Another Browncast is up. You can listen on Libsyn, Apple, Spotify, and Stitcher (and a variety of other platforms). Probably the easiest way to keep up the podcast since we don’t have a regular schedule is to subscribe to one of the links above!
Mr. Tilak Devasher, Author, Member, National Security Advisory Board and former Special Secretary, Govt of India joins Maneesh, Somnath and Dr. Ali to talk about his latest book The Pashtuns- A Contested History.
On the 26th Episode of The Indic Explorer Show, I spoke to Abhivardhan from Bharat Pacific on the topic of Indic Futurism – A Civilizational Vision for the Future.
It is a topic that is part of the larger vision of Indic Modernity. While the Traditionalists and Conservatives have been well documented in the Socio-Cultural Civilizational space, the Indic Modernists have been less studied.
While Modernists do study the past and take lessons from it. What differentiates them from others in the Civilizational renaissance movement is that they are present in the future and present a more futuristic vision.
The Indic Explorer YouTube channel focusses on the interplay of Indic culture with modernity explored through different facets in the socio-cultural sphere.
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Nimrata Nikki Haley is running for President of the United States of American.
1) She’s a donor-class wet dream and a throwback to the pre-Trump Republican party. I don’t think this is going to work, but who knows?
2) It’s America, you do what you want, but not going to lie; Bobby Jindal was always a bit too unctuous in his urge to emphasize his American bonafides. Haley’s biography strikes me as more natural and relatable.
3) I think she may be tapped for VP on identity politics grounds by the Republican party. Interesting VP debate with Kamala Devi Harris.
On the 25th Episode of The Indic Explorer Show, I spoke to Major General Vikram Dev Dogra on The Lessons for Civilians from a Military Person’s Life.
The Indic Explorer YouTube channel focusses on the interplay of Indic culture with modernity explored through different facets in the socio-cultural sphere.
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Another Browncast is up. You can listen on Libsyn, Apple, Spotify, and Stitcher (and a variety of other platforms). Probably the easiest way to keep up the podcast since we don’t have a regular schedule is to subscribe to one of the links above!
Sunny Narang, a Punjabi born and brought up in Delhi with ancestral roots in Pakistan, speaks with Dr. Ali on post partition Punjabis in Delhi; they also talk about culture and people who have and continue to shape the history of the sub-continent, from Jain bankers in Mughal India to the business clans of modern India.
Some of the books talked about on the episode.
It should be researched rationally like any other treatment and used if it works.
The underlying framework is not going to survive forever (even if it captures something useful, it does not coexist well w the rest of our modern knowledge) but some things will surely survive?— omar ali (@omarali50) February 8, 2023
No, it includes countless prescriptions (from medications/herbs to "complementary medicine") AND a theoretical framework. That framework will not coexist well w modern medicine, but that does not mean prescriptions are all wrong too.. as far as framework goes.. 1/n
— omar ali (@omarali50) February 9, 2023
Small digression of the day was in a domain I know little about (my thought was more that u shud not dismiss the products an ancient and sophisticated culture summarily,, real knowledge is captured in it, frameworks need "translation"), but if anyone has interesting links, share https://t.co/eI0Y6b9DUE
— omar ali (@omarali50) February 9, 2023
A couple of days ago i saw a tweet from @theliverdr on twitter that made fun of some recent initiative to add Ayurvedic medicine to the medical school curriculum. I don’t know what they will teach and how useful it will be in practice (as a boomer of Pakistani origin my first thought is that expectations should be low, at least initially), but I thought the summary dismissal of the entire corpus of knowledge is also unscientific and tweeted out the tweets pasted above.
My point was not so much about what the Indian medical system will actually end up teaching. It was more a philosophical point that we should not dismiss the products of an ancient and sophisticated culture summarily; there is likely to be real knowledge that is captured in it, but the framework is very different (and “pre-scientific”) and will need “translation”. As an example I mentioned Ida, Pingala and Sukhmun Naadis, channels in which energy supposedly flows along our spine. Modern science recognizes no such channels, but that does not mean that the lore built up around this theory is all valueless. Methods to manipulate these channels can still work even if the channels do not exist, but even beyond that we know less than is advertised, and it is conceivable that we will discover elements in biology that we will then recognize as being the modern (and presumably far more scientific) equivalents of whatever observations and theories the ancients had along these lines. But having tweeted this out, I also know that I know very little about Ayurveda, my thoughts were just on “general principles”. So I asked a few friends if they had a good article introducing ayurveda or ancient Indian science in general.
Lo and behold, I was sent a large document that has been written by a blogger who goes by the name “Manasataramgini“. Acharya ji (since he is anonymous, this title will have to do) is a Hindu nationalist who blogs at manasataramgini.wordpress.com and many of whose writings will no doubt be grounds for cancellation in left-liberal circles, but he is also a very serious and competent scientist, and an intellectual with very deep knowledge of Sanskrit and ancient Indian lore. It is a 51 page document, but it seems to me that this is worth posting on the internet. People can draw their own conclusions 🙂
The entire document is at the above link. I am posting a couple of excerpts from the intro and the text as screenshots, but it is really easier to read at the above link (but since I know how lazy I am when reading blog posts, I am posting some screenshots.. note that similar early scientific speculations by the Greeks are treated as “the beginning of science”).
On the 24th Episode (Part 2) of The Indic Explorer Show, I spoke to Ami Ganatra on The Higher Learnings related to Yoga.
The Indic Explorer YouTube channel focusses on the interplay of Indic culture with modernity explored through different facets in the socio-cultural sphere.
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On the 24th Episode (Part 1) of The Indic Explorer Show, I spoke to Ami Ganatra on Yoga 101 – The Basics & Fundamentals of Yoga.
The Indic Explorer YouTube channel focusses on the interplay of Indic culture with modernity explored through different facets in the socio-cultural sphere.
Do subscribe to the channel at https://www.youtube.com/theindicexplorer
and follow me here
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Every nationality or cultural group should have a song done like this. I’m writing a Substack on Vikings, who were quite nasty in many ways, but popular culture songs like this make them seem “bad ass.”
India might open to foreign universities. That could be a game-changer:
And India’s higher education system badly needs shaking up. Setting aside issues of quality (as if those can be set aside), India does not come close to providing sufficient seats to those aspiring to higher education — a glaring shortcoming as India’s burgeoning middle class strives to prepare their children for the opportunities of the future.
India’s system has its successes, of course, but they are narrow. Just nine Indian higher education institutions made the top 500 of the most recent QS World University Rankings. The top one — the Indian Institute of Science (at 155) — is a highly specialized institution focused on postgraduate studies and research in the sciences. The other eight are part of the well-known Indian Institutes of Technology, which specialize in engineering. The highest-ranked comprehensive university was the University of Delhi, falling in the 520s.
That is simply not good enough. All told, India has just over 1,000 institutions of higher learning. China, with a similar population, has three times that. The United States, with a much smaller population, has four times as many.
This all sounds find, but India will replicate some of the US’s pathologies in the education sector. The “consumer model” of higher education has been causing serious problems here over the past few decades. The op-ed even states that “Private universities, too, are overly regulated and cannot operate for profit. That deters the best entrepreneurs from entering the sector.” Entrepreneurs entering the sector was a disaster, and for-profit colleges were a way to absorb student loans from the public fisc.
But I wish India well.