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Bhisma's Wisdom

2014-03-31T10:05:00.001-07:00

Generations in India have adored the epic figure, Bhisma, of the Mahabharata for his mighty deeds as well as his glorious qualities.Though renouncing the fulfillment of earthly love, he is renowned for his steady adhering to all the noble principles of life.
Bhisma's terrible vow of celibacy won him the name, which striked terror in the hearts of the enemies of Hastinapur. True to his vow, and as a warrior and upholder of the Kshatriya Dharma - he is as hard as ice. But he is also a sage, much known for his wisdom and upheld in great esteem by the Pandavas. As the most glorious and longest living mortal of his time, Bhisma is respected by everyone. However, it was tragic that Bhisma's vow of defending the prevailing King of Hastinapur forced him to fight against his own grandsons, the Pandavas, whom he had held in his hands as babies and showered love and affection. The intensity and ferocity with which Bhisma fought was only blunted and stopped by another of his vow: not fighting against women. In the end, Arjuna had to use this vow to stop his beloved grand sire's ferocious fight.
This particular dialogue between Bhisma and Yudhisthira begins, at the end of 18 day long Mahabharata war, with Bhisma laying on a bed of arrows. Krishna asks Bhisma to share all his timeless wisdom with Yudhisthira, to which he readily agreed. In the epic, this section is one of the voluminous one, with Bhisma teachings convering every expanse of human life. Here, it is presented in condensed form. Credit to Graham Bond.

Bowing to his beloved Grand Sire, Yudhisthira began
"Please tell me, O son of Ganga, all that which you wish me to know
Honor us with the rich wisdom of all your long years, before you depart.
Can I question you on matters close to my heart?"
Bhisma nodded.

On Attaining the Highest Good
Yudhisthira began " Oh Grand sire, how can one attain the highest good?"
Bhisma replied, "One who practices universal compassion, and
Who controls lust, anger, greed attains to the highest success,
And the highest good of the human life."

The one who regards all creatures as part of his own self,
And practicses the divine virtue of universal compassion,
Leaving aside the vindictive rod of chastisement,
And subjugates his anger, will succeed to attain happiness.

On the Best Friendship
"O Sire", Yudhisthira asked, "Please tell me who is truly one's friend"
Bhisma replied,"One is born alone, O King, and one dies alone
One crosses alone through the difficulties provided to us to learn by.
No-one can really share the joy or misery destiny brings forth to us.

After one dies, one's body is abandoned by relatives and friends.
Only righteousness remains to comfort the soul.
So it is Plain that only righteousness is the only friend.
And that righteousness should be sought by all.

Between the righteous, friendship springs up, even though they
only exchange seven words or walk seven steps.
But friendship with the unrighteous is like sleeping with a snake.
One is inflicted with the poison of unrighteousness goes to hell.

On the Transmigration of the Soul
King Yudhisthira asked, "Is the Soul destroyed by death?",
Bhisma replied,"The moon, on the fifteenth day of the dark fortnight,
cannot be seen, however can you say that it has been destroyed?
The conscious soul is eternal, experiencing time and space.

When liberated from the body, it cannot be seen.
But like waxing moon, it obtains a new body and manifests once again.
Governed by the consequences of the many actions it has performed,
it takes up a body suitable to reap the fruits of those actions.

On seeing the Self
Yudhisthira replied, "So how can one obtain the eye to see the soul"
Bhishma answered, "If the soul is freed from the anxieties of desire,worry and fear
Then the soul can be seen through the eyes of understanding awakened by grace.
Like an image in a reflecting in a still pond, the Self reveals to himself to oneself.

Only a snake can see the legs that carry another snake,
One with a inner vision can see the energy of the subtle worlds.
True happiness comes in the contemplation of the spiritual realm,
And the Self reveals himself to the unperturbed soul of unwavering intent.

Blessed are those who cultivate a still mind and restrain their senses,
Through grace and practice, one obtains the eye which can see the inner Self.
Bhisma then paused, and then turned within to savour the experience he had just described,
And Yudhisthira watched in amazement.

Bhishma Parva

2013-03-05T11:33:00.002-08:00

A great extract from Mahabharata's Bhishma Parva. Read on to find out.

Yudhisthira inquired, “How should one react to people who insult you by their rudeness and arrogance?”

Bhisma replied, “If one does not become angry when insulted by another, then he takes away all the pious merit that person may have accumulated by good deeds. In addition he transfers to the abuser his own sinful reactions. After all what is the value of praise or blame when uttered by a vulgar fool? A person who praises some one in his presence but criticizes him behind his back is no better that a dog.”

Yudhisthira, “How should one debate with an unscrupulous person?”

Bhisma replied, “In a debate the tactics of a truthful person are limited, but a deceitful person can utilize any abominable method. However if the truthful person were to use the same tactics as his opponent, he will find himself at a greater disadvantage, for he is acting contrary to his nature. Therefore a truthful and honest person should always avoid an argument with an unscrupulous person.”

Yudhisthira then inquired, “How should one behave towards a more powerful enemy?”

Bhisma replied, “Even though the swift current of the river can uproot and carry huge trees, the canes survive since they bend with the current. Similarly in order to survive an enemy more powerful, one must yield while staying firmly anchored to the roots.”

Yudhisthira inquired, “What should a weak person do if out of foolishness and pride he provokes a powerful enemy?”

Bhisma replied, “O King, the weaker person must repent and thus appease the stronger enemy.”

Yudhisthira inquired, “What is the origin of all sin?”

Bhisma replied, “Greed, the hankering to posses more than one’s naturally ordained quota is the origin of all sin. The desire to posses that which belongs to another is insatiable and gives rise to anger, lust, loss of judgment, arrogance, miserliness, lack of compassion, enviousness, mistrust and many other evils. Ignorance is made up of the same material as greed, though if analyzed it can be seen that ignorance also comes from greed. As one’s greed increases, his ignorance also becomes more dense.”

Yudhisthira inquired, “What produces the highest merit?”

Bhisma replied, “Self-restraint surpasses all other activities in this regard and is therefore considered to be the highest virtue. Because self-restraint purifies and controls every aspect of one’s life it is more important than giving in charity and the study of the Vedas. By self-restraint alone one can achieve liberation from the material world. Self-restraint comprises sense-control, freedom from anger, non-enviousness, impartiality, truthfulness, steadiness and contentment. However, the essential quality of self-restraint is austerity. Thus no good can be achieved without austerity.”

Yudhisthira then inquired, “O Bhisma, is there any rule that should never be violated under any condition?”

Bhisma replied. “The worship of true brahmans and giving them all kinds of respect must never be given up under any circumstance”

Hindu Kush

2013-03-05T11:29:00.002-08:00

I am sure that all of us would have heard or read about this term in our schools. School textbooks tell us that it is 500 mile long mountain range, stretching between central Afghanistan and Northern Pakistan, and is barrier between the pass linking Iran and Afghanistan.

But that's geography. Ancient Hindu literature s, from the time of the Maurya Empire, refer to the mountain range as "Pariyatra Parvata", whereas the ancient Iranians named it as "upari saena" or "kof-i aparsen" (mountains that rise higher than birds can fly). The Greeks, during the time of the invasion of Alexander had encountered this mountain and named it as "Paropanisadae". Documents, and inscriptions surviving from the period of Chandragupta's conquest of this area never refer to this area as Hindu Kush. How did it came to be known as Hindu Kush?

An answer can be found in Ibn Batuta's travel memoirs dating back to 13th century, just a few centuries after the Islamic invaders first attacked the Indian subcontinent. Ibn Batuta was a scholar from Morocco, and travelled to many countries,in Asia and Africa during his lifetime, and recorded his observations and memoirs.

"Another reason for our halt was fear of the snow, for on the road there is a mountain called Hindukush, which means "Slayer of Indians," because the slave boys and girls who are brought from India die there in large numbers as a result of the extreme cold and the great quantity of snow. The passage extends for a whole day march. We stayed until the warm weather had definitely set in, and cross this mountain by a continuous march from before dawn to sunset"

Ref. - Travels in Asia and Africa, 1325-1354

Batuta's travel memoirs clearly allude the naming of the mountain ranges to the death of slaves, who were natives of India. These slaves were either the captured soldiers, or (unfortunately) the inhabitants of forts or cities which these invaders raided with impunity and without any mercy. The code of conduct followed by ancient Indian rulers strictly forbid disturbing the non-combatant population or hamlets during the time of battles and warfare. As a result, sub continental India was actually little affected by wars and battles between different princes - until the Islamic invasions happened - which changed everything.

Current history textbooks, do not mention these events or even talk about them, for they have been written by "scholars" who have omitted such details for no obvious reasons. But to negate history as it is happened, and consequently misrepresenting it is a greater crime, for it does not allow us to see our own history in light and learn from it. Unfortunately, history textbooks in India are full of such glaring omissions and intended additions. For example, we learn about the evils of caste ism and communal ism, but do we ever read the evils of communism and Islamic fanticism? Did we read about the atrocities which were committed by the Islamic sultans during the course of their campaigns to bring Indian population to subjection? Do we read about the horrors inflicted by the Portuguese on the Hindu residents of Goa during the Inquisition, and their consequent forced conversion to Christianity? Do we read about the atrocities committed against the Hindus by Aurangzeb, who brought untold miseries to them by his policies? We read about Akbar the Great, but how many of us have heard about Devaraya, Prithiviraj Chauhan, Harsha, Rajaraja, Pulkeshi, Krishnadevaraya or Rana Pratap? Communist interpretations of India's history has erased these heroic bearings of these great kings, and brought ruthless conquerors as "saints". Perverse, indeed.

Vegetaranism : a Lifestyle for Inculcating Compassion

2013-03-05T10:57:00.002-08:00

From Hinduism Today

Vegetarianism was for thousands of years a principle of health and environmental ethics throughout India. Though Muslim and Christian colonization radically undermined and eroded this ideal, it remains to this day a cardinal ethic of Hindu thought and practice. A subtle sense of guilt persists among Hindus who eat meat, and even they will abstain at special times. For India’s ancient thinkers, life is seen as the very stuff of the Divine, an emanation of the Source and part of a cosmic continuum. They further hold that each life form,even water and trees, possesses consciousness and energy. Nonviolence,ahimsa, the primary basis of vegetarianism, has long been central to the religious traditions of India—especially Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism. Religion in India has consistently upheld the sanctity of life, whether human or animal.

The Sanskrit word for vegetarianism is shakahara, and one following a vegetarian diet is a shakahari. Hindu vegetarians commonly consume milk products, but not eggs, which are definitely a meat product, containing cholesterol which is only present in animal flesh. The term for meat-eating is mansahara, and the meat-eater is called mansahari.Ahara means “to consume or eat,” shaka means “vegetable,” and mansa means“meat or flesh.” The very word mansa, “meat,” conveys a deep appreciation of life’s sacredness and an understanding of the law of karma by which the consequence of each action returns to the doer.

As explained in the 2,000- year-old Manu Dharma Shastra,5.55, “The learned declare that the meaning of mansa (flesh) is, ‘he (sa) will eat me (mam) in the other world whose flesh I eat here.’

” There developed early in India an unparalleled concern for harmony among life forms, and this led to a common ethos based on noninjuriousness and a minimal consumption of natural resources—in otherwords, to compassion and simplicity. If Homo sapiens is to survive his present predicament, he will have to rediscover these two primary ethical virtues.

Is Vegetarianism Integral to Noninjury?

In Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami’s book, Dancing with Siva, this question is addressed as follows: “Hindus teach vegetarianism as a way to live with a minimum of hurt to other beings, for to consume meat, fish, fowl or eggs is to participate indirectly in acts of cruelty and violence against the animal kingdom. The abhorrence of injury and killing of any kind leads quite naturally to a vegetarian diet,shakahara. The meat-eater’s desire for meat drives another to kill and provide that meat. The act of the butcher begins with the desire of the consumer. Meat-eating contributes to a mentality of violence, for with the chemically complex meat ingested, one absorbs the slaughtered creature’s fear, pain and terror. These qualities are nourished within the meat-eater, perpetuating the cycle of cruelty and confusion. When the individual’s consciousness lifts and expands, he will abhor violence and not be able to even digest the meat, fish, fowl and eggs he was formerly consuming. India’s greatest saints have confirmed that one cannot eat meat and live a peaceful, harmonious life. Man’s appetite for meat inflicts devastating harm on Earth itself, stripping its precious forests to make way for pastures. The Tirukural candidly states, ‘How can he practice true compassion who eats the flesh of an animal to fatten his own flesh? Greater than a thousand ghee offerings consumed in sacrificial fires is not to sacrifice and consume any living creature.’ ”

Amazingly, some people define vegetarian as a diet which excludes the meat of animals but does permit fish and eggs. But what really is vegetarianism? Vegetarian foods include grains, fruits, vegetables, legumes and dairy products. Natural, fresh foods, locally grown without insecticides or chemical fertilizers, are preferred. A vegetarian diet does not include meat, fish,fowl, shellfish or eggs. For good health, even certain vegetarian foods are minimized: frozen and canned foods, highly processed foods, such as white rice, white sugar and white flour; and “junk” foods and beverages—those with abundant chemical additives, such as artificial sweeteners, colorings,flavorings and preservatives.

According to Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami, “In my forty years of ministry it has become quite evident that vegetarian families have far fewer problems than those who are not vegetarian. If children are raised as vegetarians, every day they are exposed to nonviolence as a principle of peace and compassion. Every day they are growing up they are remembering and being reminded to not kill. They won’t even kill another creature to eat, to feed themselves And if they won’t kill another creature to feed themselves, they will be much less likely to do acts of violence against people.”

