Wednesday, October 3, 2007

Did Rama build the Rama Sethu?

I don’t understand why this has to be a controversial question. There is a very simple test prove that it was Rama’s army who built . If you believe that Rama (the God, 7th incarnation of Vishnu – not just some great ordinary human being who lived a long time ago) existed; the same Rama who killed the rakshasa in the form of a golden deer, the same Rama whose bhakt Hanuman jumped from Sri Lanka to Himalayas and transported a mountain back, then there is a very simple proof. When they were building the bridge, the stones kept sinking (naturally!). But if you wrote ‘Rama’ on the stone, then they wouldn’t sink. So here's the proof. Take a rock, write ‘Rama’ on it and drop in the sea. It won’t sink. Concrete proof. No more controversy.

Arguments based on damage to the local ecosystem, displacement of the local fishermen are understandable and should be debated. But something that can be settled in a minute by throwing a rock in the sea is beyond debate. I don’t understand why Rama’s devotees are not taking this approach.

For those interested to know more about the project, visit the official site at http://www.sethusamudram.gov.in/

Building a shipping channel in the Palk straits has been talked about for the past 147 years.

From http://www.expressindia.com/latest-news/ltBgtWhat-is-Adams-Bridge-or-Ram-Sethult-bgt/219109/

What the project envisages is a continuous navigational channel from the east coast to the west coast of India, which the nation currently lacks. Presently ships coming from the east coast of India to the west coast have to navigate around Sri Lanka and thus have to go an additional 424 nautical miles or 780 kilometres, which takes an additional 30 hours.

With the opening of the proposed channel, this distance and time will be lessened not just for the ships coming in from the west coast of India but also for trade ships coming in from other western countries. For any country looking to emerge as an economic superpower, the importance of faster and cheaper trade routes cannot be denied. While studying this project six routes were examined, here it is important to know that the areas near the coast is rich in marine life like coral ridges etc. and any path cutting through this area would mean a tragic loss of ecosystems. The other path suggested by the opposition parties goes through this area and could also result in loss of livelihood of many small fisherme, whose primary source of income would be affected. So the only viable option left is to dredge through the shallow area known as Adam’s Bridge or to Indians as the Ram Sethu.

Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Might is Right

Where does our sense of right or wrong come from? A popular theory is that there are universal laws of ethics/morality and those are used to deduce if a particular instance is right or wrong. Like the concept of God, this is very appealing and from evolutionary biologists’ point of view, this has a lot of survival value.

There a few problems with this theory of universal laws. They are not clearly documented and agree upon in specifics. People believe in the general principle that killing is bad. But in specific situations, it becomes difficult to apply. Killing cows is fine, because we eat them. If a person kills my child, killing the killer by sentencing him to death is fine. If a pack of stray dogs kills my child, killing the stray dogs is unacceptable. Killing mosquitoes, rats and cockroaches is fine. Killing people in the name of religion or country or ‘war on terror’ is fine.

Here’s an analogy. Like different religions, people might believe in the general concept of God, but when it comes down to specifics, the general rule is that “we are the chosen people” and those who don’t believe in my God are all going to hell. People tend to ignore the possibility that there is no God. Similarly, it might be possible that there are no universal ethics or morality.

However, a look around the world we live throws plenty of evidence that ‘might is right’ could be a better theory that explains how we accept what is right and what is wrong. Here, ‘might’ does not refer to a single living entity. ‘Might’ can be an invisible force such as fear of backlash. A few examples will clarify this. When stray dogs kill my child, I cannot kill the stray dogs because there is the ‘might’ of animal rights people. When a person kills my child, the ‘might’ of the government gives the right to sentence the killer to death. Since there is no ‘might’ to protect cockroaches, it is right to exterminate them.

Is it right to have reservations for backward communities in educational institutions? How is it right that a maid servant slogs it out seven days a week and earns what Aishwarya Rai earns in one second?

One answer is that we have got models of what seems to be acceptable to the majority of the people. Notice that ‘acceptable to majority of the people’ is another ‘might’. So we have models like capitalism and communism. A capitalist model can explain the discrepancy between the earnings of Aishwarya Rai and my maid servant. A communist model might aim to avoid this discrepancy in the first place. But, the point is, does it answer the question of right or wrong?

Here’s another example. There is propaganda all over the world on how we are depleting the earth’s resources and hence we need to conserve energy, recycle etc. Clearly, the major reason for this is that there is too much human population and it is growing. Somehow, I’ve not seen a single propaganda that shows that population reduction is one way to avoid resource depletion. The message is usually, ‘protect the world, so our children might enjoy it’ – not ‘don’t have children, so we may protect the world’. Mankind’s might versus rest of the species.

