Science Day message
Today, I shall talk about the
science that I know. Now what is science, if I look upon that question, I can
say that it is a mixture of three things.
1.
It
is a method to find things out.
2.
It
is a body of knowledge arising from things
3.
It
is to use this newly found out mechanism to do better things, I mean
technology.
So, Science is partly
technology too. According to me, it is more or less same since technology and
science have almost same and obvious characteristics i.e. how you apply knowledge
about things. The effects of science are always understood by common man and
need hardly any mentioning. The whole industrial revolution would have been
impossible without development of science. To name a few,
1.
Adequate
food for large population
2.
Controlling
sickness etc…
Being a social being,
questions also rises whether to use this for good or evil because science
doesn’t come up with a user manual. We have improved medicine to resist all
types of diseases but we also look for knowledge of new bacteria in hidden labs
where there is no cure for it. We have invented air transport successfully but
also we are aware of horrors happening in modern air warfare. We have entered
space, but carry nuclear weapons with them. So, a Science discussion forum is
necessity even if it may not come up with a permanent solution, it could
address new generation born every day the problems in development of science,
the power and value of doing it in the rightful manner.
In Buddhist
mythology, there is a fine line. “To every man is given the key to gates of
heaven. The same key opens the gate of hell”. So it is with science. Of course
it is a serious question, but I think that we cannot deny the value of the key
to the gates of heaven. When the scientist is told that he must be more
responsible for his effects on society, it is the application of science that
they are referring to. If we think, work and bring ideas in nuclear energy, you
must realize also that it can be used harmfully. I think most of you know this
since most of us would have watched sci-fi movies. Coming to point, I should
say we need to ask a question to ourselves, “If I do (learn/teach/search) this,
what will happen?”
And now coming to
character that a person should have while doing science can be explained
beautifully by picking life example of C V Raman. The institute that Raman
founded is called Raman Research Institute (RRI). Institute just couldn’t
spring from now where. We need to equip them and to run them, money is needed. When Raman moved to new
Institute, for the first year, there was no electricity. But Raman didn’t deter
from carrying out several optical experiments with sunlight. He considered a
beam of sunlight as the best source and in Bangalore there was no shortage of
blue sky and bright sun. A manually operated heliostat using few lenses and a
pair of Polaroid kept in order produced astonishing results which made several
ground making scientific improvements in lattice vibrations.
After establishing
the institute in firm grounds in international scientific community, One day
Raman found a research student looking rather dejected. When he asked what the
matter was, the student replied “Professor, my competitor in England who is
working on the same problem has a 100 kW lamp whereas I have only a 10 kW one”.
Raman replied, “Never mind. Put a 100kW brain on it!” True Raman cracked a
joke, but his reply also reflects his spirit. You may understand this because great
discoveries are always wild and exciting. Let me give an example. In ancient
philosophy Earth was considered as the back of elephant that stood on a
tortoise that swam in endless sea. Of course question still remains what held
up sea was impossible to answer. They didn’t know the answer. It was a result
of imagination. It was poetic and definitely beautiful. But today, the world is
a spinny ball, people are held on it from all the sides and some of them upside
down. We oomph around sun. Science is more romantic and more exciting that all other
dull stories, isn’t it? Science doesn’t end there. It also explains why it is
so. The Universal law of gravitation, it not only holds us but planets, stars,
solar system and the entire galaxy in all directions. Is science dull?
To conclude, I would
like to talk about one other thing, and that is, how do you get new ideas? This
is for amusement for students here, mostly. How do you get new ideas? I think
there are lots of things that you can look to. Let us think about the
transitions in scientific outlook of world through life history of Galileo,
Newton, Einstein, and Stephen Hawking’s. Yes, Grand design is universe is still in its
infancy, isn’t it? We each exist for but a short time, and in that time explore
but a small part of the whole universe. But I believe humans are curious. We
wonder, we seek answers and gazing at immense heavens above. Most of us don’t
spend most of our time worrying about these questions, but almost all of us
worry about them in some of the time. The Grandest design is still somewhere
around. If designed, it will be the successful conclusion to search going back
more than 3,000 years.
Thank you very much.
I enjoyed myself writing this for you all. Also i invite you to my invited talk on "Ideas of Everything-Grand Design" at Devamatha College, Kurvilangad.
Sibi K S
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