What is Science!(1)

A great deal of efforts has been devoted in articulating different technicalities and minutest details involved in the scientific revelations. But, little has been said and talked about "what is science?" Though it is difficult to define and delimit science within any restricted conceptual parameters, I have tried to understand and explore different manifestations of science with my own limited knowledge and competence to understand it.

What is science, what is mathematics, why I would like to pursue higher studies, how I would like to teach science, how I studied science during my stay at IIIT, who is science, how my advisors guided and shaped my thoughts, why I did not like attending classes at IIIT, why I defy grade system, why I became an atheist after 19th January, 2010 though I used to be a believer of god, is science(or the way we practice it) to assist human being or to substitute humans, what is the connection between science, hinduism and buddhism, are we institutionalised, and a more bizzare question to ask at this point-are Indians selfish by nature. But are these questions different? I have tried to answer these questions with my own limited savvy. Now looking at the past, I can relate things; we can connect dots looking backward but not forward.

Since 19th January, 2010 now that I have some time and patience out of my work, I have thought of writing on this topic. I will be writing on the same topic after every 2-3 years, nevertheless its logically valid though that my understanding will ameliorate and I will have more expertise to write on this topic. You may also find a flavor of pedagogical form of dialogues used by Plato, which I am not denying. As well I read articles written by many scientists, mathematicians; my language might have been influenced and motivated by their writings, but I have tried to write in my own language. It is also not conceivable to write everything in one blog post; I have written in chunks. I will also write about different scientists and references which have influenced me and my thoughts in the coming posts. Also, if you find some errors or mistakes, they will be changed with sufficient evidence.

With certain level of confidence, I thought of going for PhD. After spending five beautiful years at hyderabad, I am looking forward to spending at least four to five years of my life at Oxford. But, why did I reject the offer to join MSR, cambridge to go for PhD? Is it just to quench my own intrinsic parameters? If somebody from an alien planet with prior knowledge of science and mathematics comes and reasons with me about my decisions ... what should be my answers to him?

"And why, my friend, why do you want to do PhD?"

I have always been enthralled by mathematics and especially probabilistic aspect involved in the problems of computer vision which I came across during my undergraduate program at IIIT, which escalated my overall fascination towards it and so would like to understand and explore it in depth. And, PhD will provide me with ample opportunity and podium to conduct profound research in this direction. While PhD, you solve problems, whose crazy solutions you only have in the world. And, I wish to solve the problem of infinity in my PhD.
Building an intelligent system requires an efficient camera system which takes the denoised and deblurred images of the world. They are projected to resynthesize the world which provide the pertinent information about the world. It is a holistic view of research as far as I am, as a computer science student, concerned. I wish to analyze and probabilistically model this complete framework. I think these problems are very exciting and challenging. They will certainly make our life easier. But as a computer scientist what should be the goal? Is it just to improve our lives!

"It seems you want to study mathematics. Why do you wish to explore and understand mathematics?"

Science looks at the world with doubts and uncertainties but mathematics formulates them as we call them laws of nature. I wish to understand and interpret nature. But, in order to understand nature, we need to know the language she speaks in. And mathematics is the language of nature. As John A. Adam says, "The beauty of nature as revealed by mathematics and the beauty of mathematics as revealed in nature". Also, Galilio Galilei supports this by saying, "the universe cannot be read until we have learnt the language and become familiar with the characters in which it is written. It is written in mathematical language."

"So, my friend, you want to understand the nature and universe?"

"What is universe and whats' beyond it?", "What is cosmos and what does harmony in nature means?", chaos theory, fractals etc. have always followed my thoughts. Its my strong belief, our obligation to survive is not just only our responsibilities but of that cosmos and nature also from which spring and to which we are all part. From a hawk eye view, as Nye says, I see myself as a small speck on this vast and ancient planet and our lovely planet is a small speck in this vast universe. And with our limited knowledge of this universe, its interesting to think, analyze and rationalize the complexities involved in it. Its interesting to think how our earth planet provides life to so many species who share passionate love though our planet in itself keeps revolving around lonely. (As Carl Sagan says, "One of the great revelations of space exploration is the image of the earth, finite and lonely, bearing the entire human species through the space of time and space.") Its my believe that there are other planets in this awesome universe which supports life. May be things are not made of carbon but of some other elements. I want to explore the universe. I feel there are things beyond our survival.

"So you want to build your own universe"

We are always at the brink of the knowledge, spanning across different generations, which are the sources of the greatest revelations about the universe. Great scientists like Newton, Einstein, Feynman, Sagan, Hawking, Nash with their enterprising capabilities tried to gauge through the dark corners to get a new and better understanding of the universe and so built their own universe. We live in a universe where time and space are relative. But, can we give a model of universe where things are absolute! Where we can define ourselves by more than 3 dimensions! What we see is just projection of our palpable world on our brains. However, its known we use only 6-7% of our brain. It raises this question about the capabilities of our brain? What we interpret might be semblance of an illusionary universe? Which raises another question of reality. Is it what we see through our eyes or through our brain?

"But do you think the current form of science and mathematics will give answers to your questions?"

Mathematics is one of the languages in which the nature speaks. However, to reveal the nature in its true and simplest form, I believe, the problem of infinity and precision are to be solved. Infinity refers to quantity beyond our reach and so is the universe. So, does the solution of infinity lie in understanding the stretch of the universe? As well providing precisely exact answer to a problem challenges human mind too. But is it necessary to get the exact solution to each problem! John Tukey says, "It is better to have an approximate answer to the right question than an exact answer to the wrong one." But Aristotle says, "It is the mark of an instructed mind to rest satisfied with the degree of precision which the nature of the subject permits and not to seek an exactness where only an approximatation of the truth is possible." To unravel the true and inexplicable nature of the nature, we need to resolve the issues of infinity and precision. I believe the answers lie in understanding the nature- movements of birds, squirrel, behaviors of animals of different sizes and their inter-relationship etc.

"So you want to give a new number system and mathematics just to resolve issues of precision and infinity."

For a moment, lets say our mathematical model in its current form is perfect. One can identify the mathematical models either as deterministic or statistical. But, generally there is an aspect of uncertainty involved in every element, from the growth of a tumor to catching bus. Statistical model may help in identifying and studying many of the uncertainties in the nature. But as John A. Adam suggests, "Indeed, I venture to suggest that all mathematical models are flawed to some extent: many by value of inappropriate assumptions made in formulating the model or ...". There is a lot of difference in errors and mistakes. But, is the mathematics language of tha nature! As Galilio Galilei says, "Another fundamental (and philosophical) question has been asked by many:- How can it be that mathematics, a product of human thoughts independent of experience, is so admirably adopted to the objects of reality?" Is there any flaw in our number system?

To Be Continued ...

PS: Busy writing a journal paper and my thesis. So, next related post may take some time.