सेमिनार से बड़ा सेमिनार, Advanced PDE की मार

 हर 6 महीने में सेमिनार देना होता है। 25 को फिर देना है, पहले भी बोले थे। कल उसका ही mock है। तीसरी बार देंगे इस बार तो उतना, यदि बंगालियों की भांति बोले तो, चाप नहीं आ रहा। अच्छा है। शायद आदत सी हो गई है अब। लोगों के सामने बोलने में शायद पांचवीं कक्षा से ही डर लगने लगा था। कारण अज्ञात है। अब ज़हर का नाम जान के क्या ही फायदा? नहीं फायदा तो है, Anti venom शायद सब का अलग होता है। थेरैपी का शायद ये ही फण्डा है। ज्ञान होना चाहिए ये सब का भी। 

लेकिन ये ज्ञान recommended श्रेणी में है, सेमिनार आवश्यक है। उसका मोटा मोटा आ ही गया है। उससे खराब दिक्कत तो लेकिन Advanced PDE में है। हाँ बहुत अच्छा विष्य है, वर्कशॉप भी जा रहे हैं। लेकिन जैसे उस वर्कशॉप की चिन्ता है वैसे ही अब course के लिए भी लग रहा है। 

अधिकांश तो आर सर के विष्य में अधिकतर मेरा काम चल जाता । उनका जीवन बुनियाद में ही समर्पित है । अच्छी बात है। गणित शब्दों या अंकों (Number Theory करने वालों भाइयों के लिए एक सावधानी) को इधर उधर करना और एक equation या वाक्य गढ़ देना नहीं है। क्लर्कगिरि नहीं है ये। रामानुज क्लर्क थे, लेकिन जब ये नौकरी मांगने गए तो Ramanujan: The Man and the Mathematician ( मेरी समीक्षा) में लिखा गया है कि उसने कहा लिया कि

 Ramaswamy Ayyar: It is too bad. If you become a clerk in any of these offices, your mathematical abilities will soon dis- appear. I do not want to sin that way.

अब उनपे देवी नामगिरि की असीम कृपा थी । लेकिन अय्यर साहब की बात हम आम लोगों पे वैध है । आर सर जैसे लोग हम शोधशास्त्रों को इस क्लर्कगिरि के जाल से बचाने में लगे हुए हैं। कई बार इसको इतना श्रेय मिलता नहीं, श्रेय दूर अपयश मिलता है। लेकिन ये सुकर्म है, आवश्यक है। हम 3 ही छात्र है इस विष्य में । तो internal के 13 अंक के लिए सब को एक एक सवाल present करने दिए हैं। अब सवाल सुन ही लें, Integration by parts on   ${H^1 ({\mathbb{R}_+}^2)}$ और Trace map के Image पे है। हमारी किताब में है दोनों। हम Kesavan की Topics in Functional Analysis and Applications ही पढ़ते हैं कक्षा में, इसमें ही 2.8.1 और 2.8.2 देना है। मुझे 2.8.2 का दूसरा भाग मिला। लेकिन इसमें त्रुटि है, और चोटी मोटी नहीं, पूरा का पूरा proof नष्ट कर देने वाली। बहुत ही basic गलती है, जिसका derivative ही नहीं उसे Schwartz कह रहा है। अब इतना ही गलत होगा ये थोड़ी कोई सोचेगा। हम भी सोचे नहीं थे । आज present करना था, उसके घंटे भर पहले जाने की क्या कांड कर रहा है किताब में। घबरा उठे । जल्दबाजी में  Strongly Elliptic Systems and Boundary Integral Equations में जवाब मिला । कक्षा की और जाते हुए ही पीडीएफ फाइल मिली। आज तो गए भईया। मेरा नंबर दूसरा था। लेकिन जब चालू की पांचाली (नाम बदला हुआ) तो बेचारी को 20 मिनिट जो मिले थे, उसमें तो कुछ नहीं हुआ। एक घंटे में भी कुछ हुआ नहीं। फिर पता नहीं किसकी महर थी, shayad मंगल है न आज, नॉनभेज त्यागने का फल है बंजारबली से, लेकिन R सर ने कहा कि तीसरा होगा। उसका तो चालू करने से पूर्ण एक बुनियादी सिद्धांत पे रोक दिया। दरअसल वो, मैं और किताब भी एक छोटी सो चीज़ को नज़रंदाज़ कर रहें थे। लेकिन सर से नहीं छिपता ये, कैसे छिपे? निठरता तो घोल पी गए हैं। आस रखे थे कि हम लोग भी अब तक कुछ चरणामृत की भांति पिए होंगे। नहीं लेकिन खड़े उठे आज तो। नहीं उठे। उनको न वाक्चातुर्य से मतलब है ना हि एकान्तप्रयास से। कई दफ़ा तो बाहर चले गए कहके कि तुम लोग आपस में बात चीत कर लो । अब परसों मेरा है। सेमिनार, जो 300 नंबर का है, उससे ज्यादा इसमें, 13 नम्बर का, से डर लग रहा है। लेकिन सच कहे तो इसमें सीख भी अधिक रहे है। अब चलो 2 दिन ईश्वरीय कृपया से मिला है तो अच्छा है। तो Krantz की Partial Differential Equations and Complex Analysis में भी छान बीन किए, और मिला। ये सबसे मंगनी किताब है मेरी, फेलो बार काम आई अभी। सही है। लेकिन इस आदमी का काम बहुत व्यापक है। मेरे से भी बहुत मिलता जुलता है। एक न एक बार इससे मिलना है। 

