Random Thoughts - IX

I thought of categorizing middle class corruption listed by this article in the Outlook magazine.

1. Paying in "black" when buying a house: Corruption
2. Bribing cops to get away with minor offences:
- jumping the signal or breaking one way, no u-turn: Corruption and criminal act
- carrying no proper documents (forgetting RC, license): Mistake by the person
- having no proper documents: Corruption and Criminal act
- no pollution certificate: Stupidity (Pollution certificate is an official scam by the governments)
3. Paying "capitation fee" in higher educational institutes: No corruption from the briber as the benefit has to be earned but corruption by the management. Unclear criminal act as the loss to a more deserved isn't confirmed since capitation fee is legal because of loopholes.
4. Bribing for school admission: No corruption from the briber as the benefit has to be earned but corruption by the management.Unclear criminal act as the loss to a more deserved isn't confirmed since capitation fee is legal because of loopholes.
5. Buying an illegal driving license (or any license): Corruption and criminal act
6. Paying extra to get gas cylinders ontime, when in short supply: Corruption and criminal act (your benefit some one else's loss)
7. Fudging bills to claim refunds: Corruption and treason
8. Avoiding paying income tax: Corruption and treason
9. Bribing cops when they come for passport identification: Insecurity (passport is not a benefit but the right of a citizen)
10. Pulling strings even paying touts, to confirm a waitlisted railway ticket: Corruption and the criminal act (your benefit, some one else's loss)

Updated:
http://bantwal.blogspot.in/2011/05/random-thoughts-ixa.html

The Moral Individual - iib

When I was an impressionable teenager (in my early teens) I used to watch a program on animal rights on television. At that time our(my family's) meat eating was restricted to fish(not on daily basis). Chicken or mutton was rare. The family were on and off vegetarians with my father holding himself off for more than 25 years then coming back to the normal self towards the end of his life.

The program was about how non-vegetarianism was leading to inhuman treatment of animals (thus how barbaric the whole non-vegetarianism was). The program provoked me to such an extent that I started bringing chicken meat to home every week. This act in fact followed a period of chicken abstinence as I had trouble cleaning my teeth after eating as they had many gaps in between them.

At that time I had no understanding and experience of the caste system. I had made no observation how vegetarianism was part and parcel of the purity and pollution idea. When I can be easily overcome with emotion just by watching sentimental scenes in the movies, how could a real life situation of cruelty to animals, instead of making me remorseful, would make me angry at the program creator?

Obviously, if some animal lover calls non-vegetarians as barbarians, it  becomes a personal attack. But was this a case, where I believed - because of my ignorance- that I did no wrong and when someone pointed out the contrary I had trouble admitting it? At that time, my argument was that the animals we would eat were reared only for that purpose. No non-vegetarians then no existence of animals of slaughter. Now I don't think I need to justify non-vegetarianism, as the caste system has proved, the idea of vegetarianism is perverted as it develops a contempt for fellow human beings without any guarantee of love for animals. My views are likely biased by "born" vegetarians as I hardly came across vegetarians by choice in my society. Anyway, at that time I got angry.

I wonder, instead of portraying non-vegetarians as barbarians, if the approach of that vegetarian crusader had been different, then would that have convinced me. I'm not so sure. There is an absurd thinking that if people go and see how animals are slaughtered they would stop eating meat.

The act of killing (or violence in general) is as enticing as sex. I  used to go and watch the slaughter of chickens. I didn't feel anything. I suppose it is true for people who like action movies where violence is normal. However, as I have argued before, the empathy comes after violence because of a feedback loop. Majority, I believe, would be moved if the person or animal is half dead and struggling. The sound of struggle and emotion in the eyes are enough to invoke empathy through the feedback system. I did feel this when I came to Hyderabad and saw 'halal' killing. In Mangaluru, chickens were killed in one shot and there was no struggle afterwards. Initially, halal killing disturbed me but I got used to it later on. I guess unless acted upon, empathy can turn into indifference.Is this true in other cases too?

Even now, I can't control my feelings while watching emotional movie scenes. If tears don't roll down like they used to be when I was small, I believe, it's only because watching the computer monitor all the time  has dried up my eyes.

