VISMAYA: History & Philosophy of Physics

Author: G V Pavan Kumar

  • Conversation with A.R.Venkatachalapathy

    Welcome to the podcast, Pratidhavani – Humanizing Science

    A. R. Venkatachalapathy is a prolific historian, writer and Professor whose work explores the social and cultural history of colonial Tamil Nadu. In 2024, he was awarded the Sahitya Akademi Award. 

    His notable books include “In Those Days There Was No Coffee,” “The Province of the Book,” “Tamil Characters,” and “Swadeshi Steam,” which examines V.O. Chidambaram Pillai’s role in anti-colonial maritime resistance. His scholarship spans Tamil literature, publishing history, and intellectual culture, blending rigorous archival research with literary analysis.

    In this episode, we explore his intellectual journey as a historian and bilingual author.

  • Polanyi’s quote

    “…The example of great scientists is the light which guides all workers in science, but we must guard against being blinded by it. There has been too much talk about the flash of discovery and this has tended to obscure the fact that discoveries, however great, can only give effect to some intrinsic potentiality of the intellectual situation in which scientists find themselves…”

    Michael Polanyi, in an essay titled  “My Time with X-Rays and Crystals” (1969)

  • Rotational jamming – preprint

    link to the preprint

  • History of Maths in India – a good book

    In recent years, this has been one of the best books on the history of mathematics in India. The late Prof. Divakaran was a theoretical physicist and a scholar.

    This book is also an excellent example of how a scientist can present historical facts and analyse them with rigour and nuance. Particularly, it puts the Indian contribution in the global context and shows how ideas are exchanged across the geography. The writing is jargon-free and can be understood by anyone interested in mathematics.

    Unfortunately, the cost of the book ranges from Rs 8800 to Rs 14,000 (depending on the version), which is a shame. Part of the reason why scholarly books, particularly in India, don’t get the traction is because of such high cost. This needs to change for the betterment and penetration of knowledge in a vast society such as India.

    There is a nice video by numberphile on Prof. Divakaran and his book:

  • Random Walks in Polarization

    I have been teaching polarization of light in my optics class. In there, I introduced them to matrix representation of polarization states. One of the standard references that I use for explanation is a 1954 paper in American J. Physics, by McMaster titled: “Polarization and the Stokes Parameters.”

    While skimming through the pdf of the journal paper, I found an excerpt from a 1954 book, which quotes Fresnel writing to Thomas Young:

    Further, I knew from the past that S. Chandrasekhar (astrophysicist) had a role in rejuvenating Stokes vector formalism in radiative transfer. Below is his description from AIP oral history archives (May 1977):

    ” I started the sequence of papers, and almost at the time I started it, I read the paper by Wick in which he had used the method of discrete coordinates,* and I realized at once that that method can be used in a large scale way for solving all problems. So that went on. I have always said and felt that the five years in which I worked on radiative transfer [1944 – 49] is the happiest period of my scientific life. I started on it with no idea that one paper would lead to another, which would lead to another, which would lead to another and soon for some 24 papers — and the whole subject moved with its own momentum.” (emphasis added)

    He further states how he rediscovered Stokes polarization vector formalism:

    “All this had a momentum of it own. Then suddenly I realized one had to put polarization in; the problems of characterizing polarized light — my rediscovery of Stokes original paper, writing on Stokes parameters and calling them Stokes parameters for the first time“

    Chandra further adds that the Stokes formalism was almost forgotten for 50 years, and he had a role in resurrecting it.

    Next, there was some noise on social media where some one questioned the utility of matrix multiplication. For them, below is a wonderful review article by McMaster (again), to explore from polarization viewpoint, and realize the power of non-commutative matrix algebra:

    Finally, the original paper by Stokes on his formalism, which is hard to find (thanks to paywall). But, classic papers are hard to suppress, and I found the full paper on internet archives.

    Below is a snapshot:

    Enjoy your random walk !

  • Cartoon – Factory Workers

    A cartoon from a 1947 edition of a US magazine

    Source: https://archive.org/details/sim_factory_1947-08_105/page/112/mode/1up

  • Conversation with Jyotishman Dasgupta

    Welcome to the podcast, Pratidhavani – Humanizing Science

    Jyotishman Dasgupta is a professor at TIFR, Mumbai, in the Department of Chemical Sciences. His research focuses on probing dynamical structural events leading to charge generation in molecular materials, particularly for bio-inspired photocatalysis and solar electricity generation. He uses ultrafast spectroscopy, including Stimulated Raman spectroscopy, to study reaction mechanisms in these systems.

