Smartness hinges on taking care of or addressing five fundamental items/aspects of life.

 

Smartness hinges on taking care of or addressing five fundamental items/aspects of life.

 

Just a view based on brash observations on the how and why of macro level dominations.

 

Not justifying domination per se or any of its ugly manifestations and/or consequences.

 

Domination comes through power and that comes through smartness.

 

Smartness does not consist in doing postmortem analysis and making or claiming predictions based on that but instead, smartness emerges from ' merely exploring and then exploring possibilities of future developments based ​on prevailing trajectory of trends.

 

The nations and races which did these, ended up leading  the world and then gradually dominated​ and sometimes loot​ed as well.

 

 

If we peep into the past the first dominators were the explorers who ventured out of their regions and found new terrains. They then started slowly exploiting whatever was newly available be it material or human resources​ or knowledge systems or traditions.

 

They knew in those times it was showing sometimes merely a domineering tone of uttering a different language as if they had landed from heaven and had some special right.

 

When they encountered a slightly sceptical and smarter population, they tried brutal power using crude weapons that they had and engaged in combat. 

 

Once having made an entry one had to start turning the leaf, it is the other way only in the case of accountancy and Adam and Eve story (i.e., you turn a leaf and make an entry). 

 

They turned the leaf one by one and understood that in most societies what held the societies cohesively emotionally together were​ five 5 major items, namely, food, language, culture, traditional practices, and belief systems [ these include resources, knowledge of utilising them, developing tools for enhancing easy, better and more access to these five aspects] 

 

People were generally nice to whoever appreciated those 5 aspects or showed keen interest in knowing and/or learning about those ​five 5 aspects. 

 

The colonisers feigned to show interest in the food of the natives, if found tasty, probed into the new ingredients, and started slowly looting those ingredients, then, as for the other four they started slowly supplanting, then implanting and finally, replacing as much as possible with the dominators​' versions of those ​four other aspects . 

Thoughts about food and some food for thoughts.

 

When sharing some thoughts about food there emerged some food for thoughts.

All of us by instinct are ambivalent about the quantum of importance given to micro details and macro views because our tastes and thoughts are subjective; our intellectual perceptions have lot of limitations and the addition of our prejudices, emotional and psychological biases, conditionings of all hues and colours emanating from ideologies, religions, cultures, traditions, social pressures and so on create a heady mix of a cocktail that gives heavy kick wherein all these *happen.

These vary from topic to topic, event to event, person to person, domain to domain, situation to situation, items to items and manifest in varying degrees and intensities.

*

Attitudes get adamant and adulterated,

Beliefs get blinkered,

Cooperation gets clouded,

Details get dimmed,

Evaluations get entangled,

Faiths get flummoxed,

Guileless gracefulness gets into glamorous gymnastics,

High standards get high jacked by hypocrisy and hidden agenda,

Institutions’ importance gets ignored,

Judgements get jeopardised through justifications,

Kindness gets kicked out by kludge and kerfuffle,

Love gets locked up in lacklustre relationships,

Modesty gets mauled by manipulative mind-sets,

Nice nuances get neglected,

Optimism gets oppressed by opportunistic overtures,

Peace gets pilloried by power mongers,

Questions get quarantined as quarrels,

Rationalism gets restrained by restrictive reasoning,

Synergy gets side-lined by selective sensationalisms,

Tolerance gets treated as timidity,

Understanding gets underestimated by utopia sponsors,

Values gets vilified by vacillating virtue signallers,

Wisdom gets weighed down by wealth generation,

Xenophilia gets xferred by xenophobic nationalistic posturing,

Youth get yoked by trends and trade-offs,

Zeal gets zombified by critics.

 

 

Holistic medicine

​Though these types of interviews and talk shows are popular and appealing their actual understanding involves trying​​ to find out what are the issues that remain unaddressed by such speakers who are specialists in their own way but also hold some extremist positions whereby many things get diluted and masked including what they wish to get implemented. 

We cannot rewind or reject the massive strides made through R&D in modern medicines, lab, advanced technologies and financial help extended by investors for those institutional activities and insurance companies for individuals and most importantly the overall comprehensive facilities provided by HOSPITALS.   

Two main aspects of health when seen as medical care are:-

1. HEALTH PROMOTION which involves most importantly HEALTHY easily digestible FOOD CONSUMPTION.

2. DISEASE or HEALTH PROBLEM ADDRESSING which involves multiple healthcare practices from diagnosis to treatment. 

Health care for any individual is both a micro and macro issue and the medical profession too addresses it that way. 