Why can't I control my emotions to the events that I rationally know to be unreal but become indifferent to the events that are obviously real? The clue, in my opinion, is the repeated physical movements of the chicken case and varying emotional outbursts in the form of words in movie scenes. But why would repeated things break the feedback system and dissolve the empathy? As I have already argued before, empathy is nothing but association of self-pity with suffering of others. Somehow, repeated feedback on the suffering of others weaken the link to self-pity. Probably, if I watch the same scene multiple times I would stop getting involved with it. However, if the same emotion in some other movie is expressed with a different set of words I would again get emotional.

Therefore, I would say,
- act of violence doesn't develop empathy (on the contrary it's a clue for reward like sex)
- empathy is developed in the aftermath of the violence if it's long enough to invoke the self-pity
- repeated exposure to the same aftermath would weaken the link to self-pity and thus the person loses empathy
- varying expressive words have the ability to keep the empathy alive even though the fundamental emotion is the same

I suppose, instilling non-violence in any form as a born morality, would lead to perversion as in the case of enforcing the sexual abstinence.

Save on Medicines

I have an idea for anyone who wants to contribute to the society. I don’t know if there is something similar on the web in Indian context or elsewhere.

It’s known that medicines having identical composition can vary in price by 200% or more. Doctors prescribe medicines purely based on their ethical makeup and instructions from the hospital head or pharmaceutical bosses. (I don’t want to use the word ethical make-up for the later two.)

To counter this, the idea is to have a website which will give you the cheapest alternative. It would operate something like this.

1) Enter the name of the tablet
2) Enter your location (State)
3) Get an alternative medicine and price.

Sounds easy, doesn’t it?

This can also be extended to a SMS based service for people who don’t have ready access to web.

I cannot estimate the efforts necessary but many volunteers with Masters in Pharmacy would be needed to build up the database. Once the database is built, the prices may have to be updated on a 3 month basis.

Easy web interface, no selling of medicines, no advertisements, just information.

Battle of the Sexes - ix

What makes a man? His clothes? His car? His choice of scotch? The real answer, says Brown University biologist Erica Larschan, is the newly understood activity of a protein complex that, like a genetic power tool, gives enzymes on the X-chromosome an extra boost to increase gene expression.

Men must increase gene expression on their lone X-chromosome to match the two X's possessed by women. A new study explains just how men manage to do that.

In mammals, cells therefore work to emphasize, or "upregulate," the lone X-chromosome in males and de-emphasize, or "downregulate," the extra X-chromosome in females.

I'm not sure of the significance of this study. Men trying to match up is understandable but why do women try to match down? What are those restrictions at cell level?

Via Science Daily

Random Thoughts - VIII

I believe, apart from aid by government agencies, charities done through religious organizations are the only acceptable way of helping the needy. In both cases, the self-image of the recipients won't be dented. In the case of government, people think it's the duty of the state to support them. Charities in the name of god make people humble before a non-existing entity, so in practical terms they won't lose their self-respect. Any humiliation would be purely imaginary. Philanthropy or charity in any other form is bound to kill the recipients' self-respect.

I can't access my blog

I can't access the blog but could access my blogger profile. Checking whether  this could get published.

Update:
The post is published as I could see from Google Reader. Anyway, I can't access any of the blogspot blogs.

Update:
To Maju:
I can't access from home too.

Random Thoughts - Love_Lust

Ho-M

Ho-F

He-M

He-F

Ho-M

I

LV

LS

LV-LS

I

LV

I

LV

LS

LV-LS

I

LV

Ho-F

I

LV

I

LV

LS

LV-LS

I

LV

I

LV

LS

LV-LS

He-M

I

LV

I

LV

LS

LV-LS

I

LV

I

LV

LS

LV-LS

He-F

I

LV

LS

LV-LS

I

LV

I

LV

LS

LV-LS

I

LV

He-> Heterosexual
Ho->Homosexual
M->Male
F->Female
I->Indifferent
LV->Love
LS->Lust

Just wanted to tabulate various combinations of sexual orientation(not considering all) and mutual instincts. This is a oneway table. This should be read from left column point of reference. I wonder if there is a better way to represent this kind of tables. And if there is a terminology for such tables.

