Why am I a rational atheist?

The question has been on my mind for a long time. A very long time, in fact. In this essay, I would like to reason out my rationality. And at the very outset, I would like to say my argument is with the God, as perceived by most people in this world. Overwhelming majority of the population, irrespective of the religion they belong to, see God as someone who created this whole universe, including our planet, all forms of life and has absolute control over what happens in our lives, oversees our deeds (good or bad), answers to our prayers and defines our destinies, all absolutely for no apparent reason!

The question of belief in God has been discussed by so many great people, both theist and atheist. Most of the atheists, at least most of who I have read have been westerners. There have been a few exceptions. A brilliantly reasoned out essay by the great Indian freedom fighter revolutionary Bhagath Singh and another superbly thought out Kannada book titled “Devaru” by an English professor, who lived all of 102 years and remained a happy atheist till the very end, are some that I have read.

Let me start by contemplating, briefly, what I could have otherwise become – a Hindu, lingayat by caste and a believer. And that would have been only because my parents are exactly that. That has never been a strong enough reason for me to do anything, not just being religious.

So, what god to believe in - Hindu (one or other of the innumerable gods of the Hindu pantheon) or Buddha or Jesus or Yahweh or Allah or some other? All of them, in the way perceived by most people in the world, are mutually exclusive. Not withstanding what a few magnanimously claim – that those are the various paths to that same destination, you cannot believe in one and also truly believe in another. If one is true, other has to be lesser truth, if not completely false.

Let's for a moment assume that there is one (whatever religion) God, who has absolute control over what happens in the universe and more so in our lives on earth. Even an ardent super religious person accepts that not all is well on the face of the earth. There is abject poverty, human suffering, exploitation and injustice. Why is the omnipotent almighty not doing a thing about it? By sheer will, it should be easy for the God to set right everything that is wrong on this planet. We often get to hear that we don't understand the ways of God. That argument (that we don't understand the ways of God) should only be as much valid or true, if not less, as perhaps there are no set ways of God at all! Isn't it just a logical extension that people are scared to make?

While I was young, when I used to visit temples with my parents, I used to wonder, what do I do, closing my eyes? What was I supposed to say while praying? If I said thanks for all the comforts that I had in my life, am I not being unreasonable? For, I knew there were many without two square meals a day? And favor is one thing I could never ask for from anybody, let alone God!!

Let's look at religions and God from yet another angle. What is the view of all the religions on the cosmos? Why is that none of the religions of the world talk about size of the universe or the number of galaxies? It is about 20 years since Hubble telescope was launched and it has already made ground breaking discoveries such as - black holes existence and defining the age of the universe. It has also proved (or theorized?) the existence of something no one has seen and yet is verifiable by means of science - dark energy! In comparison, all that the religions of the world are actively concerned about is - building worship places, breaking others', battling homosexuality, protesting abortion rights and when free, indulging in meaningless rituals.

Most recently, with the advances in the field of quantum physics, many experts claim that science and God (in abstract form) have moved closer. But, it should be noted that advancements in science are a result of years of research and subject to repeatable verifications. So, even if mysticism of religion appears (to people who see everything in jaundiced eyes of religion) like abstract quantum physics, the path taken by science is truly transparent and honest. Science can reveal the mysteries of life to anyone who is willing to question even the axioms, unlike religion which appears to reveal only to the chosen people - seers and priestly class!

And finally, if one wants to define God as a destination of a quest to explain how things work in this universe, it is evident that all the religious paths are at an equidistant, light years away from the truth and are not even oriented in the direction of truth! Only science has the highest probability of reaching that goal. And that's why I am a rational atheist!

Code Name God!?

Just about to finish reading Code Name God, a sort of autobiography by Mani Bhaumik. It is a fascinating story of rags to riches and of great professional success. I obviously don't agree with his views on religions of the world and spirituality. At some point in the book, Mani makes his argument that science has answers to 'what', but does not answer 'why'. In reality, the religions of the world utterly fail to answer 'what' and provide some mythical allegories as answers for 'why'. That's my view of course. Incidentally, Mani Bhaumik is the inventor of technology behind LASIK eye surgery and the book is a very interesting one to read, even to an atheist!

Indian traffic sense - one bitter taste in the mouth...

