Lets continue our discussion with Suresh from where we left. The first part of the interview with Suresh is here.

Me: Hi Suresh! What are you other interests? Can you also tell us something about your research in sanskrit?
SPS: There are lots of interests. Carnatic music, PG Wodehouse, cryptic crosswords, chess… I wouldn’t say I do any research in Sanskrit. Atleast not yet! I am a student. One of the other pros of being in academia. You can find time to enrich yourself as a person, by pursuing some of your interests. I started learning Sanskrit around 2001. After two years of learning the basics, I started systematically learning the basics of Nyaya, Mimamsa, and Vedanta from my revered Guru, who is a retired Principal of the Mylapore Sanskrit College, and is a renowned expert on Veda bhashyam and Vedanta, and is a brilliant expositor. I even gave some exams in these subjects for around four years, but couldn’t complete the full course of exams. I am especially fascinated with Nyaya, the school of philosophy which gave primacy to the process of logical reasoning, and has developed lots of brilliant theories of logic and knowledge. All the other schools of philosophy borrow these logical tools from the Nyaya to advance their own positions. Vedanta is also amazing for its counter-intuitive ontology, which also displays a very high degree of logical consistency at the same time. I have not been spending much time on philosophy recently. So much to study… Should get back to it soon!

Me: You have built a good understanding of the grammar of carnatic music. When did you start this? Are you learning music?
SPS: I do not have that much of an understanding of the grammar of music. After all, I have never learnt it formally. You cannot count an ability to identify ragas and keep the tala during a song as an understanding of the grammar. Maybe I have learnt a bit more now than, say, five years ago. Because now I definitely know of more things that I do know than I did before! But I agree that I do `get’ Carnatic music in the sense that I have some idea of what is the point behind an alapana, or a swaraprastara, or a neraval.

At the same time, I do not feel I need any of these when I listen to the musician I worship — Madurai Mani Iyer. For him the point behind every aspect of music is melody, sukhanubhava. You just get transported to a different world! Now I shouldn’t start off! I am aware that all my responses are very long already, but this might become longer than all of them put together. Karukkurichi Arunachalam on the nadaswaram is another artiste I completely adore. I am in heaven every time I listen to him. Of course there are lots and lots of favorites and not a day passes when I am not regaled by the best masters.

I think it was while I was in 11th or 12th class that I started seriously listening to Carnatic music on AIR. At some point I suddenly decided that I will become a rasika, and just kept listening. Slowly I began to understand the nuances, which made me want to listen more, and so it continues…

Me: Suresh.. Finally, what do you think about this initiative – Coffee With Sundar?
SPS: This initiative is very nice. It is good that you take the time to blog at all. I have just one little post so far. Just don’t have the required energy. But you seem to have progressed to the stage where you want to keep your readers engaged, judging by your efforts at these interviews. That’s nice. Keep it up! By the way, if you can find the time, read John Gruber’s interview on Shawn Blanc’s blog. Gruber has a lot to say on blogging. (Of course I am not providing links! You have Google, don’t you?) I guess you’ll quite like it.

Let me close with a blogger joke that I saw today (at Marginal Revolution, no links again!)

How do you tell if a blogger is extroverted?
When he talks with you, he looks at your shoes.

All the best with your present career, future careers and your blog. Who knows? This could be the beginnings of another Daring Fireball, or kottke.org. All the best!

Me: Thank you very much Suresh! Long way to go before reaching the levels of Daring Fireball et al. But yes, journey of thousand miles begins with the first step! I have started it. I need support from people like you to reach there.

Its my pleasure to welcome S P Suresh for an interview on Coffee With Experts. S P Suresh is a Theoretical Computer Science(TCS) faculty in Chennai Mathematical Institute. Suresh completed his MCA from NIT Trichy. After this he worked in the IT industry for one year. He then pursued a MSc degree in TCS from Anna University followed by a Phd in TCS in Institute of Mathematical Sciences, Chennai. Suresh is also interested in sanskrit and carnatic music. Suresh was referred to Coffee With Experts by Hemalatha Thiagarajan Maam. I must say, we had a very long, detailed and interesting discussion. Suresh also runs a site here.

Here is the part 1 of the 2 part interview with Suresh

Coffee With S P Suresh!