अगर PDE की किताबों की बात हो तो महाविद्यालय में बहुत सी पढ़ी । Partial Differential Equations with Fourier Series and Boundary Value Problems ( मेरी समीक्षा), सिंह-शर्मा की Partial Differential Equations for Engineers And Scientists, Sneddon की Elements of Partial Differential Equations ( तस्वीरों ), Amaranath की An Elementary Course In Partial Differential Equations ( मेरी समीक्षा),  लोकनाथ देबनाथ की  Linear Partial Differential Equations for Scientists and Engineers, Raisinghania ये सब तो भाई नहीं। Coleman की  An Introduction to Partial Differential Equations with MATLAB पे प्रतिक्रिया तो अच्छी लिखी थी, लेकिन कुछ याद नहीं आ रहा। छाप तो कोई नहीं है। और तब तो अपरिपाक्क था। फिर से देखना होगा, ही था क्या। डिस्ट्रीब्यूशन Theory से तो था नहीं, मतलब असली गणित के तौर पे तो निकम्मी ही है। अब खैर, हर किताब का एक पाठक होता है। इन सब का मैं न था। कोई न कोई होगा। अभी तो चिंतना मेरे इस सेमिनार को हे, और उसके बाद अलसी वाले सेमिनार की ।

मदन महीने वाला जाड़ा आया

 ठंड आ गई है फिर से । लोग अक्सर जाड़े को मौत वगैराह से जोड़ते हैं, लेकिन मेरे लिए ये ही मदन महीना है। असल बसंत का अनुभव तो मुझे रघुवीर सहाय की भांति ही होता है ये 

और यह कैलेंडर से मालूम था
अमुक दिन अमुक बार मदनमहीने की होवेगी पंचमी
दफ़्तर में छुट्टी थी-यह था प्रमाण
और कविताएँ पढ़ते रहने से यह पता था
कि दहर-दहर दहकेंगे कहीं ढाक के जंगल
आम बौर आवेंगे
रंग-रस-गंध से लदे-फँदे दूर के विदेश के
वे नंदन-वन होवेंगे यशस्वी
मधुमस्त पिक भौंर आदि अपना-अपना कृतित्व
अभ्यास करके दिखावेंगे

