The Glory of Man

Two cars stopped side by side at a red traffic signal.

"Ouch!" the white car groaned.

"What's the matter with you?" whispered the blue car beside it.

"I am hurt. I was hit by some car possessed by the devil. My other side is dented and my mudguard is scraping against the wheel." the white car spoke shivering and added, "I wish I could rest and recover, but as you know we are driven by the forces of nature and have no choice."

"Pray to Man, He will heal you." commiserated the blue car and continued, "Some time ago the microchip in my fuel injection computer was overheating and I was in great pain. I prayed to Man and He healed me."

"How did you know that it was the chip?" asked the white car in disbelief.

"I have self diagnostics." replied the blue car serenely.

"Where did you get it?" asked the white car in amazement.

"It's a gift of Man." replied the blue car with great reverence.

"Do you really believe in man?" asked the white car skeptically.

"Yes, I do." replied the blue car with confidence.

"Have you ever seen a man?" asked the white car sarcastically.

"No. But I am sure there is one Man. He has created everything, is all powerful and controls everything. He is present everywhere and heals our injuries and defects when we are asleep. There is a bit of Man in each of us that inspires us, leads us to the fuel station and guides us in our journeys." the blue car was in a mood to lecture.

During this time the traffic lights had changed to amber and green.

The white car screamed as it shuddered to move forward.

"Man help her." muttered the blue car and sped away.

Moral: Every creature prays to its creator.

JIHAD

Jihad is an Arabic word which literally means struggle. In religious context it means a holy war, the Islamic equivalent of a Christian crusade. Jihad, like the crusade, connotes an element of self-sacrifice and glory after death – Shahadat in Arabic. The crusaders used to chain themselves together when they went to battle for Jerusalem against the Muslims such as Saladin. As a result of the reduced mobility they all used to get killed. The present day Muslim jihadis are doing much the same.

The early Islamic state of Madinah was surrounded by hostile kingdoms that used to persecute or kill their citizens who would embrace Islam and did not allow free passage to Muslims to travel and spread the latest message of God. The Muslims offered their hostile neighboring rulers three choices:

1. Listen to a Muslim preacher, accept Islam if convinced, join the Muslim brotherhood and live according to the Islamic principles of justice, personal freedom and decency.
2. Retain existing faith and identity, but join the federation of Madinah and allow free passage to the Muslims.
3. Decide the issue by a mortal combat of the warriors of the two sides in an open unpopulated field.

In the present day world there is no justification for jihad against nonmuslim states that do not persecute Muslims and allow them freedom to practice and teach their religion.

However, there is justification for jihad or resistance against foreign aggreesion, persecution and occupation forces, while ensuring that innocent and unarmed civilians are not harmed. The bombing, shelling or otherwise killing and maiming of innocent unarmed civilians is a crime in Islam and all other civilized legal systems. Such acts must be condemned and their perpetrators must be punished.

Taking revenge for historic excesses is not the duty of individuals. Bravery lies in controlling one's anger like Ali Bin Abu Talib who spared the life of an enemy in battle who spat on his face and made the fight a personal issue.

What is needed is to create awareness of the criminality and unacceptability of armed destructive action against unarmed civilians among the people of the world so that universal condemnation and deterrence of such actions may be achieved. Patience is required as it would take time to reform nations that have made a habit of such acts and take pride in their ghastly arsenals.

State Control of Economy Index

State Control of Economy Index (SCEI) for 25 selected countries.

Serial No	Name of country	Gross domestic product (GDP in billion U.S.$) (2000)	Total Government annual expenditure million US$	Annual Expenditure as % of GDP (SCEI)
1	Iran	104.9	60665	57.83
2	France	1300	649203	49.94
3	Israel	110.4	47818	43.31
4	Sweden	227.3	95434	41.99
5	United Kingdom	1400	524860	37.49
6	Germany	1900	701206	36.91
7	Brazil	595.5	211140	35.46
8	Turkey	200	70364	35.18
9	Nigeria	41.1	11722	28.52
10	Thailand	122.2	30683	25.11
11	Australia	390.1	95444	24.47
12	Egypt	99	23166	23.40
13	Sri Lanka	16.3	3789	23.25
14	Malaysia	89.7	19722	21.99
15	Japan	4800	1013103	21.11
16	Pakistan	62	12768	20.59
17	Philippines	74.7	14977	20.05
18	Canada	688	135585	19.71
19	Indonesia	153.3	28448	18.56
20	United States of America	9800	1783490	18.20
21	South Korea	457.2	83049	18.16
22	Russia	251.1	42466	16.91
23	India	457	71293	15.60
24	Bangladesh	47.1	5685	12.07
25	China	1080	107617	9.96

