One step at a time

The cartoon below illustrates humorously how abstractions (or building blocks on top of the other to make something more powerful) can lead to very powerful things.

Source

If you think about it, nobody could have envisioned and built the modern computer (or any great human artifact) in a single go without going through the iterations. It was always small steps rather than large leaps. Many times, there would be multiple approaches in the marketplace which leads to competition and ultimately a winner based on merits.

This process is very much akin to evolution in nature. When you read about nature's creations, you wonder how such complex beings could have been designed by evolution. For e.g. see the digestive system of a cow http://www2.kenyon.edu/projects/farmschool/food/milkbio.htm.

But if you think about them as abstractions built on top of each other over millions of years, its a little easier to imagine.

Ignorance is Bliss?

At some point in our evolutionary road, when humans developed a moral function, there was a need to justify morality. Morality has a hand in evolution because "groups" have a better chance to survive than individuals and therefore the need to cooperate within groups, which cannot function effectively without some core rules.

Thus, "God" which started out as a fear of the unknown also became a symbol of morality.

All religions profess the need to be good. And each incentivizes that behavior in the form of some reward: most common one being the heaven.

But there are problems with that.

1. What if you are just ignorant? For e.g. the six brothers in 'Satte Pe Satta' who lived like animals.

2. What if you lack the brain function to judge right from wrong (Yes. There is a brain component for this). Or what if you are mentally retarded?

3. Your circumstances were so bad that you cannot afford to be good. Morality is often a luxury that the poorest of the poor cannot afford.

Also, how can you explain "why bad things happen to good people" if the world was purely based on Karma.

Each religion is just a different version of Occam's Razor (the simplest explanation), trying to find the best answers to those questions.

Hinduism believes in an infinite cycle of rebirth until you graduate into something better. Hinduism doesn't enforce a belief in one God. There can be multiple ways to reach God. And yes, you don't have to acknowledge God to get your salvation. You are judged based on your actions and not your beliefs.

Buddhism is more of a stretch of the above belief and claims that "Life as we know it ultimately is or leads to suffering/uneasiness".

Christianity believes in Heaven and Hell and there is no second chance :( It also requires a belief in God, Jesus. Hence their followers have a moral obligation to propagate the religion to infidels.

Islam also believes in Heaven and Hell without a second chance after death. It also believes in one Supreme God. Therefore, it too prescribes a need to propagate itself to the infidels.

(We can see which religions tend to be tolerant just looking at their beliefs but thats for another post)

I like the Hindu explanation not only for its tolerance but also that it addresses the above 3 problems very well by giving people another chance by rebirth.

At the same time, it addresses the "Ignorance is bliss" problem. i.e. Ignorance of the moral system is not an excuse to be immoral.

You cannot get away with not being good, just because you are incompetent to decide the right path. In other words, it doesn't help to be 'Strategically Incompetent' when it comes to being good.

100 Not Out*

I initially started this blog as a place for curating my thoughts. More like a private diary to see how my thoughts evolve over time. A place to vent anger. A place where I can contemplate unimportant things like the meaning of life :)

Generally, a thought comes to my mind during on a conversation or while watching something and I start writing and I try to validate my ideas with things that I have read. Sometimes the process of writing (or typing to be precise) itself contributes to ideas for the post.

I have found empirically that I get more thoughts when I am busy or when I shouldn't be thinking about such things :) I don't know if its typical or not but perhaps the brain is built that way. For e.g. before college exams when they give you time to study, I used to feel an urge to read IEEE magazines or business mags or think about how to write a particular computer game like Tetris or do something in the coming holidays. But that is for another post.

Sometimes I do wonder if I should continue to write this blog. There are a lot of risks to writing down your thoughts. For instance, it might appear arrogant to think that your thoughts are valuable enough to be written somewhere. Or I might write something stupid and may come across as an idiot (Silence at least gives you the benefit of the doubt). Or people who read this blog will judge me solely based on the things that I write here. Or I might lose my job if my manager finds it :) (which is the reason I have not shared the blog with a lot of people)

But if not anything else, I find it amusing to read my old posts and laugh on something that I wrote which I now think is stupid. For e.g. I was clearly wrong on this one: http://somethingvishy.blogspot.com/2009/01/on-nris.html

And then, when you are staying far away from your family, writing a blog may be the only way to communicate your ideas to them.

Blogging would be worth it just for the above reasons but it turns out there is more value in it than just that:

Excerpts from Open as in water, the fluid necessary for life

Most of our happiness and productivity comes from the everyday details of our lives: the people we live and work with, the books we read, the hikes we take, the parties we attend, etc. But how do we choose these things? How do we know what to do, and how do know if we'll like it? The obvious answer is that we do and like whatever the TV tells us to do and like. I'm not certain that's the best answer though...

By sharing more of our own thoughts and lives with the world, we contribute to the global pool of "how to live", and over time we also get contributions back from the world.....