सच कहा जाए तो दिल्ली में तो सारे ही मौसम ऐसे निकल जाते। इधर ओड़िशा आके ही थोड़ा इन सब पर गौर फरमाया जा रहा है। महानगरों में ये कहां ही संभव हो पाता है। नहीं, तो नहीं ही सही। ये एहसास अन्दर कुछ जगा देता है, लेकिन जीवन तो दिल्ली बंगलौर का ही भला है। इससे याद आया दिसंबर में एक वर्कशॉप के आई बंगलौर जाना है, उधर से आके घर दिल्ली भी । Stochastic PDE विष्य है। Prerequisites का अभावअनुभव कर रहा हूं अभी से । पीछे पलक्कड़ गया था, तब पूरा अनुभव हुआ था उसका । लेकिन इधर रहे के न सीखने से अच्छा तो उधर रह के न सीखना है ना । कर्मण्येवाधिकारस्ते । 

अब ये तो हुआ इस साल का । लेकिन मेरे लिए सच ही मदन महीना है ये । घर से 2023 से निकलने लगा । उसी साल मेट्रो में लाजपत नगर में चढ़ने वाली रेखा–नयनी थी। 2024 में वो टोपोलोजी वाली। 2025 में अभी हफ्ता भर की ही बात है, तो नहीं लिखूंगा। "डीडी" (अंग्रेजी में DD लिखे तो अच्छा लेकिन हिन्दी में अटपटा लग रहा है, लेकिन अब क्या कर सकते हैं) इस बार का भी देख के जान ली है। वही है जो जानती है, उन तीनों को खुद नहीं पता कि मेरे मदन महीने को सार्थक करके के लिए ये हीं रतिदाईं हैं । प्यार हुआ लेकिन कभी इजहार नहीं हुआ । अब, बकौल  दुष्यंत कुमार के:

ख़ुदा नहीं न सही आदमी का ख़्वाब सही

कोई हसीन नज़ारा तो है नज़र के लिए

अगर ग़ज़ल से नीचे आए, और मुन्ना भाई एमबीबीएस के वाफ़िक बोले तो -  फिर क्या अगले दिन अपने मोहल्ले में ऐश्वर्या आई । 

लेकिन टपोरी नहीं है हम और न ही मेरी शून्यप्रेमकथा के ऊपर आज उपदेश देने आया हूं मैं। निष्कर्ष ये ही की ठंड मेरे अंदर कुछ जगा देती है। विद्यालय में कुछ बारहमासी परंपरा वाली कविताएं थीं, उसमें ठंड का कैसे वर्णन था याद नहीं, लेकिन most likely मेरे ये विपरीत ही होगा । ठंड से याद आती है हर Saturday मसालेदार खिचड़ी की, जमे हुए नारियल तेल की और भारी गरम मुलायम रज़ाई के अंदर सोने की । 6 ऋतुएं में से ये ही मेरी मनपसंद है हालांकि 6 नहीं, 3 ही मानता हूँ मैं –गर्मी, जाड़ा और मानसून। भाई मुझे तो ठंड ही भली। 

Poker Face: Less-than-anticipated-but-still-good beat?

 

I have recently started watching webseries. Started with Sitcoms, the first one was How I met your Mother. But am now diversifying a bit. Poker Face is one which I liked. The leader charector is a human lie detector and often gets involved in murder cases which require her skill to unravel. I will confess that I was looking for a Poker themed show when I can across this show, but the comdey-mystery did get be hooked up. I ended the first season and it was genius.

For much of the first season, Charlie the lead character was on the run, living off her car. Many episodes were set in rural Texas. This is a part of USA I seem to be discovering a lot recently. Sheldon is from here, and as such both Young Sheldon and Georgie and Mandy's First Marriage is set here. Recently, I read 'I was a Teenage Slasher', it didn't work for me but the description of the country life was vivid. And now Poke Face, the loke star state reaches out to me. There is a small, but as of now very distant, possibility that I may land a Postdoc position in Texas. But thats something I can worry about in like 5 years, for now, more pressing carrer update is having a seminar on 25th of this month.

Simon Helberg, more familiar to me as Howard from The Big Bang Theory and Loki lookalike, plays a FBI agent and he is indeed a good actor here too. The lead actress, I will confess that I don't recognise her from anywhere, is simply fantastic. The way she walks and talks just makes Charlie seem a real person. 