    Jyotishman effectively combines his love and passion for research and teaching with compassion and mentoring researchers. In this free-wheeling conversation, we discuss his intellectual journey so far.

    References:

    TIFR – Department of Chemical Sciences. ‘TIFR – Department of Chemical Sciences’. Accessed 3 November 2025. https://www.tifr.res.in/dcs/faculty-detail/91.

    ‘‪Jyotishman Dasgupta‬ – ‪Google Scholar‬’. Accessed 3 November 2025. https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=DS8RvTcAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate.

    ‘Jyotishman Dasgupta | LinkedIn’. Accessed 3 November 2025. https://www.linkedin.com/in/jyotishman-dasgupta-312578a/.

    X (Formerly Twitter). ‘Jyotishman Dasgupta (@jd1278) / X’. 27 October 2025. https://x.com/jd1278.

  • 3 Questions for the AI age

    3 Questions to Ponder in the Age of Artificial Intelligence (AI).

    1. What will you do with the time you gain from the utility of AI?
    2. How will you utilize your individual short-term and long-term memory?
    3. What is your definition of intelligence in humans?

    I think it is worth thinking about.

  • ‘We’gnana !

    Recently, I saw the following tweet from the well-known historian William Dalrymple.

    Congrats to the listed authors, who deserve rewards (and the money) for their effort.

    I have 3 adjacent points to make:

    1) India badly needs to read (and write) more on science and technology. Here, I am not referring to textbooks, but some popular-level science books (at least). Generally, educated Indians are exposed to science only through their textbooks, which are mostly dull, or, in this era, YouTube videos, which have a low signal-to-noise ratio. Good quality science & tech books at a popular level can add intellectual value, excitement, and expand scientific thinking via reading, not just in students, but also in adults.

    2) In India, most of the non-fiction literature is dominated by the social sciences, particularly history (as seen in the best-seller list). I have no problem with that, but non-fiction as a genre is a broad tree. Indian readers (and publishers) can and should broaden this scope and explore other branches of the tree. Modern science books (authentic ones), especially written in the Indian context, are badly in need. I hope trade publishers are reading this!

    3) Most of the public and social media discourse in India does not emphasize (or underplays) the scientific viewpoint. Scientific literature and scientific discourse should become a central part of our culture. Good books have a major role to play. Remember what Sagan’s Cosmos did to American scientific outlook, and indirectly to its economic progress. The recent Nobel in economics, especially through the work of Joel Mokyr, further reinforces the connection between science, economics and human progress. This realization should be bottom-up, down to individual families and public places.

    One of the great scientists, James Maxwell, is attributed to have said: “Happy is the man who can recognise in the work of today a connected portion of the work of life and an embodiment of the work of Eternity.…“

    Science, with its rich, global history and philosophy, in the form of good books, can connect India (and the world) to the ‘work of eternity’, and make us look forward.

    Embedding science within culture, in a humane way, can lead to progress. Science books have a central role to play in this.

    विज्ञान (Vignana) should transform to ‘We’gnana !

  • Conversation with Vijay Chikkadi

    Welcome to the podcast, Pratidhavani – Humanizing Science
    Vijay is an Associate Professor of Physics at IISER Pune, and works on various aspects of Soft Matter Physics, including deformation and flow of soft matter, and active matter.

    In this episode, we discuss various facets of soft matter physics and Vijay’s research on these fascinating materials.

    ‘Vijayakumar Chikkadi – IISER Pune’. Accessed 1 November 2025. https://www.iiserpune.ac.in/research/department/physics/people/faculty/regular-faculty/vijayakumar-chikkadi/252.

    ‘Soft & Active Matter Lab’. Accessed 1 November 2025. https://sites.google.com/site/vchikkadi/home.

    ‘Soft & Active Matter Lab – PEOPLE’. Accessed 1 November 2025. https://sites.google.com/site/vchikkadi/people.

    ‘‪Vijayakumar Chikkadi‬ – ‪Google Scholar‬’. Accessed 1 November 2025. https://scholar.google.co.il/citations?hl=en&user=Xex6qvIAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate.

    Sahu, Ratimanasee, Mohit Sharma, Peter Schall, Sarika Maitra Bhattacharyya, and Vijayakumar Chikkadi. ‘Structural Origin of Relaxation in Dense Colloidal Suspensions’. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 121, no. 42 (2024): e2405515121. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2405515121.