Me: Hello Suresh! Welcome to CWS! Can you introduce yourself and give a brief background about education.
SPS: Hi Sundar! Thanks for the invitation. Nothing very distinguished about my education for a very long time (unless you count the 0 in Botany and 2 in Zoology I scored in the half-yearly examination during my
12th class (or was it 11th?)). After a BSc in Mathematics in Salem (not learning anything much, needless to say!), I did MCA at REC (nowNIT) Tiruchi from 1993 to 1996 (slightly better here!). After a year in the software industry, I joined the PhD programme in TheoreticalComputer Science at the Institute of Mathematical Sciences, Chennai in 1998. I completed my PhD late in 2003 (defended my thesis only in
the beginning of 2005! Quite a long time, wouldn’t you say?). From 2004 I have been with the Chennai Mathematical Institute… which is in Chennai! (Who could have guessed?)

Me: How did you go from MCA to research. What was the trigger that made you switch from application to theory?
SPS: I moved from an MCA to research. While this is quite rare, I am not the only one who has done this. I known some other people who have done the same. The switch was from industry to research, not application to theory. And it was not that big a switch in a way. I had spent hardly a year in the industry, found that I didn’t quite fancy the life, and switched before it was too late! I can imagine that there are others who feel the same way when they start off in the software industry (not enough intellectual challenges, unless you seek them really hard!). But it takes some guts to sacrifice the pay and commit five

years of your life on a PhD program (and the rest of your life as well on research, come to think of it!).

That is the social aspect of it. You also need to be interested in the subject. In my case, when I first encountered discrete mathematics, automata theory, etc. at RECT, was when I realised for the first time
that I had an aptitude for some kinds of mathematics. There was always a deep desire to do a PhD, even though I would dismiss the thought as being impractical. But the software jobs I held must have sucked so
badly, I guess, that I just switched to research at the first available opportunity. HT Mam helped a lot to develop my interest in these areas. She was the one who introduced me to the delights of mathematical logic by giving me all kinds of beautiful books on logic. So I definitely owe her one on that!
In a sense, starting to research in theoretical computer science is much easier than research in physics, say. You aren’t supposed to have learnt anything about mathematical logic or automata theory in school
or in a typical BSc Mathematics course, right? (Even in a BE/MCA course, most of the time you do not learn it right.) So, you do not feel bad about learning all this after starting your PhD. In a sense,
you might have been an average student in whatever you did before a PhD in theoretical computer science, and still do good research! I would imagine that you need to seriously start learning things much earlier, if you want a career in mathematics. (Which is what the BSc students at CMI do. Some of them are frighteningly bright!)

Me: Now you are into teaching.. How do you find this role? What are the pros and cons of academia over industry?
At CMI, we have BSc/MSc programs. I teach a variety of subjects to them apart from lecturing to PhD students also. I love both. The PhD level courses are usually subjects that are close to my heart (mathematical logic, for instance), and usually I have a captive audience. Every time I teach a course at this level, I learn more of the subject. I approach this as an opportunity to learn more and convey the excitement of the subject to the students . With the other courses, the challenge is to make the students interested in the material. I get to teach subjects like computer organization, compilers, etc. where I have to learn a lot (having lost touch with them over the years!) — which keeps me interested. I love teaching. Especially since at CMI, it isn’t accompanied by a lot of grading (there aren’t many students here!).
Pros and cons … I don’t know if I can have a balanced take on this matter. My experience in the industry has been very limited and it hasn’t been good. I haven’t seen much of the software industry recently, but my guess is that nothing much has changed over the years. I can mention some things that I enjoy most about life as a researcher in the environment I am in. I go to work in a veshti (dhothi), always! And it was only after starting on a research career that I feel about the work I have to do as my work. A sense of ownership! These are big pros for me. But it is not very objective! Somebody slogging it out in a private engineering college (if you consider him/her as part of academia) will, I am sure, have a very different
perspective to offer.

The most obvious con is that you get paid much less. (Even though nobody cons you about that. You always know what you’re getting into!)
Here is an amusing anecdote: I ran into the father of an RECT classmate somewhere near Adyar, and we were talking for a while.`Ennappa Suresh, eppadi irukke?’ (Hi Suresh, how are you?) and all that. After a while, he asked, `Velai nanna irukka? Evvalavu salary taraa?’ (Howz work, how much salary they offer?) I was a post-doc then earning something just above 14,000. So as not to sound too third-world, I said, `15,000 mama!’ (15k uncle) I am almost sure it is unrelated, but two seconds later he was saying: `Sarippa paarkalaam! Time kidaicha oru naal aathukku sappida vaayen!’ (Ok see you, when you get time, lets catch up for lunch!) I haven’t found the time to go, but I should say that I didn’t feel the pinch after all! You get enough money to spend on the things you like (which ought to be books, music DVDs, even iPods, or laptops). But don’t develop too strong a yearning for your own house, etc. I am not saying it will not happen, but it won’t be easy, thanks to your classmates in the industry who would be driving the real estate prices up!