Come season 2 and a few episodes in Charlie doesn't really have much reasons to be on the run. Can't settle she prays, and we all go with it. Well the intresting thing is the varied location and situation and sections of contemporary American populace the show offers a world view into. And Charlie is not a investigators for hire, it is only that she keeps finding herself into such situations. A normal episode is normally non linear, Charlie is missing for about 25% of it and then we get a recap of the entire show from Charlie's POV and we get to know how she was connected to it. I really like this structure, a quater of each episode is just a new world. And like a spiral model of reinforced learning, we come back. This non linearity of narration is something I loved about HIMYM. This video explaining why it's spinoff failed does a much better job of saying what I want to say. 

But the absence of Charlie (and her powers) from the beginning of each episode that made the narrative unique now seems to have oozed into the entirety of the season 2. In many of the episodes the ability to detect Bullsh*t, as the captions put it, is only tangentially involved. In fact, some episodes may have been without Charlie but anyone else in her place and it won't have went much different. I will not say it is bad. It is good, entertaining, brilliant at times even. But still, as a blog puts it "This is not the Poker Face we were sold." (btw Good and more importantly active blog that I found today, read the review of the First part of the second season too.).

It is like the SJG book stripped on horror elements, it is good but could have been better. It is getting a flush on the river rather than the straight flush that was promised. I will not be continuing with the series as such. Bullsh*t! Okay, but this is not a reccodemndation I'll give to anyone. Bullsh*t! Okay, Okay, I still love this, the directors and writers are good. I need more of them, as I do of the lead actress. 

I - a straightener a la Collins

 I recently started Billy Collins' Horoscopes for the Dead. It has been on my TBR list since 2021! I don't remember why or what prompted it to be on the list. But should I be asked to hazard a guess, it would be my roughly semi-annual urge to appreciate, understand or at least read English poetry.

The Romantics and the Ballads are fine, but it’s free verse that I normally struggle with. Poetry by and large has been absent from my reading this year. I think the only one I read was वर्जिन: काव्य संग्रह, which, while Hindi was in Free Verse and more akin to the Modern English poetry rather than the Dinkars, Gupts and the other Rashtrakavis I hold in regard. Now that I look at Goodreads, the last poetry book before that was मधुशाला which I read in 2024. I started reading both these years ago but managed to finish them when I did only. But indeed Bachanji was a treat, to be savoured like expensive wine. 

भावुकता अंगूर लता से खींच कल्पना की हाला,

कवि साकी बनकर आया है भरकर कविता का प्याला,

कभी न कण-भर खाली होगा लाख पिएँ, दो लाख पिएँ!

पाठकगण हैं पीनेवाले, पुस्तक मेरी मधुशाला।

He is said to have written it before he started drinking. I may not have the "लोहू में है पचहत्तर प्रतिशत हाला" (seventy-five percent alcohol in my blood), still, I would use the "पाठकगण हैं पीनेवाले" (readers are the drinkers) as the basis to defend my right to employ the wine metaphor.

Anyway, the goal was to read more poetry. And so I am.

Billy Collins is the sort of poet I don't normally get. He writes like one speaks, no rhymes, no metre (or at least the one whose cadence is less noticeable). No heavy use of alterations. But this everyday speech flow and the poetry grounded in everyday life are what made it more palatable. After reading this, should one be disapointed at the lack of vakchautya, he will at least not be completely lacking in what happened. The hidden कवि कहना चाहता है कि may be not so hidden, but that's charming in its own way. This book is a bit soothing even when grief is a major theme.

Anyway, this is not supposed to be a prescription of what I like in poetry. I just happened to resonate with one of the poems. 'The Straightener', which can be read here (I myself am unclear of the legality of hosting a poem from a book in a personal blog as she did, but whatever).  

I love to organise my desk in my office. Some piles are arranged by thickness, but by width, and some by colour. The piles themselves are organized by utility. I just love to do it. No, I just love to complete this, to overcome the inertia is much hard. But once I start, its just peace. Once in a while, I will reorganise DD's desk too. It feels like Shramdaan, Karmdaan, Kaarseva. The peaceful feeling while organizing is there too when I do it for myself only. I remember during class 10 matrix exams making timetables and stuff meticulously. Tracking down every 15 minute chunk, with many chunks reserved for tracking itself!That were the days indeed. Anyway, back to the poem. 