Specific micro issues we have specializations all of which cannot be wished away. 

What this doctor says may be true to a certain extent, but everything cannot be dismissed outright. 

On medical treatment:-

All the technological advancements in diagnosis done through advanced equipment and surgeries done to fix the mechanical or structural problems of the human body cannot be thrown out of the window overnight.

Similarly, immediate relief and remedial medicines with universally available and accessible to many cannot be wished away just because of a few instances of Pharma+ insurance cos+ medical fraternity nexus mafia. 

Holistic medicine, true to the meaning of the word, holistic, may or preferably must include all forms of medical practices including allopathy. 

It would better that the top docs or institutions and manufacturers of different types of medicines starting from Allopathy to Ayurveda to Homeopathy to Naturopathy to neuropathy to psychology to psychiatry to multiple therapists to Siddha to Unani to many other regional and traditional medical practitioners gather together and decide on certain basic agenda of health care addressing micro as well as macro issues.

The issues may be broadly on biochemical, biomechanical, genetic make up, psychological issues etc.

Last but not the least important is as pointed out in this small interview to focus on the 'FUEL USED i.e. FOOD ITEMS' that human beings consume.

Most importantly, maintenance of one's health may involve multiple activities, exercises, type of food and medicines and treatments that one may take.

However, ultimately, care of one's health cannot be outsourced to anyone else and when there is a problem all the stakeholders are equally important i.e. doctors to diagnostic equipment  manufacturers to hospitals to all paramedical staff to pharma companies to insurance companies. 

Food is one thing that cannot be homogenized

 

There were three interesting magazines, which started even much before internet became accessible to the general public in 1995 in India and even after that almost ten years after that very few had access to internet, and those three magazines continue even today, more colorfully.

Of these two were from Europe which were [available for members of British Council Madras] and one from India.  All these three magazines I literally would memorize because they were packed with important and interesting information for general public and academicians alike, especially on non-political issues like environment, health, food and nutrition and important topics of great importance socially but were never the issues that were prioritized by politicians and often never even blinked in the radar of their politicians’ attention [a global phenomenon].

These magazine were:-

1. Resurgence [Wonderful monthly magazine from UK that was started by an Indian Satish Kumar -the founding editor, which ensured every issue had articles on topics like Onion, Garlic –starting from giving details of their etymology to tracing their history, indicating their biochemical properties, their nutritional value to their prevailing utility and benefits to human health. I never missed a single issue of that for almost 20 years in the 80s and 90s.

2. Down To Earth a magazine was started by Anil Agarwal from India which had lot of informative articles on environment, the importance of native items [ I remember one issue titled ‘Cow pathis-mentioning the importance of cow dung] but sometimes it had an excess of environmental activism [ I am not saying right or wrong].

3. The New Internationalist on various topics highly informative in the pre-internet era but predominantly [swinging between reasonable socialism to extreme left].

In spite of their ideological affinities they brought out lot of otherwise, hidden information on several topics and issues.

Why I mention these three magazines is, because they dealt mostly with food, environment, and sanitation and even while discussing issues on humanitarianism, economy, social justice etc., it was more about lack of access to food, the role nutrition and malnutrition played in the life of children and women, food habit, under-utilized native food items and so on.

While veering from these magazines for general public to domain specific books on nutrition, food ingredients, food processing, and food recipes, later on in recent years watching various Master Chef Programs and an inundation of Youtube videos on health foods, food supplements and so on repeatedly reveal these factors.

Irrespective of whatever food items that are offered to any society, the food items available in nature locally and food habits of a society will be the  inevitable preferential choice and major aspect of food consumed by human beings in different geographical locations and even within the same geographical location by different socio-cultural groups.

Therefore, food is one thing that cannot be homogenized however one may wish to do so.

The same ingredients used in different parts of the world will have varying degrees of intensity – saltiness in salts available, the sweetness of sugar available in different regions will vary, the variation that the same quantity of a particular ingredient will undergo when used for cooking in different items and different ways of cooking and so on.

Therefore, except for industrial grade and quantity of production neither the exact quantity and nor the method of food processing can be homogenized or even regulated beyond a certain extent. Any chef and every cook will vouch, that cooking any tasty menu is more instinctive that instructional and at best one acquires some expertise over a long period of time through sheer practice.

Besides, all these the food that is consumed tastes differently for everyone and is ingested and reacts differently for everyone.