I'm not entirely sure if there can be love between two people of the same sex. The extreme clue for love could be found in the action of suicide. This situation is very obvious between persons of the opposite sexes. However, I don't have any real life evidences for the same sex couple. Nevertheless, I consider it's a possibility because the other day I watched a movie "Little Miss Sunshine", where it was shown that a professor tried to commit suicide after being spurned by his male lover. Does that mean it is possible for a person to be in love with the same sex but  in lust with the opposite sex? I don't have any such examples. However, the opposite case, where a person is in love with the opposite sex but in lust with the same sex is normal. Francis Bacon's life is a good example.

Identities - iii

Differentiating identities:
A homogeneous religious identity of classes and castes was, in my opinion, the sole reason why inequalities could sustain for such a long time between minority upper classes and majority lower classes. The success of Communism in some societies owe it to the new identity that it gave to people. Interestingly, opposing religious identities can become catalysts for class wars. One such example is the Mappila Rebellion of Kerala. The peasants who were Muslims rebelled against their landlords who were the castes.

The peasant Muslim rebels already had a practice for their actual struggle in the Khilafat movement. The Khilafat movement was a religious, a completely irrelevant for a slave Indian peasant, and in retrospect, absolutely shortsighted pan-Islamic movement of Indian Muslims. But that is expected from a wrong ideology like religion. The upside of this religious movement was a meaningful fight against the feudal system. In South Malabar , the feudals were the castes and the peasants were Muslims (and the castes). We hardly hear about the castes rebelling against their co-religionist feudals until the Communist ideology came to that society. This of course does not mean the castes accepted their fate or were passive. Obviously, there were no leaders to group them together and channel their anger. Anthroplogist Dilip Menon makes an interesting point on the plight of bonded labourers in North Malabar society where peasants more mostly castes and suffered more than the Muslims in the southern Malabar[1]. The opposition to the caste system he finds in the Teyyattam, a spirit worship tradition of Tulu and Malayali tribes and in the sorcery practices.

According to him, sorcery in Kerala society was generally associated with Brahmins and Parayans (one of the erstwhile untouchable castes). Whereas for Brahmins, sorcery was a way to maintain their grip on the general population, for Parayans it was a way to protect their space of dignity. Because of their position in the hierarchy they didn't have any protection from upper caste atrocities. Sorcery(or the fear associated with it) was their way of keeping away others from exploiting them. He states that (hope that is not conjectural), the regions where landlords were known to be malevolent the number of sorcerers from the lower castes were higher than the regions were landlords were known to be benevolent to their peasants.

The common religious identity is probably the main reason why Pakistan society is still feudal ridden and there was no revolution worth talking. Even though India too have feudal mafia run states like Andhra Pradesh, the situation is not as humiliating as in Pakistan where feudal dominance in the politics has been unchequered (but the tide is inevitably turning).

Reference:
1. The Moral Community of the Teyyattam: Popular culture in Late Colonial Malabar, Dilip M Menon, Sage Publications

Idea of a Nation - ia

It will be the turn of the British Prime Minister now to denounce Multiculturalism or "State Multiculturalism". I wonder whether the report is a deliberate rumour to gauge public opinion (What is the term?).

Addressing a security conference in Germany, David Cameron will argue the UK needs a stronger national identity to prevent people turning to extremism.
Different cultures are encouraged to live apart, and objectionable views met with "passive tolerance", he will say.

Via BBC

Update:
The same post at BBC has been updated to reflect the actual given address. I should have copied the complete text in the first instance.

A small change in the above sentence:

"Frankly, we need a lot less of the passive tolerance of recent years and much more active, muscular liberalism," the prime minister said. 

Anyway, he goes on to say:

Building a stronger sense of national and local identity holds "the key to achieving true cohesion" by allowing people to say "I am a Muslim, I am a Hindu, I am a Christian, but I am a Londoner... too", he said.

He probably is clueless. That is alright as I believe that a civilized idea of a nation is still in its infancy. 

Idea of a Nation - iv

Just found J. B. S. Haldane's description of India which matches my own(bold mine).

 I also happen to be proud of being a citizen of India, which is a lot more diverse than Europe, let alone the U.S.A, U.S.S.R or China, and thus a better model for a possible world organization. It may of course break up, but it is a wonderful experiment. So, i wan't to be labelled as a citizen of India.

 I haven't come across any argument in the secessionist movements that trumps this beautiful idea or this wonderful experiment.