinema never miss a chance to malign the nation. While in West they never miss a chance to show Hitler as evil, Indian cinema always try to paint Pakistani war criminals as not so bad. If we continue like this in India, there will be a day when these people in India may call Jinnah as real Hero and Netaji Bose in bad light! Time for Indians to come out of guilt trap and learn that we too faced tyranny of West and we fought against evil leaders of Pakistan.

Time travel: Myth, Reality or A Dream?

 

Humans are yet to learn many answers of unsolved mysteries like: Why universe exists? How it came into existence? How big universe is? Are we alone? Can we travel through dimension of time? Well these many questions and there are few theories surfaces every now and then but there is no answer on it. Time travel is one of the most fascinating concept used in books and movies extensively, which even attracted many of us and gave us some real thrill. From books of H.G. Wells to Avengers End Game and Tenet, we have been mesmerized by concept of time travel. For at least once in our lifetime many of us wanted to experience time travel, many of us wants to see future and many of us wants to go back in time to see dinosaurs roaming on earth, Chanakya giving lessons to Chandragupta Maurya, many desires but this is just a dream. So what time is? Let's follow what Einstein says, just like distance time is one of the dimension. My location is not just point where I am now but when I am there too. In such case one can say that all of our actions are happening not just with reference to place but with time too. Now the question is what is time travel? Just to define it simply we can say that to defy the flow of time and to move within it physically. What if I say that daily we are experiencing time travel? Sounds unbelievable? Well it's not, very significant star in northern sky is Pole star, which is around 433 light years away from us, meaning that the image we are capturing of Pole star in our eyes is 433 years old. With this we can say that we are looking at past or travelling back in time! Sounds fascinating but I consider it as time travel as it falls under basic definition of it. Our night sky is filled with ancient history what we are observing is not of now but of past of thousands and even million year old history. Point here is the more we try to know about universe, the more puzzles comes in front of us. Whether you believe in the theory I have presented or not one thing we all know that there are many questions which will remain unanswered forever. So just enjoy the view from millions of years ago and feel happy that you are able to observe the marvelous creation called universe.

Innovation and India: An Idea for bridging the gap

 While Indian society and social media mostly focus on lifestyle, glamour, politics and defense upto certain extent there's a void for debates and discussion over state of science and technology. Recent data of innovation index shows that we have climbed up 4 numbers and entered into top 50. South Korea leads the chart followed by Singapore and Switzerland while our all weather competitor China ranked 16th. Second most populated nation and has ancient history of many innovations why such struggle today? It's understandable that during constant invasions we have struggled a lot but even after transfer of power from British to Indian parliament why there's no change? For me biggest reason is making science as taboo and labelling it as very tough subject while reality is that our British made education system and continuation of it took all interest away from science and made it a boring subject. Science is nothing but matter of learning nature. This leads to less people opting for it and even those who are studying it gets either too much difficult or over simplified. The essence of making changes and creating something new gets away in this process. When the kid comes out of the college the target being given is to earn more and more no matter what you have studied, well this part can not be ignored as in reality it's tough to maintain a good life in India if you are born in lower middle class hence you have to spend your life in maintaining that balance and many bright minds gets rusty there. At workplaces the approach is simple, just follow what you are being told, in some cases 'jugaads' are hailed as biggest achievements and there's nothing to think beyond it. So collective approach of society, education and industries have not promoted innovation. This is the problem and cause, now what about solution? Shall we just keep repeating this ranting and wait for someone to come up with idea? Well I do have an idea which I don't know when will be implemented. We are out of government and systems so most we can do to education is to write to government about changing syllabus so let's not talk more about it. We don't have multi million dollar organization which can hire scientists and create a research lab on our own so one thing left with enthusiasts like me which is partnered labs. Institutes, Industries and science enthusiasts can come together and develop small labs which will provide basic facilities and small funds for initial phases for any research. While industries can invest money, institutes can help with books, some apparatus from their labs and volunteers can co-ordinate, guide and help researchers to get those resources and knowledge they need. From cellphones to weapon systems we are fully dependent on other countries which is not at all in our favor, if India want to become a global leader it must first establish itself in domain of innovation and technology. Let's not wait for something big to happen, let's do our bit. This is our nation and our society, I dream to see India in top 25 by 2030 and in top 10 by 2047. It sounds very crazy but it is achievable. I request people to join hands for this and let's come together to establish such innovation labs. Let's have first few labs for innovation on transportation and agriculture. 