Food habits, like mother –tongue is an important part of everyone’s nature and how much ever one may move around and migrate to different parts of the world, taste different food items and even if the taste buds put into forced metamorphosis due to inevitable life style changes, at the earliest opportunity one’s instincts crave for the food items one had as a child as one resorts to speaking in mother tongue when in the company of people who can understand and communicate in that language.

Having said, all these, as humanity has managed to predominantly adopt globally certain languages for convenient communication and easy understanding [this was, of course, achieved at different costs and for various reasons], similarly, can, majority of human beings be made to adopt a few major food items which can, [this being what goes onto take care of our health and habits] be satisfying different tastes, easily available, easily digestible and also help in one’s health.

If we consider these aspects, then among the 6 or 7 primary tastes that human tongue can decipher Sweet, Salty, Sour Spicy /pungent/hot, bitter, and astringent, umami etc.

Contrary to popular claims that food items get accepted through brand publicity ( which may be like temporary trend or passing cloud) what actually gets a food popular, if we choose to observe, keenly are factors like first taste, second availability, third affordability, fourth whether it fulfills the pangs of hunger, then whether it can be consumed raw and if not, whether it is ready to eat or easy to cook, all other factors like pleasant flavors, attractive colors, shapes and sizes, easy digestibility, health benefits, nutritional values and so on follow suite.

For example, let us take a globally known popular food Pizza. Though human being may want to taste new food items they prefer to consume food items that have some element familiarity and not totally new.  For example, anything that is wheat, corn or rice based with thousands of permutation combinations can be served be it raw bread or biscuits or pizzas or pastas or multiple flakes made out of them added with nuts and dry fruits. 

If we take pizza for example we will know how it originated and why it has become popular. 

 

It was just flat bread based, it emerged from the poor working class known as lazzaroni who needed to be fed with inexpensive food that would give them energy to work. It was just flatbreads with various toppings, eaten for any meal and sold mostly by street vendors. Now of course, it has taken many avatars with multiple toppings and seasonings, flavors etc.

 

Our knowledge of tastes and smells are extremely limited and often restricted by the prevailing vocabulary used in common parlance whereas, tastes and smell are senses which are around not waiting for our vocabulary to define and classify them. So, creative generation of tasty and healthy of food items is limitless.

A fast reading of Chapter 8 titled Twenty-one Senses of Chemistry, Mind and Spirit in the book The Seven Mysteries of Life by Guy Murchie [now available on the net free] will take us into a journey of smells and tastes of life in general through his information packed romantic and poetic prose.

More about smells when I get time reflect, recollect and render here.

Food we eat

On World Food Day think of this.

​​

Almost 80% to 90% of our food contains or is predominantly made of these 13 items which may be remembered through a simple acronym as:-

WRECKED MY TOPS

Wheat

Rice

Egg

Corn

Kinds of sea food

Edible nuts

Diary products

Meat

Yummy oils

Tomato

Onion

Potato

Some fruits and vegetables .

Moderation in food

Theories and real scientific research will throw up newer and newer facts and information generally and mostly for the benefit of human beings as a whole. 

However, in most regions most of the traditional and regionally available food either raw or processed are time tested.

Finally taste and temptation dominate till alarm bells ring ​and ​force one to change to nutritious and healthy stuff.

Most  foods unsuitable or toxic for our body and climate send signals through our body itself through cough, constipation, indigestion, nausea, carminative uneasiness , allergies, rashes etc if we choose to observe.

But for some people even the most toxic food does not harm and for others even the least harmful food causes problems.

Ironically, we all realise very late in life that food is one area where moderation is the vital aspect.

Food

Carnatic music, Cockroaches, Cars, Canteens and Creating Overnight Celebrities

Carnatic music, Cockroaches, Cars, Canteens and Creating Overnight Celebrities

“Get out of your own way… stop the paralysis by analysis… decide what you want, create a simple plan, and get moving!” - Steve Maraboli.

I beg you… to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don’t search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer. ~ 
Rainer Maria Rilke.

“Across planes of consciousness, we have to live with the paradox that opposite things can be simultaneously true.” 
― Ram Dass.

I start with these three quotes whose relevance I would like the readers to infer at the end.

The ideology which preaches a comfortable car to redesign itself in speed, design etc to render justice to bullock carts to bridge the gap of disparity is putrefying  growth and petrifying to a 21^st century human being.

All that I write below are merely observations and not judgments on anything as correct or wrong.

Everything is inherently embedded with certain basic and fundamental steps which one cannot by pass [of course this too has exceptions] but to deprive things of these fundamental steps would be emasculating them of their very vitality.

