krishashok October 27, 2009 Blog

Kaka Kronicles: A Universe from Nothing

I saw this video.

Then I saw two crows (presumably the ones that dispossessed my neighbour’s Labrador of his biscuit) deep in conversation. I listened and transcribed their conversation for my readers

48Comments

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1

Venki on October 27, 2009 at 3:57 pm
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hey this a relly good one… have you by any chance read a write up of Mahakavi Bharathi?, where he imagines two crows to be in deep conversation and transcribes it… and it’s a conversation on the nature of man… biting satire…
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  somebody on November 10, 2009 at 5:22 pm
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  what’s that called? it sounds kinda interesting.
  - 3
    
    Venki on November 13, 2009 at 4:30 pm
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    dont know to be exact… read a rough english translation some time back in a magazine… just struck me as i was reading the blog…
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    Venki on November 13, 2009 at 4:38 pm
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    and btw u just made google, thanks for that, and it’s called “the parliament of crows”…
    link…
    http://www.expressbuzz.com/edition/story.aspx?Title=The+Parliament+Of+Crows&artid=kbEOP0XbQWc=&SectionID=f4OberbKin4=&MainSectionID=f4OberbKin4=&SEO=&SectionName=cxWvYpmNp4fBHAeKn3LcnQ==
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Maitri on October 27, 2009 at 4:59 pm
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But, you do know that the three parts of the Whatever Cycle are Elaboration, Condescension and Participation.
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VeNkY on October 28, 2009 at 2:10 am
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First of all you said as probable highly unlikely event. the probability of them occurring is 1 in 10 to power 100 as calculated by various scientist. Which effectively means zero. A logical person wouldn’t say that it is chance. I assume you must know the Arctic fern, it migrates from north to south pole every year. Why? You cant say to escape cold it can fly to Florida like other birds but why fly another 4000 thousand miles to edge of south America which is equally harsh. Thats because many things which libe there depend upon as their main food. The Arctic tern doesnt enjoy any advantage over it. Same goes animal crossing the Serengetti. This cant be chance this is design. Probability is just number to make us believe that we have a chance. Let me come to Big Bang theory and Darwin theory of evolution, there are numerous argument in the science cadres that both theories stated are wrong. A girl has went on to prove that light of speed is not constant and value calculated my Eienstein is wrong. Science is constantly evolving what was considered dubious are not now. So science cant claim to know everything because no one does know everything.

Problems with Hindu cosmology is it uses a lot of figuritive speech like brahma sitting on lotus and those stuff. But if see through you really know what great things they have found which western scientists are finding now, ages back.

Take a look at this http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?t=16672
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  decimator on October 28, 2009 at 3:44 am
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  Not this shit again!!
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    VeNkY on October 28, 2009 at 4:42 am
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    If you call that shit you must the most ignorant person in this whole wide world perceiving to be the greatest but in reality in the ignorant one sided fool everything existed in this universe created out of nothing
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      Piyush on May 23, 2010 at 6:08 am
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      @Venky” Where did you find out that the speed of light was “calculated” by Einstein? And who is the “girl” who “has went on to prove that light of speed is not constant and value calculated my Eienstein is wrong”? And what is the nature of this “proof”?
      
      By the way the theory of (special) relativity just postulates that the speed of light in vacuum is “constant” only with respect to all inertial frames. There are several potential pitfalls around this statement if one is naive at interpreting it: for example it does not talk about the speed of light in water or air but just vacuum.
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  Suru on October 28, 2009 at 5:11 am
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  I read your type i.e. Arctic Fern and I was like WHOA! …. Flying Ferns 🙂 ….
  
  Cheers,
  
  Suru
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    almostinfamous on November 4, 2009 at 1:39 pm
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    yeah – that’s what i thought – Arctic Ferns don’t really travel that much, and i doubt they are more than plastic made-in-china ferns that never got painted.
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  krishashok on October 28, 2009 at 5:46 am
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  Venky, this is just a comic strip that talks about the progress of science and its ability to explain the universe we live in. Traditionally, mainstream religion has always claimed (wrongly) that they have the answers to questions related to our origins and place in the universe.
  
  I really don’t think a discussion on Hindu philosophy is relevant here. Saying that Hindu philosophers knew about Quantum fluctuations or Doppler red shifts is as irrelevant as saying that Einstein had deep insights into the condition of man and his place in society.
  
  I wish to make a clear distinction between the metaphysical lessons and insights into human nature that are present in the Upanishads and most other religious texts and purely scientific knowledge that comes from observation, hypothesis, testing, theory etc. I think it is pointless to retrofit modern knowledge into ancient metaphors and claim that we already knew everything. We clearly did not, because if we had really known, the industrial revolution would have happened around the time of the Guptas, and it did not.
  
  So, let’s keep Hindu philosophy out of this. The Upanishads are brilliant in their own right, in their insights into human nature. But they are not cosmological treatises. Metaphors and allegories are useful in poetry, not in science. And also, let’s not make this yet another Science vs Hindu philosophy thing, because there is no “versus” here that applies. It’s like saying that Zinedine Zidane is about to take a free kick and Sachin Tendulkar, fully padded up, is batting near the goal post. We’d all get more things done if we stop comparing things that cannot be compared.
  
