Category: contemporary social

Power Paradox and Asuras

June 10, 2016

Dacher Kelter, psychology professor at the University of California Berkeley has written the book Power Paradox. In this book he outlines parallels between behaviors he has seen in research labs and corporate America. The book is is an eye opener to those who believe in gaining power through force. Dacher shows that our power is granted…
Directionally qualified Hell in the Vedas

February 16, 2016

Religions around the world present a gory view of Hell. In contrast, the idea of Naraka hell was more meaningful in an earlier ear. There are four pits of hell according to the Vedas (in the Aruna Prasna Mantras). They are each assigned to the directions Southeast, Southwest, Northeast and Northwest. Secondly, they relate to…
A memory experiment from 4000 years ago

January 18, 2016

The Chandogya Upanishad text of the Vedas contains an interesting dialogue between a teacher and a student. In this episode, the teacher explains the connection between food and the subtle aspects of life in the body. Certainly, everyone knows about the gross aspects. Firstly, the body uses nutrients from food and forms the cells such…
Dumpster Diwali – Recycling lessons

November 28, 2015

Indians, especially those who live along river Ganga celebrate Dev Diwali on the full moon of the Karthik month (Nov-Dec). It is the culmination of the fortnight of the Diwali festivities in Northern India. South Indians celebrate Dev Diwali as Karthigai Deepam. Firstly, people in Tamil Nadu decorate the front porches of households in Tamil…
Canadian Native languages, the last to adopt the Devanagari script

April 7, 2015

For decades missionaries held a love-hate relationship with the native knowledge systems across the world. For example, in the19th century, they created new alphabets for the languages of the Canadian Natives. Initially, they tried to use European language scripts. Soon, they found how their alphabets were a misfit because the natives followed Phonetically oriented scripts…
What does Brahma have to do with Collapsing Quantum Systems?

March 16, 2015

Does Brahma dream the universe? If Creation exists only within the mind of Brahma, can it not dissolve like a dream? Is this similar to a collapsing quantum system? Let us review these two ideas. The popular idea among scientists is that human intelligence is an accident. A certain biological evolution created the power of…
Celebrate a cosmic scale birthday!

December 4, 2013

One’s birthday as per the conventional calendar is only a crude approximation of the configuration in the sky when one was born! Tropical dates identify the position of Earth with respect to Sun ignoring the background of fixed stars. In a sense it distances our awareness from the wider cosmos by limiting it to a…
A piece of Zirconium – Beginning of Life on Earth

January 17, 2013

A Zirconium crystal can tell its own age. One such crystal specimen from Australia gives a puzzling picture of when water arrived on Earth. This challenges assumptions about life on earth. During formation, a Zirconium crystal accumulates less on more Titanium atoms based on the temperature. Firstly, geo-chemists recently discovered a piece of Zirconium, almost…