Vegetarian Animals

Vegetarians come in all sizes and shapes, but the elephant is the largest of all, with a sophisticated social life, loving and affectionately caring for its own. Elephants live long, vigorous lives, have a very large brain and, of course, are renowned for their excellent memory. They do not suffer any weakness for not eating meat. In fact, so many muscular and the most intelligent animals—the horse, the cow, giraffe, zebra, rhinoceros, the apes, and more—are lifelong vegetarians and friends of men. Lean animals, thin and wiry, who are feared by man and beasts alike, are all hunters and killers and eaters of flesh— tigers, sharks, hawks, wolves and the like. No one fears a gentle vegetarian, but all have reason to fear the unpredictable meat-eater.

Food and Consciousness

Food is the source of the body’s chemistry, and what we ingest affects our consciousness, emotions and experiential patterns. If one wants to live in higher consciousness, in peace and happiness and love for all creatures, then he cannot eat meat, fish, shellfish, fowl or eggs. By ingesting the grosser chemistries of animal foods, one introduces into the body and mind anger, jealousy, fear, anxiety, suspicion and the terrible fear of death, all of which is locked into the flesh of butchered creatures. It is said that in ancient India meat would be fed to the soldiers during military campaigns, especially before combat, to bring them into lower consciousness so that they would forget their religious values. They performed these deeds in fulfillment of a warrior’s way—with not the least restraint of conscience.

The inner law is ever so simple—not eating meat, fish, foul or eggs is essential to awaken consciousness into the seven higher chakras (the uttara-chakras), up to the crown. Nonkilling— and Scriptures admonish that it is non eating of that which is killed—is a must to pass from realms below the muladhara. wise to fear what should be feared.

Dharma

How many there are who resent the very mention of becoming a vegetarian, whose instinctive nature is repelled by the idea because they intuit the road ahead. They sense that once the more sattvic diet of pure foods is taken in place of meats (and other dead foods, packaged, processed and cellophane-wrapped) they will feel a great guilt occasioned by their transgressions of dharma, as they have so well perfected over the years their adharmic ways. Adharma means all that stands against Indian spirituality, against the path of the good and the pure and the natural, against dharma in all of its intricate dimensions. None of the specialized dharmas—stri dharma, the duties of women; purusha dharma, the duties of men; ashrama dharma, the responsibility of one’s stage of life; varna dharma, one’s position in society; and svadharma, one’s own perfect pattern—even when performed properly will have the same results without fulfilling this virtue. Even rita dharma, cosmic order, is upset by man’s insatiable, aggressive appetites expressed through flesh-consuming.

Hindus Were the First Vegetarians

The book, Food for the Spirit, Vegetarianism and the World Religions,observes: “Despite popular knowledge of meat-eating’s adverse effects, the nonvegetarian diet became increasingly widespread among Hindus after the two major invasions by foreign powers, first the Muslims and later the British. With them came the desire to be ‘civilized,’ to eat as did the saheeb. Those actually trained in Vedic knowledge, however, never adopted a meat-oriented diet, and the pious Hindu still observes vegetarian principles as a matter of religious duty.

“That vegetarianism has always been widespread in India is clear from the earliest Vedic texts. This was observed by the ancient traveler Megasthenes and also by Fa-hsien, a Chinese Buddhist monk who, in the fifth century, traveled to India in order to obtain authentic copies of the scriptures. These scriptures unambiguously support the meatless way of life. In the Mahabharata, for instance, the great warrior Bhishma explains to Yudhishthira, eldest of the Pandava princes, that the meat of animals is like the flesh of one’s own son, and that the foolish person who eats meat must be considered the vilest of human beings [Anu. 114.11]. The eating of ‘dirty’ food, it warns, is not as terrible as the eating of flesh [Shanti. 141.88] (it must be remembered that the brahmins of ancient India exalted cleanliness to a divine principle).

“Similarly, the Manusmriti declares that one should ‘refrain from eating all kinds of meat,’ for such eating involves killing and leads to karmic bondage (bandha) [5.49]. Elsewhere in the Vedic literature, the last of the great Vedic kings, Maharaja Parikshit, is quoted as saying that ‘only the animal-killer cannot relish the message of the Absolute Truth [Shrimad Bhagavatam 10.1.4].’”

Common Dietary Concerns

Those considering a vegetarian diet generally worry about getting enough nutrients, since the belief that meat is a necessary part of keeping strong and healthy is still extremely widespread. Recently a group of eminent doctors called the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM), themselves members of the American Medical Association, have decided to change the US consciousness on human nutrition, particularly among the medical community. The PCRM is a nonprofit organization based in Washington, D.C., consisting of doctors and laypersons working together for compassionate and effective medical practice, research and health promotion.

Founded in 1985, the PCRM is supported by over 3,000 physicians and 50,000 laypersons. PCRM president (and vegetarian) Neal D. Barnard, M.D., is a popular speaker and the author of The Power of Your Plate. Armed with decades of nutritional research data, PCRM addresses these dietary concerns head-on:

“The fact is, it is very easy to have a well-balanced diet with vegetarian foods. Vegetarian foods provide plenty of protein. Careful combining of foods is not necessary. Any normal variety of plant foods provides more than enough protein for the body’s needs. Although there is somewhat less protein in a vegetarian diet than a meat-eater’s diet, this is actually an advantage. Excess protein has been linked to kidney stones, osteoporosis, and possibly heart disease and some cancers. A diet focused on beans, whole grains and vegetables contains adequate amounts of protein without the ‘overdose’ most meat-eaters get.” Other concerns are allayed by the PCRM as follows:

1. Calcium is easy to find in a vegetarian diet. Many dark, green leafy vegetables and beans are loaded with calcium, and some orange juices and cereals are calcium- fortified.

2. Iron is plentiful in whole grains, beans and fruits.

3. Vitamin B12: There is a misconception that without eating meat one cannot obtain sufficient vitamin B12, which is an essential nutrient. This is simply not true. The PCRM advises: “Although cases of B12 deficiency are very uncommon, it is important to make sure that one has a reliable source of the vitamin. Good sources include all common multiple vitamins (including vegetarian vitamins), fortified cereals and soy milk.” Vitamin B12 is widely available in brewers yeast and other potent dietary supplements.

4. Nutritional needs increase during pregnancy. The American Dietetic Association has found vegan diets adequate for fulfilling nutritional needs during pregnancy, but pregnant women and nursing mothers should supplement their diets with vitamins B12 and D.

5. Vegetarian children also have high nutritional needs, but these, too, are met with a vegetarian diet.

A vegetarian menu is “life-extending.” As children, vegetarians may grow more gradually, reach puberty

somewhat later, and live substantially longer than meat-eaters. Be sure to include a reliable source of vitamin B12. Those interested in supporting or learning more about the work of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine should visit: www.pcrm.org.

Converting to Vegetarianism

Making the transition from carnivore to herbivore is not as hard as you might think. According to the book, The New Vegetarians, by Sonia Partridge and Paul Amato, 73% of vegetarian converts stated that the transition was not difficult. It is easier for people who do some homework on the subject and have a bit of cooking skill. The time it takes for people to totally convert varies greatly. About 70% of people make the transition gradually, while 30% stop all at once. Red meat is almost always abandoned within the first year, followed by fowl, fish and eggs. One recommended method for the transition is to set a series of goals for yourself. Start simply with getting through one day without meat. Then, try one weekend, then one week. Make a realistic timetable for reaching each goal. Two to three months might be reason- able for some people, while six months to a year might be better for others. Rewards can also help. For a major accomplishment such as a week without meat, treat yourself to a nice vegetarian meal out.

One can also take a formal Hindu vow of vegetarianism, shakahara vrata, available on-line at www.hinduismtoday.com/in-depth_issues/veggie_vow/. The vow may be taken privately, before elders or parents or as part of a temple ceremony. It reads in part, “I accept the principle of shakahara as the method by which I may acknowledge my compassion, my karuna, for all living beings. As an act of dedication, I am resolved this day to begin (or continue) the regular practice of eating a strict vegetarian diet and not eating meat, fish, shellfish, fowl or eggs.”

The most common problem with conversion is not knowing enough about the vegetarian diet. Some people decide to be vegetarian but have no idea what to eat, and end up with soggy vegetables and undercooked brown rice for breakfast, lunch and dinner. They become discouraged and rightly wonder how they will survive. But decent vegetarian food isn’t boring. A little research will put your mind at ease. Get some vegetarian cookbooks. Ask restaurant waiters which menu items are vegetarian. Search online for vegetarian recipes.

Vegetarians are often asked “Don’t you miss eating meat?” For about half of beginning vegetarians the answer is yes, acording to The New Vegetarians. They miss the texture and flavor of meat in the early weeks and months. Almost everyone though, gets over this within six months to a year and for many it becomes nauseating even to think about eating meat. Eighty-two percent of fully adapted vegetarians say there is no way they would consider eating flesh again.

Conclusion

Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami writes, “Modern meats are killed by chemical treatment of the animals, the hormones of fear and chemistry of death before and during slaughter, killed again by refrigerating them, killed again by grinding them, killed again by preserving them, killed again by packaging them, killed again by reezing them, killed again by storing and shipping them, and finally really killed by cooking them to death. How can such so-called food nourish a human being?

“Why should we ever think of eating meat, fish, foul, eggs, anything with eyes or, as some say, with two or ore senses. The cock-a-doodle-doo who wakes us up in the morning is dinner on the table at night. How gruesome.

How ruthless to thus forever close the eyes of an animal, or have someone else do it for them in order that they may buy the carcass, closing their eyes to the fact, which is even worse, and keeping their own eyes closed to that creature’s suffering to consume it without conscience during jovial small talk over the dinner table.

How easy in turn for such a person to turn and maim or kill a fellow human in the same way in times of stress as a natural reaction,in ‘justifiable righteousness.’” As the Tirukural proclaims, compassion cannot be found in the hearts of those who eat meat.

Transfer a Windows 8 ISO to a bootable USB flash drive

2013-02-09T03:36:00.001-08:00

Windows and Office

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Transfer a Windows 8 ISO to a bootable USB flash drive

By Greg Shultz

September 27, 2012, 9:52 AM PDT

Takeaway: Greg Shultz shows you how to transfer a Windows 8 ISO to a bootable USB flash drive.

In last week’s post, Get the free 90-day evaluation of Windows 8 Enterprise, I showed you how to download the free 90-day evaluation copy of the final version of Windows 8 Enterprise and burn the ISO file to a bootable DVD using Windows 7’s Windows Disc Image Burner tool. While installing from a DVD is suitable in most situations, you may want to be able to install Windows 8 from a USB flash drive. Fortunately, doing so is not as difficult as it once was. In fact, Microsoft has a utility called the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool that will allow you to convert the ISO image so that it can boot from a USB flash drive. (Keep in mind that while the tool has Windows 7 in its name, it will still work for Windows 8.)

In this article, I’ll show you how to download, install and use the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool to transfer the Windows 8 Enterprise evaluation ISO to a bootable USB flash drive. Keep in mind that while I’ll use the Windows 8 Enterprise evaluation ISO as my example, this procedure will work with any Windows 7 or Windows 8 ISO.

This blog post is also available as a TechRepublic Photo Gallery.

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What you need

To install the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool, you need at least a Pentium 233 MHz processor and 50MB of free hard disk space. You can install the tool in Windows XP SP2, Windows Vista, or Windows 7 (32-bit or 64-bit). Your USB flash drive must be at least 4GB and it should not have any other files on it. In fact, I recommend that you perform a full format of your USB flash drive; just to be sure that it is error free.

If you are running Windows XP, you will need to download and install both Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 and Microsoft Image Mastering API v2 before you install the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool. Keep in mind that the most current version of the .NET Framework is 4.5, but if you only want to download 2.0, previous versions are available on the .NET site linked above.

Downloading the tool

Downloading the tool is easy. To begin, head over to the Microsoft Store’s Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool page and scroll down until you see the download link. When you click it you’ll be prompted to either Run or Save the tool, as shown in Figure A. For my example, I chose to save the file so that I could experiment with the tool on various machines.

Figure A

You can download the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool from the Microsoft Store.

Installing the tool

After I downloaded the file to my hard disk, I double-clicked the executable and was prompted with a Security Warning, shown in Figure B. You’ll see a similar warning if you choose to Run the installation from the download site.

Figure B

If you run the file from your hard disk, you’ll see this Security Warning.

As soon as you click Run, you’ll see the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool Setup Wizard. The installation runs pretty quickly via the four step wizard and the first and last screens of the wizard are shown in Figure C.

Figure C

The Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool Setup Wizard consists of four screens.

Running the tool

Once the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool is installed, I recommend that you insert your 4GB or larger USB flash drive and wait for it to be recognized. That way, the drive will be ready when you are running the tool. When the flash drive is ready, you can launch the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool from the Start menu. As soon as you do, you’ll encounter a User Account Control dialog box like the one shown in Figure D and will have to work through it.

Figure D

When you launch Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool, you’ll have to work though a UAC.

When the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool displays its first screen, as shown in Figure E, you’ll be prompted to locate and select the ISO file. (As a sidebar, I must point out that the first time that I saw this screen I was a little startled to see Microsoft Store in the title bar - I had expected a more traditional looking wizard interface, like the one from the setup. Not a big deal by any means, it just took a little getting used to.)

Figure E

The first step is to locate the ISO file.

On the second screen, shown in Figure F, you will click the USB device button. However, as you can see, you can just as easily select DVD as the media type. (If you are running Windows XP, which doesn’t include a tool like Windows 7’s Windows Disc Image Burner tool, this tool comes in handy if want to burn a Windows 8 ISO to DVD.)

Figure F

On this screen, just click the USB device button.

When the third screen appears, you should see your USB flash drive in the list box, as shown inFigure G. If not, click the Refresh button adjacent to the list box. Once your drive appears, click the Begin copying button. As soon as you do, the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool will perform a quick format of the flash drive, ostensibly to make it a bootable drive.