  Science, over the years, as had to contend with mainstream religion, which for most part, has been Christianity. Hinduism is far too diffuse and disorganized to a single, all powerful, controlling entity, which is why my cartoon does not take any names. Its simply goes after the general tendency of the human population to be gullible and believe in the supernatural despite perfectly natural explanations for most phenomena that we see.
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    VeNkY on October 28, 2009 at 8:19 am
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    Agreed krish thanks for the reply
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      decimator on October 28, 2009 at 1:50 pm
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      Let me summarize Ashoks respectful reply for you in the way its supposed to be done (and increase the SNR of his reply):
      
      “Stop retrofitting modern knowledge into ancient metaphors and claim that we already knew everything. We clearly did not, because if we had really known, the industrial revolution would have happened around the time of the Guptas, and it did not.”
      
      All religions were first attempts to explain the natural world at a time when nobody had a clue that viruses/bacteria/electrons/protons/quarks/background microwave radiation existed. I would like to see a “poetic” quote in hindu cosmology about these to convince me that they actually had some semblance of an understanding about these. So stop quoting random internet forum posts and go read some actual science textbooks.
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        Dinesh on October 28, 2009 at 6:31 pm
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        “Just read Text books” will not do. Think! Whether it is Science that you have read or Ancient Sacred texts! Thinking is the only first hand knowledge! Reading is second hand.
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        VeNkY on October 29, 2009 at 3:27 pm
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        I am not claiming that we know everything but please treat our ancestor with disdain, because they have done some valuable things. Everything is old and ancient need not dubios.
        
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        VeNkY on October 29, 2009 at 3:34 pm
        
        I am neither a believer not an atheist i am agnostic. I am not biased towards religion or science. Someone will prove this theory of nothingness proposed to be wrong. In this video he says that the nothing changes so fast we cant see it or something like that i am not convinced and i am not sound enough to say why this theory may be wrong, i will leave it to science community.
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Shri on October 28, 2009 at 6:22 am
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Coming to the rescue of Kaka 1,
There is something called Incompleteness theorem by Kurt Godel, by which he proves that u cannot completely explain anything…. not even science(Hope my understanding is correct 🙂 )…
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  Jayadev.J on October 31, 2009 at 1:48 am
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  It’s ‘everything’ not ‘anything’ … That word changes the meaning completely …
  Which means you can fully explain a subset of all the truths if not the entire set itself i.e. there might be an answer in sight for physics …
  
  There simply doesn’t exist a symbolic (phrase-structured, algorithmic, turing machine parseable … all the same) language that can express all true statements in arithmetic ..
  
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gödel's_incompleteness_theorems
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    Jayadev.J on October 31, 2009 at 1:51 am
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    One more thing .. if indeed if the theorem explicitly meant that one couldn’t explain all facts within physics then research would have stopped long ago ! The fact that they’re still at it clearly states otherwise …
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      Jai_C on November 16, 2009 at 1:26 pm
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      While that’s a good clarification by Jayadev, it does appear from the overall smugness that Kaka2 has an explanation for everything..so Godel could apply…..
      
      Well Kaka2 doesnt quite know how Saravana Bhavan’s sambhar tastes exactly the same at all its outlets 🙂 so we’re clear of that too.
      
      Thx,
      Jai
22

jynn on October 28, 2009 at 7:11 am
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And so the debates begin ….
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gireesh on October 28, 2009 at 8:40 am
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To supplement u r point, there is a something called higgs field and higgs boson which satisfactorily explain the creation of mass of any matter in space from nothing, in other words the creation of mass , however this theory is equally contradicted for there is no experimental evidence of higgs bosons or muons for which is being investigated at CERN, Geneva.may be it is more complicated than one can ever imagine… good post man!!!
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  Jayadev.J on October 31, 2009 at 1:31 am
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  http://abstrusegoose.com/49
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jynn on October 28, 2009 at 8:48 am
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Richard dawkins on stephen colbert….

colbert(at his satirical best ) :” It would be simpler if we believed this complicated universe was created by GOD”

Dawkins :”then who made GOD?”

Colbert :”ah …god came from nothing”
26

suvarnasundar on October 28, 2009 at 9:44 am
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where did nothingness come from what is space. How do you define nothingness. Please don’t point at another youtube video.
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Gradwolf on October 28, 2009 at 5:16 pm
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There is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here,……well, ok never mind!
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Dinesh on October 28, 2009 at 6:33 pm
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So what is nothingness? Can “Nothing” be defined? If everything came out of Nothing then “Everything” is nothing but “Nothing”. So what is “Nothing”?
29

PS on October 28, 2009 at 8:09 pm
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Love the background score..
ey dandanakara dandanakara
30

Shreevatsa on October 29, 2009 at 3:11 am
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On the other hand, this argument proves nothing either. 🙂 The “surely there must be a creator” argument is always unconvincing… (interestingly, the phrase “god of the gaps” was coined by an evangelist).
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Destination Infinity on October 29, 2009 at 11:45 am
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What about time? How can science (or for that matter religion) explain the beginning of time, if any?

