God, Atheism and Miracles

Last updated on: August 25, 2008 at 7:05 pm By Desh Kapoor

Recently, I had two questions/observations put to me: 1. A Pakistani blogger friend observed that a lot of Indians she is interacting are calling themselves atheists, which she found rather strange. Why, is this happening she asked? 2. Another blogger friend had these experiences where she was convinced that other people several thousand of miles away could read her mind, including what she was about to think! How can this happen, she wondered? At some level both these questions are inter-linked. First, to start with, both the questions, deal with that phenomenon which the conscious mind cannot fathom or even observe. If at the foundational level there is an interplay in the world of sub-atomic waves, mind can hardly second-guess it. Since we have been taught that only that we see and hear is the truth, we believe that anything which cannot be explained should be in the realm of "miracles". Little realizing that the larger and vast primordial energy can work in its own ways, and one of the properties in non-locality, which John Bell helped his generation stumble upon. It is believed that somehow electrons at vast distances have shown properties that suggest as if they are communicating with each other... although for this to happen their interacting medium would have to move faster than the speed of light, which given the other scientific understanding is still an impossibility. So, non-locality of our foundational blocks is a truth, which we may not believe or be able to fathom, is a reality that cannot argued against. And how these blocks function is as real as the "action and reaction" principle of Newton. There is nothing miraculous about it. It is the VERY property of our existence. Read more

New face of terrorism and the coming storm!

Last updated on: August 25, 2008 at 12:14 am By Desh Kapoor

In yet another example of using the technological infrastructure in India to hurt it, the terrorists used a computer in Khalsa College's computer lab - which was connected to internet (Wi-Fi connected) but was not password protected. So, they used this computer to hack and send the email through it using [email protected]. At 7pm, three students were present in the laboratory and were working on their project. Students of biochemistry, computer science and even those doing their PhD use the laboratory. While the laboratory has 12 more machines, only one was connected to internet at that time. The laboratory was closed at 7.45pm, said the police. "The email is similar to several other mails sent on earlier occasions. Our teams are investigating the matter," said ATS additional commissioner P B Singh. As I said earlier, that this is not just a terrorist act for the terror's sake but it hits another bird with that stone - India's position as a technological power. It has a very sinister element to it and it is imperative that India's technical companies take this up on war footing. Just as the rise of India's technical market started not because of Infosys but because there was a large market full of smaller companies ready to back the big guys up and give them competition, similarly, the fall of the larger powers will also be predicated on the fall of the smaller players! So, if Infosys, WIPRO, TCS, and Satyam have to keep growing, TODAY they must sit up and take notice. We need to have a strong organization to create a solid and robust security infrastructure that takes care of the loopholes so hacking does not become an easy door for the terrorists!! Read more

Know Thyself

Last updated on: August 24, 2008 at 5:05 pm By Rev. Dr. Todd Littleton

In order to continue enjoying having a productive life by striving to improve himself man has to take drastic measures regarding overcoming difficult times, and succeeding in the persuade of his well being. Since ancient times man has discovered that some of his time must be spent deeply immersed in the search of self-knowledge. First hand experiences with places, people, things and events have taught him very valuable information. Time spent in the eternal quest of self-knowledge has allowed man to understand much better the eternal laws of Mother Nature. These two constant actions will permit him to have just a little glimpse of God’s Divine Realm, but this experience will be enough for him to now spend more of his time discovering this new brave and amazing world. To be successful in the above important actions, we have to devote ourselves, in a very serious way, to the task of possessing self-discipline and to demonstrate to our selves certain degree of impersonality. First of all, what is self-discipline? It is our impatience being successfully controlled by us. Everything worth in life requires system and order. Talking about impersonality, it is when somebody is able to demonstrate an increasing measure of it, when we can affirm that this person is on the right track. Read more

Victims of an imaginary virtue cannot be expected to be its Guardians!

