Worries Abound

Presently, we are back to four of us in the house with our two youngest sons are back in their colleges. My second youngest drove his own car back to IIUM campus last Sunday, while me and my other half drove back our youngest back to UiTM campus in Jasin. Apparently, the campus canteen was still closed when we were there, and so we brought him out for lunch in Merlimau. Here is a pic of him before we left the campus.

The Saturday before, we had visitors to our house from our in-laws. On their return back to their homes, one family had positive Covid-19 test results. That startled us a bit. So, we started our own testing. My third son in IIUM is tested positive and is now under quarantine. For us, in the house, none of us have tested positive. This is my own test result.

I was worried a little bit since I have been feeling very tired all this week, unsure because of the travel and/or our current Syawal fasting. With the result(s), one worry is now out of the way. My hope is to get to meet my side of the family in these coming weeks.

Another worry is my graduate students. I hope they can graduate/do their viva before I take my leave for my retirement. One of the problems faced is to get the examiners for them. Despite what we have done, we are still far away from establishing ourselves in the international arena (that experts refer to us for certain topics). Often what we try to do is to find examiners who are within our contact network and the experts involved perhaps are aware of what we are trying to explore. Beyond this network, often results in the negative (not agreeing to examine).

Having said the above, breaking through the international scene is certainly not easy, particularly with all the intense competition. Even experts find such difficulties to make a breakthrough. I recall Bob's tweet in his attempt to put out diagrammatic reasoning for quantum theory. He even said in his public lecture here that there is an ego problem in the academia; how things tend to be more acceptable when they are made more difficult and not easier. I believe that most of us had the experience of one's article being declined publication simply because it is not interesting enough. Not known enough internationally sometimes make such events more probable. I have always advised my own students (and my own self), not every research results are deemed publishable. What more if the problem is considered as merely a mathematical exercise and hence the attempt to cloak them in much more technical language. On the other hand, I do understand the need to be more technical as science progresses with more difficult problems or the need to be more abstract as one digs deeper into the foundations. In fact, I do think our problems here are different; there is a tendency to evade difficult problems and go only for easier ones. This is the story of my life: trying to make theoretical physics to be more acceptable among our local community.

Recently, when Dennis Sullivan won the 2022 Abel Prize, I was 'surprised' there was very little coverage of the news in our local (social) media. Sure enough, Abel Prize is less popularly known than the Nobel Prize locally, but there seems to be even very little stir among local mathematicians about Dennis Sullivan's Abel Prize award (also true for earlier awardees). The topic for which Dennis Sullivan is awarded the prize is indeed technical, something that have stirred my interest in my PhD journey i.e. algebraic topology. So when the 2022 Abel Prize news came, I have been wanting to write something on some parts of his discoveries for our educated public here. This was only realized during the Eid holidays. I have been carrying around articles on rational homotopy theory, hoping to find a better way of describing it. Finally this came out. However, I felt it is rather a rushed job. Looking back, I thought I could have done better in explaining ideas about differential graded algebras in cohomology, piecewise linear manifolds where the theory is more relevant and many others (even the hand-drawn diagrams looked ugly). This would have made the article longer and if pursued, the article might not have seen the light of day. I certainly hope that the blogpost could spark some interests among local theorists or mathematicians. Yes, I know it does not contribute to my KPIs.

I guess I will continue writing such posts after I retire, just to bring unpopular topics upfront. I'm still unsure of my post-retirement future. Certainly I will continue to pursue my research interests only for my own satisfaction. Yesterday, I revealed some wishes or fantasies I have conjured up during Ramadhan to my younger colleague. I do wish I get some understanding of our Holy Qur'an as the ultimate miracle. Playful thoughts that I have entertained is the use of complex networks and grammar algebras to study the Qur'an. However, without mastering Arabic language, these will just be fantasies. In any case, I just want to be a better person in the hope that it helps me in the hereafter.