Figure G

Once your drive appears, click the Begin copying button.

Once the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool begins copying the file to the drive, from start to finish the process will take anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes to complete depending on the speed of your flash drive. When it is done, the status will indicate Backup completed. The beginning and ending of the copy operation are shown in Figure H. When the copy operation is done, just click the close button in the upper right corner.

Figure H

From start to finish the process will take anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes to complete.

When the operation is finished, you can launch Windows Explorer and take a peek at the contents of your now bootable USB flash drive, as shown in Figure I.

Figure I

You can use Windows Explorer to take a look at the contents of the USB flash drive.

Booting from the USB flash drive

Once you insert the bootable USB flash drive into the system on which you want to install Windows 8, restart the system, and then follow the onscreen instructions to access the boot menu. On my test system, the boot menu looked like the one shown in Figure J. Using the down arrow, I selected the USB Flash MemoryPMAP option and pressed [Enter].

Figure J

On your system’s boot menu you’ll select the option that identifies the bootable USB flash drive.

Within a few moments, you’ll see the new Windows flag on the screen, as shown in Figure K, indicating that Windows 8 Setup is being initialized.

Figure K

The new Windows flag displays as Windows 8 Setup is initialized.

For the best possible experience while you use the evaluation and for ease of disposal once the 90 days are up, I recommend that you install Windows 8 Enterprise to a VHD and use it in a dual-boot configuration as I showed you in the article titled Dual-boot Windows 7 and Windows 8 using a VHD.

What’s your take?

Are you planning on installing Windows 8 from a bootable USB flash drive? Will you install it in a VHD dual-boot configuration? As always, if you have comments or information to share about this topic,

Which Mobile OS Is Best for You?

2011-09-25T00:40:00.000-07:00

Which Mobile OS Is Best for You?

Most people don't think twice about which operating system will power their new smart phone or other mobile device. Should you?

By Ari Hakkarainen, Computerworld May 2, 2007 1:00 am

Most people don't think twice about the operating system that's going to power their new PC -- their minds have already been wired for Windows, Mac OS X or Linux. Similarly, most people don't think twice about which operating system will power their new smart phone or other mobile device.

But that can be a big mistake because the underlying software has major impact on how you use your mobile device. For example, a look at the Linux-powered Nokia N800 Internet tablet shows just how an operating system can have strong advantages and shortcomings.

This Internet tablet runs customized Linux software, Maemo, which has been developed from the Debian and Gnome technologies. Out of the box, the unit can browse the Internet, read RSS feeds, send and receive e-mail, play music and videos, and make Internet phone calls using Google Talk. It also can transmit live video during phone calls via a built-in camera. Internet connection can be established via Wi-Fi or Bluetooth or by using a broadband-capable cell phone as a modem.

However, while the N800 might initially seem to be feature-rich, you can't take photos or capture videos with the built-in camera because imaging software isn't included with the device. The same applies to personal information management -- calendar, notes and document-viewing applications are missing from the product. Such omissions may seem like quite a drawback for a product like the N800.

Because the device is based on open-source software, you can find and install those capabilities for free. Yet, this type of flexibility isn't for everybody -- many people will find it easier and more satisfying to buy devices based on other, less-open platforms such as the Symbian OS and Windows Mobile.

Let's look at how the Linux platform as deployed on the N800 compares in functionality with the Symbian OS and Windows Mobile.

Customizing the N800

For the N800 users, the place to start shoring up the device is the maemo.org Web site. The site hosts downloadable applications that open-source developers have made available for free.

For instance, readily available are a digital camera/video capture application, a multimedia player, calendar, spreadsheet, office document viewers, instant messaging, games and many other applications. It takes a single click (and a few security confirmations) to download and install a new application to the N800.

Smart phones built on Linux are available from many vendors, including Motorola, NEC, Panasonic and Samsung. Practically all current products are targeted at Asian markets, but the situation is changing. Apple has said that its iPhone will run on OS X, which is derived from Unix software. Palm is switching from Palm OS to Linux later this year.

The practice of building up a system configuration from freely available software components is nothing new for Linux desktop and server software users, who tend to be power users. On the other hand, it's hard to imagine that an average Joe would pay for a product knowing that he would have to find, download and install an imaging application on the device before he could take photos with the camera.

While Maemo is used as the model of the open Linux culture, Windows Mobile and Symbian OS as major competitors of Linux have completely different origins and objectives. Both operating systems are licensed as traditional software products, both provide tools for programmers to create applications, and both are controlled by commercial enterprises.

Windows Mobile

Practically everyone who has used a desktop computer has used some Windows software. Yet, that knowledge doesn't necessarily translate to Windows Mobile, which is a separate piece of Microsoft software designed for smart phones and PDAs. Lately, devices like the Motorola Q and Samsung Blackjack have made the smart phone edition familiar to business people and consumers.

When you take a Windows Mobile smart phone or PDA out of the box and charge it, you are ready to roll. You can make phone calls right away. If you purchased the device from a carrier, messaging and Web access settings are already in place for sending e-mail and for browsing the Web.

Everything you need for managing your schedule, contacts, notes, to-do lists and messages is installed in the device. If you want to synchronize information with a desktop PC, you simply plug in a cable between the devices and use ActiveSync (on Windows XP) or Windows Mobile Device Center (on Windows Vista) to update the information.

Multimedia is another area in which integration between a Windows Mobile device and a PC works well. Streaming and downloading video or audio to a Windows Mobile device from the Internet doesn't require any additional software or settings. Windows Mobile can also play WMA and WMV formats, which are commonly used by media companies.

In contrast to Linux, Windows Mobile comes as ready-to-run software. You can enhance the software by downloading additional -- typically commercial -- software into the device, but you can't (or you don't have to) tweak the underlying operating system.

Symbian OS

Symbian is owned by a consortium of cell phone manufacturers that has specifically targeted the platform for smart phones. Products running on the Symbian OS include the upcoming Motorola MOTORIZR Z8, Nokia E- and N-series products, and the Sony Ericsson P800 and P900 series devices. Interestingly, Symbian is, by far, the most widely used platform for smart phones worldwide, although it has yet to catch on in the U.S. despite the availability of some nice devices like the Nokia E62.

Like Windows Mobile devices, a Symbian-based device is ready for action as soon as it comes out of the box. Telephone, messaging and Internet access features are the key virtues in most Symbian OS devices. Typically, these features have been tightly integrated with relevant applications in the user interface software.

Symbian OS provides three alternative user interfaces while Windows Mobile keeps the choices to one. The user interface -- UIQ, S60 or MOAP -- is customized by the device manufacturer. The user can modify the system graphics, colors and sounds but can't touch the underlying software.

Contacts, calendar, notes, calculator and other applications for managing personal information are included with the user interface software. As with Windows Mobile devices, synchronizing personal information with a PC via cable or Bluetooth is also possible.

The integration of multimedia capabilities in Symbian OS/S60, however, has room for improvement. There's nothing wrong with individual components that let you view videos or listen to music, but the lack of integration between the media player and other applications can be painful when trying to stream video or music from the Internet.

Which Platform to Choose

Symbian OS and Windows Mobile have their competitive advantages. The former has strong telephone, messaging and browser integration, while the latter comes with stronger sync and media streaming capabilities. Both operating systems allow enhancing the functionality by downloading additional software, typically at a price. However, the underlying premise is the same: What you see is what you get. By contrast, Linux devices tend to be more bare-bones out of the box, but you can customize and upgrade easily and, typically, for free.

It all comes down to user needs and skills. If you are a tech-savvy person who enjoys spending extra time with new electronic devices, examining their options, looking for support from the Internet and customizing features, you are a strong candidate for a Linux device. If you would rather walk the dog in a freezing rain than configure software for a new device, a ready-to-run product built on an established operating system software is your choice.

However, while that's the scorecard today, the technology communities aren't sitting still. Palm has announced its intention to migrate its Palm OS-based software assets to Linux. Apple is about to launch iPhone, which will run on OS X, a Unix-based software. Both companies have a track record of delighting customers with easy-to-use products that work out of the box without any extra work.

If vendors such as those can leverage the ability to customize Linux devices with the ease of setup found with Symbian OS and Windows Mobile devices, Linux could easily catch on -- big time -- as a mainstream mobile platform.

A more than 20-year consulting and marketing career has taken Ari Hakkarainen across the world in high-tech business. In addition to having authored a book about smart phones, he is the mobile expert at Avec Mobile.

Vegetaranism : For the Good of our Planet

2011-07-05T09:03:00.001-07:00

Will Facts and Figures change your opinions?

Here we approach the issue from another perspective, examining the devastating harm caused by a meat-laden diet–not only to the animal which is killed and eaten, but also to the meat-eater himself, to humanity as a whole and to our very planet. The following presentation is based on the poster, “How to win an argument with a meat-eater,” published by Earthsave, of Felton, California, giving facts from Pulitzer Prize nominee John Robbins’ book, Diet for a New America. This version details ten arguments against meat eating.

1. The Hunger Argument

The world’s massive hunger problems could be greatly alleviated by reducing or elimination meat-eating. Vast quantities of food suitable for humans are fed to livestock for meat production–wasting most of its protein in the process; in addition, the huge acreages now used as pasture for meat animals would produce much more human food if converted to grains and vegetables.

This year alone, twenty million people worldwide will die of malnutrition. One child dies of malnutrition every 2.3 seconds. One hundred million people could be adequately fed using the land freed if Americans reduced their intake of meat by a mere 10%. Eighty percent of the corn and 95% of the oats grown in the US is eaten by livestock. The percentage of protein wasted by cycling grain through livestock is calculated by experts as 90%. One acre of good farmland can produce 40,000 pounds of potatoes, or 250 pounds of beef. Fifty-six percent of all US farmland is devoted to beef production, and to produce each pound of beef requires 16 pounds of edible grain and soybeans, which could be used to feed the hungry.

2. The Environmental Argument

Many of the world’s massive environmental problems—including global warming, loss of topsoil, loss of rain forests and species extinction—could be solved by the reduction or elimination of meat-eating. The meat industry’s voracious need for pasturelands is the primary force driving the destruction of old-growth forests–which are essential to the survival of the planet. Their destruction is a major cause of global warming and of the rapidly escalating losses of topsoil and endangered-species habitat. Two hundred sixty million acres of US forestland have been cleared for meat production. An alarming 75% of all US topsoil has been lost to date,and fullly 85% of this loss is directly related to livestock raising. Another devastating result of meat-eating is the loss of plant and animal species. Each year 1,000 species disappear due to destruction of tropical rain forests for cattle grazing and other uses—driven by US demand for meat. The rate is growing yearly.

3. The Cancer Argument

Those who eat flesh are far more likely to contract cancer than those following a vegetarian diet. The risk of contracting breast cancer is 3.8 times greater for women who eat meat daily compared to less than once a week; 2.8 times greater for women who eat eggs daily compared to once a week; and 3.25 greater for women who eat processed butter and cheese two to four times a week as compared to once a week. The risk of fatal ovarian cancer is three times greater for women who eat eggs three or more times a week as compared with less than once a week. The risk of fatal prostate cancer is 3.6 times greater for men who consume meat, eggs, processed cheese and milk daily as compared with sparingly or not at all.

4. The Cholesterol Argument

The average cholesterol consumption of a meat-centered diet is 210 milligrams per day. The chance of dying

from heart disease if you are male and your blood cholesterol intake is 210 milligrams a day is greater than 50%. It is strange but true that US physicians are as a rule poorly educated in the single most important factor of health, namely diet and nutrition. As of 1987, of the 125 medical schools in the US, only 30 required their students to take a course in nutrition. The average nutrition training received by the average US physician during four years in school is only 2.5 hours. Thus doctors in the US are ill equipped to advise their patients in minimizing foods, such as meat, that contain excessive amounts of cholesterol and are known causes of heart attack .

Heart attack is the most common cause of death in the US, killing one person every 45 seconds. The male meat-eater’s risk of death from heart attack is 50%. The risk to men who eat no meat is only 15%. Reducing

one’s consumption of meat, processed dairy products and eggs by 10% reduces the risk of heart attack by 10%. Eliminating all of these products from one’s diet reduces the risk of heart attack by 90%.

5. The Natural Resources Argument

The world’s natural resources are being rapidly depleted as a result of meat-eating. Raising livestock for their meat is a very inefficient way of generating food. Pound for pound, far more resources must be expended

to produce meat than to produce grains, fruits and vegetables. For example, more than half of all water used for all purposes in the US is consumed in livestock production. The amount of water used in production of the average cow is sufficient to float a destroyer (a large naval ship).

While 25 gallons of water are needed to produce a pound of wheat, 5,000 gallons are needed to produce a pound of California beef. That same 5,000 gallons of water can produce 200 pounds of wheat. Thirty-three percent of all raw materials (base products of farming, forestry and mining, including fossil fuels) consumed

by the US are devoted to the production of livestock, as compared with two percent to produce a complete vegetarian diet.

6. The Antibiotic Argument

Another danger of eating meat is the fact that large amounts of antibiotics are fed to livestock to control staphylococci (commonly called staph infections). The animals being raised for meat in the United

States are diseased. The livestock industry attempts to control the various diseases by feeding the animals huge quantities of antibiotics. Of all antibiotics used in the US, 55% are fed to livestock. But the diseasecausing

bacteria are rapidly becoming immune to the antibiotics, thus endangering humans who depend on these antibiotics to combat disease. The percentage of staphylococci infections resistant to penicillin, for example, has grown from 13% in 1960 to 91% in 1988. These antibiotics and/or the super-resistant bacteria they were intended to destroy remain in the meat that goes to market. The European Economic Community banned the importation of US meat because of this routine feeding of antibiotics.

