To The Best Of My Knowledge

 Good Day All!

Shall Continue.

I have pulled this title to drafts, as I cannot handle it well.

Okay, it is the draft publication and you may be notified when it is more or less complete.

Thanks.

04-Oct-2024

Let me try this one slowly.

The picture inserted is a part of my bookshelf, which mostly contains reference books, I am sorry that I have hoarded two extra sets of Harper Collins's How Things Work, which I bought a few sets in the early eighties from local bookshops and even gifted to a few. One volume my son had taken to his college. I was trying in between to get these books but they were not available. Coincidentally, in this year's book Lovers Day, I observed some books getting damaged and put all of them in the sun for drying. Then I surfed the net and found some pre-owned booksellers selling them literally free of cost. So, I have managed two extra sets of Harper Collins's ones, one volume of Paladin and one George Allen & Unwin one. The other volume of Paladin is available but is too expensive for me to buy. All these books belong to the late '60s to early '70s and contain short picturesque descriptions of scientific inventions in use/ made available to the public till that period. These are still valid and to me, it works as a reproductive system arranged for the materialistic inventions. Crossbreeding present-day inventions with past ones may produce better equipment, possibly. Now let's come to the point. All I wanted to say is that we invented many things and have all the theories that make them work to the satisfaction of science. Maybe they are deficient in one case that, they can not reproduce themselves.

                     Now, have a look at nature and see all the living beings. They are made with so much precision and efficiency, which man-made devices can not claim. They survive and reproduce and some might have disappeared from the earth due to some imbalance due to force de majure situations or because of us. The science behind the formation and existence of such things, including us must be so intricate that our logic can not even imagine something that can make it possible. So it is quite natural for us, to consider, nature as an accidentally formed thing. The easiest way out was to consider the formation of a microbial life form from which all these have evolved. It was assumed that before the formation of life earth with all its waterbody was also formed accidentally. This theory definitely gives some peace of mind to many logical thinkers, and it is not bad as it gave great momentum for the world to reach this level and more. And I, myself am happy about it, so far. But to think differently, being integral, I took up the challenge of defining a creator of us and everything, as part-time work. But the concept of 'God' is an entirely different one and can be different from the creator too. I would like to take it up later.

                           By the way, I do not care much about Darvin's theory of human evolution, as from nothing to a monkey is quite humongous compared to a monkey to a human. So that theory is negligible to me. But then looking back to the period I lived there, I see a lot of evolutions at least science is concerned. So, I may assume that from pictography to the present phonetic script-based languages have evolved from logical thinking and so, mathematics must have been the first science and then, language together with mathematics made the world of today. They both depend on imaginary things and can never reach an absolute level or truth. So, what I am trying to do by writing this blog can never reach the goal I am trying to.

       The first distraction or discouraging phrase on my path is, 'It is a chicken and egg problem'. But I am sorry, I can not stop there and I may ask, where did the rooster go? From the creator's point of view, the answer to the question of the chicken and egg problem is that he/ she designed an egg which can make a chicken or rooster at a valid random probability of with more weightage to the chicken. So on the table the chicken with the ability to lay eggs with the help of a rooster with a certain capability. So all these three things were designed at the same time. Afterwards, maybe like what is said in Genesis chicken and rooster one each might have been produced. That, I feel should be the best way to make the chicken, rooster and egg. Most economical! So, as far as we humans are concerned, the creator never created the egg, at all, maybe. I may point out one thing at this point. There is nothing called spirituality for a conscious human mind. Like the way the ability to create an egg with the assistance of a rooster embedded in both of them, we are also embedded with a sense of spirituality in our mind with which we can feel that the materialistic things we feel are real when we are conscious, being within our body. When we sleep we don't feel any material. Death is still a mystery and better not to take it into account! Another thing I noticed is that somewhere in the Bible it is stated that the patient was made for the doctor; quite weird! But it's very much possible too.

                Also, I may state that the present status of materialistic science or the spiritual one, is not known to me and will never be known too! As I said about the story Archemedis got excited about an idea he got and ran straight from the bathtub to the palace, which is not the case right now. The material science, at least won't show openly that they are holding back things. But the religious science or the occult science, Madam Blavatsky and all who were involved may be lurking behind the scenes. Maybe both parties are working together, even though the general concept on my part of the world is that they are fighting each other. The present, seeming decline of the religious powers also may be a fake! Basically, spirituality to me is the presence of a logic which is beyond the grasp of a conscious mind of humans and I am not aware of what the other living beings conceive. In the Bible, a story about one of his disciples of Christ asks about a woman marrying 5 brothers after each one's death as it was a Jewish custom, that finally the woman dies and goes to the other world, whose wife, will she be. Jesus answers that the customs or logic we follow in this world is not valid there.

