#thought_of_the_day

Here is a sneak peek to the thoughts of some of our members

Arundhati Banerjee, JB Scholar 2014

Among the many exciting avenues for research at the intersection of computer science and biology, a question that often gets asked in Machine Learning is - what is Intelligence really about? What would an abstraction of its components look like in the computational design space? Several research methods in the Machine Learning community have developed and are developing trying to mimic our understanding of the mechanisms in the human brain. But, it is also quite interesting to think about the different forms of "Intelligence" that nature has already created besides humans, even in organisms that do not have a "brain"! This panel (https://youtu.be/RpwW9Lw2Ku4) discusses a diverse set of some such instances that I found really intriguing.

Maitree Bhattacharyya, Director and Secretary Ex-officio, JBNSTS

Knowledge is power. But access to knowledge is limited in the present era. There are certain limits and boundary conditions which restrict the students to reach the world of science and technology. In the new normal life, there are millions of students who do not possess a smart phone or high-power internet connectivity, or cannot afford higher data packages. These young students are being deprived of the classes and lectures on digital platform, many of them are talented, many being innovative, but we fail to keep them! Only 4% of Indian households have a computer, our concern is not only about India, but also in the global frame. Though right to education is the very strong assertion but their right is curtailed and the dropped-out students are increasing significantly in the pandemic scenario. Abrupt move from classroom to remote online learning has decreased the right to education strikingly. We witnessed an educational disruption and loss of invaluable human resources in such a scale that never happened before.

Learning is a journey entrenched in experience. Worldwide youth face complex social, cultural and economic challenges that constitute obstacles to their education. Not only in the pandemic situation, not only due to digital divide, there are other perspectives, other contexts, where, students and researchers have limited access to knowledge. Information and knowledge have also been turned into private property, scientific and scholarly materials are increasingly being locked in few powerful hands. Everywhere there is a word inequality to divide our society into pockets. Free flow of scientific knowledge is essential for the growth of science, for the advancement of research. The thought of the day is, we have to thrive for an scientific ecosystem where knowledge is open and accessible to each one, where there is neither privileged, nor excluded.

Shubhadeep Bej, JB Scholar 2017

The idea that the most abstract bit of math can stay hidden beneath the physical world of things and forces and senses has always baffled my mind. I recently came across this beautiful essay by Freeman Dyson, where he talks about a two-layer interpretation of our world in the context of Maxwell's Electromagnetic Theory. The fundamental layer being of math and equations, and the second layer being of things that we can touch, measure, make sense of. In this essay, Dyson also mentions how mathematical equations operating on the abstract layer indirectly influence objects on the second layer. Maxwell's theory (or any other theory that exploits the abstract and fundamental nature of math), having its origins deeply rooted in the abstract layer, is not directly accessible to our senses. Which is why it takes us some time to get used to them. Even for physicists back then, who were researching the idea of mechanical aether, something abstract like fields didn't come easy. Or perhaps, Maxwell was a little too modest to brag about his theory. All in all, an excellent essay to read.

Reference: Why is Maxwell's theory so hard to understand? By Freeman J. Dyson.

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Primary Organizer: Arghya Bhattacharya, Ph.D. Student, Stony Brook University; JB Scholar 2012

Primary Archivers: Madhusree Seal, BS-MS student, Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science; JB Scholar 2018

Sreeja Datta, UG Student, University of Calcutta; JB Scholar 2019