7. The Mad Cow Argument

In February, 2001, Cornell University reported, “Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), also known as mad cow disease, has now been officially identified in a dozen European countries including the UK, France, Italy, Germany, Spain, Belgium, Ireland, Liechtenstein, Portugal, Switzerland, Luxembourg and the Netherlands..

8. The Pesticide Argument

US-produced meat contains dangerously high quantities of deadly pesticides. Many people believe that the USDA protects consumers’ health through regular and thorough meat inspection. In reality, fewer than one out of every 250,000 slaughtered animals is tested for toxic chemical residues.A study of mothers’ milk in the US has clearly demonstrated that these chemicals are ingested by the meat-eater:

a. Ninety-nine percent of the meat-eating mothers in the study produced milk with significant levels of DDT–compared to only 8% of the vegetarian mothers’ milk. This shows that the primary source of DDT

is the meat ingested by the mothers.

b. The breast milk of meat-eating mothers has 35 times more chlorinated hydrocarbon pesticides than the milk of non meat-eating mothers.

c. The average breast-fed American infant contains nine times the permissible level of the pesticide dieldrin, which (though now banned in the US) continues to accumulate in the food chain and often exceeds safety

guidelines in fish and seafood.

9. The Ethical Argument

Many people have become vegetarians after reading about or personally experiencing what goes on daily at any one of the thousands of slaughterhouses in the US and other countries, where animals suffer thecruel process of forced confinement, manipulation and violent death. Their pain and terror is beyond calculation. Most slaughterhouse workers are not on the job for long and have the highest turnover rateof all occupations. It also has the highest rate of on-the-job injury. In the US alone, 1.14 million animals are killed for meat every hour. The average per capita consumption of meat in the US, Canada and Australia is 200 pounds per year! The average American consumes in a 72-year lifetime approximately eleven cattle, three lambs and sheep, 23 pigs, 45 turkeys, 1,100 chickens and 862 pounds of fish!

10. The Physiological Argument

The final argument against meat-eating is that humans are physiologically not suited for a carnivorous diet. The

book Food for the Spirit, Vegetarianism in the World Religions, summarizes this point of view as follows. “Many nutritionists, biologists and physiologists offer convincing evidence that humans are in fact not meant to eat flesh.…” The book gives seven facts in support of this view:

1. Physiologically, people are more akin to plant-eaters, foragers and grazers, such as monkeys, elephants and cows, than to carnivore such as dogs, tigers and leopards.

2. For example, carnivores do not sweat through their skin; body heat is controlled by rapid breathing and extrusion of the tongue. Vegetarian animals, on the other hand, have sweat pores for heat control

and the elimination of impurities.

3. Carnivora have long teeth and claws for holding and killing prey; vegetarian animals have short teeth and no claws.

4. The saliva of carnivora contains no ptyalin and cannot predigest starches; that of vegetarian animals contains ptyalin for the predigestion of starches.

5. Flesh-eating animals secrete large quantities of hydrochloric acid to help dissolve bones; vegetarian animals secrete little hydrochloric acid.

6. The jaws of carnivora only open in an up and down motion; those of vegetarian animals also move sideways for additional kinds of chewing.

7. Carnivores must lap liquids, as a cat does; vegetarian animals take liquids in by suction through the teeth.

Nice Little Story - The Buddha and the Gift

2011-02-01T09:55:00.001-08:00

Nobody could make Buddha angry very easily. Once when He was passing by, one man wanted to incite anger in Buddha’s heart. He went to Buddha and shouted at Him scorching, painful words of insult. Buddha still appeared to be smiling. It’s said there is aura around Buddha. Even if tiger and deer come into that circle, they would forget the enmity. He is so powerful. When the person is giving all these harsh words, He (Buddha) didn’t take it seriously. After sometime, this man felt great pain in this heart. He was surprised “I am giving such words to Buddha, instead of He feeling pain, why I am feeling pain?”

Buddha asked him “Do you ever get guests in home?. He said “yes”. “So when they come, do you offer some gifts to them?”. He said “yes”. “What will you do if they don’t accept?”. That Person said “who cares? I will keep with me only.” Buddha said “That’s what I did with you also; you offered me something(harsh words) which I didn’t accept”.

So Life is like a mirror. The words which you give will come back to you. We should be careful about what we give to others. Now somebody may say “I gave so much love to some person, still that person is rude with me”. No! If you give love to someone, don’t expect love from same person, it may come from somebody else. For example- Dhruva Maharaj is gentle to his step mother. But He is mistreated by her. He didn’t get love from his step mother, but he got love from Krishna later. His mother told him “Supreme Lord can give you so much love that millions of mothers like me cannot give”. Similarly in our life also, if we become vehicles of love n give love, we will get that love back.

Excerpts from IYF Lectures

Credit to Venkatesh Y

IS VEGETARIANISM THE CHRISTIAN THING TO DO?

2011-01-27T05:31:00.000-08:00

History Of American Vegetarianism

Vegetarianism as a movement did not start with the hippies of the late 60′s and early 70′s as I would have imagined but rather it started long before that in 1817 with a small group of pilgrims who voyaged from Britain to the New World. Like the first Pilgrims, they were seeking escape from religious persecution and desired to practice their faith. They were serious about the Bible, and they took even more seriously the admonition in Genesis 1:29-30 which commands that the first humans only eat herbs and vegetables. They firmly believed that this was the original will of God. They called themselves the “Bible Christian Church” and one of the conditions necessary to become a member was being a vegetarian.

Does The Bible Command Vegetarianism

This author is also a Christian and a vegetarian but my marching orders did not come from Genesis 1:29-30 but rather I believe that although all the Bible is FOR us, it is not all written TO us, orABOUT us. I believe that the specific part of the Bible that is written directly to Gentiles in the Dispensation of Grace is found in the thirteen Gentile Epistles of Paul. As far as this writer is concerned Genesis 1:29-30 is not directly admonishing us regarding food but rather such verses as Romans 14:14 and I Timothy 4:4 in which Paul states by the Holy Spirit; I know and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing unclean of itself: but to him that esteemeth any thing to be unclean, to him it is unclean. (Rom. 14:14) For every creature of God is good and nothing to be refused if it be received with thanksgiving. (I Tim. 4:4)

Although as stated I am a Christian and a vegetarian, nevertheless I do not snatch a verse out of Genesis to the exclusion of many other verses and attempt to establish a religionbased on a single passage of scripture. Instead I attempt to Rightly Divide the Word of Truth (II Tim. 2:15) and find out exactly which part of the Bible is speaking directly to me. So although I believe strongly in the cause of vegetarianism for reasons of health, protection of the environment, and protection of the rights of animals, I do not feel it prudent to teach that God has commanded all men throughout the ages to practicevegetarianism. I also believe that although God is not commanding the practice of vegetarianism in this Dispensation of Grace (Eph 3:13), He would nevertheless have us to realize that under grace All things are lawful for me but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me but all things edify not. (I Corinthians 10:23) Therefore I must choose that which is expedient and that which edifies. In regards to the consumption of animal flesh and their by-products as far as I am concerned the expedient and edifying thing to do is to abstain.

I hope the reader will be clear of at least one thing in regards to my stance on vegetarianism. It is my firm conviction that if all the evidence regarding human health, environmental issues, and animal cruelty are weighed in the balances, the only reasonable choice would be to adopt a vegetarian lifestyle. I attempt to be intellectually honest about my convictions and offer evidence to support my conclusions. I do not however, seek to use an obscure passage of scripture to back up my strong intellectual belief in the many merits of a vegetarian lifestyle. It is not necessary to do so. Actually from my study of the Bible, I am fully persuaded that each of us must come to our own conclusions about this matter based on objective evidence. God is not condemning the practice of eating meat nor is He championing the merits of vegetarianism. Therefore if you are a Christian meat eater, I would not be so foolish as to try and prove to you from the Bible that you are out of God’s will.

I must admit however, that I secretly wish that the Bible did condemn the eating of meat as a sin in this present dispensation because as far as this writer is concerned, if it did it would end allarguments. But unfortunately it does not. In reality it asks Christians to weigh all the verses in the Bible as to God’s will in a matter and to pay specific attention to the verses that speak directly to us. As for the consumption of meat, it is clear to this author that God does not condemn the practice.

That said, I also believe that farm factories which treat animals as mere commodities and raise them under the cruelest conditions and then slaughter them in the most barbaric fashion imaginable would be very much condemned by God. Greed is the major force behind the raising and slaughter of animals in the present factory system and this is clearly not in God’s will. I also believe that God would have us to be good stewards of the environment as well as our own bodies and as far as food is concerned this in my opinion can best be accomplished through adopting a vegetarian lifestyle, but Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. (Romans 14:5b)

In conclusion it is my opinion that there are many compelling reasons to adopt a vegetarian lifestyle but I cannot in good conscience use the Bible as my reason for championing the cause. I also think that when someone uses one verse from theBible to try and make others believe that it is actually God who is commanding vegetarianism that they do more harm to the cause of vegetarianism than good. We who believe in the merits of a vegetarian lifestyle do not need to play fast and loose with the scriptures in order to make our point. We are better served by presenting a searching soul with the mountains of evidence in favor of the vegetarian way and let such a person make an intelligent decision based on the facts.

I am passionate about health issues, and the state of the health of our wonderful America. I believe the American diet is literally killing us and that a steady flow of money and perks from the meat, egg, and dairy

Copy from http://theblogisdead.com/2010/is-vegetarianism-the-christian-thing-to-do/

Brahmanas, Dog Eaters and the Holy Name!

2011-01-25T06:34:00.000-08:00

Bhaktivedanta VedaBase: Śrīmad Bhāgavatam 3.33.7

aho bata śva-paco 'to garīyān

yaj-jihvāgre vartate nāma tubhyam

tepus tapas te juhuvuḥ sasnur āryā

brahmānūcur nāma gṛṇanti ye te

SYNONYMS

aho bata — oh, how glorious; śva-pacaḥ — a dog-eater; ataḥ — hence; garīyān — worshipable; yat — of whom; jihvā-agre — on the tip of the tongue; vartate — is; nāma — the holy name; tubhyam — unto You; tepuḥ tapaḥ — practiced austerities; te — they; juhuvuḥ — executed fire sacrifices; sasnuḥ — took bath in the sacred rivers; āryāḥ — Āryans; brahma anūcuḥ — studied the Vedas; nāma — the holy name; gṛṇanti — accept; ye — they who; te — Your.

TRANSLATION

Oh, how glorious are they whose tongues are chanting Your holy name! Even if born in the families of dog-eaters, such persons are worshipable. Persons who chant the holy name of Your Lordship must have executed all kinds of austerities and fire sacrifices and achieved all the good manners of the Āryans. To be chanting the holy name of Your Lordship, they must have bathed at holy places of pilgrimage, studied the Vedas and fulfilled everything required.

PURPORT

As it is stated in the previous verse, a person who has once offenselessly chanted the holy name of God becomes immediately eligible to perform Vedic sacrifices. One should not be astonished by this statement of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. One should not disbelieve or think, "How by chanting the holy name of the Lord can one become a holy man to be compared to the most elevated brāhmaṇa?" To eradicate such doubts in the minds of unbelievers, this verse affirms that the stage of chanting of the holy name of the Lord is not sudden, but that the chanters have already performed all kinds of Vedic rituals and sacrifices. It is not very astounding, for no one in this life can chant the holy name of the Lord unless he has passed all lower stages, such as performing the Vedic ritualistic sacrifices, studying the Vedas and practicing good behavior like that of the Āryans. All this must first have been done. Just as a student in a law class is to be understood to have already graduated from general education, anyone who is engaged in the chanting of the holy name of the Lord — Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare/ Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare — must have already passed all lower stages. It is said that those who simply chant the holy name with the tip of the tongue are glorious. One does not even have to chant the holy name and understand the whole procedure, namely the offensive stage, offenseless stage and pure stage; if the holy name is sounded on the tip of the tongue, that is also sufficient. It is said herein that nāma, a singular number, one name, Kṛṣṇa or Rāma, is sufficient. It is not that one has to chant all the holy names of the Lord. The holy names of the Lord are innumerable, and one does not have to chant all the names to prove that he has already undergone all the processes of Vedic ritualistic ceremonies. If one chants once only, it is to be understood that he has already passed all the examinations, not to speak of those who are chanting always, twenty-four hours a day. It is specifically said here, tubhyam: "unto You only." One must chant God's name, not, as theMāyāvādī philosophers say, any name, such as a demigod's name or the names of God's energies. Only the holy name of the Supreme Lord will be effective. Anyone who compares the holy name of the Supreme Lord to the names of the demigods is called pāṣaṇḍī, or an offender.

The holy name has to be chanted to please the Supreme Lord, and not for any sense gratification or professional purpose. If this pure mentality is there, then even though a person is born of a low family, such as a dog-eater's, he is so glorious that not only has he purified himself, but he is quite competent to deliver others. He is competent to speak on the importance of the transcendental name, just as Ṭhākura Haridāsa did. He was apparently born in a family of Muhammadans, but because he was chanting the holy name of the Supreme Lord offenselessly, Lord Caitanya empowered him to become the authority, or ācārya, of spreading the name. It did not matter that he was born in a family which was not following the Vedic rules and regulations.Caitanya Mahāprabhu and Advaita Prabhu accepted him as an authority because he was offenselessly chanting the name of the Lord. Authorities like Advaita Prabhu and Lord Caitanya immediately accepted that he had already performed all kinds of austerities, studied the Vedas and performed all sacrifices. That is automatically understood. There is a hereditary class of brāhmaṇas called the smārta-brāhmaṇas, however, who are of the opinion that even if such persons who are chanting the holy name of the Lord are accepted as purified, they still have to perform the Vedic rites or await their next birth in a family of brāhmaṇas so that they can perform the Vedic rituals. But actually that is not the case. Such a man does not need to wait for the next birth to become purified. He is at once purified. It is understood that he has already performed all sorts of rites. It is the so-called brāhmaṇas who actually have to undergo different kinds of austerities before reaching that point of purification. There are many other Vedic performances which are not described here. All such Vedic rituals have been already performed by the chanters of the holy name.