I feel compelled to write about what happened in the morning today. I was passing through a traffic junction on Bannerghatta road, Bangalore. It is a T junction, and I was going straight and it was 'Green' for going straight. Suddenly, I see a biker making a right turn, when it is 'Red' and land right in front of my car. Seeing me behind, he moves to the right and gives me way. I rolled down my window and said "You should not have crossed, it was Red for you". His reply "I was not in your way". I said "But, you violated the traffic law, you should not do that". His reply - "does not matter, I was not in your way". Here I lost cool, yelled at him "but rule is a rule, you look like educated and but behave like an idiot". He scooted off fast and after being away at a safe distance showed his left hand middle finger. I felt frustrated because of the helpless situation that I was in. No, I have no hope for this country. I am sorry that I have to live here.

Rationalism - a way of life

I am back to blogging after a gap of about three months. In this period, there were times when I wanted to write, mostly to blurt out my frustrations at various things in life. But, again, I thought, what is the point, things are not going to change here. So, I had or I have gone into a cynical mood about various things such a traffic, lawlessness, chaos in public places, lack of civic sense, caste, religion and irrationality. I am back to writing however, without having to force myself, thanks to something that happened over the weekend.

I attended the First Meeting Of The Karnataka Rationalist Association in Bangalore on the 14th of March, 2010, held at Makkala Koota. I usually don't associate myself with any social groups or activists for various reasons, my introvert nature being one. So much so that many of my close family members call me an anti-social! But, being a rationalist, I could not resist myself going to this meeting. I consider myself a rational atheist. And, it is not too often that we get a chance to be amongst rationalists in a overly religious society like ours.

I was there, along with my friend Sumanth (who happens to be my daughter's college mate) about 11:00 am. The meeting had already started. There were delegates from other states and also from various districts of karnataka. Quickly we understood that the purpose of the meet was to discuss about founding a state wide umbrella organization to include all the rationalist movements. And, one of the agenda was to collect views and opinions from the delegates as to what should be the activities (apart from exposing miracles) that the organization should involve in to promote rationality and scientific temper.

Firstly I was pleasantly surprised to see so many rationalists and that too from districts and small towns. I say surprised because, it is not very easy to be a rationalist. We are surrounded by faiths in various forms. Worshiping of ant hills to automobiles and anything in between is considered a scared ritual. Self proclaimed religious gurus are dime a dozen and what is amazing is they all do brisk business with millions of clients. Any kind of questioning is vehemently discouraged by giving such illogical reasons as "our elders have done this for a reason" or "how can you question the very belief system". I would guess situation is probably even tougher for a rationalist living in small towns.

Secondly, I was a little disappointed to see so few youngsters and women in the meet. Does it mean the youngsters are too busy worrying about their careers and women about their house hold work!? When I was young, I had an urge to rebel and question things. And I expect it to be natural for youngsters to be rebels or am I worng?

Coming to think of it, I have broken all traditions. I was born and grew up in small towns of Karnataka. I must have been either 14 or 15 when I started questioning everything. I must say, my high school teacher M N Shadakshari was greatly responsible for setting me on the path of questioning every premise and presumption. Reading some great authors such as Kuvempu,UR Anathamurthy and later on Bertrand Russell made me realize that morality and religion have nothing do with each other. Slowly and surely, I realized that I was incapable of praying and worship. And by the time I graduated and moved out of my parents home, I had totally given up on religion and god. Since then, I have lived a rationalist life without ever feeling a need for either religion or god in my life.

One thing that made me think a lot about was what one of the delegates ( I think it was Ramesh) said. He said something like (not exactly the same words) - "we tend to compromise some times on our rationalism, with the fear of hurting sentiments of others. We should not. No change can be brought about in the society with out hurting sentiments." And I am sure I have hurt many a people in my quest for rationalism. To all those, including my parents, I say - I am sorry, but I had no choice and it is my life anyway.

And finally, I really enjoyed listening to so many delegates speak passionately about rationality. And to listen to them putting their views across in Kannada was really great. I felt as if my spirit of independence was rekindled.

Mankuthimmana Kagga and rationality!

I am sure for Kannada literature loving people, there is no need of an introduction to DVG's epic Mankuthimmana Kagga, which is often called 'kannadada Bhagavadgeethe'. I have enjoyed reading Kagga thoroughly and many times loudly as well! There is also an English translation of it titled Dim Tim's Muses, but kagga is best read in the original Kannada version.

The very first verse of the Kagga is, for me the most intriguing of all, because it seems to throw light on DVG's deep understanding of life and analysis of it from a rational stand point. Here is the verse that I am talking about.