Everything in any process of growth is just a step, important and inevitable, but not a stop. It is so with mother’s milk [our biological aspect of life]; it is so with learning of alphabets, words and numbers [our intellectual aspect of life]; it is so with hugging, kissing and cajoling as babies [our emotional aspect of life]; it is so with our learning and understanding of different concepts [ our philosophical aspect of life]; it is so with all forms of worship, devotion and all its concomitant rituals and religious practices [ our spiritual life] and so on. This is the inherent wisdom. A normal human being has to go through a process to grow in everything or into something. There may be exceptions like a Adi shankara, or a Bhagawan Ramanamaharishi.

We can neither avoid the steps nor get struck to them. That’s why I cannot accept the snobbism of so called intellectuals parroting pet slogans like religion without rituals, god without religion or religion without gods, spiritualism without god or religion etc. In fact I have books titled in each part of the slogan.

This does not mean that we must stop questioning or doubting anything in real earnest to get answers or get further enlightened. Fortunately we are from a philosophical background, I mean Indians, wherein the religion is Sanathana Dharma which allowed also carvaka philosophy which almost advocated atheism when the word atheism itself did not exist in any language.[1]

Incidentally my New Year Greeting for 2014 itself is about questioning.[2]

Here even in the arena of spirituality I would suggest to those who cannot digest the high philosophical exposition of reality as explained by a J.Krsihnamurthy or a Neale Donald Walsch to read Swami Chinmayananda’s wonderful and very simple book ‘Logic of Spirituality’ as it can help us make a true evaluation of what type of human being we are and which type of approach will be appealing to us and make us access our spiritual roots easily. For some it is rituals and devotion; for some it is philosophical enquiry; for some it is pure meditative approach etc. Here are the links but better still to buy the book with CD and gift it to parents. [3] This applies to all fields.

Take for example the food in a hotel. Some may like the food in a hotel just as it is to satisfy their hunger, some may like its ambience , some may get attracted by brand name, some may appreciate the presentation of the food, some may like the hospitality of the waiter, some may like the dressing of the food, some may like the color of the food, some may be interested in analyzing the ingredients, some may be bothered about whether they were prepared in hygienic conditions, some may be bothered about the nutritional content of the food, some also may like the taste  etc. It is difficult to satisfy all these categories and many more such seekers. If a hotel starts analyzing all these factors  in the food that they plan to offer then the hotel business can never takeoff.  

In any evolution in general and in individual in particular certain metamorphic changes could be at times spontaneous, sudden, intense, intermittent, linked to some hidden agenda or ulterior motives etc but nevertheless they create an impact. Sometimes it has produced the greatest souls who have propelled the course of history like a Valmiki or a Voltaire [read Will Durant's story of philosophy wherein he introduces Voltaire as 'Italy had renaissance, Germany had reformation but France had one man called Voltaire']. But mostly when public pronouncements or publicity of such supposed metamorphosis especially when it pops out of  people who merely seek popularity and prominence through short cuts without necessary experience -based maturity, sound knowledge and groping about in irrelevant territories desperately seeking identity it does not augur well either for that person or the cause[s] which he is supposed to be promoting and it could even be counterproductive.

Everything that has ever existed and continue to exist or anything that has happened or continue to happen quiet often has its own inherent logic, principle, purpose, value, strength etc. In addition they are or act as some pieces to fit into the jigsaw puzzle of life.

These two important factors inherent logic and being part of the jigsaw puzzle of life are attributes of everything starting from the various forms and names of Almighty to all things in the universes.  

Unfortunately the whole or complete picture of life is yet unknown to many of us [if we are honest and humble enough to accept] but not unknowable. This unknown mystery is so because of various factors of which the two most glaring are our chronologically limited mortal body frame and the limited abilities and perceptions of our mental frame and this prevents us from simultaneously perceiving anything at both the micro as well as macro level.[4]

But despite the limited existence of our individual body and all the limitations of our mind, we as human beings have explored the unmapped atlas of life enjoying, experiencing and enlightening ourselves in the process. Life as whole has been constantly reciprocating us with both sweet melodies and bitter tragedies in the course of our explorations and experiences.

Life has manifested its splendor through the excellent contributions and developments leading humanity to the zenith of advancements and enhancement of living conditions as well as pushed humanity to the nadir of existence because of some destructive and decadent activities.

The destructive and decadent activities are not only the tangible material ones but the psychological ones too and the purpose of this article is to address one such psychologically destructive activity which is promoted by vested interest groups.