The word juhuvuḥ means that the chanters of the holy name have already performed all kinds of sacrifices. Sasnuḥ means that they have already traveled to all the holy places of pilgrimage and taken part in purificatory activities at those places. They are called āryāḥ because they have already finished all these requirements, and therefore they must be among the Āryans or those who have qualified themselves to become Āryans. "Āryan" refers to those who are civilized, whose manners are regulated according to the Vedic rituals. Any devotee who is chanting the holy name of the Lord is the best kind of Āryan. Unless one studies the Vedas, one cannot become an Āryan, but it is automatically understood that the chanters have already studied all the Vedic literature. The specific word used here is anūcuḥ, which means that because they have already completed all those recommended acts, they have become qualified to be spiritual masters.

The very word gṛṇanti, which is used in this verse, means to be already established in the perfectional stage of ritualistic performances. If one is seated on the bench of a high court and is giving judgment on cases, it means that he has already passed all legal exams and is better than those who are engaged in the study of law or those expecting to study law in the future. In a similar way, persons who are chanting the holy name are transcendental to those who are factually performing the Vedic rituals and those who expect to be qualified (or, in other words, those who are born in families of brāhmaṇas but have not yet undergone the reformatory processes and who therefore expect to study the Vedic rituals and perform the sacrifices in the future).

There are many Vedic statements in different places saying that anyone who chants the holy name of the Lord becomes immediately freed from conditional life and that anyone who hears the holy name of the Lord, even though born of a family of dog-eaters, also becomes liberated from the clutches of material entanglement.

A Tradition of Sharing

2011-01-20T03:13:00.000-08:00

Recently, in view of reports of foodgrains rotting in godowns, the Supreme Court of India ordered the Central Government to distribute these grains free of cost to the starving millions of our country, rather than to let them rot. Our Agriculture Minister(who recently declared that the ministry cannot be held responsible for rising food prices) reacted to the judgment by saying that food grains cannot be distributed free of cost. Pitiless statement. Grains can be left to rot, but cannot be given to one those who seek it. The article looks at the traditions in India till recently which emphasize greatly on the sharing of food - food as a necessity which cannot be sold or bought.It shows as to how even in 1900s, food was distributed freely to those who needed it the most, without any strings attached.

A Lost Tradition

The discipline of sharing in India continues till almost the present times. Texts of all ages from different parts of India emphasize the importance of ensuring an abundance of food and sharing it widely before eating for oneself. Even a Buddhist Tamil text like the Manimekalai, tells the touching story of Aputran who, being left alone on an uninhabited island with an inexhaustible pot of food in his hands, prefers to die of hunger rather than eat for himself from that pot, without sharing it with anyone else. And the older people in at least the state of Tamilnadu still remember how their parents used to wait outside the house before every mealtime for some seeker to come and accept food from their hands, and on the days that no seeker appeared the parents went hungry too.

The story of Harsavardhana, the renowned seventh century Indian king, who used to empty his treasury every few years and share his riches with his people, is well known.And when Hiuen-Tsiang, the revered Chinese scholar who visited India during the reign of Harsavardhana, describes the festivals of sharing that Harsavardhana organized, it reads almost like the descriptions of grand giving and sharing that happened unceasingly during the great yajnas of Srirama and Yudhisthira and other celebrated kings of classical antiquity.

Even as late as the beginning of the nineteenth century,the kings of Thanjavur seem to have cared as deeply about assuaging the hunger of all within their kingdom as the kings of Indian antiquity. In a fascinating letter written by Raja Sarfoji, the king of Thanjavur, in 1801 to the British who had by then set themselves up as the colonial overlords, the Raja describes the chatrams that abounded in his state, especially along the road to the great pilgrim centre of Rameswaram, which had been running since the times of his ancestors. In thesechatrams all comers received food throughout the day, and at midnight bells were rung to call upon those who may have been left behind to rush and receive their share. The Raja goes on to describe in detail how the chatrams took care of those who fell sick during their stay, and of the dependents of those who happened to die there. The running of the chatrams, the Raja felt,was what gave Thanjavur the title of dharmarajya, and this was the title, the Raja told the British, he valued above all other dignities of his office. And he implored the British to ensure that whatever else might happen to his state, this tradition of providing for the hungry was not abridged or eliminated.

This king of Thanjavur, it seems, was amongst the last representatives of not only the tradition of feeding the hungry, but also the Indian tradition of growing a plenty.Historical evidence from different parts of India from around the tenth century to the beginning of the nineteenth century indicates that lands throughout India used to yield an abundance. Inscriptions from the Thanjavur region from 900 to 1200 A.D. record yields of between 12-18 tons of paddy per hectare. An 1100 A.D. inscription from South Arcot, neighbouring Thanjavur, mentions yields of 14.5 tons per hectare, and another inscription of 1325 A.D. from the relatively dry Ramanathapuram records production of 20 tons of paddy on a hectare of land.

Similarly high levels of productivity were reported by the European observers from many parts of the country. Thus, for productivity of foodgrains in the region around Allahabad, one such observer in 1803 reported a value of 7.5 tons per hectare, and another reported a yield of 13.0 tons of paddy from Coimbatore in 1807.

We have fairly detailed information about production and productivity that prevailed in about two thousand localities in the Chengalpattu region thatsurrounds the city of Madras in the 1760s. The best lands in the region, according to this information, produced as much as nine tons per hectare at a period when the British and French armies were crisscrossing the region and subjecting it to much devastation. The average of the region was a modest 2.5 tons of paddy per hectare, nevertheless it amounted to the availability of as much as 5.5 tons of foodgrains a year for an average household of between four to five members, which represents a very high level of prosperity, not merely by the Indian standards of today — which happen to be abysmally low — but also by the standards of the most prosperous in the world.

A ‘Wasteful’ Habit

With the coming of the British the abundance of the lands disappeared almost overnight as it were. In the Chengalpattu region, which was one of the earliest in India to come under the British rule, the relatively modest average yields of 2.5 tons per hectare observed in the 1760s had come down to a mere 650 kg per hectare already by 1788. The yield of lands seems to have persisted around this low level throughout most of India during the whole of the British period. Average productivity of paddy in India in 1947 at the end of the British rule was less than a ton per hectare, that of wheat around 700 kg, and of the coarse grains much below that figure.

Availability of food per capita also declined precipitously, leading to the unending series of famines that kept visiting India throughout the British period. In 1880, when the British had their first serious look at the problem of famine, they estimated the available food to be around 280 kg per capita per year, which is to be compared with the availability of around 5.5 tons per household in the Chengalpattu of 1760s. Estimates of actual production in the 1890s, when the first systematic data were collected, turned out to be nearer 200 kg per capita per year. And our production remains near this figure even today. Thus did the British convert the traditional plenty into a scorching scarcity that persists with us till now. And they institutionalized the scarcity by forcibly deflecting the Indian polity away from its traditions of sharing. The institutional arrangements that the Indian kings had made for providing for the seekers, like thechatrams that the Raja of Thanjavur mentions in his letter of 1801, were unacceptable to the British from the very beginning. They insisted on withdrawing with a heavy hand the resources that used to flow to these institutions. Their insistence on such withdrawal of resources was so great that Richard Wellesely, the governor-general of the East India Company at the time of the conquest of Mysore in 1799, found it necessary to warn Diwan Purniah of dire consequences in case he indulged in the alienation of state revenues to such institutions. Purniah, who had been re-appointed the Diwan by the British to administer Mysore on their behalf but in the name of the hereditary ruler of Mysore, promptly reduced the resources assigned to such institutions from 2,33,954 to 56,993 controy pagodas in the very first year of the new administration.

In addition to scorching the lands and stunting the polity, the British polluted the minds of the Indians by turning them away from their discipline of giving before eating and towards a callous indifference to the hunger and want of others. The sharing that the Indians practised as a matter of the inherent discipline of being human, was disdained by the British as a wasteful habit. And their disdain had such impact on the newly emerging elite of India that already in 1829, William Bentinck, the then governor-general of the Company could write that, “...much of what used, in old times, to be distributed among beggars and Brahmins, is now, in many instances, devoted to the ostentatious entertainment of Europeans; and generally, the amount expended in useless alms is stated to have been much curtailed...”

The Indians who came under the sway of the British soon internalised the British judgments on the Indiandiscipline of sharing; the very first issue of Keshub Chandra Sen’s Sulabh Samachar, dated November 15, 1870, carried an article against the evil of giving alms. “Giving of alms to beggars is not an act of kindness,” the article proclaimed, “because it is wrong to live on another’s charity.” And the article went on to suggest that incapacitated beggars should instead be trained to do “useful things for society.” This attitude of demanding work of those who do not have enough to eat has over time become a cliche among the relatively well-off Indians, especially those who claim to have acquired a modern, rational consciousness.

However, in spite of all the efforts of the British, the habit of sharing before eating remained widespread enough for the Famine Commission of 1880 to fret about its consequences on what they described as the administration of famine. They were afraid that such caring by the people themselves may detract from the majesty and the sovereignty of the state and recommended:

“Native society in India is justly famous for its charity....Such charity is to be encouraged at the beginning of distress;... but when famine has once set in with severity it may become a serious evil unless it can be brought under some systematic control. ...When once Government has taken the matter thoroughly in hand and provided relief in one shape or another for all who need it, and a proper in closed place of residence for all casuals and beggars, street-begging and public distribution of alms to unknown applicants should be discouraged, and if possible entirely stopped.”

Incidentally, in the Indian scheme of things it is indeed the uninvited and unknown seeker at the door who is honoured by the name of atithi and who has to be sheltered and fed with great ceremony and respect by the householder for his daily discipline, of feeding others before eating for oneself, to be properly accomplished. As against the great ceremony and respect that the Indian tradition insisted must be bestowed upon a seeker, the relief that the British administration provided in times of famine, and which according to the famine commissioners justified their discouraging, if not completely banning, the Indian tradition of caring for others, consisted in providing a survival wage, “sufficient for the purposes of maintenance but not more”, in return for a day’s hard labour at specially organised work sites. For those whose health had deteriorated beyond the possibility of work, the commissioners recommended provision of “dole” after due examination by inspecting officers, and the dole was to be withdrawn as soon as a person, in the eyes of the inspecting officer, began to look fit enough for work. Even from women “who by national custom” were “unable to appear in public”, the commissioners expected work, in the form of spinning cotton for the state, in return for the dole of grains provided to them and their children.

Such was the horror that the British administrators felt for the “gratuitous” giving out of food, which for the Indians is the very essence of being human. And, the famine commissioners’ report of 1880 became the basis for the creation of an elaborate bureaucracy for the management of relief and distress, and the judgments and sensibilities of the British thus became institutionalized into state controlled mechanisms for commanding the supply and distribution of food, that remain with us till today.

In spite of all this the ordinary Indians till recently retained some sense of the discipline of endeavouring to have a plenty of food and sharing what one has with others before partaking of it oneself. However, the continued scarcity and the almost total conversion of the mainstream of Indian public life to the western ways have so befuddled our minds that even the residual memory of the Indian ways seems to be finally fading. And amongst the more resourceful of the Indians there is not even a feeling of shame for the continuance of extreme scarcity or for the all pervading hunger of men and animals around them.

We, who, as a people, used to be so scrupulous about caring for all creation, have become callous about the hunger and starvation of people and animals. We know of the hunger around us, and we fail to care. We, all of us together, all the resourceful pople of India, bear this terrible sin, in common.

But we cannot continue to live in sin. No nation with such a sin on its head can possibly come into itself without first expiating it. We shall be liberated from the sin only when we begin to take the classical injunction of annam bahu kurvitaseriously, and begin to grow a great abundance of food again. We have not so far taken to the task with proper application. It is true that during the last fifty years, productivity of foodgrains has improved sufficiently to lift the national average to near two tons per hectare. But this average is quite below what was achieved in the eighteenth century in a relatively difficult and dry coastal terrain like that of Chengalpattu, and it is far below the level of productivity today in almost any other region of the world. And, in any case, all increase in productivity has taken place on about 30 percent of the Indian lands, which have high resources of capital and modern technology and which produce for the market. The remaining about 70 percent of the lands, large parts of which lie in the fertile plains of the bounteous Indian rivers, continue in the state of deprivation and neglect to which they were reduced during the British rule and continue to produce barely one indifferent crop a year.

With care and application these lands can produce the abundance that classical India cherished, and in the process can enliven large numbers of Indians who have been forced into economic idleness because of the idleness of the lands. Much is said about the growing population of India that has made it difficult for the lands to feed them all. But India is a country endowed with rare natural abundance. Unlike almost any other major region of the world, India is a country, where more than half of the geographical area is potentially cultivable, where almost every major geographical region is traversed by a great perennial river, and where the climate is so fecund that crops can grow throughout the year in almost every part. Notwithstanding her density of population, arable land per capita in India is still twice that in China and only marginally less than that in Europe. The sin of scarcity shall be wiped off the face of India only when the idle lands begin to be looked after with care and attention once again, and the bounty that nature has bestowed upon India is converted into an abundance of food.

Therefore, even before we begin to undertake the great task of bringing the abundance back to the Indian lands, we have to bring ourselves back to the inviolable discipline of sharing. We have to make a national resolve to care for the hunger of our people and animals. There is not enough food in the country to fully assuage the hunger of all; but, even in times of great scarcity, a virtuous grhasthaand a disciplined nation would share the little they have with the hungry. We have to begin such sharing immediately, if the task of achieving an abundance is to succeed.

