When I think about this it makes me more and more confused and lost. Whenever I find myself at the end of certain phase or episode in life I would never be able to trace back the path that lead to that consequence or the “ending”. I really don't mean the chain of thoughts that led to that ending. Whatever the solution or the “right decision” is for an issue or a problem it has been decided. Some might cause regrets, others might cause joy. Sometimes the decision making process is so fast that we are not ready for the 'whats coming next!'. But is the personality (or personalities - if there is more than one inside me, could be the one who is thinking all this?) which helped me find the answer or the “perceived right” direction or the “right” path really an entity with its own will, able to wright its own destiny. Power of Will? Is there anything as such? Aren't we all binded by infinite number of incidents happening all around the Universe (or perhaps universes) , ultimately affecting each other like the effects of multiple ripple formation on a lake, only infinite in number? Every incident/event affecting the other , just like a Butterfly Effect! LOVE TAT MOVIE.. Or the Sound of Thunder!!
The difference between a child and a grownup is that a kid will always feel and even realize for sure that he/she is the center of this world; we as grownups have realized that it is completely untrue and there is no center whatsoever! A child once believed that he could fly until his mother makes him believe that it is not possible for man to fly. Could the child really have flown like superman? Ofcourse, nobody saw him! A man believes that he is perfectly healthy until he goes for a routine checkup and is told he has cancer. The man dies after a couple of months due to cancer. Is Belief so important? What about Fate or Destiny? A person smokes tons of cigarettes and never gets any smoking related disease in his life. Another maintains a strict life with no harmful consumption of any kind, and this man dies of lung cancer! Ironic? Fate? Someone saved all his life so that he could enjoy after retirement without having to worry about cash to live in comfort. He dies the next day after his retirement. A couple tried to have kids several times and every time the wife conceived, miscarriage followed after a couple of months even after taking the best precaution they could. The last time she conceived the child came out perfectly stable and healthy even after a long bumpy ride of hundreds of miles in the last row of a bus trying to reach a a bed ridden parent who was sick. Ironic? Fate? Destiny?
Life takes us thru all the journeys and lessons and at some point we think that we have learnt almost everything. Well almost? Yet at every phase of life, at every page, at every turning we are left with some lesson or some thought that had escaped us before. Sometimes life seems to be an endless process of thought accumulation in us, inside us (somewhere in the brain?) until the day we die! But then for what purpose. What bigger picture? Or is it even necessary to have a purpose or a bigger picture for everything? May be. To me if you look around it seems like everything has small purposes and a bigger purpose is met by all these smaller purposes. But check this out......
If we have to take humans out of this whole scene of existence is this universe there wont be much change except only some positive changes that will help the existence on earth. So the whole universe is still there without us and more prosperous as far as our planet is concerned. So we don't seem to have much purpose here. Or are we missing the bigger picture? We will never know if we actually go extinct! So how do we actually know things that we cannot otherwise know? Hence, sometimes the bigger picture will never come to light or cannot come to light like the above case. For me this creates an emptiness inside me. The feeling that there are things and thoughts that I cannot have or realize. This feeling takes me back to another question. If we don't know the purpose of life, is it worth living? Pessimistic... ? Think about it....
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Global Enlightenment
One October morning when I went to the local ATM to withdraw some cash I realized that the so called 'Global Recession' has effected me too! Just a common man earning his living month by month and spending it month by month with no savings. I had to fetch out 10k to 'bail-out' a close relative out of his share of the "global financial mess" of today. I earn around 20+k. Now half of it is gone and I'm in the process of moving to a better(read cheaper) location. So, my very intention of moving to a new location is associated with my financial standings. Who knows that it is also not associated with this recession? Is the world really becoming smaller day by day that a financial wave in America could blow me off sitting here in Bangalore? Will we every see the real picture? Are we capable of looking at the big picture? Are ants capable of pondering about how we humans build ships and planes? Maybe they are? Maybe they are not? But who will decide? The ants off-course! But what if the ant does not want to decide or even bother about the whole crap that we men do? Then they just got Chance to act upon itself and topple Man's regime to save the ants from human tyranny. Lol!