Last updated on: August 24, 2008 at 9:44 am By Desh Kapoor

A Virtue for all cannot be founded on vice of one and victimization of another. Note: To better understand the myth and reality of the Jammu Agitations, please read this informative post.Since 1980s a cleansing and crime of gigantic proportions has been perpetrated and the entire "secular" and "activist" community has remained a deliberately silent spectator. Kashmiri Pandits lost everything bit by bit. Their honor, their daughters, their women, their men, their homes, their land, their livelihood, and finally their voice. Nobody was bothered. They have quietly taken everything on themselves gritting their teeth and without support went on their ways. Kashmiriyat has often been forwarded as a great value system and its burden has been put entirely on the Pandits of that land, as if the burden already imposed on them was not enough! Update: One of the main "concerns" of most Kashmiri separatist leaders and the government there has been the effect of the construction on the "Ecology" of the area. Right? My, my.. what a bunch of green-mouthing hypocrites. Now, at the EXACT same spot, construction of Jama Masjid has been started. The reasons and goals are very clear. This will one day lead to the end of Amarnath yatra itself as tempers will flare up everytime thousands descend upon that area henceforth. The Indian Government is of course quiet! For picture and detailed discussion go to The Kashmir and for its expose go to The Shadow Kashmiri Muslims chose to fight for an illusionary world that has never existed - an Islamic society that provided them the peace on the lines of Islamic Shariat. No society which has followed Shariat to the last word has ever been peaceful and free. In that delusional dream, they have chosen to side with leaders which have led the entire community into nothing but disasters. They drove their own neighbors out, butchers amongst them like Bitta Karate and Yasin Malik (1 . 2 . 3 . 4) openly and proudly killed Pandits and advised them to part with their daughters and women with an air of self-righteousness and the moderates were busy explaining it away as "un-Islamic" while looking the other way at the exodus that was unprecedented since the senseless partition!A Virtue for all cannot be founded on vice of one and victimization of another. Note: To better understand the myth and reality of the Jammu Agitations, please read this informative post.Since 1980s a cleansing and crime of gigantic proportions has been perpetrated and the entire "secular" and "activist" community has remained a deliberately silent spectator. Kashmiri Pandits lost everything bit by bit. Their honor, their daughters, their women, their men, their homes, their land, their livelihood, and finally their voice. Nobody was bothered. They have quietly taken everything on themselves gritting their teeth and without support went on their ways. Kashmiriyat has often been forwarded as a great value system and its burden has been put entirely on the Pandits of that land, as if the burden already imposed on them was not enough! Update: One of the main "concerns" of most Kashmiri separatist leaders and the government there has been the effect of the construction on the "Ecology" of the area. Right? My, my.. what a bunch of green-mouthing hypocrites. Now, at the EXACT same spot, construction of Jama Masjid has been started. The reasons and goals are very clear. This will one day lead to the end of Amarnath yatra itself as tempers will flare up everytime thousands descend upon that area henceforth. The Indian Government is of course quiet! For picture and detailed discussion go to The Kashmir and for its expose go to The Shadow Kashmiri Muslims chose to fight for an illusionary world that has never existed - an Islamic society that provided them the peace on the lines of Islamic Shariat. No society which has followed Shariat to the last word has ever been peaceful and free. In that delusional dream, they have chosen to side with leaders which have led the entire community into nothing but disasters. They drove their own neighbors out, butchers amongst them like Bitta Karate and Yasin Malik (1 . 2 . 3 . 4. These videos were deleted from YouTube. You can now watch it here.) openly and proudly killed Pandits and advised them to part with their daughters and women with an air of self-righteousness and the moderates were busy explaining it away as "un-Islamic" while looking the other way at the exodus that was unprecedented since the senseless partition! Read more

Dead baby for 5 hours in Refrigerator comes alive

Last updated on: August 24, 2008 at 5:27 am By Desh Kapoor

A kid was pronounced dead and was kept in the refrigerated storage unit. As she was being taken to be buried the parents found her to have come alive! She was in the refrigerated unit for 5 hours. Any normal human being would have died even if he/she was perfect. And this 600 grams girl baby came alive in a place where she should have died even if she was alive. "We unwrapped her and felt she was moving. We didn't believe it at first. Then she began holding my mother's hand, and then we saw her open her mouth," said 26-year-old Faiza Magdoub, the baby's mother. The girl's mother was 23 weeks into her pregnancy and the doctors had to abort the child because of internal bleeding. This girl was pronounced dead after that. What is it? Doctors have not been able to explain it at all! Read more

Why does Pakistan try to hit India…

Last updated on: August 24, 2008 at 5:13 am By Desh Kapoor

MJ Akbar is a shrewd comemtator on Indp-Pak relationship. Here he writes about what leads the Pakistani establishment to fight us and the times they undertake those actions. He argues it is not the personalities that trigger actions, but the evaluation of an "opportunity" and perceived ease of achieving what they want. From Jinnah to Musharraf, the story has been the same! A euphoric belief that something can be achieved and a complete miscalculation - even after four defeats - of the Indian reaction. I am reproducing it because it is so well written. Islamabad's policy towards Kashmir is calibrated on a sensitive thermometer that measures the fever between circumstance and opportunity. This was true of October 1947, when Jinnah launched a war for the Valley after the peaceful resolution of Kashmir through negotiations with Nehru and the Maharaja, with Britain as the fourth party at the table, became inevitable. All three, India, Pakistan and Britain, were agreed that independence was not on offer. Jinnah was convinced that Nehru's inexperienced government, unable to control a raging Hindu-Muslim civil war, would be incapable of fighting back a "tribal incursion" and he would be able to join the congregation on the first Friday prayers at the grand mosque in Srinagar within days of the Pak-sponsored "uprising". In 1965, Ayub Khan saw an opportunity in three critical facts: the humiliation of the Indian Army on the China border three years before; a Congress bereft of Nehru, who died in 1964; and a Kashmir still in the tremors of an unprecedented upsurge over the mysterious disappearance (and even more mysterious reappearance) of the mo-e-muqaddas, a strand of hair from the beard of the Holy Prophet of Islam. Read more