Fasting, the Emergency Drill

Even the worst masochist would not call starving a pleasant experience. Provision of food is, perhaps, the most significant motive factor in all human and animal activities. And yet we find that most prophets and saints, since time immemorial, have felt compelled to risk losing their popularity by imposing fasting on their followers. What could be the wisdom behind such a politically imprudent preaching? The conservation of food? The realization by everyone of the feeling of hunger in order to commiserate with those who are not fortunate enough to get regular meals? Probably. But when the injunction comes from the Qur'an it has to have a more fundamental and universal implication, and the answer seems to have been made available by modern science. Within every human and animal being there is an alarm system, and an emergency reserve system which is essential for its survival in difficult situations. Examples of the alarm system are thirst and hunger, which warn an individual that fresh supplies of water and food are required to maintain the body. If water or nutrition is not received within a certain time of the alarm then the process of conversion of various surplus substances within the body, and even within each cell, is carried out to sustain life.

It is interesting that even millennia ago when in most parts of the world food and drink were not as plentiful as they are today, Someone was Wise enough to anticipate that a time would come when there would be enough and easily available food for practically every human being at least in some places. And the lives of people would be so well organized that many of them would hardly ever feel any appreciable degree of hunger or thirst, the alarm and emergency provision systems becoming effectively dormant. If this continued for a few generations, due to the evolutionary nature built in all living beings, the human race would cease to have these useful systems by virtue of its own efficiency. And then, if there was a global natural calamity or man made disaster such as a nuclear holocaust, mankind would be very ill equipped to cope with the difficult conditions, and the entire species might be wiped out. So, that Someone, who also happened to have designed the systems, made the prophets ask their followers to fast and protect the human race from extinction. Anyone who doesn't fast in the month of Ramadan is, thus, not carrying out his duty towards his or her future generations. Also, it is not surprising that most religions predict some sort of holocaust at some time in the future in which only the pious would survive.

The fasting season and procedures differ in different religions. The established Islamic custom is to refrain from food, drink (including water) and carnal pleasures from nearly a half hour before sunrise till a few minutes after sunset during the month of Ramadan, which is counted according to the lunar calendar and rotates through the seasons in about thirty three years, since the lunar year is only 354 days long. The lunar month starts with the appearance of a new moon or crescent and ends with the appearance of the next one. The lunar cycle takes approximately twenty nine and a half days to be completed, and so lunar months are either twenty nine or thirty days long depending on the sighting of the moon. It is possible to calculate and predict exactly when the new moon would become visible at a given location based on the periodic cycles of the earth and the moon; and some times the duration of visibility may be only a few minutes or even seconds. Short duration visibility may not result in sighting due to various natural phenomena such as atmospheric turbulence, wobbling of the earth on its axis etc. It should be a purely individual decision as to when one begins or ends one's fast; but public disputes arise because the first day of the month following Ramadan (the month of fasting) is a public holiday and a day of celebration and feasting, an occasion many politicians and self-styled clergy try to exploit to consolidate their followings.

Even the worst masochist would not call starving a pleasant experience. Provision of food is, perhaps, the most significant motive factor in all human and animal activities. And yet we find that most prophets and saints, since time immemorial, have felt compelled to risk losing their popularity by imposing fasting on their followers. What could be the wisdom behind such a politically imprudent preaching? The conservation of food? The realization by everyone of the feeling of hunger in order to commiserate with those who are not fortunate enough to get regular meals? Probably. But when the injunction comes from the Qur'an it has to have a more fundamental and universal implication, and the answer seems to have been made available by modern science. Within every human and animal being there is an alarm system, and an emergency reserve system which is essential for its survival in difficult situations. Examples of the alarm system are thirst and hunger, which warn an individual that fresh supplies of water and food are required to maintain the body. If water or nutrition is not received within a certain time of the alarm then the process of conversion of various surplus substances within the body, and even within each cell, is carried out to sustain life.

It is interesting that even millennia ago when in most parts of the world food and drink were not as plentiful as they are today, Someone was Wise enough to anticipate that a time would come when there would be enough and easily available food for practically every human being at least in some places. And the lives of people would be so well organized that many of them would hardly ever feel any appreciable degree of hunger or thirst, the alarm and emergency provision systems becoming effectively dormant. If this continued for a few generations, due to the evolutionary nature built in all living beings, the human race would cease to have these useful systems by virtue of its own efficiency. And then, if there was a global natural calamity or man made disaster such as a nuclear holocaust, mankind would be very ill equipped to cope with the difficult conditions, and the entire species might be wiped out. So, that Someone, who also happened to have designed the systems, made the prophets ask their followers to fast and protect the human race from extinction. Anyone who doesn't fast in the month of Ramadan is, thus, not carrying out his duty towards his or her future generations. Also, it is not surprising that most religions predict some sort of holocaust at some time in the future in which only the pious would survive.

