About Badri

The Badri Srirangam Blog

Category: Philosophy

  • Taste and Flow

    Quite by random accident I am in the middle of two classic books:- “Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience” by Mihály Csíkszentmihályi and “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Repair: An Enquiry into Values” by Robert M. Pirsig. A moment’s reflection will quickly reveal the easy connection between the two: motorcycle repair for the enthusiast can indeed be a Flow experience. But I realized that the connection is a bit deeper.

    At first I couldn’t quite understand and hence agree with the “Quality” thing that Pirsig keeps going on and on about. But, I am starting to think he is talking about what is today fashionable among certain intellectual circles to call “taste”. As in, so and so has good taste in AI model architecture research, or investing thesis and so on. Both concepts get at an (as yet) undefined element that certain extraordinary people posses or can access, that leads to breakthroughs. Others, even experts, can do really good work, but either that work goes waste or is derivate or incremental in nature.

    Both authors talk about “care” as an essential element, both to achieve a Flow state in one’s work as well to produce work with Quality. One needs to care to do anything worthwhile. When something is done with care it shows. Sounds obvious. But is lamentably rare.

  • A Hobby that makes one deal with one’s Mortality

    A Hobby that makes one deal with one’s Mortality

    I have often wondered what enables, even inspires, some people to think and dream beyond their own lifetimes, and work on grand projects with the sole hope that the projects would attain fruition after they themselves are long gone. In many cases, like the Egyptian Pharaohs, it was a firm belief in life after death. In may other cases, it’s a hope for a sort of historical or cultural immortality; a legacy. Many people seem to be motivated by the urge to leave the world a better place for their progeny (those clever genes!).

    But in all these cases, this thought of legacy or after-life comes when one is well into ripe old age (or in the sick bed). Perhaps, parents of young children occasionally wonder if they would be around to see their children grow up. I for one, sure hope to be around to see these rascals suffer at the hands of their young children! Other than that, my mortality has never come to fore in my mind, even as I venture into that confusing phase of one’s life called “middle age”.

    That is, until I started dabbling in Bonsai. Tress grow excruciatingly slowly, and I knew that. When you plant a fruit tree in your yard, you need to wait a few years for it to get to, hmm, fruition. Sure. But Bonsai is different. The very essence of this craft is to grow miniature, mature trees in a pot, and make them mimic an ancient wild tree. While there are some techniques to fake the ancient look, the only authentic way is to simply give the tree the time it needs to grow old. And that time is measured in decades, and sometimes in centuries!

    Utah Juniper Bonsai photographed in the East Bay Bonsai Society Exhibit, Oakland CA, March 2019
    This tree is estimated to be a 250 year old tree, and the Bonsai training was started 17 years ago. It’s not uncommon for bonsai to be many centuries old.

    So, when you start a bonsai, say from a seedling or a cutting, this predicament hits you: you’ll be dead of old age well before this tree is anywhere close to being “done”. You may see your children have their own children, you may see your start-up company grow into a trillion dollar behemoth, you may even see your pet public works project get completed, but you will not see your seedling become an authentic, great bonsai tree. Deal with it.

  • Pondering Eternity

    These have been absolutely the most hectic and the most productive weeks of my life. It has nevertheless been exhausting, and unhealthy. And I am looking at a few more weeks of this. I don’t remember what it is to be relaxed. I don’t remember how it feels to get 8 hours of solid sleep. I don’t remember life without a hundred niggles and little pains all over the body. I so much wish to not have to rush every minute of the day. A vacation is so alien in concept, I am afraid to think of one.

    Ironically, in the middle of this craziness, a strange thought occurred to me: What if I was stuck in an eternity with nothing to do?

    It’d be impossible to do nothing. So, what would I do? I’d build things, I guess. Especially using a computer, because that’s pretty much the only skill I have. But it’s also a convenient one, because after all, everything in the universe seems to come down to information – storing, replicating, communicating. And a computer is pretty good at handling information.

    So may be I’d start building stuff on my computer. First, I guess, for the heck of it, I’d redo the stuff that’s already been done. There would be enough time, even for a dim-wit like me, to be able to build complex stuff by trial and error, say an operating system from scratch or a virtual reality simulation.

    Soon I guess I’d want to build new stuff, may be build my own virtual fantasy world. I’d define the laws of that universe. I’d build in a bunch of knobs such that tweaking each a little creates a new universe. Again, with time on my side, I’d start creating very interesting, complex stuff. Stuff that interact with each other, stuff that does stuff; stuff that may even start wondering how they came about, if there is a creator, if there is a point to all the fuss in their world, and if they really have be rushing all the freaking time.