end-game

My only contention with Ambedkarism is because Budhhism should not be interpreted as just a hindu-hating recalcitration. The pantheistic idea of gods among hindus (being illusory as Hindus themselves would agree) is more friendly to budhhism than assertion of a supreme God that rules us all. And when I say friendly, I don't mean that it is just a feeling of harmony. Instead, it is so that a Hindu doesn't have to face a social obstruction for moving to truth or the path Buddha took. His duties are not imposed by the Supreme, but are only dynamics of his society; he doesn't think that things go bad because of the devil's designs. Ideally, he knows that realization individual self is false, he knows that soul is a non-entity. Theoretically, the Hindu gods are not the instances of God either. There is a big difference between praying God and worshipping a god (mark the difference between pantheism and monotheism). It is for those reasons that I say Hinduism is not too much antagonistic to Buddhism. (and I am talking philosophy here)

I know that one can easily come up with instances in Chinese buddhism which contradict some of the things that modern Hindus have incorporated, but again Hindu is a medieval term, it is always incorrect to say that Buddhism came out of Hinduism, in the literal sense. On the top of that, I agree that practically we see things a lot different among hindus (than it should be according to Vedanta) but thats more because of political reasons in general than any proposed 'brahmin conspiracy' (or should we not be more just by putting brahmin conspiracy under political reasons rather than the essence of Hinduism) ?

Frankly, I have problems with the whole 19th century way of classifying Eastern religion as such, and trust me, I am not the only one. There are umpteen reasons why eastern religion (or eastern philosophy) should not be approached just by finding equivalents of a central scripture (bible/quran), a religious head (pope/ulema) – which I (like many others) think, would be inherently erroneous. Such an error is evident not just in the differences that a 19th century indologist would cite between buddhism or hinduism, but also in the classification of various 'sects' withing buddhism itself in the buddhist countries (comparing thailand or sri Lanka for instance)

Intrestingly, Jainism has enough reasons to curse Brahmins as much as anyone else. They have been assimilated manipulatively too. Jains would not submit to Vedanta (They never were adherent to Vedanta historically) but still the evil brahmin mind could gel them in. You would seldom find a Jain who would refuse to accompany a Hindu to a temple. After a few 19th century revivals, you would easily find Jains marrying so called Vedantists (or mainstream Hindus, might I say) too.

Honestly, with demise of Hinduism and buddhism in India and the onslaught of some chauvinistic confused revivals, I see more days of intellectual bankrupcy in India.

Nostalghia

My conscience wants vegetarianism to win over the world. And my subconscious is yearning for a piece of juicy meat. But what do I want?

Charlie Kauffman and the coffee shop

A u-turn I had taken in life once was to keep the faith in 'love' as a feeling. It was too corny of a confession but, I didn't mean the 'corny' way - I was just saying that you gotta acknowledge love, if you really can't deny it completely.

Actually, the way I wanted to say so was that I didn't feel the need for any human language to have to separate words for passion and love. They are so much the same; They both are made up by those unbridled feelings that the only drive that carries you. I am even sure there would a good enough statistical correlation between true lovers, and people passionate about something, anything.

Charlie Kauffman's movies actually helped in that assertion; some of them even changed the way I used to look at things. Not sure, if his movies would contribute to existentialism too but at least my interpretations would. In "adaptation" and more so in 'TESoASM' the idea of loving what you love is defended to its best, without having any expectations from what you love because thats what love is all about. It is, only if it is unrequited. If its not unrequited, it would be just an agreement. If its an agreement, you would find something to trade it for. So, it can't be love... i think that is right. You gotta love few things in life, and love them with no expectations (the last one was from software design, not from existentialism nor kauffman)

What I think of Indian commies...

WB commies are not surviving in Bengal because of the supremacy of their ideology, but because of their experience in harboring pro-bengali sentiments since a long time back. People go and vote for WB commies because its portrayed as a bengali party. Leaders from all other parties in Bengal would be adequately branded foreign and hostile to Bengal, by these marxists. The lower world of criminals and union-leaders is so strong and interlinked, that almost no free political thought can take hold in Bengal. The Bengal of British times, seems to be 'gone with the Raj'.

Ironically enough, these so-called Marxists, exercise all nasty machiaveliian political tactics, expoiting the very malpractices in Indian society, which their intellectuals are found tirading against. In the villages of bengal, the new untouchables are those who don't support CPI. Its the same play goin' on in Bengal, where marxists have just changed the names of the characters, to give this whole game a humanitarian edge, or probably to hybridize marxist socialism and Bengali identity into their own kinda communism.

I would say leftists in India don't have an ideology. They have to save their butt by being a good regional party. Throughout all their history, from the intellectuals to the leaders, they have always said what the indian educated class wants them to say. At times, they have even ridiculously changed stances, like in the time of world war. They remain nothing more than whores of elitism, controlled by big business houses, but still trying to sell their ideas of socialistic justice, reflected nowhere in their own actions. If they represent anything in india, its only the bankrupcy of ideas and hypocrisy.
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my rant on religion

do unto others as you would they do unto you.

This ethic is based on individuality, and the ablilty of an individual to make choices that seemingly govern his fate. To be frank, this has roots in an existing christian ethic. In this particular case, existence of an individual has to be assumed. Since hindu/buddhists don't believe in individual entity, it really doesn't make sense to govern their ethics on this rather than the fatalistic notion of karma.