To us, Indians, sharing of food comes naturally. We do not have to be taught how to share, how to perform annadana because, we have been taught the greatness of anna and of annadana by our ancestors, and we have practised the discipline of growing and sharing in abundance since the beginning of time. For such a nation to obliterate the memory of a mere two centuries of scarcity and error is a simple matter. Let us recall the inviolable discipline of sharing that defines the essence of being Indian. Abundance will inevitably arrive in the wake of such annadana.

References and Extracts are from Annam Bahu Kurvita:Recollecting the Indian Discipline of Growing and Sharing Food in Plenty - Published by Centre for Policy Studies, Chennai.

Nice Little Story:Indra and the Ants

2011-01-20T03:10:00.001-08:00

Story from the Brahma Vaivarata Purana
In this story, Indra defeats Vrtrasura and releases the waters from bondage. Elevated to the rank of King of the gods, Indra orders the heavenly craftsman, Vishvakarma, to build him a grand. celestial palace. Full of pride, Indra continues to demand more and more improvements for the palace.As his vision unfold. He requires additional terraces and pavilions, more ponds, groves, and pleasure grounds. Whenever Indra arrived to appraise the work of Vishvakarma, he developed vision beyond vision of marvels remaining to be contrived.
Vishwakarma goes on making the improvement, and in the end he is not able to take in any more. Exhausted, Vishvakarma requests Lord Brahma the Creator, for help. Lord Brahma in turn appeals to Lord Vishnu, the Supreme Being, for assistance.
Early next morning,Lord Vishnu sets to visit Indra's palace in the form of a young brahmana boy. The boy is about ten years old,dwarfish, smiling, and radiant with the luster of wisdom. Indra discovers the boy amidst a cluster of enraptured, staring children. Indra welcomes him in and respectfully recieves him. Vishnu begins the conversation by praising Indra's palace, and then casually adds that no former Indra had succeeded in building such a palace. At first, Indra amused by the young boy's claim to know of former Indras. But the amusement turns to horror as the boy starts telling Indra about his former ancestors, about the great cycles of creation and destruction, and even about the infinite number of worlds scattered through the void, each with its own Indra. The boy claims to have seen them all.
During the course of the boy's talk, a long procession of Ants enters the palace and catches his attention. On seeing the procession of the Ants, the boy laughs loudly. Astonished and equally humbled, Indra asks the boy the reason for his amusement. To Indra's horror, the boy reveals that the ants were once Indras in their previous lifetimes! For all his celestial splendor, Indra comes to see his own insignificance in the creation when he sees the ants.
Another visitor then enters the hall. He is Lord Shiva, in the form of a hermit Lomasa, and Indra receives him and then sees another strange sight. On the chest of hermit, lie a circular cluster of hairs, which are intact at the circumference, but with a gap in the middle - the center is devoid of hairs. Indra worships him respectfully, and the anxiously asks him the reason for the disappearance of hair from the center of his chest.
Stating that he knows about his own short lifetime, Lord Shiva reveals that each of these chest hairs corresponds to the life of one Indra. Each time a hair falls, one Indra dies and another replaces him. He further adds that his own lifetime will be over by the period of Brahma!With this revelation, the Muni abruptly disappears and so does the young boy.Indra was startled and amazed to behold this sight, it seemed to him as if it was a dream.
No longer interested in wealth and honor, Indra rewards Vishvakarma and releases him from any further work on the palace. Indra having acquired wisdom, himself decides to leave his life of luxury to become a hermit and seek wisdom!
Horrified, Indra's wife Sachi asks Indra's spiritual guide Brihaspati to intervene and change her husband's mind and resolve. Brihaspati then teaches Indra to see the virtues of both the spiritual life and the worldly life. Thus, at the end of the story, Indra learns how to pursue wisdom while still fulfilling his kingly duties. And thus the pride of Indra is vanquished, and wisdom awakens in the end!

Health and Mobile Phones

2011-01-16T09:31:00.001-08:00

Alarming report. A government funded study conducted by JNU School of Environmental Sciences has found that exposure to radiation from mobile phones and mobile towers could have an adverse impact on human health - especially fertility as well as depleting the cell defence mechanisms, leading to malignant tumours. The results of these tests match up with similar studies been done in the West.

The report also underlines the extended risk to people living close to cellphone towers. A summary of the findings appears in The Hindu and can be found here.

A similar article had appeared in the "Down To Earth" magazine published by Centre for Science and Environment(CSE) in July 2009 and laid out similar concerns over the mushrooming of cell phone towers in residential areas. The report quotes Girish Kumar, professor of electrical engineering at Mumbai IIT, on the radiation limit in India - "We have allowed 4.5 Watt per sqm as the safe limit. Russia has put a limit of 0.02 Watt and Germany 0.001 Watt," he said. "You know what 4.5 Watt means? It is same as putting someone in a microwave for 19 minutes a day,"...here.

And yet the industry is slow to react to these studies and worse, they are ignored and no action is taken to protect human health.

I had got this in my mail box in March 2010, an entire article quoting a number of scientific studies regarding the safety of mobile phones. Extracts -

Despite industry’s reluctance to admit the scientific basis of placing a prominent warning on every cell phone sold, the legislation was indeed prompted by such scientific findings.

A study by Dr. Siegal Sadetzki linking cell phone use to salivary gland tumors

Wearing a cell phone on your hip – either on your belt or in a pocket – has been linked to decreased bone density in the pelvic region. (All the other vital organs located in your pelvic region – your liver, kidney, bladder, colon and reproductive organs – are also susceptible to radiation damage)

Proximity to cell phone towers causes an increase in the symptoms of electromagnetic hypersensitivity, including fatigue, sleep disturbances, visual and auditory disturbances, and cardiovascular effects
The 2009 special EMF issue of the Journal of Pathophysiology, which contains over a dozen different studies on the health effects of electromagnetic fields and wireless technology

In addition, a review of 11 long-term epidemiologic studies published in the journal Surgical Neurology revealed that using a cell phone for 10 or more years approximately doubles the risk of being diagnosed with a brain tumor on the same side of the head where the cell phone is typically held.
Another noted brain cancer authority, Australian Dr Vini Gautam Khurana, published a paper in 2008 titled: Mobile Phones and Brain Tumors, which also covers more than 100 sources of recent medical and scientific literature on this topic.

Protecting Yourself and Family

The bare minimum, don’t let young children use a cell phone or other wireless devices, and avoid cell phone exposure while pregnant or carrying your infant as children are FAR more susceptible to harm from microwave radiation than adults.

If you’re not prepared to ditch your cell phone, you can at least minimize exposure by heeding the following advice
Reduce your cell phone use: Turn your cell phone off more often. Reserve it for emergencies or important matters. As long as your cell phone is on, it emits radiation intermittently, even when you are not actually making a call.
Use a land line at home and at work: Although more and more people are switching to using cell phones as their exclusive phone contact, it is a dangerous trend and you can choose to opt out of the madness.
Reduce or eliminate your use of other wireless devices: You would be wise to cut down your use of these devices. Just as with cell phones, it is important to ask yourself whether or not you really need to use them every single time.
Use your cell phone only where reception is good: The weaker the reception, the more power your phone must use to transmit, and the more power it uses, the more radiation it emits, and the deeper the dangerous radio waves penetrate into your body. Ideally, you should only use your phone with full bars and good reception.
Also seek to avoid carrying your phone on your body as that merely maximizes any potential exposure. Ideally put it in your purse or carrying bag.
SAR value, while providing information for comparison purposes between phones, is very limited in its usefulness as a measure of ‘safety.’ For more details on SAR values, please review this previous article.
Keep your cell phone away from your body when it’s on: The most dangerous place to be, in terms of radiation exposure, is within about six inches of the emitting antenna. You do not want any part of your body within that area.
The Web site ElectromagneticHealth.org also offers ten free audio interviews with some of the world’s leading experts in the field of EMF.
Will keep this page updated with latest news.

By Ritesh

Bhagavad Gita in Iraq

2011-01-16T09:29:00.000-08:00

An American soldier sees hundreds dying at the battlefield in Iraq. He wonders about the questions that have disturbed mankind for over two millennium; 'Who are we?' 'What is death and is there life after death?' Ari Sonnenberg, from Brooklyn New York, USA is a soldier in the US Army. And in the middle of a war, he discovers in the Bhagavad Gita, the answers to his questions. And Mr. Sonnenberg's life changed ever since.
Ari picked up a Bhagavad Gita while in US in 1994, and had been deeply touched by Lord Krishna's call for duty and love. Now while fighting deadly battles in Iraq, he began to get lonely, and pondered over the questions of life. The Gita he carried with him, provided solace and strength. "I was pleasantly surprised when one evening I shared this knowledge with my friends, and they too became receptive and eager to know more", says Ari Sonnenberg. While in US, Ari also met his guru, spiritual preceptor, Kadamba Kanan Swami, a teacher of Bhagavad Gita, and who originally hails from Netherlands. "I am amazed at the profound wisdom of Bhagavad Gita. The temporary nature of this body and the world is succinctly presented in the Gita, along with the knowledge of a spiritual path" says Ari. "I now know I can love God and re-establish my relationship with Him, even while serving my country in a war." Ari's guru inspired him to make the best of his situation, and encouraged him to preach the message of Gita. Ari confesses to be a beginner student of the Gita but wonders how much more ecstasy waits to be plundered with deeper study of Bhagavad Gita, and a more sincere practise of spiritual life.
What prompted him to commit to serious study and preaching of the Bhagavad Gita? Ari recalls the testing moment, "I had to pick up dead children while on a battle at Kosovo, and the whole thing sickened me. I was internally lost and confused. At night, as I picked up my copy of the Gita, Lord Krishna guided me with the immortal words in the eighteenth chapter, especially, 18.66- do not fear." Ari's positive demeanour, even in trying and extremely provocative situations inspired his superiors to appreciate and recognize his special position. "My superiors think Bhagavad Gita is excellent. They have also become favourable," exudes Ari with child like enthusiasm, "my old commander would offer pranams in the traditional Indian way. My new supervisor came by because he remembered seeing my salagram silas (a stone likeness of the Lord) in Kuwait and he wanted to have an audience (darshan) before them again." US Army officials have noted that while many soldiers fighting a gruelling war are interested in escaping reality, Ari is really keen to help each person develop the good in themselves.
After returning from his gruelling and life threatening missions, each evening Ari cooks a small meal of Dahl and chapatti for his Lord, and accepts the remnants as Prasad. He then studies Bhagavad Gita reverentially. For a few minutes he also teaches mantra meditation to his Army brothers at the defence unit, and then retires for the night. There are some soldiers taking guidance from him. "They ask questions and seek solace in their craziness." Ari reveals, "I don't force anything on them; they ask and I repeat Lord Krishna's words." Ari's positive outlook and Gita's spiritual potency has helped the few dozen soldiers, whom Ari has personally counselled, in emotionally troubled times.He has been counselling the soldiers since 17 years now.
What is the one most important realization in Ari Sonnenberg's life that he wishes to share with all? "Lord Krishna is kind. If we spread His message of Bhagavad Gita, He certainly reciprocates. In my opinion, Lord Krishna wants us to give Him to everyone with whom we come in contact. We can do that in our own way."
His final word of advice to Indians, "Please do not take this great wealth of India for granted. You are in the best situation in the world. Please make your lives perfect and share this priceless gift of spiritual culture with the whole world."
Thanks to Arise India Forum!

The Divisions of Time

2010-11-01T12:22:00.000-07:00

Carl Sagan, in his book, Cosmos writes:

"Hinduism is the only religion in which the time scales correspond... to those of modern scientific cosmology. Its cycles run from our ordinary day and night to a day and night of the Brahma, 8.64 billion years long, longer than the age of the Earth or the Sun and about half the time since the Big Bang"

Indeed, the divisions of time propounded by the ancient sages is incredible, and the life span of different classes of living beings as described in the various Puranas appears unbelievable- human life does not even form a tiny part in the affairs of the universe according to this world view.

We may start with the description of the Yugas - there are 4 yugas in the this timescale which repeat themselves cyclically.These 4 Yugas are called Satya, Treta, Dvapara and Kali Yuga - which last for 12,000 years of the demigods.Different classes of living entities dwell in these Yugas on earth according to their level of consciousness. These 4 Yugas are experienced by only those living entities who are in the earthly planetary systems - there is no effect of these Yugas on the demigods

A year of the demigods is 360 years of human beings. Taking this into account, the duration of various Yugas

Satya Yuga - 4,800 x 360 = 1,728,000 years Treta Yuga - 3600 x 360 = 1,296,000 years Dvapara Yuga - 2,400 x 360 = 864,000 years Kali Yuga - 1200 x 360 = 432, 000 years

So, combined these yugas last for 4.32 million or 43.2 lac human years.One cycle of the Yugas is known as a Catur Yuga.

One thousand Catur Yugas combine to form Brahma's day and Brahma's night is of the same period - a night and day of 4.32 billion years! Thus, Brahma's day lasts for 8.64 billion years. Brahma's months also have 30 days, and Brahma thus lives on for 100 years. The lifespan of Brahma comes out to be an astounding 311 trillion 40 billion human years.

Creation of the planetary systems begins at the start of the Brahma's day and these creations continue to exists throughout the fourteen Manus - thus each of these Manu's have a lifetime of 71 catur-yugas, which is nearly 305 million years. The various posts in heaven, such as that of Indra, the seven sages and his followers, simultaneously come in the reign of Manu.

There's an interesting point to note, however, that one's life endures only for hundred years, in terms of lifespans in different planets - which means although Brahma lives for trillions of years according to human beings. he lives only for hundred years according to his perception. Time is relative to the consciousness of the living entity - 100 years of human beings amount to only 3 months of the demigods in the higher planetary systems, and in Brahma's timescale - it does even count up to 1 second!