Fortunately, at least in our country, most things and individuals have remained unencumbered by political ideologies formed and framed to homogenize everything and everyone and exercise control over and dominate and rule.

This long preamble is necessary to drive home certain points that I would like to explain now.

For want of time, space and in order to confine myself to the topic I am addressing, I am limiting myself only to a very small area of psychological destructiveness which by itself is too vast staring from catchy slogans which block thinking and reasoning to constant propaganda and brainwashing techniques which prevent perception and many such destructive tools adopted to control a whole population to fall in line with a particular or specific ideology through homogenization. [5]

These ideological invasions are done through various means to curb the manifestation of law of nature which is variety, and freedom of individual thinking which is the natural process of inward flowering of every individual soul expressing itself through the body and mind it has chosen.

Many religious institutions and political outfits have used these techniques to propagate, preserve and promote their vested interests.

From the vast sky of these vague generalized observations let me dive down to the specific clouds.

Persons, things, events are the different clouds that dot the sky of life. What happens is out of  an attitudinal problem when we deal with or resort to apply or evaluate wrongly [6] different clouds then our overall perception[7] of the cloud is clouded and before we realize the cloud either moves away or explodes or evaporates. So, great havoc is created through psychological fallacies. How? Let me explain.

That is, we cannot apply to study things or events out of context however exalted or revered tools we may use, be they the Vedas or bible. To drive home this point let me take a very crude example. Can they [Vedas or bible] explain or do they contain literature about methods and morals of cyber usage? The answer is a definite no. Obviously cyber activities did not exist at the period when Vedas or bible came into existence. So to evaluate them [Vedas or Bible, however great, good and useful they are, or however much you hold them with reverence and sanctity] with reference to their relevance to cyber activities will only make these texts of no use or value. If anyone who attempts to use the Vedas or bible in such a way is resorting to adopting wrong tools of application or using wrong methods of evaluation. We have to only laugh at his ignorance or ignore his laughable behavior.[8]

Cockroaches have their own inherent attributes like being nocturnal creature with a chain of hearts, in all totaling to 13. Some regard it as a single heart with 13 chambers. These are funnel shaped chambers with a pair of tiny holes called ostia. The ostia allow blood into the cockroach hearts. The hearts push the blood forward, in the direction of the head. Beneath the hearts are rhomboid alary (i.e. wing-shaped) muscles. Contraction and relaxation of the alary muscles pulls the blood nearer heart and Suction pressure fills the heart with blood entering through the ostia. We cannot complain about cockroaches having a heart throughout its body with more than a dozen chambers and having an ability to live longer without air or food and even their ability to withstand radiation better than human beings can be explained through the cell cycle. Cells are most vulnerable to the effects of radiation when they are dividing. A cockroach's cells divide only once each time it molts, which is weekly at most in a juvenile roach. Since not all cockroaches would be molting at the same time, many would be unaffected by an acute burst of radiation.

It is these very unique features or attributes that have made them survive, as probably only species over several millions of years. We cannot complain that they have unfair advantages like they are only nocturnal preferable inhabiting dark but dry as well as wet places.

We cannot apply or need not apply and expect cockroaches to fit into our political ideology based on twisted logic and demand that cockroaches must also like many other insects be made to be present at day time, on all environs and so on. We may not like the cockroach’s filiform antennae or its anal cerci and therefore we cannot expect creation to redesign a cockroach’s anatomy to suit our taste or liking.  Cockroach’s worthiness or value is dependent on the above cited aspects of  its own unique features.

Cockroaches and mango fruit sambar have their own inherent logic for existence.[9]

All bubbles and balloons are very attractive spectacles but we can never erect structures using them as a foundation, the Indian brand of Marxist leftist ideology is one such bubble or balloon to which all of us are attracted but trying to claim it as a panacea or use to as a tool to evaluate everything or as a reference manual to explain the correctness or justify everything is to live in a world of delusion and muddying the water. Some migratory birds may fish in these troubled waters whether we view their acts as noble or otherwise [pun] intended.

One can combine the use of the gift of the gab, mastery of language and google’s search engines and produce excellent literature on cardiac surgery and neuro surgery which can put to envy even great cardiac surgeons and neuro surgeons but that does not mean that that person has the least bit of knowledge about either the heart or brain much less can be expected to even witness either a cardiac or brain surgery without shivering, leave alone doing the surgery. There is nothing wrong in such literature or persons producing such literature.

But it would be grave mistake  to give more prominence or importance to such writers over real cardiac and neuro surgeons especially to people who are confused as to which specialist doctor they need to approach for their cardiac problems.