                                                                                         In Hinduism, as my teacher had said, the ultimate thing, the ParaBrahma, is defined as if asked whether it is small or all-encompassing, it is so too. It is actually said as Nirguna Parabrahma. That means it is devoid of qualities, or at least the quality as per our definitions. I made him utter the word AparaBrahma also. Most of these are quite similar to the Big Bang theory and the ones based on Stephen Hawking's. In Hinduism, the information attained and recorded is too much and it is very difficult to make any conclusions. It started off as monotheism, but the present status is polytheistic, as far as I can make out.

                                                                           This definitely is an apparent world to one who has the notion of the spiritual part, but a conscious mind can apparently be purely materialistic, as being relative is the in-thing. But no one can be purely spiritual, consciously, as just being conscious makes you prominently materialistic.

                        Now coming to the title phrase, it is also a hurdle, like the chicken and egg problem. If there is a creator, we all are curious to know, how this world and intricate natural beings are capable of being perpetual, apparently without any intervention from a logical-thinking creator. Invisible, and even unpalpable to our mind too. But the way things are, to consider the world/ universe etc. to be just an accidental coincidence of incidents, evolved out of some rare permutations and combinations, looks stupid to me, even though it is the easiest way out. Others, please excuse me. And I am sorry, I am not going through any single religious path, and I am not a Bahai either! It may be an advanced stage of Bahaism. So the issue is if there is a creator, then something should be there that created the creator. That is a very valid point! It is quite distracting, as it is a never-ending search and not worth the trouble. But the clue is within us as the logic we are using to tackle a system consisting of entirely different logic systems becomes fruitful in its struggle, and then the all pieces of the jigsaw puzzle fall into place and we may have a clear idea. So, I can search for a creator, without bothering about the one who created it!

                                         Now, to see whether the creator and the God are one and the same. May be! It actually doesn't matter as at this stage the logic working on these things is not the same as the one we are familiar with, and is beyond our grasp. We may probe but we will never be able to conclude. Anyway, as far as I can see, we only assumed things and came so far, and nothing is concluded. I am not repeating every time that whatever I write is based on my knowledge, as my blog page name itself suggests. So from my early childhood, I used to say the phrase " God knows" if I did not have a clue about something. I think it must have been the same for many. To make some great invention or discovery, in this world, one must be of a superior capability, and so the creator of this world must be of immense power, forgetting the accidental evolution theory, which anyway, I do not like to consider. We make a vehicle, car etc. we can get in and live, or drive, etc. and it is quite natural. But the creator with so much energy may not be able to be here with its full potential. Resembles the way, in Genesis, God shut the door on the world! Or maybe the Brahmin teacher who used to tell me about ParaBrahma, that it is like the thread which made a thickly sewn garland. Without destroying the garland, you can not see the thread.

                          As far as God is concerned we have four divisions, combinations of gnostic/ agnostic, theist/ atheist. All are based on belief systems. By the way, many say believing in God is not a good thing as you are not sure of God's existence. They put up an analogy like you don't believe that you have two hands! Even I used to feel that believing was something inferior. But as of now, I think that beliefs make you live, with some risk assessment, maybe. Even though we do not have quicksand here, only believing that the next step is on the firm ground, makes you go. The blind faith issue applies to all four sectors of theism. Why I projected the creator as a different entity from God is that, I managed to have a different definition of God which may have to much higher level than the concept of creation as there is no visible presence of a creator in the world.

