The things I think about when idle.
Dark Matter:
Why am I doing this?
Life, as a natural introvert, in a strange land, a continent and ocean away from home, where you work from home, and live in a cottage in the hills, is about as surreal as it gets. I can count weeks when I didn’t speak a word to a soul, other than the 2 squirrels, who live in a maple tree in my backyard. And may be smiled at the grocer while she checked my purchases out the store.
Over the years, I picked up the habit of talking to myself before I discovered twitter. Back then I used a diary to tell myself what I had discovered, thought about, liked, cursed, loved, or was angry with. Mind I keep a trade diary as part of my work discipline. So this other diary was basically about personal furries and fairies.
Then came twitter, something with a very low bar for entry, which very democratically invites everyone to vent their outrage, right or wrong, and I joined in to add my two bit. It was fun, very addictive, but also distorting of perspective. Twitter shuts off the long view, and keeps you venting when you should be thinking, and instant gratification drives the demons along.
I have tried to tone it down, reducing it to a mere means of communication, and content discovery, but every now and then, my noble resolve dissolves, and I find myself bobbing wildly in the torrents. So the substack.
Herein I hope to pick a topic, any topic - not necessarily topical- that strikes my fancy, and where I think I can add to the conversation without adding to the noise, and write what I think about it.
In my experience, writing is the best way to force clarity of thought on yourself, to discipline intuition with logic and reason, and to generally let your rational side temper your inner turmoil. So this is more an endeavor in talking to myself, than to addressing any other issue.
What I put down here are my thoughts. Not as they come but after a bit of reflection. They could be essays, poems, on politics, economics, history or philosophy. Or just about anything, not excluding my first love, which was astrophysics. I know, I know ;-)
I do not guarantee much entertainment. Over the years I have discovered my attempt at humor more often fails than not. Nor do I offer any news or views on news. I do hope though that what you read here will entice you into discovering more about things yourself.
I am too old to think I can I change the world, or even teach my squirrels to behave themselves. They are rowdy clowns, fruity as nuts. And I am not old enough to be resigned to it.
I believe all good things happen to the world at the level of the individual, not because all virtue resides there, but because she is the the only rational agent around, blessed with a conscience, and hence all understanding of the strange world that we confront, must stem from her mind. It is from the individual, her mind, that this world becomes comprehensible, if only partly.
For the individual to do her bit, she or he must be free to live life as she deems fit. Society must organized around her, in such a way as to preserve her freedoms, subject only to the similar freedom of others. That is the way mankind has made progress through the aeons, and that’s the way it will be for aeons to come.
God I think was a necessary invention, and will remain so long after we have discovered many other worlds, out of the windows that we see as forbidding blackholes today. We do not know what dark matter is. But 85% of this world is dark matter, that doesn’t interact with the electromagnetic field, and may well be on the other side of blackholes that we can’t yet penetrate. So there will always be lots to learn.
Nothing is final, much less ancient scriptures, penned by our illustrious ancestors, as minds began their long journey, to discover why we are here at all.
So why am I here? Well I hope this brief introduction will tell you why.
Sonali.
In the meantime, tell your friends!