Disciplining body and mind..

Disciplining body and mind..
Human mentality is often considered to be unstable. It is hardly settled by a single thought or action. It always lounges for newer things and actions. That is perhaps the reason why one thinks of the discipline. It is essential because it forces human mentality (mentality in the sense of mind as well as body) to act in a particular way or mode. In this manner, it surely takes away the freedom to act according to one’s free wish. But the favourable outcome is a result that is often not seen in short run. Or rather seen in the long-run.
To illustrate, take a look at the training which army soldiers undergo. That long, arduous and exhausting training is building the foundation for a soldier to survive in war situations. Difficult obstacles (kinds of exercises the soldiers are supposed to perform) test the mettle of the soldiers. On the other hand, they inculcate a habit of facing these kinds of situations in them. This habit is precisely the long-run benefit of the discipline.
Can we say that such discipline can work for mind? Well, there can be a strictly drawn schedule, according to which one has to perform the tasks. So that, the schedule becomes a habit for the individual. Once the person is accustomed to it, things become simpler.

Limits of probability

Probability is the art (science as some may want to argue) of prediction. it was born out of the requirement of french king who kept on losing in gambling.

The biggest limitation probabilty has is the absence of any hint about the place or position of occurence of the event.

What I mean by this is suppose an unbiased coin is tossed thrice, the probability of getting a head( or a tail) every time is one-half. The problem is that we have no idea when will the coin show head and when it will show tail!!!

Devrai

Have you come across this joke? Once the education inspector comes to a school, goes in a class and asks the students, "If five mangoes cost twenty-six rupees, how many steps does the school staircase have?" One ultra-smart student raises his hand and answers, "Twenty-nine, Sir". "That’s absolutely correct, but how could you get that, my boy?" Sir. "Simple, my mom has cooked Spinach for lunch today, Sir", Boy…
Ok, now lets jot down seriously the dissimilar events in the joke. Mangoes-Rupees-Steps-Spinach…. Do they make any sense? No, as long as its not a joke.
Let’s take another such link. A Garden-Boy sitting under an apple tree-An apple falls down-Gravity- Earth’s attraction-Rules that govern heavenly bodies-…
Oh, that’s our Newton.
A similar chain…Earlier one created a joke, this one- rules that govern the universe!
Suppose for a moment, had Newton not been able to express his thoughts clearly; then…
That means had he understood the linkage between a falling apple and law of gravity but could not have expressed the same in a clear coherent manner; then…
Obviously, people would have called him a ‘fool’.
Precisely this confusion of thoughts is one of the symptoms of a mental disorder called ‘Schizophrenia’.
Exact cause of this disorder is still unknown. It happens because of imbalance of certain chemicals in the human brain; but this is also a symptom than a reason. It can happen to anybody, at any age. Heredity, Depression, Lack of communication, Overly introvert nature are some of the contributing factors, yet none is conclusive.
We can roughly describe Schizophrenia as a mental state wherein a person comes up with seemingly inconsistent ideas, believing strongly from inside that they are consistent. It’s the problem about not having effective communication or translation of thoughts in a coherent, clear exposition. To put simply, it’s a ‘traffic jam’ of thoughts. The order collapses down!
This differs from the case wherein the thought expressed has a clear exposition but just doesn’t fit into the relative custom-time frame. In this case, the thought is regarded as a ‘mad’ or ‘insane’ one. Think of Galileo, Keplar who expressed their difference of opinion about earth to the Church. They were ridiculed, insulted initially but later promptly recognized and remembered for their brilliant contributions- this is because of clarity of exposition.
On the other hand, when there are problems in the exposition of the thought itself, the person behind it, rather than the thought, is unnecessarily proclaimed as ‘mad’ or ‘insane’.
This is on account of the inconsistency in ideas, which is the ‘raw material’ of both the outcomes as said earlier. Unfortunately there is no clue to predict in advance whether this inconsistency will breed a great scientific or artistic breakthrough or a joke!
Because the processing system in which this raw material is supposed to be processed-the human mind- is an unresolved mystery to date. When this processing system goes out of system, the result can be a mental disorder like ‘schizophrenia’.
A person having schizophrenia finds it difficult to distinguish between the real world i.e.day to day life that is indispensable in nature and a virtual, crafted world of unsaturated ideas created by his mind. Emotional and social aspects of his/her life suffer badly. There remains hardly any person with whom the sufferer can share his /her pain.
There aren’t any fixed patterns in which schizophrenia affects the personality of a person. Nobel laureate John Nash of A Beautiful Mind is one of them; so is Sheshashayee Desai of Devrai.

The Challenge of Development

We always wonder about the word development- especially economic development. What does it consist of? Material Well Being? Of course; but something more than that! The problem is that the more we try to define it specifically, more we are caught in trouble.
There is no fixed definition. Recently Dr. Amartya Sen has come up with the novel and revolutionary idea of "development as freedom". That means freedom from restrictions that inhibit an individual's progress and freedom to him to enhance the scope of his capabilities.
To me, well, mere assurance of such a freedom is one step shorter to the road of development. I feel there is one more aspect that is missing. It is the discovery of one's self. Unless and untill one is thoroughly "through" with one's self, the external freedom is hardly of any use.
e.g. lets take the simple case of waking up early in the morning. General experience has it that ample plans are made about getting up early in the morning to do this and that. The alarm rings, but the lazy mind refuses to respond. There is no discernable cause that really prohibits one from doing what he/she has planned. There comes this 'self'. It is often taken for granted and hardly paid attention to. This self is nothing but our 'self-conscience', the so-called gut-feeling. We refuse to pay heed to it and stay where we are.

How to realise this self? Quite a difficult one.... But keep on searching. I'm too.....

In the defence of Economics

IN THE DEFENCE OF ECONOMICS

Since the inception of the discipline of Economics, charges have been levied on it of being a ‘narrow-focused’ discipline. Critics are always delighted to point out that the so-called ‘economic man’ is rational to an unimaginable extent. The notion of self-interest and its persuasion by an individual to fulfil his own wishes is also often under attack. What follows is an attempt to justify the existence of this discipline on the basis of the premises it takes for granted.
First of all let us say that this discipline tries to analyze human behaviour. This I suspect should not create any problem for anybody. If it is a study of human behaviour; it should try to portray human behaviour as close as possible. So we need to take into account essentially the ways in which people behave when confronted with the situations demanding a decision.
I would like to recall a small anecdote here. Do you remember one of those Birbal-Akbar stories, wherein a mother monkey is made to stand with her younger one in a tub. Slowly tub is filled with water. Initially mother monkey does her best to protect her younger one. But as the water level starts rising and passes above her nose, she puts the younger one down, climbs on it and seeks some breath!! The point is as clean as a whistle. Primarily an individual would do everything to achieve his self-interest.
Let’s take another facet of it. Why would one have to ‘acquire’ virtues? Don’t we all possess them by birth? Mostly not. Virtue is an external quality so as to be displayed exclusively. E.g. if a person is lying injured on a busy road in the peak hours of the day- say by 10.15 a.m., how many of the passers-by would pay heed to him? I doubt not more than a very few- a handful of them would bother to stop and see what is wrong with the person. What is driving the remaining huge majority from not paying attention? Surely, the self-interest.
If this example is not convincing enough (even as I feel) you can come up with any other example. I am sure there are scores of them. The point I want to make here is this: the essential nature of human being is looking for self-interest. If a discipline is based on this very premise and tries to analyze human behaviour, how far can we call it wrong? It is showing really the essential nature of human being. If that is not acceptable, why blame the discipline?