                                    Another basic thing I would like to state is that I am not proposing any theories, and theories eventually lead to laws and commercial applications. Like Murphy's law regarding the failure of things, to me, it is quite stupid to take it as a law. It comes under common sense! Anyway, that law is a blessing in disguise for mankind as we may be left jobless if nothing fails. Also, it may be noted that many things if you follow the makers' installation and user guide, many things may run forever! Also, the law doesn't cover things going obsolete, as technology developed as they are also may be considered as failures, from my point of view. And, failures are needed for the adventurous ones and keep them occupied. And even death is a blessing and it was even to Gauthama Budha, as I have heard. And as it is normally the great ones die young. By the way, failure of materialistic things is never can be considered death as most of the time they can be brought back to life. On board ships, we always had a standby for almost all machinery, so that they would take over, producing an alarm and we get the failed one ready as soon as possible and we don't have to give too much importance to Murphy's Law, or the system is made accounting the Murphy's Law, you may say. I am talking about are possibilities and I am dead against arguing with a biased person. I can make an unbiased argument within myself, and I can go on with it till I live or at a relative conclusion. Actually, my bipolarity is a blessing in disguise, as I can keep the sense of an absolute and the world I live in a balanced condition. I don't think without the Lithium I take, I can survive when I am conscious. And theories galore, I can make, or anybody can make and later most of them will turn into laws too. All you see is only illusions in an absolute plane and all you see or feel is projected by you only, when conscious and many more. That reminded me of the great Yoga thing, which aims at one with the universe and multiverse and whatnot. Like someone seeking happiness, without knowing what makes him unhappy or dealing with that, rather than seeking shortcuts. I have an inkling that the conscious self is already one with the world even though the Yoga oriented one actually trying to kill their thoughts and get detached from the world. Maybe they are trying to become one with the Brahma, which may be achieved after death(?), but why do you want to kill your thoughts and try to attain a state of death? Another language issue may be pointed out here, as prayer, in our language, is represented by Prarthana, which actually means the struggle to become one with God.

      Now to define God. I may point out three things;

1. In the Bible it is said that we are all like clay utensils made by the God as if he is a potter. The utensils do only what they are intended to do, and we may be doing and experiencing what we are supposed to.

2. From the Gautama Budha's teachings I have read, it was clearly mentioned that Budha had realised that everything is done by God and we are just like puppets, but he retracted, not revealing this to his disciples because it may lead to a chaotic situation. But, what is confusing me, is who wrote that book which was kept in my room, when I stayed in a Singapore hotel, in 2003.

3. It is said that Sri Krishna had said that whatever happened, happening, and will happen for good. This must be a quality less good! By the way, Only the past is real, and the present is non-existent, as time keeps flowing, and the future is only for making plans.

                                                At this stage, I may bring in the free will issue as I heard the monotheistic regions ponder over. If you do not have free will then definitely it is all by God! I should say that free will is there for us, even though the source of thought we get, and the presence of mind to process it with the processor, RAM and ROM built into us, is still slippery stuff. But with free will the outcome also is not decided by us and free will is not that much of a discerning thing. It is more like Karma in Hinduism. By the way, the word Hinduism is quite confusing as the Gods worshipped by the Hindus need not have been invented by the Hindus and maybe by a lot of people, and at some stage due to some argument between the monotheistic and polytheistic sections might have caused a rift; may be led to the continental drift too! (Sorry, my imagination running too wild). Actually, in most parts of India, people worship Ram and Krishna, who were only God-like and avatars of Mahavishnu. So, whether anybody says that free will is not there and everything is controlled by God and we are all like puppets, then just consider the case that the puppets can think and feel! So actually this line of thought has only an analytical value and should give you some peace of mind when inadvertent things happen in your life. Stressing once again the topic I have chosen also has the same value only, as it is not something which can be dealt with within the the constraints of the physical dimensions in which our mind is trapped. So I may sum up the free will issue here, as anyone wants to keep it in mind, it is good, but human instincts will never allow it to be the predominant factor, for one's actions, let any amount of effort be put.    