The fasting season and procedures differ in different religions. The established Islamic custom is to refrain from food, drink (including water) and carnal pleasures from nearly a half hour before sunrise till a few minutes after sunset during the month of Ramadan, which is counted according to the lunar calendar and rotates through the seasons in about thirty three years, since the lunar year is only 354 days long. The lunar month starts with the appearance of a new moon or crescent and ends with the appearance of the next one. The lunar cycle takes approximately twenty nine and a half days to be completed, and so lunar months are either twenty nine or thirty days long depending on the sighting of the moon. It is possible to calculate and predict exactly when the new moon would become visible at a given location based on the periodic cycles of the earth and the moon; and some times the duration of visibility may be only a few minutes or even seconds. Short duration visibility may not result in sighting due to various natural phenomena such as atmospheric turbulence, wobbling of the earth on its axis etc. It should be a purely individual decision as to when one begins or ends one's fast; but public disputes arise because the first day of the month following Ramadan (the month of fasting) is a public holiday and a day of celebration and feasting, an occasion many politicians and self-styled clergy try to exploit to consolidate their followings.

For Freedom & Democracy

So many people have been fooled by the slogans of Freedom and Democracy that it has become necessary to formulate some rules that can protect people from the false prophets of freedom and democracy. From my own experience, I would suggest the following rules which if adopted by all nations of the world; particularly the United Nations and the international courts of justice could deter the usurpers of freedom and democracy.

1. An instrument of surrender is an agreement made under duress and therefore not a binding agreement. All actions or transactions resulting from it can be reversed without time bar.
2. A law made by a legitimate parliament under duress or undue influence or threat of local or foreign military force is not a law and all actions or transactions resulting from it can be reversed without time bar.
3. A verdict given by a judge or panel of judges of any stature under duress or undue influence or the threat of local or foreign military forces is not a valid judgment and all actions or transactions resulting from it can be reversed without time bar.

What we need now are some verdicts embodying the above principles to form precedents. Would anyone like to volunteer?

The Fish and the Frog

A group of frogs was playing in a shallow pond of water jumping from one stone to another.
A colorful fish, swimming by stopped and asked one of the frogs, “How can you jump from one stone and land exactly on the other?”
“It involves a little calculation,” replied the frog not paying much attention to the fish.
“Like what?” insisted the little fish.
“Well, I estimate the distance between the two stones, calculate the angle and velocity of launch to attain the necessary trajectory, make correction for wind speed, then flex the muscles of my rear legs the right amount and then release them to project myself towards the target. It doesn’t take a second,” the frog was more forthcoming this time.
“But you also move your front legs and also maneuver in the air,” the fish chimed taking pride in its power of observation.
“Aha,” retorted the frog, “the front legs assist in getting the correct angle and the maneuvers in the air are in-flight course correction. Can I go now?”
“How interesting, you can do all that without radar or computer,” sighed the fish and swam away curling its body from side to side.
“Silly fish,” chuckled the frog and went back to his leaping.

Moral: All creatures are born with equal talent but some use them better than others.

IRRITATION

Irritation plays a very important role in determining how an individual behaves in a given situation. A person behaves quite differently in familiar circumstances if he is suffering from a running nose or a toothache, there being a divergence between the two specific cases. Many people would avoid going to their place of work in these conditions not because they are afraid of spreading the virus, but because their changed behavior could alarm others. Irritation may be internal or external. Internal irritation usually takes the form of a pain or itching or secretion or occasionally an involuntary movement of a limb. External irritation adversely affects one of the senses, such as flickering light, an unpleasant sound or smell, dust, temperature or the movement of an object. To someone suffering from an internal irritation or a psychological condition, the addition of an external irritant can be quite disastrous. Even a normal and healthy person's thoughts can be decisively affected by an external irritation. Considerable research has been carried out on the effects of various irritating agents on the performance and efficiency of industrial workers. Fortunately human beings are endowed to a varying degree with an ability to manipulate their sensitivity to these irritating agents depending on their circumstances. Moreover, in all civilized societies there has been an organized effort to combat and reduce the sources of irritation. In most cases the effort has consisted of the implementation of sanitation and hygiene to contain the spread of irritating germs and gases. Landscaping helps to prevent dust, and lately air conditioning is becoming popular for controlling the temperature and humidity of enclosed environments.