Some of us think that we are the 'higher' beings. But what if we are not? We think that animals may never have the knowledge that we possess. But what if they possess a better knowledge then us? I am sure that they would never have become the cause of 'global warming' or environmental pollution or any other kind of man-created havocs existing today. Or am I? Just as we think that we are the masters of this world, we would also like to think that there is a superior-supernatural master over us overlooking us! Just like the first one the second one may as well be fake perception generated over thousands of years or may be even passed on to generation thru 'gene-mutation' or something. First of all the very idea of 'heaven' & 'hell' seem so 'ungodly' but would seem like an alien oppression if not something more 'natural'. And also the idea that we have an identity that is much higher in nature against other animals like assuming a 1st class priority in Nature. Everything we do has a benefit 'for Man' attached to it. I don't think we have the capability to see the big picture.
Maybe. May be we are just a fluke of Nature; a wrong adventure that Nature is trying to make right. Hence whats happening around the world today. The lives of all of us are becoming more interconnected and hence inter-dependent with each other;More comfort means more laziness; more advancement and sophisticated machine means more free time and that means more people have time to 'ponder on how to make life more comfortable and have more diversity in what we do and have' and that in turn means faster pace of development which leads to more plundering; plundering leads to more scarcity of resources which will give rise to a chain of events and consequences. All these are going to hit equally to everybody. Unless we have something like a 'Global Enlightenment' or something like a collective realization.
Super Computer God
If only we had a computer collecting data on events at all times and at all places in this universe! We would get an all knowing supercomputer. A person with that computer will be able to manipulate everything. Heard of the Omnipotent/All-powerful God?
Sunday, August 17, 2008
Destructive Design II
Let us take the argument further by taking an example.
If we consider a situation at a very early stage of human history we can picture things like the man of the household rising up early in the morning and going out for food gathering, in a group or may be alone. Everyday he would return home with his gatherings which he and his family would consume on that day. As this goes on our man is going to finally realize that if he brings home more gatherings everyday he can actually rest or take a holiday someday when his spare gatherings from each day will be enough that he wont have to go out hunting or gathering that day. This realization gives rise to more desires for pilling up resources and it continues for ever.
Now take a present day scenario, that of a middle class man. He gets his salary every month and makes ends meet. His does not pile up cause he gets just enough to survive. But if we take somebody who earns enough to save every month or somebody really rich enough, we'll find that he will have piles of money and property to last his family for generations. Now whats that piled up money and property? Its all natural resources converted into more portable form.
So all the money that these guys have stashed up in banks is actually natural resource piled up from plundering earth for thousands of years. And how did it happen? Cause man had a desire to take a rest for a day. Desire that gave way to pondering that gave way to innovation that gave way to more desires that gave way to destruction.
If we consider a situation at a very early stage of human history we can picture things like the man of the household rising up early in the morning and going out for food gathering, in a group or may be alone. Everyday he would return home with his gatherings which he and his family would consume on that day. As this goes on our man is going to finally realize that if he brings home more gatherings everyday he can actually rest or take a holiday someday when his spare gatherings from each day will be enough that he wont have to go out hunting or gathering that day. This realization gives rise to more desires for pilling up resources and it continues for ever.
Now take a present day scenario, that of a middle class man. He gets his salary every month and makes ends meet. His does not pile up cause he gets just enough to survive. But if we take somebody who earns enough to save every month or somebody really rich enough, we'll find that he will have piles of money and property to last his family for generations. Now whats that piled up money and property? Its all natural resources converted into more portable form.
So all the money that these guys have stashed up in banks is actually natural resource piled up from plundering earth for thousands of years. And how did it happen? Cause man had a desire to take a rest for a day. Desire that gave way to pondering that gave way to innovation that gave way to more desires that gave way to destruction.