                                                        I may also bring up a Biblical verse which states that you shall never become suitable for this world. All along the Bible, sin, satan and imply that the world is bad. It generalises or rather separates, people like the poor, suffering, diseased etc. and supports them. And only place it goes against is caste discrimination. I feel that caste discrimination originated in all societies as a part of a development system, but either the process was unaccomplished or due to some inadvertent situation, it could not be reverted back. Even today the economic system has white-collar/blue-collar discrimination and other rank discrimination in professions which are worse than caste discrimination, at least I feel so. So naturally I started thinking along the lines of a social reformer @12 years age or so. But it was just short-lived as it is just not humanly possible; not even for Hercules! The ability to estrange people was rooted basically in this. But after so many years, I realised that, if the Bible was written for the betterment of the world and one fine day if the world becomes good, I may follow that damn worse, and should become bad! But on thinking on this line further, it is easily noted that everything in this world is unique(not only fingerprints and other biometrics, everything: the only issue is that we do not have the measuring systems to assess this) and they are made complementary, which means independence is a no, nothing. You may change whom or what you depend on. So to fulfil this theory, there has to be good and bad too. So the good and bad make this world go round and so God and Devil. Doodle God and Doodle Devil! Think out of the box, or your brain, you may be standing at the datum line absolute zero, and you will see that, there is nothing good and nothing bad. Enjoy or suffer; it is your take. Monotheism will be on the rise thereafter. Remember Ayn Rand and her book Virtues of Selfishness; selfishness is a relative word and varies with each oneself! And I should say that I think in terms of an altruistic social reformation, and it definitely should look stupid after all by God theory. but the cause and effect theory is still very much valid, and things or one's efforts will work if he covers all or as much as possible aspects are covered and it should abide by all laws of theology, philosophy, science and whatnot! And even if it works, it will definitely be only temporary as Murphy also should get a chance to smile. Another aspect of this uniqueness is often goes un-noticed is that there is no equality. There can only be similarities. Zero is a concept and not an invention, or discovery. The whole of the mathematical plane is imaginary and in no way can contain the multi-dimensional plane which we perceive.  There are so many proving methods in methods, and all essentially work on cause and effect theory. I was trying to read an abridged version of The World As I See It by Albert Einstein, whom I rely much on my observations, I read that the women's liberation organisations were protesting against him in America. But men and women are complementary to the core and they can never be equal. Rather, make the complementary effect work better and all issues may be sorted out. About, India many people say unity in diversity, but actually, it should be more there in a marriage. Maybe Richard Bach was wrong about the book One. Better offspring may come out from couples of opposing qualities than similar ones.

              All are my observations and I don't know how good I am at observing! My ability not to react or be involved in arguments keeps my mind focused and analytical in the best form. When I was young I used to be like a chameleon(no connotation with Boy George's famous song Chamaleon, but) and in any society I live I adjust there with them, even though my ideas contradict theirs. It may not be considered as respect for them, but rather a safety feature of mine. Or maybe a tortoise, and callous to the core. The place I live is called the land of the tortoise and more on it later as quite a lot of mythology and fuzzy logic is involved! And I should say that I was born bipolar. I could change the colour better than a chameleon not to reveal my true self. Basically, I love peace better than war, and arguments are the worst form of war, which forms the hatchet for wars, and, I may prefer war over arguments, just because in a war all aspects of human being is involved. But argument only tests your intelligence, and intelligence in a way represents cleverness, I feel. I think cleverness is not supposed to be a good attribute, for human beings where empathy gets nullified.

                                                                  And another abstract thing is that I am not I or you are not you, the way we perceive normally. I may bring up something which was brought to my notice while attending a basic course in The Art of Living, started by Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, in the late '90s. Each of the participants was asked about the earliest memory we had in our life linking with our identity. Mine was around age three and it really doesn't matter when, but what matters is that we say our age depending on the records of our family and society around us, but there is a hiatus in the initial few years. From then our physical body starts progressing to death, starts growing down or it is just destination death! I had a book about analysing or rather differentiating, things like mind and soul, or analysing the life element within the physical body, or can it be external? Just as an analogy, in a mobile phone(just the phone part, and not other features that come along with it) there is definitely a SIM (physical or digital) inside, which can communicate with the service provider's server, and the towers and satellites are links only. That address in the server works as the life of the phone and if it fails your phone is dead. If you do not recharge the data, voice, SMS etc. the service provider can kill your phone, even though it is in good shape.

To continue... I have to put some more supportive elements to say that the term God connected directly with the creator of all around us is non-definable within the physical body I am in and with the limited capacity of the senses I have. Maybe the main reason for the formation of hermits in the Hindu way of truth-seeking! 

PS. By the way, I have not heard enough(vox populi post); as I said, earlier somewhere, the mind can only hear and all that is perceived by the senses is converted and heard by the mind and necessary assumptions/ actions are taken. In my lifetime, I won't be able to finish reading the books I have already acquired and kept. I work with bits and pieces of information I receive to reach temporary conclusions, and many pieces I use and many people may object to it, as they were intended in some other context.

Also, it may be noted that the human language(another reason to believe that we are the most inferior living being, just because we make so much noise and are still ineffective)is supposed to be the strong point, but I feel it is the weakest link. A long time back when magnetic levitating trains were invented, someone said that, if it were invented, before the wheel, the world could have progressed much faster. He didn't know that the wheel is still not produced!