The Usurpers

Have you ever seen any of those movies where a highly advanced life form, whose planet is no longer habitable, attacks our Earth with the purpose of colonizing it, and in some, moving on towards other planets to devour?

I have always wondered why so many of these movies have the same pattern. I believe it is because these cinematic depictions are nothing but digital projections of the human subconscious’ foretaste.

Let me elaborate.

Us, humans are one of the youngest, the smartest beings on the planet, sitting on the top of every food chain and so further evolved than any other species on the planet, that for an onlooker it would be very hard to believe that we could be from Earth itself.

We have single-handedly changed our planet so much so that we are very close to causing a mass extinction. Before humans evolved, less than a single species per million went extinct annually. Today, the rate of extinction is a 1000 times faster, mostly due to human-caused habitat destruction and climate change.

Oh yes we are also saving a lot of species from extinction by spending millions of dollars every year, but we choose our favourites to save. And the cute and fuzzy mammals receive the maximum funding. On a grander scale this bias might just pass off as a half-hearted attempt to purify our dark conscience.

We also are taking baby steps to start living on Mars since we see no future of our species on this planet.

To put things into perspective - We slowly devour this planet for our greed and convenience and then move on to another planet to do the same.

Alas! Unlike the humans being destroyed in the blink of an eye by the demonic aliens on the big screen, we torture our victims to a slow and painful death.

Alas! Nature would not be as kind on these other species as to gift them with a superhero who will save their world. Fate has left them at our mercy and we have already left faith in the fate of earth.


Manthan Mehta

The Brick Conundrum

Have you noticed how there is a brick in the middle of a roadside puddle that helps you to cross the puddle without wetting your shoes? Have you ever wondered how it got there? Did somebody put it there? Did the puddle form conveniently around the brick? Did somebody accidently drop the brick there? Have the Non-living Bricks Association of India taken an initiative to themselves travel to such a puddle and temporarily settle there?

Well most of us don’t care. We simply step on it and cross the puddle. In some cases the presence of the brick and hence the convenience to cross the puddle is just a coincidence. Some of us place a brick or two if the convenience is linked to our benefit like shopkeepers create a bridge in the puddles in front of their shops. Hardly any of us find a brick close by and selflessly place it in the puddle for the next person’s convenience.

     Source: Gettyimages (Paul Grebanier)

Life isn’t any different either. Take the puddle for an obstacle in life and the brick for guidance or help, and introspect. And if possible, find a brick and place it in the puddle.

TRANQUILITY

It is amazing how simply turning one’s back towards the road can transcend one to a different place instantaneously. There is something calming about the place. Staring at, the endless blue beneath the rarely visible Mumbai stars, the setting sun on the brink of horizon as the splashing waves rhythmically announce the onset of dusk, freezes time. One is not in Mumbai anymore.


Although adjacent to Mumbai, this world is miles away from the city. This place is a refuge. A refuge from a city which leaves no choice but to keep moving. Here, the vastness of the sea forces one to stop and reflect. The solitude it offers inspires one to introspect. The overwhelming expanse revives the child in him only to embrace the vastness and be a part of something so natural.


One is inundated with emotions that the hustle and bustle of the city had made him oblivious of. It compels one to observe trivia such as splashing of waves, colours of the sky, shapes of the cloud, and cherish the moments as they pass. One doesn’t hurry towards the next moment. One simply lives each one of them.





The place is Marine Drive.


This is the place one keeps coming back to. Not because one wants to, not because one needs to, but because nowhere else does one find heterogeneity so gratifying.


Manthan Mehta

Our shot at Redemption

It is generally agreed that life on Earth originated close to 4 billion years ago. It took us a lot of time to reach a stage where we can imagine creating a new race of species using Artificial Intelligence. Today many of us are afraid that our super-intelligent creations might wipe us out very soon.

Why shouldn't we worry? Technological advancement has outgrown our ability to control its consequences. There are 3D printers that print themselves. Also, our most technically advanced and intelligent creations are built and used for destruction.

Instead, they would revive us. What we fail to see is that these beings would be more intelligent and less foolish than us.

A super-intelligent being will respect the beautiful gift of creation. It will not only achieve astronomical technological feats, but will also cultivate intense values of love and compassion. It will use natural resources optimally and reproduce sensibly. In times of ethical or moral conflicts it will act in ways that are beyond human reasoning, and hence impossible for us to comprehend positively. It would put ‘we’ before ‘I’.

It wouldn't be arrogant and deaf towards its soul. It will be able to realize that the human brain is its creator, emotion is its soul, and rather than destroying it, would give it a better medium to serve its purpose.

In these super-intelligent beings I see an opportunity to create, to act as a soul and a shot at redemption.

Create selflessly! They will help us out survive our greed.

HE: “I envision a future in the stars. But alas! My death lies in the way”.

THAT: “If only it were yours to be. Your future was always for your child to live”.

These Latter Times

There has to be a time when you fail to keep up to your words and also a time when words fail you.

There has to be a time when your wrong decisions produce best results but also a time when your correct decisions have disastrous consequences.

There has to be a time when you disown those who depend on you and also a time when people you trust cheat you.

There has to be a time when you fight the world for the feelings you have for a person and also a time when you fight that person for the very same feelings.

There has to be a time when the dreams you have chased come true and also a time when your world falls apart.

There has to be a time which hardly makes its presence felt and also a time which doesn't heal its wounds.

There has to be a time when a man can change the world on his own and also a time where everything is beyond his control.

Although, in these former times, man will take himself to be God, it is in these latter times that God will really exist.

Manthan Mehta