The reason why atheism has been as vain, as any other theism [on a rational ground] is that it can't really detach itself from either cultural or philosophical norms rooted in other religions. In this ethic, for example, the regular individuality is assumed. So, on one hand, where this can help people detach themselves from church, on the other, it doesn't really give them a belief system very different from one based in christianity.

These atheists can remove the religion, like they adequately have by separating state and church. But then, saying that all what church has given to world is irrationality in superstition, is difficult for its denial of the fact that the work culture everyone works in is governed by the puritan work ethic; or the fact that the ideals of freedom of individual, equality are mere post-renaissance reformulations of 'God lies in everyone's heart' against the earlier times when 'king deified was god'

Point being - every ethics is governed by a certain philosophy, and before philosophy was separated from church, religion was the sole contributor to philosophy. Since philosophy can't be denied yet, nor can its basis in a certain religion. isliye bachchon, thhoda religion padh lo
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Saying that [i]moral and spiritual aspects of all religions are at their core identical, when the religions themselves are so different[/i] is wrong too.At least the moral aspects of Hindu-budhhist religions are completely different from judaist ones, in the very essence, from belief in an individual's soul to 'duty' of an individual. Budhhits/hindus don't believe in individual soul, and their notion of dharma is very different from 'duty' of an individual too.

That all religions are same is generally said, I think, to point out that every religion was meant to administer people, tell people not to fight each other, stay happy and cool, blah blah blah. However, it doesn't make sense, because you're saying that current form of ethics was the hidden motive of ancient religions, which of course, is a self-satisfied argument. Most of the religions were removed/changed adequately to fit certain standards through history. I don't really see why the essence of all religions should be considered same, when they were so strongly motivated to end each other, both in idea and material. What is the common essence, in that case?

The argument that religion is just about imposing a certain morality is not ture either. Philosophy has been the main course of all religions. Religion didn't start in India for instance, because some romanticist brahmins crafted a system where everyone would be happy. It was only a philosophical quest that started religion, to justify/understand whats right or wrong. So, was it for most of the philosophers all over the world Greece-Rome-Mesopotamia... Pagans' cultural traditions were removed, but the philosophical tradition was cherished, even by christians and muslims. Because of the inherent re-ordering after the spread of chrisitanity, there are still a lot of conflicting beliefs in the religion, which translates into a lot of philosophical debate on morals in our times. for example,

1- Belief in soul, is orignially not a christian concept. Greeks were the ones who believe in it. A jehovah witness for example won't believe in soul, on grounds of its absence in the revealed scriptures. Christian belief being a melange of a lot of faith, does have this concept as its central belief, however.

2- Likewise, belief in atman, and not soul is an essential part of hindu-buddhist religion. Most of the hindus don't know that.

3- Most of the pagan traditions of Roman Catholic church are because of the roman empire. The pope for example, served only as a substitute for roman pontiffs, pretty much antagonistic to the idea that divinity can't be in a mortal. Greeks-Romans form the heart of western epistemology, the reason why later, it strengthened itself to get separated from church; the latter having once suppressed the former.

East is East

Since I didn't have anything to post right now :)

For a westerner to understand Eastern religion(s), I think, the best way to start with would be grasping certain Western writers with pantheistic approach (or perversions?). They've existed over time, and have always wanted to say, though in a suppressed tone, that God might be inherent in the surroundings, constituted in the environment, and not someone allpowerful-separate-purest away from our world.

God is not a being, but rather a law, diffused through everything as a divine principle. Thus, for him there does not exist a personal god, just as there does not exist any personal immortality.
-L. Tolstoy

And then try to imagine that the Eastern religion started with the very assertion that God is constituted in the nature. The idea that God created the world that we reside in is not how religion in the East started. It was based on the concept that He resides in the continuum of the creation, and keeps changing itself every moment, at every instant of time. That voice of pantheism is heard aloud in Eastern religion(s), reverberating in the Sanskrit chants, or the Pali quotes. The way to reach God includes your love for nature, your parents, and probably much more. So, even the animal sacrifices and ancestral worship were compatible with the Eastern religion, if not, a direct consequence of Eastern philosophy. There is even a god for violence and retribution.

Because of this inherent value of tolerance in there, the religion in East never showed any eagerness to spread a truth that was seen by a few; and so it didn't have to destroy statues of Nature's worship, neither did it associate the numerous (practically infinite) pagan gods with Devil, nor did it replace the pagan worship of goddesses with a more solemn and integrated one. Worship itself was a not so serious business; it was constituted in what Rumi (a Muslim Persian poet, with pantheist perversions) calls a 'sweet blasphemy’

In fact, taking religion in a literal sense, there was never such thing as religion in East either. There were practices, traditions. dharma (sans) or “dhamma” (Pali) doesn’t translate very well as ‘religion’ in English. It is one word for duty and religion. Duty here, however, isn’t governed by a scripture, or a set of rules. All what is said is that what you do is what makes you; what you are is because of what you did in past lives. There is never an external entity defined, which governs this process, nor an exact way, which has to be followed. Once you feel yourself to be part of the nature, then doing good for yourself, would mean doing good to everyone. Accordingly, Hurting others, hurts yourself, not because it’s a sin that you would be punished for, but because the one you hurt constitutes ‘you’. That is what they call Karma.

Duck Pond!