Random Thoughts

That night
I stared at the silent stars
and saw my world unfold around me
death and destruction all it was
speeding cars whizzing past
scattered limbs, broken hearts
a thousand screams rent the air
I looked around for a sign of peace
a loud explosion greets me there
burning houses , crying children
blood-smeared hands murderous eyes
victory for one death for the other
man kills man in the name of war
man kills man in the name of god
this is the world we've made for ourselves
this is the world we are leaving for our children..

-BK

It was in the summer of 2008 when I finally managed to make a trip to Darjeeling. We were a small group of 7 friends who decided to take a break and spend our weekend in the silent, peaceful valleys of Darjeeling. After traveling 8 hours by train we finally reached New Jalpaiguri. We hired a Sumo to take us through the three hours journey from New Jalpaiguri to Darjeeling. It was one of the most memorable journeys I have ever made. I was completely awestruck by everything I saw around me, the terrain , the scenery, the huge mountains with white clouds resting on them. As we continued our journey up the mountains, I felt I was getting closer to heaven. The path that we were taking was a narrow road cut along the side of the mountain, with the mountain on one side and a sharp valley on the other. The first rays of the sun could be seen over the hills on the other side of the valley. The fresh mountain breeze was filling the Sumo, and my spirits too. The peace and tranquility of the whole place was slowly sinking in. Soon we passed Kuresong, a small but busy town set on the top of the mountains.
Kuresong was thriving with activity even at such early hours, with school children and elderly people stopping to stare into the Sumo as we passed them. They probably find it amusing that people invest so much time and money to spend their weekends in the mountains. We moved on climbing further up higher into the clouds. We could barely see the rugged terrain now, everything was covered in white smoke adding an eerie feel to it. Soon we were above the clouds. We could see the valley covered in white foamy blanket. Another 30 minutes drive and we entered the heart of Darjeeling, filled with tourists and local guides. There were Sumos parked all along the side of the road with lodges and hotels strewn all over the place. We moved into one of the many lodges. The rooms were pretty ordinary but the view from the balcony was worth millions. The lodge was built at the edge of the mountain with the balcony overlooking a deep valley stretching for many miles and bordered by mountains on the other side. We could see the clouds floating across the valley below. We spent 2 days and 2 nights exploring and admiring the scenic beauty of the place, the green mountains , the lush tea gardens , the deep valleys , the fresh mountain air , the misty mornings.... I feel that I left behind a part of myself amongst the hills of Darjeeling. The hills still haunt me, there is something which calls me back. Probably the memories of good times spend with good friends....

The first rays of the morning sun
seeps through the mountain clefts,
As the Heavenly Sphere,
furiously riding on its Golden Chariot,
pops up against the crimson sky.
The sea, now painted in wild colours,
heaves to welcome this new morn.
A new Day, a new Chapter begins,
taking life to a new Dimension.
New Hopes built on the ruins of old ones.
New Ambitions driven by new Desires.
Mankind welcomes this new day,
with new Destructions and a new War.
Humanity, the greatest enemy of itself,
squeezes out its own existence,
and all that’s left of this beautiful day,
are the grey mountains and the blue sea,
and the rest is painful History.

-BK

Since the beginning of intellectual civilization, people have gazed at the silent stars and wondered whether mankind is unique or if there exists other intelligent beings, who contemplate and think like us, in the cosmos. In a Universe whose vastness and age are both beyond ordinary human understanding, our Earth seems to be a tiny speck and we ponder over the ultimate significance of the tiny but exquisite blue planet.

Are we alone in the Universe? Or are we just an instance of the general rule of the Universe? These questions led to the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. In the late 20th century, scientists came upon the idea of scanning the sky and “listening “ for non-random patterns of electromagnetic emissions. SETI or Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence is the brainchild of that endeavor.

The idea of SETI began in 1959 with the publication of a paper in the British journal ‘Nature’ by Guiseppe Cocconi and Phillip Morrison. It discussed the probability of existence of alien civilization and the probable methods of detecting them. Around the same time a young astronomer, Frank Drake organized the first serious attempt to listen to possible radio signals from other civilizations. This programme, known as Project Ozma, was set up at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Green Bank, West Virginia. Drake and two student assistants launched Project Ozma by pointing their new 85-feet wide radio telescope at the star Tau Ceti, 12 light years away, and loud pulsing signals burst from the loudspeakers. They performed a simple test, moving the telescope away from Epsilon Eridani. But when they pointed the telescope back at the star, it was quiet.

About a week and half later, the loud pulsing noise returned, but they soon figured out that the signal was coming from a passing plane. After 200 hours spent listening to Tau Ceti and Epsilon Eridani, Project Ozma was over.

Since Project Ozma, there have been six or seven other such programmes, none yielding any encouraging results, but there have been intriguing signals. The so-called “Wow!” signal was a powerful burst of narrow frequency sound that came from the constellation Sagittarius. On Aug 15,1977, at the Big Ear Observatory near Columbia, Ohio, Jerry Ehman, a Franklin University astronomy professor and SETI volunteer, while monitoring extra terrestrial noise spotted something peculiar in the computer printout and wrote “Wow” in the margin. The Wow! Signal, as it’s been called ever since, was 30 times stronger than surrounding background noise.

It covered only a very small range of frequencies much smaller than any natural emission, and it appeared to have been turned on and off as the telescope was observing it. Despite searching that section of the sky, in the constellation Sagittarius nothing like it has been heard again. Wow! May indeed have been a Hi! from an alien but if so, the alien hasn’t bothered to try again.

Some scientists have attempted to estimate the number of advanced technical civilizations in the Milky Way galaxy, after considering factors like the number and the age of stars, the abundance of planetary systems and the possibility of origin of life within them. And what they came up with is around a million technical civilizations possible in our Galaxy alone. Of which, till date we have only been able to listen to about a thousand stars.

So are we really alone? Is the Earth unique, not only in the solar system but also in the Universe? How prevalent is life in the universe? Is it the result of independent stars or are planets “seeded”. Is evolution highly divergent or convergent? What is our destiny? Do cultures survive the death of their primary stars and of a collapsing universe?

Failure to discover extra terrestrial life could never possibly answer these questions in the affirmative, but the discovery of one such civilization would provide the needed counter- example and provide at least partial answers. And the day this happens, will herald the birth of anew science.

In the 45 years since the initial Project Ozma, many others have been carried out with more sensitive equipment, over much larger time frames – observing thousands of other stars. So far no conclusive alien signals have been detected, but we have only begun to scratch the surface. There is a long way to go. There are thousands of billions of stars in the universe. To complicate matters further there are millions of frequencies that a signal could be received on. It is possible that we just haven’t looked in the right place in the right time yet.