These figures are astronomical - and as such they might be brushed off as "fictitious" or "mythological". However, we need not be conditioned by our own experiences of lifetimes while judging the correctness of such figures.A hundred year lifespan of human beings does not imply the non existence of living entities who may have such extraordinary life spans.If we go by such logic, then we might end up being the "frog in the well"!

By M.Ritesh

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Do .CO domain has future ?

2010-10-25T11:43:00.000-07:00

I definitely see the .co domains taking over .com, there are so many .com domain names registered right now, and it is so overcrowded that new companies and startups will have more opportunities and new options to register .co domains and choose a good name for the new business.
.CO Domains

I’m not sure I agree with the traffic potential of .CO domains for people who simply forget to type the m at the end of the domain. Any cybersquatters who pick up domains which benefit from that sort of traffic from typos will run the risk of the brand in question legally recouping the .CO again.
However, the .CO has huge potential to online marketing in my opinion. I’ve pre registered quite a number of general availability .CO domains with LCN –as they are doing a no-win no-fee system. I believe the resale value of the ones I secure will certainly outweigh the investment.
The sunrise stage of .CO will not really give a good indication to the potential of this domain as large brands will certainly secure the .CO to avoid any future headaches. The Landrush auction prices people are will to pay will really give domainers and online marketers a clear insight as to the potential uptake of this extension.

Why .CO?

With the .COM inventory nearly exhausted, .CO is a perfect, short alternative for branding your business.
.CO domains are a global, credible, and memorable extension for your online presence.
It's new! No need to compromise - find your ideal domain

Language as a Tool for Conquest

2010-10-25T11:12:00.000-07:00

I came across this interesting article by Rajeev Srinivasan(written way back in 2000)while searching about the importance of language in the culture of a country...Interesting read-It gives some great ideas about what should actually be the official(or national, rather) language of India.

Language as a mask of conquest

The garden-variety Hindi that seems to be in vogue in the North has another major problem: that a significant portion of its vocabulary is borrowed from Urdu, and thence from Persian and Arabic. These languages are completely alien to the South Indian -- the words might as well be from Swahili. Whereas, and this is a point of agreement I might have with the Hindi-chauvinists, if it were a Sanskrit-heavy Hindi, Southerners could relate to it, for the Sanskrit vocabulary exists in our languages, except perhaps in Tamil.
Thus, for a Malayali, the word for 'eye' would naturally be chaste Sanskrit, nayanam or netram; the word musafir is meaningless, but yatri is instantly recognisable. Literary Malayalam, for instance, has far more Sanskrit in it (some 80 per cent of the vocabulary) than Hindi does; similarly for Kannada and Telugu. To us, Sanskrit is not alien; and our languages have precise analogs for Devanagari, so that Sanskrit can be written exactly and correctly in Malayalam, Kannada or Telugu scripts.
Therefore, and because all our classical literatures were heavily influenced by Sanskrit, I think none of the Southern states (except Tamil Nadu) would have objected to the selection of Sanskrit as India's national language. As the Israelis have done with Hebrew, we could easily have revived Sanskrit, modernised it and discovered our own culture; and perhaps some self-respect too. But we didn't.
However, I am glad there is some effort to revitalise Sanskrit. This is the most scientifically designed natural language ever created -- Panini articulated the idea of context-free grammars 2,500 years before Backus and Naur rediscovered this for computer languages in the 1950s. It also has very likely the world's largest ancient literature. And it has tremendous liturgical importance for Hindus. We still could make it India's national language. It is the only one that makes any sense, for all the right reasons:lingua franca, literature, liturgy, culture.
Nehruvian Stalinists disdained Sanskrit -- and the reason is quite plain: supporting Sanskrit would not fit into their master-plan to eradicate Indic tradition. You think I joke: but let me ask you the question -- what are the three classical languages of India? You will be surprised to hear the answer, according to the Indian Council for Historical Research (or is it the Indian Cabal of High-handed Revisionists, I wonder). See below.
Nehruvian Stalinists, caught up in their vision of a Marxian utopia, felt that they needed to overturn Indic traditions in order to bring about the communist millennium. Therefore, they proceeded to denigrate Sanskrit and de-emphasise it. They have succeeded. Today, it is extremely difficult for the average person to learn Sanskrit. It is also hard for the average Hindu to find his sacred texts in the original Sanskrit.
These tactics used by the Marxists are exactly the same as those used by semites to destroy the cultures of lands they conquered. Create a vacuum, and then fill it with their own dogma. Christians in Europe demonised the Druidic religion they had overcome; they also destroyed whatever they could find of the sacred Druidic literatures. As they did in the Aztec, Mayan and Inca lands in Latin America.
This idea of language and culture for conquest, so pithily summarised in 'Macaulay's Minute', is also behind a most interesting experiment. Question for the reader: Where and when was English literature first studied as a subject? This is the question that underlies Gauri Visvanathan's brilliant Columbia PhD thesis, later published as the book Masks of Conquest: Literary Study and British Rule in India, (Columbia University Press, 1989).
If you guessed Oxford or Cambridge, you are wrong: because it was in Madras University in the early 1800s that English was first studied as a literary subject! English, which was considered unworthy of serious study (Oxbridge only studied Latin/Greek), was brought to India as part of a colonial plan -- the intent was to demonstrate to the 'natives' that everything British was superior. Macaulay, full of imperial swagger, suggested that the entire classical canon in Sanskrit was not worth as much a shelf-full of books in any schoolboy's library in Britain!
J Farish, in a chilling minute from the Bombay Presidency suggested, "The Natives must either be kept down by a sense of our power, or they must willingly submit from a conviction that we are more wise, more just, more humane, and more anxious to improve their condition than any other rulers they could possibly have." In other words, it was for pure propaganda purposes.
English, therefore, was a tool for brainwashing the Indian. After the introduction of English into Madras University, the imperialists then decided to use it -- alas, with less success -- in Ireland and other colonies too. Sweet irony, then, that the Empire is now striking back, and that with our English, Indians may dominate intellectual property in certain fields! One of these days, India may also 'own' English to a greater extent than Britain itself, by sheer weight of numbers.
The Nehruvian Stalinist use of language was a similar effort at cultural eradication. Fortunately, it has not succeeded, at least not fully. For the foreseeable future, despite the Hindi juggernaut, I think the many larger languages in India will survive and thrive; as India becomes more self-confident, Sanskrit will make a comeback, too.
Many tears have been shed over the alleged demise of Urdu. I find this bemusing: for one, there is a whole country, Pakistan, that has Urdu as its language; and there, it is overwhelming the regional languages such as Pushto, Baluchi and Punjabi just as Hindi is doing in India. Besides, Urdu has become the lingua franca of Bollywood film songs, after all. So don't cry for Urdu, Argentina!
I have continually been surprised at the great reverence certain Indians have for Urdu: the same metaphor of 'masks of conquest' applies to it too. When Muslim rulers, say in Delhi or Lucknow, preferred Persian motifs and Arabic words, it had overtones of conquest. And it made a certain sense for their subjects to kowtow to them. Three hundred years ago, it made sense to genuflect to Urdu; not today. Today, with a non-religious Indian state (except I guess when Nehruvian Stalinists run the place), it is time to view Urdu critically, on its own merits.
While I do sympathise with those who feel their culture is tied inexorably to Urdu, I fail to understand why India needs to give the language of its most bitter enemy, Pakistan, any great respect. And I also fail to see why the use of Persian or Arabic words is a sign of great scholarship or great artistic sensitivity.
People tell me Urdu just sounds more beautiful than Hindi. I think this is a very subjective claim. My friend Reeta Sinha went to some trouble to explain the words to the songs in the film Taal and how they were apparently sufi qawwalis or some such. Very nice, I'm sure, but I still fail to see why the Urdu word ishq is any prettier than the word prem in Hindi. It's just different. Maybe all they are saying is vive la difference!"
To summarise, the plethora of languages in India will probably continue into the near future; much as certain Northerners might like to push their idea of a 'Bharat' which is Hindi-only (I keep getting mail from reader Mohan suggesting this), I think they will not succeed. And this is a good thing too. Let a hundred flowers bloom! Let the marketplace decide which will thrive. Let the state get out of this business, just as it is getting out of the mammoth public sector white elephants.
But there is one exception: Sanskrit should be declared the national language and a vigorous programme put in place to explore its tremendous riches. We need to reverse 50 years of neglect. We must put a lot of effort into deciphering the Indus-Sarasvati Valley Civilisation's language. My suspicion is that it will show that there was no 'Aryan' invasion, no 'Dravidian' race: our early civilisation,was possibly the oldest in the world with the city-site in Mehrgarh, Pakistan going back to 6000 BCE, earlier than Sumeria, earlier than Babylon, earlier than Mesopotamia.
Blog Authors Note-The article was published first in 2000-the author suspects that the there was No Aryan Invasion. In spite of repeated push by the Communist Indologists, the Aryan Invasion Theory seems to be failing. The latest Harvard University study demolishes it convincingly.Only remains to be seen when it will be erased from the TextBooks!
I suspect we will find that the Sarasvati language was indeed both proto-Sanskrit and proto-Tamil, thus demonstrating once and for all the total and historical cultural unity of Indian civilisation. No more separate identities: just migrations from that riverine cradle of civilisation in the Sarasvati flood-plain to other parts of the Indian subcontinent.
India's "classical languages"
According to the ICHR, if I am not greatly mistaken, India's classical languages are: Sanskrit, Persian and Arabic! Only in Nehruvian India would such a travesty be acceptable. I agree that Persian and Arabic are classical languages -- for Persia and Arabia, respectively, not for India. Why English is not a classical language in India according to the esteemed ICHR, by the same token, is not clear to me.
In my opinion, India's classical languages are Sanskrit, Pali/Prakrit and Tamil. These form the true literatures of the Indic tradition -- Vedic Hindu, Buddhist/Jaina, and non-Vedic Hindu. Naturally, the Nehruvian Stalinists were eager to condemn all three of these as part of their enterprise of destroying Indic civilisation.

by M Ritesh

Questions on India's (Mutiliated) History

2010-10-25T11:09:00.000-07:00

Stephen Knapp

It is interesting that the common laypersons are quicker to see the logic in the new research findings and in considering these new architectural discoveries than the academic scholars.
The academicians who cling to such ideas tend not to write more books justifying what they teach, but seem to spend more time on trying to debunk, criticize or discredit the new findings or theories that seem more relevant and able to answer or put to rest the age-old questions.
Just a few of these questions include:
1.Where is the pre-Aryan language that existed if the people of India were not part of the Vedic culture?
2.What existed in India before the Vedic culture, if it was brought by invaders?
3.If the Vedic Aryans invaded the Indus region after 1500 BC, then how is it that the Vedas glorify the greatness of the Sarasvati River which is known to have dried up no later than 1800 BC?
4.How did the Vedic Aryans know of the Sarasvati River at all, unless they were already there and a part of the advanced Vedic culture from thousands of years ago?
5.How is it that Arabic and European countries were able to make advancements in mathematics only after they learned the numeric system that originated in India, now called the Arabic numerals, with its unique symbol of zero?
6.Why, when we seriously look at the way the area of India, the Middle East and Europe developed, it appears that the advanced nature of society came from India rather than from outside and then back into it?
7.When we read in the Puranas of the advanced organizational nature of the Vedic cities and their fabulous palaces and buildings such as in Dwaraka as found in the Bhagavat Purana, why should we think that India had no amazing structures before the Muslim invaders entered the country?

Should we think that ancient Indians only lived in forests and tents? That's what it seems many academicians would have us believe. Anyway, these and other questions have not and can not be answered by the old ideas on India's history such as the Aryan Invasion Theory.

Interesting read, indeed.

by M Ritesh

Marxists and Indian History

2010-10-24T08:18:00.000-07:00

Marxists and Indian History

Among the most active and determined academic opponents of any serious reopening of the "Aryan Invasion Theory "we find Marxists such as Prof. Romila Thapar (whose positions will be discussed below) and Prof. Ram Sharan Sharma. Let us make it clear from the outset that there is nothing controversial about the label “Marxist”: in India, Marxism is still the dominant paradigm in the Humanities, and hundreds of academics are still proud to call themselves Marxists. It is therefore a bit bizarre when Romila Thapar insinuates that the non-AIT school merely uses the label “Marxist” as a cheap way to dismiss the Indian pro-AIT scholars like Sharma and herself without proper refutation: “Those that question their theories are dismissed as Marxists!” If confirmation from an unsuspect Marxist source is needed, Tom Bottomore’s standard dictionary of Marxism mentions and quotes both R.S. Sharma and Romila Thapar as representatives of Indian Marxism.

The Marxist dominance of India’s cultural sphere is not a convenient rumour, it can easily be documented and its genesis traced and explained. Nehru was fond of Communism though personally too bourgeois to join it. It was chiefly his daughter Indira Gandhi (guided by her secretary P.N. Haksar) who, when she was critically dependent on Communist support during her intra-Congress power struggle, promoted Communists (often unregenerate Stalinists till today) and created many new institutes for them, including Jawaharlal Nehru University. In 1975, when the Communist bid to take over the Congress Party from within was thwarted by Indira’s son Sanjay Gandhi, the Communist power position in the intellectual sector was left untouched: its importance escaped the Gandhi family, who only focused on immediate political power.

When in 1998, the new BJP Government nominated people of its own choice to the Indian Council of Historical Research, a roar of indignation went up among Indian Marxists against this “politicization of scholarship”, highlighting to the alert observer the extent to which the Marxists themselves had treated the ICHR as their own playground, and how, like spoilt children, they couldn’t stand losing it.