Capitalism accepted that human beings are essentially selfish and greedy and hence capitalism is thriving. Communism failed because it assumed that people will work for the community and put the community ahead of the individual. Is Capitalism right and communism wrong? Is democracy right and monarchy wrong? For a long time, monarchy was mightier so it was right. Now democracy is mightier, so monarchy and dictatorship are wrong.

So what’s my message? Let’s be scientific and accept the realities and then design systems that serve us well. It’s not about right or wrong. It’s coming up with theories such as: it is OK to exterminate cockroaches because it maximizes mankind’s happiness. It is not OK to kill each other in the name of country because of the grave danger of reducing our happiness drastically. So what are the measures we can take to abolish armies?

Friday, March 30, 2007

Two things I'd like to see in my lifetime

First thing: A fast forward way of demonstrating evolution and creating life. One possible way is to fill a huge transparent cyclinder with Hydrogen, close the lid and press a button. After one hour we see the results of millions of years of evolution. It could be some life form similar to something on earth or some completely alien life form.

Actually, if someone could do a computer simulation of evolution, that would also be very nice, though it won't please as much as seeing it happen live.

Second thing: No countries. There is just one world and we are all world citizens.

P.S: As a bonus, I'd like to see us banish God from our lives and live in the age of reason. But I don't think I can see that in my lifetime.

Thursday, March 8, 2007

In the footsteps of the Mahatma

Mahatma Gandhi is a source of inspiration for my vocal campaign on atheism. I could have easily continued to live my peaceful life without taking up the task of spreading awareness about Atheism. Like most Indians, I have also been heavily influenced by the life and principles of Mahatma Gandhi. Gandhi could have easily continued to his career as a lawyer in South Africa. But once Gandhi realized the truth that India was a slave country to England and India would be better off by obtaining freedom from the British, he took it upon himself to spread the same awareness among the rest of India.

Gandhi realized that the British were not really bad people, but were misguided by their sense of racial superiority. Therefore he adopted the means of Truth and Non-Violence to educate the British that freedom was the most important thing for India and the British eventually left India (without having to fight a war -- unlike many other British colonies, including USA, where lot of blood was shed). It’s very depressing and at the same time ironic to note that millions of people were killed in the name of religion during the partition. This ugly stain has forever defaced India’s path breaking approach of obtaining freedom using non-violent means.

Coming back to the freedom struggle, many good things too came out of the British rule. India got very good civil services, railways, postal system and the most important of all – command over English language. Today, India is shining in the outsourcing market primarily because of our command over English.

While everyone acknowledges the benefits of British rule, I’ve not met a single person who says that we made a mistake by getting freedom from the British. Agreed, India has its share of problems with the corruption, poverty, over population, illiteracy, exploitation etc. And, it is arguable that India might have been better off by being under British rule than a free nation (take the case of Hong Kong as an example). But the “Truth” is that living a poor life of freedom is better than a rich life of slavery.

In the same way, I believe that the “Truth” is that freedom from the delusion of God is better than leading a richer life based on the falsehood of God. While people can easily perceive the benefits of believing in God, many find it difficult to understand the pain and misery that mankind has suffered because of the false belief in God. Mahatma Gandhi, who was a devout theist (though he seemingly believed in all religions, even though most religions are mutually exclusive), said in The Degeneration of Belief, “The most heinous and the most cruel crimes of which history has record have been committed under the cover of religion or equally noble motives”.

Most of the theists are very good people, so the Gandhian principles of Truth and Non-Violence are applicable to make them see the light of freedom from religion. In the footsteps of the Mahatma, I want to contribute my bit to humanity by spreading awareness about the “Truth” about the non-existance of God. I wish Mahatma Gandhi were alive today to spearhead the freedom-struggle from God.

Friday, February 16, 2007

Scared to be an Atheist in India

I've been reading about Darwin's theory of natural selection, evolution and evolutionary psychology for a few years now. I am also an engineer by background and appreciate the scientific methods. I used to be an agnostic before this (the kind of agnostic about space aliens; basically didn't spent any time thinking about these issues). But after reading these subjects, it was not possible for me to be an agnostic anymore. I don't remember how and when it happened, but suddenly sometime late 2006, I suddenly realized that God does not exist. There was too much evidence staring in my face against God.

Then I started reading about Atheism and was pleasantly surprised that there are millions like me, which was very reassuring. I'll talk about these resources in some other post. I also started realizing the pain caused to humanity by religion. However, it was not until read Richard Dawkins' 'The God Delusion' that I got enough courage to come out of the closet and do something about it.

But frankly, I'm quite scared. Though by and large, India is a very tolerant society, there are lot of fundamentalists and extremists who can get away with murder. I'm scared to take any steps on educating people on atheism because I fear some religious group will issue a bounty on my head. Bounty is an overstatement. Somebody might just be inspired to break my bones for free.

So, I repeat, I'm scared. Now I'm thinking that I'll use subtle means to educate people about the evil effects of religion.