Destination Infinity
32

shri on October 29, 2009 at 5:07 pm
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http://www.om-page.de/indexE.html

its the scientist who say the above thing….
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A on October 29, 2009 at 5:35 pm
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Hmm…this post was kind of unfunny, actually (if it was even meant to be funny). Since you follow up with a passionate defence in your comments, I’m assuming you tried to make a point.

“I think it is pointless to retrofit modern knowledge into ancient metaphors and claim that we already knew everything. We clearly did not, because if we had really known, the industrial revolution would have happened around the time of the Guptas, and it did not.”
–> Now (though I agree with the first part of the quote) that is opening up a can of worms. I like your “modernist” (as in the movement) way of thinking, but don’t be fooled into thinking Science has answered the origin of the universe, meaning of life, and much less, the “everything” you referred to in your post.

PS: I really like your blog.
PPS: I really really like the crow cartoons.
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Ramaa Ramesh on October 30, 2009 at 9:12 pm
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Why this rush to compare and play the no-no-this-is-better game? Religion and science are two different ways to answer the same question. According to your temperament, you pick one or the other. If you have the maturity to handle both, plenty fine. Why all this deeph pheelings?
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  krishashok on October 31, 2009 at 3:05 pm
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  Agree Ramaa. See my earlier response to Venky. It’s exactly this sort of pointless comparison I’d like to avoid. The cartoon simply satirizes mainstream supersitious aspects of religion that makes people gullible, not any specific religion or beliefs
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    ramaaramesh on October 31, 2009 at 3:45 pm
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    Sometimes, I wonder why you bother. 🙂 The more you write and reply, the more they grow passionately defensive. Followed this blog for quite some time now. Kickass work. Oh, and Promoted Family’s blog is V Nice, too. 🙂
37

Ritheesh on October 30, 2009 at 9:35 pm
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This is one of the best blogs (No, no, s/one of the/the ) I have seen . Would you believe if I say that I have finished all your posts in two days? 🙂
The other thing I liked about is the way you answer in the comments section. I thought you will be sarcastic and tear apart every person’s comments , but you turned out to be a cool dude.

This must be your Nth praise.
Go on.
38

Manikandan S on October 31, 2009 at 5:15 am
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Awesome. What font have you used?
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  krishashok on October 31, 2009 at 3:03 pm
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  Blambot Casual
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Hayley on November 1, 2009 at 6:31 pm
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My, way to provoke debate. I loved it, anything that stirs the imagination has to be good for you.
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vv on November 2, 2009 at 3:31 am
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Although I am not a religious person, I do feel Richard Dawkins is a pompous ass. Lawrence Krauss, a little less.

And you, Krishashok, although you hide behind the cloak of “its a funny blog”, you do try(and I use the word “try” loosely) to rid people of their prejudices. It is insincere to your objective of being funny. You are very funny in your other posts. And please don’t think I am sincerely trying to reform you. There are weirdos in this world, and one more wont do any harm! 😀
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Ganesh on November 3, 2009 at 5:44 pm
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Krish

Great post as usual, This Intelligent Design is a big thing here in US. There are many people who believe that earth is only 3000 yrs old. And dinosaurs talked with humans etc
Only 39% Americans believe in Evolution, I wonder how Indians will fare in this one..
http://www.gallup.com/poll/114544/Darwin-Birthday-Believe-Evolution.aspx

So it doesn’t matter where you live, ignorance has no region/religion/language barriers.
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Amit on November 10, 2009 at 3:21 pm
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Sorry that a Amit has had to peep into your life once again. This may interest you.
http://amitbuster.blogspot.com

And this may more than interest you…a potential.. sorry an amit..
http://gitesh-bansal.blogspot.com/

I really hope you do see both of them.. and sorry to have used your link without the permission.. Thanks…
44

Anoshka on November 11, 2009 at 2:07 am
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This shit is briliant 🙂 This is my 1st time commenting on ur blog. Keep em coming 🙂
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Manikandan on November 13, 2009 at 11:02 am
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Great post as usual!. and nice artwork for the kakas. did you do them by yourself 🙂
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Anon on November 16, 2009 at 12:40 pm
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purely scientific knowledge that comes from observation, hypothesis, testing, theory etc
One would have to explain observation first? All the information relayed by our sense organs are converted into perceptions in the brain. Believing that the objective reality is similar to our perception is naive realism or direct realism. (Eg: assuming that something is red, yellow or green is naive because there is no colour in the universe, they are just electromagnetic waves being interpreted as colour in the brain (according to science itself). 3D space in which we move about is a complex perception using only the 2D projection our retina receives and past experience and so on).
If you consider a purely theoretical approach, all the methods of proof in scientific theories rest on mathematics which finally rests on axiomatic set theory. You should read about Kurt Godel and his incompleteness theorems
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Ekta Khetan on November 18, 2009 at 3:47 pm
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That was a “kaka” of a post!
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sari on November 23, 2009 at 10:16 am
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congrats…