Sharing your boring thoughts and activities may seem narcissistic and self-absorbed at first (I'm still kind of embarrassed about having a blog), but there is virtue and benefit in it. Naturally there will be challenges and fear along the way, but in the long term we're contributing to a more open, fluid society, where people are more able to find happy, productive lives. It also encourages us to be more accepting of others. Everyone is flawed, and the more we see that we aren't alone, the less we need to fear that truth.....

People can not truly live and thrive in a prison -- we require freedom and mobility. This may explain my incomprehensible analogy, "Open as in water, the fluid necessary for life".....

* The title of this blog indicates the count of my posts so far.

Fwd:Patriotism is stupid

This blog post, Patriotism is stupid, totally captures my thoughts on patriotism. Working for an Indian subsidiary of a multi national company which in turn gets its contracts from countries across the globe, I have always thought that it doesn't make much sense to be a nationalist anymore.

Ofcourse, you have an obligation to contribute to the society that groomed you. But crazy nationalist pride is for idiots like the Shiv Sainiks.

After all, how do you know if the history you learnt in school is not propaganda? Pakistani's for instance, read a different version of history.

Marx was right

A friend of mine at work, a middle aged guy, has a lot of bitterness at the Britishers. Born in Coorg, he inherited a 3500 acre coffee estate from his father which he says would have been 20 times the size if India's colonialists had not snatched it away and then paved the way for Indira Gandhi in post independent India to implement land ceiling acts which brought down his inheritance to 'middle class', in his words.

Ofcourse, the bastard still lives an affluent life. A palatial house in the estate and coffee exports to foreign countries guaranteeing that he never has to work again. But the peer pressure to be "one step better than the rest of you" amidst the thousands of other similar estate owners, led him to pursue a career in the US, so that when he goes back to India, he can boast to his peers "I design software that manages millions of US dollars. And what are you guys doing here looking after your parent's estates?".

To justify himself, he also believes that workers who now enjoy a collective ownership of the land that was distributed at that time were better off without it.

"How much land does a man need?" I ask him, quoting Tolstoy's short story and he says "But there are other people who didn't get affected because of their influence in the government and they are much better off than me now."

Clearly, he doesn't get it. An otherwise intelligent and well read man, he seems to be off by a big margin on this one.

Does just being born into a family entitle you to their fortune?

In a perfect world, everyone would have equal fortunes and motivations for working and excellence would be altruistic and for one's own satisfaction in contributing something to the society.

And usually, they are. The best discoveries and inventions by man were motivated by the 'cause' and not by the fortune that awaited it. See for e.g. this TED talk on 'The science of motivation'.

Which all leads me to conclude that Socialism is the ideal solution and the only reason it doesn't work is because we are not ideal humans yet, which is a perfectly valid reason not to adopt it.

Atleast I have my priorities right

I am not very passionate about making money. I mean, I am very happy if I am doing things that I like to do. I am the kind who would rather pay the taxes than do the boring paperwork for evading it. So, I get concerned about myself when friends talk about investing in stocks or keep looking for a scheme to avoid paying taxes.

"Am I getting left out? Of course I want to be wealthy but if I am not passionate about it, will I ever be?"

Therefore, I get consoled when I read articles like these which I get from the people I follow on Twitter.

“There are two goddesses in your heart: the Goddess of Wisdom and the Goddess of Wealth. Everyone thinks that they need to get wealth first, and wisdom will come. So they concern themselves with chasing money. But they have it backwards. You have to give your heart to the Goddess of Wisdom, give her all your love and attention, and the Goddess of Wealth will become jealous, and follow you." -- source

Its not what you believe. Its what you do that matters.

Working out of perhaps, the most conservative state in US, the Mormon state of Utah, you get a feeling that while America is a developed country, a lot of their people are not very developed in their thinking.

First, they are a very closed society in Utah, especially the Mormons. The city shuts down at night like in India, and unlike other places in the US. Their Sundays are dedicated for religious practice.

All that is OK but what gets you is their stubbornness that theirs is the oldest religion and everything else is a loose and derivative of their Church. In fact all of them think that if you don't follow their religion, you are going to hell, which shows their intolerance towards other faiths.

You don't find many Blacks here. Many hate Obama. They are also Republicans and think that George Bush was a good president.

Ofcourse, their thinking is because of propaganda. What they hear in the Church and the Fox News channel (which is blatantly biased towards Repubs) . And most news channels are inward looking. They don't have a world news segment.

Many of them, like Sarah Palin, think that Africa is a country and not a continent and, they cannot point out India on the world map. Also see this: http://images.google.com/images?q=the+world+according+to+america

I think a lot of their bigotry comes from their own insecurities. The Mormons, after all settled in in the mid western, unpopulated state of Utah only because they were persecuted in the other states.

How else can you instill pride in the faith if it is unpopular? By making such claims and thinking that those who are not Mormons are morons. :)