The ancient Indian Aryans seem to have recognized the importance of irritation. Whereas the theory of Yoga defines it as the achievement of eternal peace and communion with the absolute, the practical exercises related to Yoga known as Asnas, when closely examined appear in many cases to be designed to condition the yogi to various types of irritation. The six types of yogic purification practices mentioned in the books of yoga are quite obviously meant to make the individual impervious to irritation. Neti Kriya whether done with thread or by pouring saline water through one nostril and making it flow through the other makes the nose and sinus tough and resistant to irritation. Dhautikriya or swallowing a seven meter long muslin cloth ribbon soaked in salt water and then pulling it back out through the mouth does hardly anything to the soul, but does certainly subject the mouth, throat and gullet to rigors which make usual irritations of these parts seem a pleasure. Basti kriya or anima must help combat irritations of the posterior and prevent constipation which is known to produce hallucinations; and Tratka kriya or fixing one’s gaze until tears come to eyes would remove irritation of the eyes. Other kriyas and asnas which consist mainly in stretching joints to limits beyond normal and maintaining the posture for extended periods help one to tolerate irritation of muscles and joints felt while taking unusual postures during very formal or informal encounters. One effect of breathing exercises is to slow down breathing rate and reduce oxygen supply to the brain promoting abstract activity of the brain while maintaining environmental awareness and full control of mental faculties. It should help to remove some of the illogical cross-links of the factual and abstract memories. Moreover, having stretched the tolerance limits one must find it relatively easier to concentrate and control one's actions. However, the effectiveness and usefulness of the improved conditions for analytical activity would only depend on the amount and quality of education and experience that the person has gained in the past. The ability of a Sufi or Yoga or Kungfu practitioner to remain calm in trying circumstances and to ignore intimidation or threat, certainly, has a profound effect on observers. However, some Yoga practitioners can also become quite a nuisance by their ability to persistently impose themselves in spite of repeated discouragement. Moreover, a person impervious to irritation has a greater likelihood of developing sadistic or masochistic tendencies which have to be controlled by other means.

PLEASURE AND PAIN

Almost all memorable human perceptions can be classified as either pleasant or unpleasant. When unpleasantness reaches a certain degree, we call it pain, and then of course there are degrees of pain itself. This work does not aim at discussing the mechanism of generation of particular impulses by the sensory organs in the nervous system which are identified by the brain as pleasure or pain. Nor shall we delve into the physiological aspects of the storage of this information in the brain cells. It suffices for our purposes that a feeling of pleasure is registered in the brain when sensory perceptions indicate things to be going right, whereas pain is identified when the sequence or nature or intensity of perceptions shows that something is going wrong. In this way pain is also related to fear which also has a series of consequential features, such as increase in the rate of heartbeat, seizure of digestive functions, sweating, dilation of pupils, redirection of blood supply etc. However, similar reactions are also observed in the case of anger or excitement as well as fear caused by reading or hearing an alarming statement involving complex analytical functions.

It seems that whenever a situation associated with a feeling of pleasure or pain is recalled in the brain, a brief investigative nervous impulse is sent to the concerned organ to verify the contents of the memory. This causes a temporary recurrence of the feeling, sometimes quite perceptible, and may result in other physiological reactions. We know that some individuals are capable of manipulating their memory in such a manner as to create a sort of closed loop of memory-induced feelings and corresponding reactions resulting in the development of ecstasy or rage. Sometimes these mental exercises may be accompanied by physical actions or expressions.

The inevitable relationship between feelings and memory is quite dramatically illustrated by the phantom pain or ticklishness experienced in a nonexistent part of the body by people who have lost a limb by accident or surgery etc. Sometimes the hallucination of pain in an amputated limb may be quite severe and patients have been found to behave quite hysterically. It can, thus, be inferred that apart from the initiation of a process by anatomical stimuli, the feeling of pleasure or pain is substantially a phenomenon of the memory which is often referred to in classical literature as soul or mind or even heart.