Sri vishu is the the beginning, the end and reason of existence of the universe, the god head, the master and so do believe people with out being able to even see that (aavudanu kaanadoda - with out an iota of proof) and believe they do with all the devotion (malthi means bhakthi)..to that supernatural miracle (loose translation of vichitra) you bow down your head..mankuthimma!!

Two expressions are of great interest to me - aavudanu kaanadoda which I interpret as 'not having any proof' and vichitra, which I guess is unbelievable and magical or almost irrational. I could be wrong. But, never the less, it is such a beautiful expression. All I can say is, DVG is just too brilliant with his thoughts and with his words.

For those who have not read the Kagga, I strongly recommend it. Read it and read it loudly. I bet you will enjoy it.

Astrology - fortune lying!

Other day my sister called me up to let me know that her daughter, my niece, had found a job. For obvious reasons I was very happy. And it was her dream job as well, being related to her area of interest. Everyone in the family was delighted and wished her the very best! There was yet another reason for me to be overjoyed on this happy occasion and that is going to be the subject of this blog entry.

A few weeks before, my parents being orthodox and having faith in astrology, had consulted a guru with my niece's horoscope. Looking at the horoscope and after doing all the celestial calculations, the guru had spoken. According to him, my niece had no chance what so ever of landing a job in 2009! I think this astrologer must be cursing him self for making such 'precise' prediction, rather than making some ambiguous harmless indisputable statements such as 'good times will come, you will find a job after a little struggle' as most of the seasoned professional astrologers do! And my niece finding a job and a dream job at that, and there by proving her horoscope and the astrologer wrong was in deed a double joy for me!

Most certainly, I did not really need any proof and I would obviously have not changed my opinion about astrology even if this prediction about my niece not getting job in 2009 had come true! Astrology and various other similar so called fortune telling (or lying) systems have been debunked before. How can the planets or the time of birth or place of birth or even random lines on your hand decide or provide an indication of your future!? There are a number of people who will say 'it is true, I have experienced it my self', but they are just anecdotal and purely coincidental! There is no scientific and verifiable proof and hence it is to be taken just for it's entertainment value and nothing more. I rest my case!

Diwali - festival of pollution

Yet another Diwali has passed us. As I was driving today morning to office, and I start quite early, I could see the havoc caused by the firecrackers. In addition to the normal Indian street squalor, there was debris of the firecrackers strewn all over the place. I just cannot understand what right do we have to treat our roads and environment with such utter callousness? In what scripture is it mentioned that Diwali is to be celebrated in such a way?

According to the authorities, in Delhi there was more air and noise pollution than last year, as people preferred colorful and noisy firecrackers then ever before. Times of India Bangalore edition, dated 19th Oct, reported more than 25 eye injuries caused by firecrackers and quite a few of them resulting in permanent loss of sight. It is very hard to justify what goes on in the name of festival of lights, even if you are overly religious. It is not as if people don't know the problems of air and noise pollution. There have been numerous campaigns and awareness programs driven by NGOs requesting people to celebrate Diwali as festival of just lights. Even the central and state governments have exhorted Indians not to pollute the environment in the name of Diwali festivals. But, as it always happens in India when it comes to good civic sense, it is just ignored. Self pleasure and celebration always prevail over public good.

Here is yet another stark reflection of reality.

http://news.rediff.com/slide-show/2009/oct/16/slide-show-1-world-food-day-the-worrying-indian-case.htm

It is even accepted by the Govt of India that of the one Rupee spent, not even 15 paise reaches the utterly poor. And there are NGOs who take your taxable money and return you back black money for a fee. I have read about misuse of funds collected for relief programs such as flood & Sunami victims rehab...and apart from everything else, most of the population is blissfully ignorant of either the problems or solutions. How do we hope for a change in this country?

Nobel goes to an Indian scientist...

I was very pleasantly surprised to see the news papers today morning. The head lines read - India-born scientist wins Nobel Prize in Chemistry! There cannot be a better news than this for a rational Indian like me. I read through the column to know more about the hitherto unknown Mr. Venkatraman Ramakrishnan and found out that he started off as a Physicist, transformed himself into a Biologist and won the Nobel for Chemistry!! He must have had a wonder lust doing research in various fields of science. He should be such an inspiration for young students in India to choose fundamental science rather than run-of-the-mill IT or medicine as professional careers. It is time that we, as a society, got rid of our fixation with these professional courses and develop a healthy respect and a sense of inquisitiveness towards science before it is too late. It is already alarming to note that we (Indians) produce far less number of scientific papers, publications and doctoral thesis than we ourselves did in the 1970s. Emergence of IT may have been a boon to Indian economy but, certainly it seems to have been detrimental to our contribution towards research in fundamental science. And more importantly, one can never over emphasize the significance of scientific temper in a society mired in blind beliefs and irrational practices in day to day life.

