Calculus Made Easy (2nd Edition prologue)

Considering how many fools can calculate, it is surprising that it

should be thought either a difficult or a tedious task for any other fool

to learn how to master the same tricks.

Some calculus-tricks are quite easy. Some are enormously difficult.

The fools who write the textbooks of advanced mathematics--and they

are mostly clever fools--seldom take the trouble to show you how easy

the easy calculations are. On the contrary, they seem to desire to

impress you with their tremendous cleverness by going about it in the

most difficult way.

Being myself a remarkably stupid fellow, I have had to unteach

myself the difficulties, and now beg to present to my fellow fools the

parts that are not hard. Master these thoroughly, and the rest will

follow. What one fool can do, another can.

Love means nothing to the tennis crowd.

The Mower / Philip Larkin

The mower stalled, twice; kneeling, I found
A hedgehog jammed up against the blades,
Killed. It had been in the long grass.
I had seen it before, and even fed it, once.
Now I had mauled its unobtrusive world
Unmendably. Burial was no help:
Next morning I got up and it did not.
The first day after a death, the new absence
Is always the same; we should be careful
Of each other, we should be kind
While there is still time.

Thanks, Sajithetta! :)

Excerpts from "Predator and Prey - Nature Strikes a Balance" by Ullas Karanth

Primitive human hunter-gatherers, occurring at low densities before they discovered fire, tools, agriculture and animal husbandry were truly a part of natural animal communities. People who now live at high densities in and around forests but depend on agriculture, animal husbandry, the market economy and medical care for their survival are not a part of such natural animal communities anymore, howerver primitive their lifestyles may appear to be to outsiders.

------------------------------

The puny human hunter who poses grandly with a tiger, which he has shot, is, in fact, exhibiting this deep-rooted sense of inferiority that we all feel in the presence of a mighty predator.

What He Said

What could my mother be

to yours ? What kin is my father

to yours anyway ? And how

did you and I meet ever ?

But in love.

Our hearts have mingled

like red earth and pouring rain. Chempulapeyarinar

["poet of red earth and pouring rain"] Kuruntokai 40

अर्ज़ कीजिये...

नींद नही आती, उनके ख्याल आते रहते हैं;

वोह हैं कौन, यह किसी को मालूम नही|

नींद नही आती, उनके ख्याल आते रहते हैं;

वोह हैं कौन, किसी को मालूम नही|

जब उनकी नज़र इस पर गिरेगी,

मालूम हो जाएगा उनको कि यह तो उन्ही की बात हो रही हैं|

Altaira Morbius: Where have you been? I've beamed and beamed.
Robby: Sorry, miss. I was giving myself an oil-job.
Altaira Morbius: Robby, I must have a new dress, right away.
Robby: Again?
Altaira Morbius: Oh, but this one must be different! Absolutely nothing must show - below, above or through.
Robby: Radiation-proof?
Altaira Morbius: No, just eye-proof will do.
Robby: Thick and heavy?
Altaira Morbius: Oh, no, Robby. It must be the loveliest, softest thing you've ever made for me, and fit in all the right places, with lots and lots of star sapphires.
Robby: Star sapphires take a week to crystallize properly. Would diamonds or emeralds do?

Forbidden Planet (1956)

Anagram Poetry

Toilets
by T.S. Eliot

Let us go then, to the john,
Where the toilet seat waits to be sat upon
Like a lover's lap perched upon ceramic;
Let us go, through doors that do not always lock,
Which means you ought to knock
Lest opening one reveal a soul within
Who'll shout, "Stay out! Did you not see my shin,
Framed within the gap twixt floor and stall?"
No, I did not see that at all.
That is not what I saw, at all.

To the stall the people come to go,
Reading an obscene graffito.

We have lingered in the chamber labeled "Men"
Till attendants proffer aftershave and mints
As we lather up our hands with soap, and rinse.




Likable Wilma
by William Blake

Wilma, Wilma, in thy blouse,
Red-haired prehistoric spouse,
What immortal animator
Was thy slender waist's creator?

When the Rubble clan moved in,
Was Betty jealous of thy skin,
Thy noble nose, thy dimpled knee?
Did he who penciled Fred draw thee?

Wilma, Wilma, burning bright, ye
Cartoon goddess Aphrodite,
Was it Hanna or Barbera
Made thee hot as some caldera?

Is a Sperm Like a Whale?
by William Shakespeare

Shall I compare thee to a sperm whale, sperm?
Thou art more tiny and more resolute:
Rough tides may sway a sea-bound endotherm,
But naught diverts thy uterine commute.
Sometime too fierce the eye of squid may glint
And make a stout cetacean hunter quail;
Methinks 'twould take much more than bilious squint
To shake thee off the cunning ovum's trail.
Yet still thou art not so unlike, thou two,
Both coursing through a dark uncharted brine
While fore and aft there swims thy fellow crew;
And note this echo, little gamete mine:
As whales spray salty water from their spout,
So with a salty spray dost thou come out.

- Courtesy of http://www.modernhumorist.com/

I fell in love.
She wasn't there to catch me.
Now I'm hurt and have to crawl out all by myself.

- Anonymous

You say you want a revolution
Well, you know
We all want to change the world
You tell me that it's evolution
Well, you know
We all want to change the world
But when you talk about destruction
Don't you know that you can count me out
Don't you know it's gonna be all right
All right, all right.

You say you got a real solution
Well, you know
We'd all love to see the plan
You ask me for a contribution
Well, you know
We're doing what we can
But when you want money
for people with minds that hate
All I can tell is brother you have to wait
Don't you know it's gonna be all right
All right, all right.

You say you'll change the constitution
Well, you know
We all want to change your head
You tell me it's the institution
Well, you know
You better free you mind instead
But if you go carrying pictures of chairman Mao
You ain't going to make it with anyone anyhow
Don't you know it's gonna be all right
All right, all right.

- Lennon/McCartney

Apne dil ki baat unse keh nahi sakte, bin kahe bhi ji nahi sakte.
Ae Khuda aisi takdir bana, woh humse khud akar kahe, hum aap ke bina reh nahi sakte.

- Anonymous