Mayhem in Pakistan and its consequences

Last updated on: August 23, 2008 at 7:16 pm By Desh Kapoor

Whenever poor and innocent people die, one feels bad and questions the humanity of the perpetrators. Pakistan has had three major suicide bombings: Tuesday (19 Aug) in Dera Ismail Khan: In this incident the bomber blew himself up in a hospital - killing 78 people. The bombing happened as Shi'ite Muslims gathered to protest over the death of a man in a suspected sectarian attack. Apparently, the Shi'ites were the main targets. Thursday (21 Aug) Twin Blasts in Wah Cantonment: Roughly another 78 died in this bombing at the end. Workers were streaming through two gates of the sprawling factory complex in Wah, 20 miles west of Islamabad, during a shift change about 2 p.m. when the bombers attacked outside the walls. The force of the explosions knocked many people to the ground and sprayed others with shrapnel. Saturday (23 Aug) Swat Valley: In yet another bombing, around 20 people were killed and several others injured on Saturday when a suicide bomber rammed his explosive-laden vehicle into a police station in Pakistan's restive northwestern Swat valley. Muslim Khan, the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan spokesman in Swat, claimed responsibility for the attack. All these have happened post Musharraf resignation. Now, if Musharraf was indeed an American stooge as a lot of these religious groups alleged, then WHY do these bombings now?? Is it that the new Government is more eager to carry out the "American agenda" of fighting them? Read more

Polyandrous family customs in India

Last updated on: August 23, 2008 at 5:59 pm By Desh Kapoor

Note: Given the extremely unfavorable sex ratios that one is seeing in India today - as families keep killing unborn daughters and girls, the day is not far when some believe that Polyandry will become pervasive in the society as a matter of norm and social compulsion!!A lot of cultures have the practice of Polygamy... where polygamy means a man marrying taking more than One wife. However, Mahabharata talks about the other side Polyandrous family - ONE female taking MULTIPLE husbands. Draupadi demonstrated that. That practice is alive even today and it seems to help that society with some of their issues as well... There are at least two areas in India that this practice is followed: Jaunsar Bawar, Uttar Pradesh: The people here claim that they are descendants of Pandavas. The Jaunsaris are both polyandrous and polygamous, with several brothers sharing several wives and vice versa. Some anthropologists believe that they are the purest descendants of European tribes. Often light eyed and fair skinned, the Jaunsaris, with their finely chiseled features are indeed noticeably different in appearance from, for instance, the Garhwalis who inhabit the mountains barely a stone’s throw across the fledgeling Yamuna river which demarcates Jaunsar from Garhwal. Even their sports, dances, ways of worship, marriage costumes and water mills are different from anything around there. Here, because of the customs, a baby girl's birth is welcomed and not frowned upon like other regions of South Asia. When a girl finally marries - here instead boy’s family pays an agreed, furiously negotiated bride price to the girl’s family before the wedding ceremony takes place, and the bride is carried to her new village on the shoulders of the bridegroom or one of his relatives. The payment to the bride can be anywhere from Rs. 10,000 to Rs. 60,000 depending upon the economic status of the bride family. Read more

The Spiritual Olympics

Last updated on: August 23, 2008 at 4:45 pm By Rev. Dr. Todd Littleton

Last night, it rained heavenly where I live, so I went to bed late. While it was pouring I turn on the TV, and I watched the Olympic Games. I enjoyed watching the women swimmers; I noticed a great resemblance in their body structures with those of men swimmers. Then I saw the men’s gymnastic performances, and I noticed a very big difference in their body structures with those of the common man. Their arms were developed with great strength. I also was aware about their focus. Their trained minds most accompany their trained bodies. There most be a harmonious balance between these two aspects. This morning, I went for my long walk about an hour and a half later than usual. The day was brighter. I was able to smell the wet grass, and soil. To my mind arrived the images about the Olympic athletes watched the previous night, and I wondered why weren’t there spiritual Olympic games, as soon as I asked this question, the answer came to my mind. In the spiritual realm, every day there are spiritual performances, but instead of getting bronze, silver, and gold medals the champions are given an increase of their circle of service. No applauses, no material recognition is granted to these blessed p human beings. This thought brought me the next idea association: Who are superior human beings? If to your mind came scenes of famous people, you most think again. There are no sex differences, no age differences either. These blessed people are not usually rich or famous. They are rarely detected by us. Read more

Hooker finally does it with the Pole!

Last updated on: August 23, 2008 at 7:03 am By Desh Kapoor

Well.. He is Steve Hooker from Australia and he won the first male athletics gold for Australia in 40 years after 1968 Mexico Olympics for Pole Vault. Russia's Evgeny Lukyanenko took silver after he failed his three attempts at 5.90, before Hooker grabbed gold with a successful and third vault at the height. Ukraine's Denys Yurchenko took bronze but caused some confusion after he injured himself and passed on each level after his successful leap at 5.70. Read more