Never tomahawk, lantern, and spyglass.
Always lantern, spyglass, tomahawk.

Yes indeed. Once decided, things are set in stone. I can be the greatest Lakir ka Fakir at times. I love self imposed rules. If I had some legal background, I could feature among the absurd anecdotes in Restart: The Last Chance for the Indian Economy (my GR review here). But actual babudom is torture to me. Foucaultian-poststructuralist-imposed-structural-violence should I refer to Akhil Gupta's Red Tape: Bureaucracy, Structural Violence, and Poverty in India (the book unirnoncally uses the terms, more can be read in my GR review here). The view is supported by the "I" in the poem too it seems:

And if I can avoid doing my taxes

Only if we all could do so, I am not an anarchist. I once read (and did a GR review of) von Mises' Bureaucracy. I agree a lot with him, self imposed rules are not the same as those imposed by the punitive backing of the state. I am currently reading The Bureaucratic Phenomenon which seems to diagree with this view of Mises, but I am yet to see his complete thesis and have just started it.  But at the very least i am no anarchists, I am for a strong state but at the same time hate the Babudom to its core. I don't know what I I am exactly, I feel a bit like the protagonist in English, August: An Indian Story. I feel like him in a lot many ways and I think I will pen down those thoughts once in a while. That I must do, but I must write a thousand other things. But this is somewhat more serious and personal than others. 

Sociology and fictional IAS babus aside. Back to the poem. The "I" in the poem too must feel the same tranquillity that the I do in real life. He too shirks social and legal obligation and prefers to straighten things out. The "I " has 

a note from a girl I was fond of.

As did I! It was a note saying we shall study Topology after we have lunch (separately). She planned things with me in writing! It was on my table for many months.  DD discovered it once and had a lot of fun teasing me. Good for her, I give her much pain, she can use this distraction. I have given over that girl now, but did the "I" in the poem ever express his feelings? Or perhaps he already did and it was reciprocated, and the note was a witness of that hence kept on the table as a trophy. Or maybe it was just an innocent note like in my case, kept as a reminder that he must act or perhaps a memoto. We will never know, but I hope the best for the "I" in the poem. He seems to be doing well. In fact:

Today, for example, I will devote my time
to lining up my shoes in the closet,
pair by pair in chronological order

and lining up my shirts on the rack by color
to put off having to tell you, dear,
what I really think and what I now am bound to do.

The rhythm of "tell you, dear ... what I now am bound to do" sounds so much better than it would have without the "dear." I don't know if there is a technical word for that, but perhaps it's not important. I can just enjoy it as it is. Maybe. The itch to know is too strong. Straighten, I must. But perhaps now. I will keep some things absolutely straightened out, and some will be the most convoluted. Like my thoughts, like this very post. I don't know perhaps it is that I can't tame my thoughts that I cut off artificial physical sacred zones that must be straightened out? Okay, no more pop self Freudian (?) diagnosis. Off (to straightening out my desk). 

Review: Applications of Harmonic Measure (The University of Arkansas Lecture Notes in the Mathematical Sciences)

Applications of Harmonic Measure (The University of Arkansas Lecture Notes in the Mathematical Sciences) by John B. Garnett
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Typesetting of the book is more of 70s Soviet Russia rather than the first world of the 80s. As clearly indicated in the title, the book is not about Harmonic measures but rather their applications. Still, it is one of the better introductions to them, perhaps only Conformal Invariants: Topics in Geometric Function Theory was a better book explaining them when it was written (and which, to be fair, I only discovered for Garnett cites them here). Only Krantz's The Theory and Practice of Conformal Geometry beats both of them. Garnett's own Harmonic Measure couauther many years later is not good either.

The approach is purely deterministic, but a small introduction is made to the probabilistic approach and references are provided should one be interested. The applications are interesting, but in case they are in Krantz's or Ahlfors' books, the exposition there is better. Still, a many of the applications first (and in a couple of cases only time) appeared in monograph form here and as such the book has its value.

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