Parasara Sridhar Duggirala's Blog

This book documents the journey of various ethic and national groups and their integration (or lack thereof) into the American way of life. The book is mainly divided into 4 parts: Americans from Europe, from Asia, from Africa, and from South America. Since the arrival of various groups occurred at different times, there is no uniform timeline for all of these arrivals. Naturally, since the major events in American history affected all of these groups, we can see the interactions between these groups. The various groups discussed in this book are Irish, German, Jew, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, African, Caribbean, Puerto Rican, and Mexican. For each group, this book discusses the origins, the reasons for arrival in US, initial stages, occupations, economic and social norms, barriers and advantages faced in the new nation, major achievements, and finally the present situation. Not all groups started uniformly, for example, the German immigrants were, from the very beginning, very hig...

I bought this book in the same bag sale (books sold by the bag) at our local library. Proving Fermat's last theorem is one of the most crowning achievements of 20th century Mathematics. Knowing a bit about mathematics and writing/teaching proofs for a living, I am familiar that the actual proof of the theorem is extremely complex. Even for an amateur Mathematician, understanding all the nuts and bolts of the proof itself would take several years. I was of the opinion that this book might be full of superficial pop culture mumbo-jumbo and was skeptical to pick it up. Of course, if one wants to write a book on Fermat's last theorem that can be understood by a layman, then everything has to be watered down, except for the statement. Once I started reading the book, I understood that this book was not just about the theorem, but more about the endeavor of Mathematics itself.  The book takes us through the journey of the origins of proof based mathematics (Greeks), to Fermat, to...

I bought this on a bag sale (books sold by the bag) at our local library. This book contains essays on War, Religion, Press, Fascism, and Intolerance. The essays are mildly interesting to say the least. I found the essay on Religion least interesting because the discussion was purely centered on Christianity and the conflict between Christianity and Atheism. Needless to say, Umberto is fairly sympathetic to the Christian cause and presents a few interesting arguments. I also found the essay on War to be a bit simplistic. Umberto is of the opinion that "intellectuals" should always be against war. Since this speech was given in 1991 post cold-war time, and given the end of history narrative that was in the air at that point of time, such a perspective is understandable. I am interested to know if Umberto changed his views given the developments in the past ~30 years. Having grown up in a Hindu school of thought, I think that, there are circumstances where a war can be justi...

I picked up this book on a random stroll through the library. I found the title interesting and the cover pretty good, so I thought of giving it a try. This book is basically a collection of essays written on different topics. Some are directly related to the title like "Is Indian Civilization a Myth" and "How India met Vasco", others weren't related at all, like "Marquez, Hemmingway, and Cult of Power" or " An Ambiguous Parisian". Seems like a random collection of essays in no particular order. I found his essay "What, Exactly, is an Empire?" a bit pedantic. It is a classic case of logic defeating its own purpose. Here is the thing, irrespective of any definition of Empire, you are bound to ignore or include some elements that are questionable according to other definitions of Empire. One should not dismiss works on analyzing Empires because they adopted a specific definition. More frustratingly, Sanjay does not even provide an ...

Consider that there are two parties A and B. Party A proposes a "scientific" hypothesis and forces part B to provide an explanation this specific hypothesis. This is exactly the framework for the "Aryan Invasion" myth. Aryan Invasion refers to a hypothesis which briefly states that Aryans were the "white" foreigners who came to India on horse drawn carts and "invaded" the cities of India, driving the original inhabitants, called Dravidians to the south. I call Aryan Invasion as myth neither in a literary philosophical term that folks with English PhD talk about nor as a set of mythological stories that are used in popular culture. I mean myth as something that people literally invented without any scientific basis. The whole "theory" of Aryan Invasion does not have any scientific leg to stand on. Even the religious followers of Aryan Invasion such as Romila Thapar et. al. just switched their stance to Aryan Migration, as if the explana...

Why do we do anything? If the basic needs such as food, water, clothing, shelter, healthcare, and sanitation are met, what is the additional motivation to work? People often cite "fulfillment", or worse, "happiness" as a motivation to work (whatever that means!). Now consider an extreme scenario like climbing Mt. Everest, also dearly called Chomolungma, by the common folk in Nepal and Tibet. Why would you want to climb it? I will give an outline of the the logistics involved in climbing Mt. Everest. An expedition would often take at least 2-3 weeks and easily a month. One needs to diligently plan the times of ascend, set up several base camps, and stock up sufficient food, water, and oxygen. It takes several days to get acclimatized to the high altitude. It is essential to carry sufficient clothing and climbing gear. A climber can face storms, avalanches, and injuries, that can be instantly lethal, frost bite that might cause disfiguring or amputation, or worse, ...