Unfortunate trend is the TV anchors and media promoted personalities are tending to be considered as  experts in all fields and some turn out as overnight celebrities, heroes and even chief ministers.

The platform that gives more importance to such writers is contributing to the psychological decay of the human race. Damage is more if a majority of innocent people look up to such platform.

The subject I am touching upon is a frustrated carnatic vocalist and the prominence given to him by a particular newspaper.

I beg to disagree with you respected author of this article who makes lofty comparisons of a small fry.[ http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-features/tp-editorialfeatures/an-open-letter-to-tmkrishna/article5494768.ece#]

I can quote a few hundreds of eccentric geniuses like flute Mali in India in various fields and a few thousands across the globe.

Their eccentricities were psychological or emotional manifesting either as inherent natural attributes of their individual self or out of their reaction based on the actual realization or presumed perception that their extraordinary talents were not appreciated to the extent that they deserved or expected.

For those who believe in astrology there are certain combinations of Venus [ sukran]  which endows one with both extraordinary talent and eccentricities.

But then in the case of TMK, with all respects to him [ I too used to enjoy some of his concerts] let me make it very clear, avoiding comparisons [both in terms of voice quality or musical expertise] that he is not even anywhere near many others of his time and of even those much younger to him. They are all far more talented than him.

His eccentricities could be probably out of frustration that he is not able to perform as well as many others or his over ambitious short term prominence seeking and cheap publicity seeking mentality through short cuts or is the result of his having got influenced and getting confused by a totally conflicting and irrelevant ideological fixation based on a social philosophy which has proven track record of colossal failure in actual application even in domains for which it was intended and that ideology needs to be kept in the attic of a Museum, not even anywhere else in the museum, namely Leninist Marxist ideology which has failed even in USSR.

Or perhaps he is consciously aware that he cannot compete and excel among his peers and other great singers that he has resorted to, thanks to his family background and being well connected to some media houses to these tricks.

Incidentally I have written this way back without as much of fanfare or publicity as TMK more or less on same lines in certain aspects with suggestions that my small brain could think of but without trying to pose as a messiah read the link patiently [http://contentwriteups.blogspot.in/2012/08/carnatic-music-too-must-reinvent-itself.html]

Here is one interesting write up I found

“How will a deaf man understand music?

He will bring a sound detector, that might have some graphical intruments. The deaf man will make graphs of frequency vs time, and then he will merely say "THIS IS MUSIC!".

IS MUSIC MERELY "frequency vs time"?

Ask a musician to decode the frequency vs time and reproduce the music. He won't be able to. I compose music. I have tried to record my music on paper(during these vacations!) like a deaf man. Sometimes when I forget my own music, these written texts(that contain in great detail, everything) are of no use. It is dead. You need inspiration to remember the music back.

Sound forms a minuscle part of music. What matters more is the bhava(emotions and expressions) .Music requires inspiration. It requires a connection to the nature and this world. Music is never created, it is ever present, you just need to listen to it.

Music has a soul. The sound is merely its carrier.

There is the same soul within everything. Somewhere its carrier is the sound, while somewhere its carrier is the body.”[ http://prateekraj.blogspot.in/2007/10/charvaka-philosophy_02.html]

[1] http://www.mahavidya.ca/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/gajdostik-megan-carvaka-philosophy.pdf and http://www.slideshare.net/ajitceo/the-carvaka-philosophy

[2] New Year with a New Realization of Reality

http://contentwriteups.blogspot.in/2013/12/new-year-with-new-realization-of-reality_6.html

http://www.scribd.com/doc/189819608/New-Year-With-a-New-Realization-of-Reality1011

[3]http://chinmayasaaket.org/articles/gurudev/LOGIC%20OF%20SPIRITUALITY.pdf and http://www.hinduismworldwide.in/2013/05/logic-of-spirituality-swami.html

[4] http://contentwriteups.blogspot.in/2013/11/micro-details-and-macro-view.html

[5] http://contentwriteups.blogspot.in/2009/10/peace-and-non-violence-harmony-and.html

[6] http://contentwriteups.blogspot.in/2010/12/attitude.html

[7] http://contentwriteups.blogspot.com/2010/02/real-perception.html

[8] http://www.authorstream.com/Presentation/balayogiv-1483224-morality-contextual/

http://www.scribd.com/doc/101199648/Morality-is-Just-Contextual

[9] http://contentwriteups.blogspot.in/2013/12/story-of-mango-fruit-sambar-and.html