Corruption as seen by Indians...

Transparency International has once again rated India as one of the most corrupt counties. But, is that how we Indians see our selves? Ask any Indian and the answer you get is that we are the least corrupt. I have had innumerable arguments with many Indians, and clearly the perception is - the whole world is corrupt and west is even more corrupt than us. Everybody, and even those who have never set their foot on any soil outside India, strongly believe we are the perfect.

As VS Naipaul wrote, the world as seen by Indians is divided into India and Non-India and India could be proclaimed, without dis-ingenuousness or cruelty, as perfect. And if we don't even accept the fact that we are corrupt and we are one of most corrupt societies, how can we take that first step towards fighting corruption.

There is another point of view which is as bizarre as our view of corruption. For us, the change or reformation is always meant as returning to our old value system. We always see our future in our imagined and megalomaniac past. It is time we started living for today and plan for future.

Indian civic sense

A couple of days ago, home minister P Chidambaram called upon the Delhiites to behave as citizens of a big, good international city in view of the upcoming Commonwealth Games. Though the message from the minister was for Delhiites in particular, it leaves us (all Indians) with a few thought provoking questions.

First, does it mean Delhiites can revert back to regular typical Indian behavior once the games are over!? No such message has ever been handed out to Indians any time before, which should make us assume, it could be just a slight detour from our regular behavior for a short time.

And second, can they really change in a matter of few months? We are talking about habits developed over centuries. We have been going about for ages - pissing on streets, defecating railway tracks, spiting pan on walls, littering pretty much every public place, blocking the drains with garbage and generally spreading the squalor everywhere.

It is almost as if, we just don't have a damn clue as to what is good civic sense. Unfortunately even now, we are not making any effort to teach the same to our children at school. Without such long term sincere efforts, we will always end up having act or pretend good civilized behavior just for such occasions.

Rationale behind austerity measures

There is a lot of discussion in media and newspapers about the austerity measures that the Govt of India is taking these days. As it always happens in India, it is just tokenism. It is highly unlikely that there will be a sizable impact on the finances of the country if leaders start traveling by economy class and trains, although it is an appreciable individual gesture. If nothing, it can be seen as leaders being sensitive to the despairing poverty prevailing in the country.

There are of course a whole lot of things that the Government can do if they are serious about cutting costs. For instance, I am sure there are a numbers ministries and departments that require trimming. There has been a long standing discussion about getting rid of Information and Broadcasting ministry. There are ministries of Agriculture at the center and as well as at the state levels and in addition, there are ministries/departments for major and minor irrigation! And each ministry will come with a rigmarole of secretaries and other staff. Likewise, there are many parts of the Government where there is enough scope for austerity measures. It does not need a microscope to identify overlap of functions and more than the excess staff at various levels.

We also need to look at our electoral laws and processes to cut unnecessary expenses. It makes a lot of economic sense, if elections are held in a synchronous way, on particular dates in a year irrespective of when the seat falls vacant. Also, it is very common to see our leaders contesting from multiple constituencies. And if they happen to win from multiple constituencies, what follows is a blot in the name of democracy, resulting in an unnecessary reelection and wastage of resources. If this is not wasteful expenditure of tax payers money, then what is!? This can be easily avoided by amending the electoral laws to declare the next immediate contestant, the runner up, as the winner in situations where an elected member resigns while choosing to represent one constituency over the other.

We are a country where 800 million people struggle to live on a daily basis. Token austerity measures don't make a difference to their lives. It requires drastic measures of cutting government expenses at both center and state, to serve the real purpose of the austerity drive. If not, it will remain yet another symbolic exercise which aims at garnering political mileage rather any meaningful benefit to common people.

To Sir with love...

The year was 1972. I don't exactly remember the date and the month. It was probably one of the winter months. I was a VIII standard student at what was then called Nazeer Memorial High School at Chikkamagalur. Now the school is known as Mountain View School.

It was a morning Biology class taught by my favorite teacher, Mr M N Shadakshari. A brief intro about MNS, as we use to call him. He was about 25 or 26, smart, very confident looking and always immaculately dressed. That day he was in dark trousers, white shirt and an army style scarf around the neck tucked under the shirt collar.