Destructive Design I
We always wonder why we are the way we are. Why we are a social animal and not lone hunters! Why we domesticate the lesser animals and have no history of being domesticated. Why we have to work so hard to earn a living. All we do is, depend our whole childhood on somebody else: unable to look after ourself, clinging to somebody: unable to move around by ourself, get fed by somebody: unable to feed our self...and so on. We grow up and work hard to prove our self again and again. Then when we think that we are ready to face the world, we find that there isn't much time left. Now we are grown-ups. The responsible ones! We start on our new found path of piling up wealth. Wealth that may do a lot of good later in life. Or we thought so! But most likely all this will come to an end when we find that we are after all mortals. Weak bones, weak senses, weak voice and a burdened soul. That's what will be left at the end?
There are lots of takers for the Intelligent Design. Doesn't everything look planned? Designed for a specific purpose, with a specific function. The Trees, soil, water, air . Its so simple a system. Zero maintenance! So efficient that it has to be a designed one.
Maybe, The ID theory explains a lot. But still it does not answer the very first question. Why? For what reason? May be for glorification of a Kind? May be for a battle in the distant future? May be we all are parts of some Inter-Galactic Experiment? May be reasons is actually spiritual? Or may be there is simply no reason at all! Who can tell!? The last one sounds scary!
Maybe, The ID theory explains a lot. But still it does not answer the very first question. Why? For what reason? May be for glorification of a Kind? May be for a battle in the distant future? May be we all are parts of some Inter-Galactic Experiment? May be reasons is actually spiritual? Or may be there is simply no reason at all! Who can tell!? The last one sounds scary!
Untitled Thoughts
We humans tend to rely on empirical evidences while acting or reacting to general situations. It seems like we have embedded the "evidence rule" in our culture or more so into our genes itself! Now I have always wondered who decides the borderline between Good and Bad. Nobody has a manual to tell us where exactly the line should be drawn while judging situations in day to day life. We may argue that religious texts have already given us a ready manual! But again it fails ( at least in me) to give the exact nature of these two entities (good, bad) or how to differentiate between them. However it does tell us that its all in us, we are the decision takers in all matters and that we are made capable for it. That is, the definitions of these entities and their products reside in us. Now how do we find if it really does. These entities are measured by humans by evaluating the available "empirical evidences" in a given situation. While treating a person or responding to a given situation, unless we have visible and measurable evidences, or tangible facts leading to the conclusion that the person is behaving unethically or immorally to you or anybody else, we generally treat that person under the boundaries of ethics and morality, or at least pretend to.
I have always wondered about the growth of the human mind as civilization advanced. Now, can growth always be positive in case of the (human) mind or even if we consider our whole social and cultural advancement? Could it be that our mind, taking into account the whole progress of man (cause the progress itself is a product of the collective human mind) has taken a completely wrong path to growth? May be its not completely a wrong path, but its root itself could always have a wrong start. Of course, with usual permutations and combinations I'm sure it will have some right branches emerging from the wrong roots. But is the baseline all wrong? What about Chaos Theory at work?
It is very common to find animals practicing incests. But it is completely forbidden in humans! (not that I'm advocating it..)? Higher conciousness?
The point is how do we decide whether we are in the right direction or not. If only there were an external observer to tell us how we are doing! But there aren't any or at least we cant see any.
I have always wondered about the growth of the human mind as civilization advanced. Now, can growth always be positive in case of the (human) mind or even if we consider our whole social and cultural advancement? Could it be that our mind, taking into account the whole progress of man (cause the progress itself is a product of the collective human mind) has taken a completely wrong path to growth? May be its not completely a wrong path, but its root itself could always have a wrong start. Of course, with usual permutations and combinations I'm sure it will have some right branches emerging from the wrong roots. But is the baseline all wrong? What about Chaos Theory at work?
It is very common to find animals practicing incests. But it is completely forbidden in humans! (not that I'm advocating it..)? Higher conciousness?
The point is how do we decide whether we are in the right direction or not. If only there were an external observer to tell us how we are doing! But there aren't any or at least we cant see any.
Well, i think i have to get back to this later.
Chance or Destiny
Are we suppose to behave at our Will? Is there no such thing called Destiny. Was it actually Chance all the time!? Are we totally independent of any external manipulation of our Will by some higher consciousness so as to meet a "predefined end" or what they say destiny? Or is it that our will is outside the influence of any higher power, and collectively gives birth to what we call Chance!
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