Thoughts on Food, Drink and Dieting

Thoughts on Food, Drink and Dieting



I will not eat oysters. I want my food dead. Not sick. Not wounded. Dead. – Woody Allen


One reason I don't drink is that I want to know when I am having a good time. - Nancy Astor


It is a scientific fact that your body will not absorb cholesterol if you take it from another person's plate. – Dave Barry


Never accept a drink from a urologist. - Erma Bombeck


I just bought a cured ham. Wonder what it had? – Unknown


Men are strange. When they wake up in the morning they want things like toast. I don’t have these recipes. – Elayne Boosler


Triangular sandwiches taste better than square ones. – Peter Kay


It takes only one drink to get me drunk. The trouble is I can't remember if it's the thirteenth or the fourteenth. - George Burns


Wouldn't you know it...Brain cells come and brain cells go, but FAT cells live forever. – Unknown


Man is the only animal that can remain on friendly terms with the victims he intends to eat until he eats them. - Samuel Butler


I'm at an age where I think more about food than I do about sex. Last week I put a mirror over my dining room table. - Rodney Dangerfield


A woman drove me to drink ... and I hadn't even the courtesy to thank her. - W.C. Fields


The only kind of seafood I trust is the fish stick, a totally featureless fish that doesn't have eyeballs or fins. – Dave Barry


Reminds me of my safari in Africa. Somebody forgot the corkscrew and for several days we had to live on nothing but food and water. - W. C. Fields


Why does mineral water that 'has trickled through mountains for centuries' have a 'use by' date? – Peter Kay


Ask your child what he wants for dinner only if he’s buying – Fran Lebowitz


Without question, the greatest invention in the history of mankind is beer. Oh, I grant you that the wheel was also a fine invention, but the wheel does not go nearly as well with pizza. – Dave Barry


Only Irish coffee provides in a single glass all four essential food groups: alcohol, caffeine, sugar and fat. - Alex Levine


The cardiologist's diet: If it tastes good ... spit it out. – Unknown


My favorite animal is steak. – Fran Lebowitz


If you drink, don't drive. Don't even putt. - Dean Martin


If this is coffee, please bring me some tea; but if this is tea, please bring me some coffee. - Abraham Lincoln


The hardness of the butter is proportional to the softness of the bread. - Steven Wright


Why does Sea World have a seafood restaurant?? I'm halfway through my fish burger and I realize, Oh my God.... I could be eating a slow learner. - Lynda Montgomery


The trouble with jogging is that the ice falls out of your glass. - Martin Mull


Never eat more than you can lift. – Miss Piggy


My therapist told me the way to achieve true inner peace is to finish what I start. So far today, I have finished 2 bags of M and M's and a chocolate cake. I feel better already. – Dave Barry


Most turkeys taste better the day after; my mother's tasted better the day before. - Rita Rudner


Man can not live by bread alone. At the very least, it requires the addition of a little peanut butter and jelly. – Gene Simmons


Reading when you're drunk is horrible. – Peter Kay


In Mexico we have a word for sushi: Bait. - Jose Simon


Red meat is NOT bad for you. Now, blue-green meat, THAT'S bad for you! - Tommy Smothers


I was a vegetarian until I started leaning toward the light. – Rita Rudner


Everybody's got to believe in something. I believe I'll have another beer. - W. C. Fields


Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a misprint. - Mark Twain


Now that food has replaced sex in my life, I can't even get into my own pants. – Unknown


You never know where to look when eating a banana. – Peter Kay


The only reason I have a kitchen is because it came with the house. – Unknown


My doctor told me to stop having intimate dinners for four. Unless there are three other people. - Orson Welles


My Grandmother is over eighty and still doesn’t need glasses. Drinks right out of the bottle. – Henny Youngman