New Dreams of New decade

 Many are cursing 2020 to be bad year but let us not forget that there are many manmade disasters waiting for us in coming time, it's us who are damaging environment and causing problems. My vision is about what I wish to see in coming decade, here is list of few things from my point of view:

1. Mass transportation just like escalators: Yes! If we can use constant moving escalators, why can't we make a mode of transportation which is personal and at the same time for mass. Constant moving bubbles/cabins/seats/or anything comfortable keeps moving on a track and people just pick it from their stand. No need for ticket as it can use google maps and based on distance travelled your money can be deducted from your e-wallet. This will decrease congestion, save time and if we use solar and other non conventional energy to run it, it will save huge amount of fossil fuel and help to protect environment. Less vehicles will also bring noise pollution down by significant numbers, less chance of accident, less traffic vigilance is required. 

2. Free and restriction-less education for: While we are crying for no focus on innovation, reduction in ethical practices, running after short term goals. All these are caused by highly expensive education. Either one can not afford it so they just go for whatever they can have and misses big opportunities or some after spending big chunk of money thinks on how they can earn it back by any means. A person from middle class just spends his or her whole life to make sure to earn that much by which their future generation can have enough education so that they can continue this cycle. If education becomes essential means of living one can save that money and can invest in new ventures be it innovation or art.

3. Breakthrough in food supply chain and farming techniques: Weather dependent farming must be modified now, changing weather patterns will only increase our problems to fight starvation, time to develop affordable and easy methods of farming to grow crops without being dependent on weather. This must be supported by efficient supply chains as truck load of food stuck won't serve any purpose if people at other end can't get it.

4. Automobile/aviation engine modification: The way electronics and IT sector has advanced no other sector has advanced at that pace. In engines we are still using century old technology and no change is visible on horizon as of now. This is one of the biggest challenge I am seeing for our future.

5. Energy generation and reliable alternate to fossil fuels: While on one hand mobility has expanded our horizons greatly and directly or indirectly supported many innovations, it has cost us our environment and natural balance. This is high time that we find reliable source of energy to replace fossil fuels. One day it will dry up and we have to forcefully find the alternate, at that time it will create havoc while if we prepare from now there will be no panic in future. Solar, atomic, wind, tidal all been tested yet none of these are able to replace current source of energy. Some serious efforts needed.

6. Lab on moon: Since childhood we have read storied about future human colonies on mars or moon. Some claims been made to achieve this by 2020, well this is still far from reality and part of science fiction only. We are constantly growing and to rely on one planet for survival of our race would be foolish, better to find a way to increase our footprint and make plans for longer survival. Viruses, threat of asteroids, blast of supernova near to us can make us extinct so our focus must be on expanding our presence beyond earth and may be target should be to go beyond solar system before this century ends.

7. Health, Hygiene and Water: Nothing more to write about it, just feel that each living being on this planet has right to have these things. 

8. Branched offices and work from home: As the current pandemic has made many of us to follow work from home, I think it's time to make it a normal practice for many jobs. For those jobs which needs small teams to work together there can be localized small offices rather than giant campus. This will reduce transportation, land space requirements and managing hygiene and maintenance. In metros and super metros it's too difficult to travel to offices and people are losing their precious time in travelling too and fro. If such system being adopted it can reduce traffic in a significant way.

9. Infrastructure revolution: Majority of the world is still following century old construction techniques which are costly, time consuming and bad for environment. Affordable, long lasting and sustainable way of construction is what we need right now. We should look back in past and learn from ancient civilizations which made monuments which survived hundreds of years and are still strong and steady. We can't just put more and more concrete on the surface and made it barren, we should follow the past in this case.

 10. Change in point of view: If we want to survive as race than in this decade we must start the process of identify all humans as earthen intelligent race and must look beyond from silly disputed and prevent such events. If we want to expand ourselves beyond solar system by the end of this century then we must think about common protocol and work together. If it becomes race among nations just like we have seen for Moon and Mard landings then there's nothing to gain. I hope this decade provide much needed maturity to so called global powers and they should learn to work with other nations to build a global alliance with common goal. 

 These are the points which I think are important for this decade and may change the world from what we know today. I am sure there will be many pleasant surprises for us and we will see more and more progress and more sensible version of humanity in times to come!