I have a concern about the volume of things I read or hear and then forget without knowing where to put them in the unorganized pile of data in my head. The input is just too much for me it seems. Things are worsened by the fact that the intellectual world I am exposed to is primarily a world written in English—a second language—which always maintains a gap between any input and my conception of it. This gap itself is a rich source of confusion, full of disturbing questions that have passed my mind for a glimpse of time and then disappeared without being resolved or removed. All this has led to an exhausting vertigo and is draining my thirst for knowledge. One might say that I shouldn’t dive in a bottomless ocean if I don’t know how to swim, i.e., perhaps I’d better start with a pool. But the thing is, first, I don’t find at all any pools isolated from oceans (if we don’t want to say the ocean). Things don’t mean anything in themselves if you don’t look at them in the bigger picture. So how big a picture is sufficient to give you a unit of knowledge? That’s the question. Second, I think this kind of futile splash in water is a helpless characteristic of me as a member of my generation. We are exposed to far more immense worlds of information than we have the natural ability to suitably conceive. Things only prove false, or at least uncertain. The pile of information before us is built on no principal foundations; it’s always up to you to raise a question about anything.

P.S. This has nothing to do with science, science wars or objectivity.

“That is cute!” I literally heard this sentence 30 times a day spending my time with a family featuring two girls about my age. The cute item could be anything. A baby, a face, a dog, a piece of cloth or furniture, a hair style, a man’s beard, an old woman’s smile, or any other object that had a visible aspect. I also learnt that depending on the situation this expression can mean a number of different things---from an enthusiastic expression of fondness to a totally indifferent comment on something that unluckily had to be commented. I have never had a mastery over any spoken language and I think here is why. I cannot let such words scatter on my voice without getting obsessive about them: Oh, good God*. Nothing seems to be beautiful or ugly anymore, but cute. Aesthetic judgment is reduced to comparing things with babies---naïve and innocent beings which are empty of philosophy and therefore not subject to any critical judgement. Why are we so interested in making a toy-land out of this world? Why do we like to keep playing with our dolls forever?

* I actually cannot use this phrase either. When I use it the stammer reigns over me.