Marx’s Indian followers have a confused but predominantly negative attitude to the question of India’s legitimacy as a united republic. They are willing to accept the unified Indian state as long as it is useful to their own ends (as in 1959-62, after their election victory in Kerala gave them hope of taking over India, a hope crushed by the embarrassing Chinese invasion of 1962), but they are just as ready to discard it, because they do not believe in it and have no loyalty towards it. Around the time of independence, they actively campaigned for the Balkanization of India, hoping to gobble up one fragment after another. They never tire of denouncing anything that bolsters India’s unity as a “myth”. For them, India is an artificial unit, a prisonhouse of nations, bound to fall apart.

In contrast with other colonized countries, Marxists in India played no important role in the freedom movement, except negatively. According to a Western Marxist observer: “Uncompromising opposition to Gandhi and his cherished Hindu convictions meant that communists were cut off in a considerable measure from the mainstream of the patriotic struggle”.Ever since, they have supported every antinational cause: the crushing of the Quit India movement (1942), Partition (1947), the Razakar terror campaign to prevent the merger of Hyderabad with India (1948), the Chinese claims to Indian territory (up to 1962: “China’s chairman is also India’s chairman”). As late as 1997, Communist leader Sitaram Yechury refused to admit that China had been the aggressor in 1962.⁷¹ In the 1990s, they have threatened secession of the states they control in the event of a Hindu-nationalist election victory. It is a different matter that by the time this victory took place, in 1998, the Communist movement had become too weak and grey to hazard such action.

To complete the picture, it should be realized that as born upper-caste Hindus alienated by westernization, Indian Marxists are animated by a seething hatred of their ancestral culture. Unlike the British who felt some patronizing sympathy for the heathens whom God had entrusted to their civilizing care, anglicized Hindus feel a need to exorcize the remainders of Hindu heritage from themselves and their surroundings.

Marxism against India?

To understand the compulsion on Indian Marxists to hold out against changes in the dominant AIT paradigm as long as possible, we should know a few things about their unique position as compared to that of Marxists elsewhere. Their animosity against the native culture of India and against a theory which would strengthen their own country’s prestige is somewhat surprising, for in most Third World countries, Marxists have also been ardent nationalists in the struggle for cultural as well as political and economic decolonization. In Communist countries, national history was rewritten not only to vilify the reactionary forces (e.g. Confucius) but also to highlight and glorify the nation’s contribution to material culture and scientific progress. This is or was true of China, the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, and of their supporters abroad. Thus, Cambridge scientist historian Joseph Needham’s loyalty was to Mao’s version of Stalinism as a system, but he got enamoured with China itself and wrote a very Sinocentric history of Science and Civilization in China, highlighting the unexpectedly large contribution which China has made to human progress.

Along the same lines, we must note in India the lone Marxist historian Bhagwan Singh, who has contributed to the critique of the AIT, focusing specifically on the material culture and the economic data available in Vedic literature and the archaeological record of the Harappan cities, to show that the two match.Also, Western Marxists of an earlier generation have protested against the imperialist projection of colonial racism onto the colonized native society, as in the AIT-related racial theory of caste: “The early Indo-Aryans could no more have thought in modern terms of race prejudice than they could have invented the airplane.”Finally, Soviet historians have extolled ancient Hindu contributions to science and political culture which were ignored by their political allies in India

Most Indian Marxists, by contrast, along with their supporters in Western Indology departments (when it comes to controversial issues, most Western India-watchers are incredibly gullible parrots of whatever their privileged Indian contacts tell them), go out of their way to belittle India and to vilify as “chauvinistic” or worse any attempt to revalue India’s contribution. The mainstream of contemporary Indian Marxism is true to Karl Marx’s own contempt for and worst-possible interpretation of all things Indian. Marx thought that Hinduism “was the ideology of an oppressive and outworn society”; he “shared the distaste of most Europeans for its more lurid features. (…) he was as sceptical as his Hindu followers were to be of any notion of a Hindu ‘golden age’ of the past.”

Marx acknowledged the colonialists' historical mission of eliminating the “Asiatic mode of production”, and claimed that colonial rule could only be compared (to its obvious advantage) to the memory of Turkish or the threat of Czarist rule, but not to native rule, for which India was historically unfit because it had never been a nation. In an 1853 letter, Marx wrote that “Indian society has no history at all, at least no known history. What we call its history, is but the history of the successive intruders who founded their empires on the passive basis of that unresisting and unchanging society.”

The idea of a continuous and glorious civilization in North India dating back more than 5,000 years does not fit in well with this vision. That of the barbaric Aryans imposing foreign rule on the hapless natives is much more useful, esp. for characterizing Indian society as “oppressive”. This way, lingering colonial prejudices of Western scholars and the class interests of India’s anglicized elite and anti-Hindu intelligentsia reinforce each other to create the strange spectacle of Indians and indologists virulently opposing any rethinking of India’s past which might increase the weight of India’s own contribution to her own history.

by M Ritesh

The Degradation of Indian Television

2010-10-24T08:16:00.000-07:00

I have sourced this article from Deccan Herald, it is ascribed to an author called Shashi Krishna. I wonder how such rapid degradation has occured with Indian Television channel, that most of them have seemed to have forgotten the human values, and have unleashed a wave, a wave which is denigrating humanity, our customs, and our values- which differentiate from other species of life around us. Do we need someone to shout on us in order to make us understand basic values of life?Are we so addicted to hedonistic pleasures, that these channels can stoop to any low, make a child cry in reality show, just in order to give few minutes of excitement to immature viewers? Where are channels which promote those values on whose premise the long struggle for Independence was fought? Where are those channels, which help in building the character of young men and women, who will be future leaders?Is hedonism is what they aim to teach these young people?For people, who want to do something abt it after reading these view, e-mailing Information and Broadcasting ministry may be the best thing to do to save our folkmen from this-http://www.mib.nic.in/...For those who still remain un convinced, God help them!

It is with great regret, and a pinch of gut-wrenching shame, that I now announce the sad and official demise of Indian television. I am sure people have known of its death for a while now, but being one of the many blessed ones who don’t get to see it every day, I came to realise this tragic fact only recently. But before I go into the gory specifics, it is important to retrace my steps back a couple of decades. Maybe then, only then, can I make some sense of just how what used to be a major source of genuine entertainment came to such a sorry pass.
Growing up in a moderately self-assured India, the only television I knew was Doordarshan. I also know that the moment this name is mentioned many an eyes roll and tongues click with the clichéd tone that ‘Doordarshan’ is the name of a ghost that is now long gone. History. A pale memory from an era no one wants to be associated with anymore. I ordinarily would not have an issue with this attitude had there been something better to back it up with. But therein exists the success of my stereotypical tribute.
If Doordarshan is something we no longer care for, then why is it that the only serials and shows we can recall with joy even today are from that good old ghost’s lair? Be it anything from ‘Bharat Ek Khoj’ to ‘Malgudi Days’. Or from ‘Byomkesh Bakshi’ to ‘Karamchand’. Or from ‘Mungerilal ke haseen sapne’ to ‘Wagle ki duniya’. What was it about these images that still make us smile in peace? Why did it not matter that there was no hype, no hoopla and nothing dramatic to tease our excitement craving bones? Was it because the quality of writing was so wonderfully textured into the lives we used to lead back then?

Or was it that we, as people, were genuinely so intellectually gifted that we did not need additional coaxing to send home a point? Was it that we were a generation of naturally creative minded and spiritually advanced people? Or was it that we knew what it meant for literature and art to work in unison as the stories from our textbooks leapt out into the modesty of Doordarshan’s program? What was it?

I have spent almost a decade fighting with these questions that continue to bother me with their simplistic gorgeousness. When did we stop being humans and become … well, drones? When did sending a child to be on TV go from being a friendly family atmosphere with ‘Meri awaaz suno’ or ‘Bournvita Quiz Contest’ to shows where the kids are humiliated to tears for not being ‘good enough’ by an adult who is paid to be rude to a child on national TV? When did clever game shows like ‘Crystal Maze’ be replaced by the nauseating reek of immaturity mixed with pretentious pile of horse dung called ‘Dadagiri’? What is going on dear India? When did you become a place where people are so down trodden that they no longer care for something as subtle yet divine as ‘Surabhi’ ?
When did you get lost in a bizarre definition of your own making where you become the much revered and referenced washerman’s dog? You neither belong to the house nor to the stone on which he smashes strangers’ unmentionables each day. At least he has a conscience that is clearer than the water he uses to do his job but what about yours? Why do your citizens find perverse gratification in watching people weep and grieve on national TV? Why does someone else’s sorrow bring us so much happiness? Is this the beginning of the end of genuine intellect on the much adored idiot box?

Have we, as humans, taken a few steps back? Why are we silently consuming this foul offering with hedonistic silence? Do we need to be told everything by shouting it into our ears? Or is it that we want to shut out the saddening silences of our lives under their thunder? These are some of the other questions that bother me as I sit in absolute silence and watch the horror show that has become Indian television.

The serials, nay, mega-serials that take a decade to finish. The ‘reality’ shows that zero in on false emotions and shallow tears to cash in people’s eternal viewership. The mind numbingly insipid hosts who prance around behaving like glorified buffoons with fake accents. Oh! The sight is too painful to even think of.
It is in times like this that I actually feel glad I am not in India anymore. I don’t know what sort of human being I would have become had I been subjected to this meaningless and degrading form of ‘entertainment’ that the masses lap up like the faithful washerman’s unattached canine. Maybe I too would have let the slow moving venom of this insanity become the oxygen I would breathe in after a hard day at the washerman’s stone. I don’t know. Actually come to think of it I don’t even want to know.

My dad used to often tell me – ‘Stop watching so much TV! It will spoil you!’ I now smile at the irony of at that expression since compared to what I see now, what I was catered with by my good old pal Doordarshan should be considered a blessing from the Almighty. If I am what I am today with some sense of coherence to the written word, then it is because of shows that encouraged me to read.

Had it not been for their well timed inclusion into my life, chances are I would not have experienced the joy of knowing some of the greatest human beings who walked our planet. So, for that, I thank my friend Doordarshan. Your name was so apt, friend. Your vision was quite far fetched indeed.
Now I just hope that there will come a day when Indian television will be cleansed of the copied and modified versions of someone else’s show and something sincerely genuine makes it blessed appearance once again. Until then, let the public display of unabridged DEGRADATION and unashamed slavery continue.

by M Ritesh

The Age of Confusion

2010-10-24T08:14:00.000-07:00

India’s Heritage in Question
by Michael Domino

The present intellectual climate in India is so perverted that it would be tempting to go on and expose the workings of the perversion in exhaustive detail.

The point I wish to draw your attention to is how catchwords are hypnotically brandished, with no intelligent debate permitted on their real meaning. Indian scholars and thinkers must develop the courage to grapple with the central issues hidden behind those words. If they do not, they in effect abandon the field to the kind of perversion that has been growing in recent years, increasingly eclipsing India’s heritage and its contribution to world civilization, portraying it as retrograde and responsible for all of India’s ills. This school of thought, based on a freak hybrid of Marxist dialectics, psychoanalysis and Christian revivalism, has been steadily invading Western and Indian universities, textbooks, media, public opinion, erasing the last traces of Indian culture from Indian education and uprooting younger Indian generations from a culture which should be theirs by birthright.

Ram Swarup’s warning needs to be heard :

Hindus are disorganized, self-alienated, morally and ideologically disarmed. They lack leadership ; the Hindu elites have become illiterate about their spiritual heritage and history and indifferent and even hostile towards their religion.... India has been asleep for too long, and it needed all these knocks and probably it would get more.

In 1926 Sri Aurobindo put it very simply : “Aggressive religions tend to overrun the earth. Hinduism on the other hand is passive and therein lies the danger.” This renewed aggressive, conquering effort on the part of Christianity and Islam, hiding behind their misbegotten child of false secularism, must be resisted by the Indian intelligentsia for two reasons. One, of immediate urgency, to limit and hopefully reverse the harm done to India’s social fabric by artificial conversions, induced ninety-nine times out of a hundred by pecuniary allurements, not by any genuine religious feeling. Unless the tide is stemmed, the infinite complexity that is Indian society may become irretrievably fragmented into thousands of conflicting groups, with the kind of consequences we can already see in the North-East and many tribal regions of India.

The second reason, more essential, is to pursue and renew India’s perennial search for the Truth. If we unquestioningly accept the falsehoods that are now bandied about, we shall in the end cripple our ability to discern the Truth. “It is Truth that conquers and not falsehood,” says the Upanishad, and to work out that conquest for the world has always been at the core of India’s preoccupation. This is no ideological question, it is a matter of saving or losing our intellectual independence and ultimately our spiritual freedom—the only one left to the common Indian.

As early as 1910, Sri Aurobindo asserted :

Our first necessity, if India is to survive and do her appointed work in the world, is that the youth of India should learn to think,—to think on all subjects, to think independently, fruitfully, going to the heart of things, not stopped by their surface, free of prejudgments, shearing sophism and prejudice asunder as with a sharp sword, smiting down obscurantism of all kinds as with the mace of Bhima.

Were Indian civilization, ever in quest of new realms of reality, to surrender its independence of mind and spirit, the loss would be grave not only for India but for the world, for between moribund religious obscurantism trying to revive and grab the earth once more, and the new market fundamentalism that has well nigh grabbed it, humanity’s future appears rather bleak. We must work to see that India fulfils her role and opens a new path. We must make up for lost time.

by M Ritesh

few best competation for the people who intrested in the web development

2010-10-19T00:13:00.000-07:00

Hi,

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CONDITIONS APPLY

Is .CO domain make some change ????????

2010-10-15T13:21:00.000-07:00

Hi myself Ambresh.Kencha founder and MD of KCS

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