Nanoparticles in your food

Nanoparticles in your food? You’re already eating them

By Twilight Greenaway
I’ve been keeping my eye on the role of nanotechnology in food for a few years now, so I was interested to see a feature-length investigation called “Eating Nano” in this month’s E Magazine. In it, E editor Brita Belli takes a deep dive into the growing role of nanotechnology in food and agriculture, the current lack of oversight and regulations, and the growing consensus that more information and transparency are both sorely needed in relation to this growing field.
Nanotechnology involves the engineering and manipulation of particles at a nano scale. Nanoparticles, as they’re called, are measured in nanometers or billionths of one meter. Another way to put it: If a nanoparticle were the size of a football, a red blood cell would be the size of the field. Although some nanoparticles have been found to exist in nature (carbon nanoparticles exist in caramelized foods, for instance, and silverware has been shown to shed nano-sized silver particles), it’s the nanoparticles that are engineered in laboratories that have environmental health advocates concerned.
E MagazineThe above foods all contain titanium dioxide in nano form. Click to embiggen.
Here’s the thing: It turns out most materials start behaving differently at that size. According to the British corporate accountability organization As You Sow, which has been keeping tabs on the nanotech industry for several years, “materials reduced to the nanoscale either through engineered or natural processes can suddenly show very different properties compared to what they exhibit on a macroscale, enabling unique applications such as alterations in color, electrical conductance, or permeability.”
Considering the fact that nanoparticles are now used to help deliver nutrients, keep food fresh for longer, and act as thickening and coloring agents in processed foods, these “different properties” might be cause for concern. Or — at the very least — they might be reason enough to conduct thorough research into their health impacts.
In actuality, companies are not required to disclose nano-sized ingredients, nor is there much active questioning about their safety. Instead, Belli writes, “From the government’s perspective, nano forms of silver, iron or titanium are no different, fundamentally, from their scaled-up counterparts which have already been safety tested, so the agency has ushered the particles into the food supply under the Generally Recognized as Safe provision.”
I’ve been hearing about nanoparticles in food packaging for a while now (it’s a market Belli says is expected to reach $20 billion by 2020), but I had no idea that there was nano-coating in the works for bananas. And what I was most surprised to learn is just how many food products already contain nanoparticles. As Belli writes:
Nanoparticles can be used to purify water, as anticaking and gelatin-forming agents and in packaging to protect against UV light, prevent the growth of microbes or detect contamination. Titanium dioxide is added to a huge swath of products in nano form including paints, paper and plastics but also lends white pigment to most toothpastes and many processed foods, including Mentos, Trident and Dentyne gum, M&Ms, Betty Crocker Whipped Cream Frosting, Jello Banana Cream Pudding, Vanilla Milkshake Pop Tarts and Nestlé Original Coffee Creamer. The aforementioned products were featured in a report in February 2012 in the journal Environmental Science & Technology which concluded that each of us likely consumes some amount of titanium dioxide (TiO2) nanoparticles each day, and children under 10 likely consume the greatest amounts (around 1-2 mg TiO2 per kilogram body weight per day) due to their higher intake of frosted foods, candy, gum and other sweets.
Although there is less science focused on ingested nanotech particles than on, say, the ones that are inhaled in industrial environments, Belli does point to the few studies that exist, including a recent one out of Cornell University that looked at chickens’ abilities to absorb iron after eating nanoparticles generally considered safe for human consumption. In it, researchers found that acute exposure to the particles changed the structure of the lining of the chickens’ intestinal walls, a change the lead scientist noted “serves to underscore how such particles, which have been widely studied and considered safe, cause barely detectable changes that could lead to, for example, over-absorption of other, harmful compounds.”
When it comes to questions about the health effects of eating nanoparticles, Belli quotes a guide on the American Society of Safety Engineers’ website, which reads:
Nanoparticles may be ingested through drinking water, food additives, atmospheric dust on food, toothpaste and dental fillings and implants. Ingested nanoparticles can then be absorbed through ‘Peyer’s Plaques’ or small nodules in intestinal tissue that are part of the immune defense system. If nanoparticles enter the digestive system and proceed into the bloodstream, they could move throughout the body and cause damage.
Of course, most of this — and much of the science Belli points to — is preliminary, based on very little hard science. And if that lack of a cautionary approach to science in a multibillion-dollar industry sounds familiar, that’s because — well, it is. The comparison to genetically modified foods is unavoidable.
In fact, Timothy Duncan, a research chemist from the Food and Drug Administration, admitted as much about the nanotech industry (which likely has thousands of food and food packaging products in the research and development stage) while writing in the journal Nature Nanotechnology last year. “What’s holding back the introduction of nanofoods is the hesitation of the food industry, fearing a public backlash along the lines of what happened with genetically modified foods, and public fears in some countries about tampering with nature,” Duncan wrote.
And considering how little media coverage these larger questions about nanotechnology and food have received — not to mention inclusion on the larger “food movement” laundry list — it looks like the lesson the food industry has learned from GMOs is not one about the importance of transparency, but quite the opposite.
As Tom Philpott observed in Grist in 2010, the last time big questions surfaced about nanotech in food in the media: “As with GMOs, the strategy seems to be: release into the food supply en masse first; assess risks later (if ever).”