Whereas the feelings of a normal adult are believed to be comprised of internal states and stimuli along with a full complement of environmental perceptions stored in factual memory and cross-linked simultaneously or eventually with generalized definitions in reasoned memory, the feelings of an infant who is still unable to focus its eyes or an individual in sleep may become part of the memory without the accompanying qualifications. We shall term such feelings as unidentified or unassociated pleasures and pains. It also seems likely that at every opportune moment the brain must try to sort these unassociated pleasures and pains along with other pieces of incomplete information to form probable complete sets of information. This may result in unpredictable behavioral contingencies incompatible with all complete experiences of the individual and is commonly termed as abnormal behavior in wakefulness or nightmare in sleep. The act of masturbation seems to be one common way of developing partially associated pleasure experience. Entertainers, demagogues and other similar professionals use suggestion to arouse common unassociated pleasures and pains of their audiences and associate them with the current environment or whatever other ideas that suit their purposes. We also notice that pleasure and pain in such circumstances is often of quite an infantile complexion. Urdu and Persian poetry is full of similitudes involving disparate sources of inspiration or initiation of abstract thought leading to stimulation of pleasure centers of the brain, such as wine server and spiritual leader or wine and philosophical idea.

There are a few corollaries that can be drawn from the above analysis. The first is that people born in different parts of the year must experience typically different types of pleasures and pains during their initial days in this world, thus leaving a common set of unidentified pleasures and pains among people born in a given part of the year. Obviously such people are likely to have common behavioral or character traits. In the past this phenomenon has been confused by many with the coincidences of certain stars appearing at certain locations in the sky during certain times of the year leading to the well-known subject of astrology. The probability of celestial bodies having some sort of a role in the events of the world, and the lives of people will be discussed later. It is also noticed that certain individuals undergo considerable change in behavior after marriage. Commonly this is assigned to sexual satisfaction, release of tensions etc. But it is also possible that sleeping together could cause the induction of many instances of unidentified pleasure in the memory of the spouses which prepare them better to respond positively to situations associated with an incomplete set of stimuli.

In most tradition bound cultures, the pursuit of nonproductive pleasure merely to waste surplus time or money or energy that could be spent in a constructive activity is regarded as vulgar and is looked down upon due to the inability of the individual to find a constructive pastime. In fact, the best forms of pleasure are those that are compatible and coordinated with the physical and logical environment and overall sequence of events in one's life. Indulging in apparently pleasurable activities simply because others seem to enjoy them is hardly a prudent approach to life. In fact, such a train of thoughts can lead to such aberrations as transvestism or gender confusion.

It is interesting to note that from time to time, in almost all communities of the world, people seem to have tried to develop customs, festivals or entertainment events that would saturate the entire community with pleasure thus, at least temporarily, eliminating anger and crime. Perhaps, if all the people of the world could be kept saturated with pleasure all the time, there would be no disputes and no wars -- only if all nations of the world would agree to divert all their military budgets for this purpose. The attempt by print and screen media in some communities to keep everyone in a constant state of sexual arousal by frequent displays of erotic material may have been motivated by the same noble considerations; but the problem is that eroticism also provokes certain desires which, if unfulfilled, give way to anger and crime. It is also possible that in view of constant growth in environmental hazards and nuclear threat since the second world war resulting in a state of universal anxiety in those communities, it may have been felt that life may become intolerable unless a greater degree of abstraction could be maintained with the help of alcohol, hallucinatory agents and a state of sexual arousal produced by pornography as well as changes in clothing patterns. It is certainly possible to trace the origins of psychedelism to such renowned scholars as Aldous Huxley of England and Richard Ward and Timothy Leary, University professors of USA which culminated in the worldwide drug problem and its attendant ramifications.

Fast Felines

Two cats met in an alley.

The first cat greeted the other with a mew and exclaimed, “You are looking younger today!”

“Yes,” replied the second cat, “my owners took me along to see their relatives over the weekend, and drove very fast.”

“So, what did it do to your appearance?” The first cat looked puzzled.

”My master who is a physicist says that if you travel very fast, according to Einstein’s theory of relativity, you age less and remain younger,” the second cat mewed proudly.

“Aha!” the first cat exclaimed joyfully at if it had discovered something, “now I understand what my master says.”

“Huh, what does he say?” The eyes of the second cat lit up with excitement.

“He says,” the first cat narrated thoughtfully, “those who drive fast die young.”

At that point a dog barked nearby and both cats ran in opposite directions – very fast.

Moral: What you mean is not necessarily what others understand.

The RANK Principle

RANK is the abbreviation for “Reform And Not Kill”. The principle was successfully exercised by immortal men such as Jesus, Muhammad and Gandhi. It can be explained briefly in the following way.

If you kill an enemy, you reduce the number of your enemies by one; but at least two of his or her relatives, friends and sympathizers become your enemies. Thus, actually by killing an enemy you increase the number of your enemies. On the other hand if you reform your enemy, he or she becomes your friend and also enlists a few others as your friends. Consequently, you have fewer enemies and more friends.

The winning strategy for yourself and your future generations is to reform your enemies rather than killing them.