The class was about to begin. Someone in the class had a different idea and that someone knew that it was MNS's birthday! Suddenly, and rather a little unexpectedly a few students said "Sir, it is your birthday today and we want to hear either a story or a novel, not biology please..". And all the rest of the class joined the others.

What happened next was sheer magic. We closed our books and lent our whole selves as the story (Odessa File, by Frederick Forsyth) of Peter Miller and Eduard Roschmann unfolded. The streams of fiction and history ran sometimes in parallel and sometimes into each other. They merged and separated many a times. We got introduced to the Holocaust in general and the "Butcher of Riga" in particular. We got to know so much about the Nazis and the SS that we were in disgust hearing about what the Jews had to go through. And finally, we were seething with anger as Roschmann makes an escape to Argentina.

It went on for about a week. Each period of chemistry and biology was transformed to an episode or a chapter of Odessa file. One great Kannada novelist has said that - "reading a novel is also as creative an experience as writing one" and I might extend that to say narrating a novel is also equally creative and MNS was just too good at it.

So a precedent was set. I spent three years at NMHS and we got to hear two more narrations of novels. While in class nine, it was Crime and Punishment, by Fyodor Dostoyevsky and in tenth it was The Outsider, by Albert Camus! It was as enthralling as the first one. The character of Raskolnikov and his complex state of mind with the mental anguish and moral dilemma captivated us for a couple of days. The Outsider was a difficult story to understand, as we were too young
for the existential philosophy it deals with. I must say it also put the first seeds of rationality into my mind.

I went on to other things in life. But, thanks to MNS, my interest in reading continued. I read The Plauge, The Idiot and also some of the great works in Kannada such as Samskara, Kaanura Heggadthi and many others. I was so happy the day when my daughter, Hema finished reading Odessa file, I had to call MNS to share my joy.

Hygiene and Health care in our society

It is well known that we have pretty bad hygiene conditions prevailing in our country. You just need to drive through any city to see Indian squalor in all it's glory. It is very common see dogs and cows chewing on the leftover dinners from road side garbage. The streets are littered with plastic bags, cow dung, human excreta, papers, bottles and what not.

Less said the better about our health care system. We have the ignominy of having higher infant mortality rates than third world countries like Haiti, Western Sahara and Bangladesh. And as per
a recent report (http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Default/Scripting/ArticleWin.asp?From=Archive&Source=Page&Skin=pastissues2&BaseHref=TOIBG/2009/08/11&PageLabel=1&EntityId=Ar00102&ViewMode=HTML&GZ=T) we spend even less than some of the sub-Saharan African countries on our health care. We stand at a pathetic 171 out of the 175 countries in the world in public health spending.

The number of deaths due to swine flue across the country should be a sort of 'wake up call' for us to set right our badly broken health care system.

Traffic Madness

My first blog had to be about traffic on Bangalore roads and that might very well apply to traffic on roads of any Indian city as well. It is my very personal feeling, and I am very well entitled to, that there are probably very few places that I so much don't want to be in, as much as I don't want to be on Indian roads. Indian roads are not meant for people who care for others rights and expect others to care for their rights. Over a period of time, the Indian roads have a tendency to break your will to remain a law abiding citizen and in a way dehumanize you without your own knowledge.

It appears that road signs and traffic lights are there just for cosmetic value, as drivers disregard them with impunity. Lane discipline is just not in the pathology of Indians. Have you noticed that there seems to be some serious aversion on the part of Indians to follow queue systems in general. It is as if we strongly believe in getting to our destination by hook or crook and not necessarily by our rightful turn.

Apart from the frustration that it causes to individuals, just look at the average speed. It takes anywhere between 45 minutes to 1 hour to travel a distance of 10 km. It is a colossal waste of time, energy and resources.

When we try to discuss amongst ourselves and try to figure out the reason behind this callous attitude, we get to listen to typical Indian replies such as "traffic jams are common even in western countries" and one enlightened person who has never put his foot on US soil remarked - it is much worse in New York city!

Interestingly, I once had a chat with a BMTC bus driver who was incessantly honking at a car ahead when the traffic light was red and his point - you don't have to stop at red lights on a Sunday and that was a Sunday! I hope he does not extend the same bizarre logic to other laws that prohibit criminal activity, such as murder!

Now for numbers, there are more road accidents and road accidents related deaths in India than in any other country, not by just absolute numbers but also for every hundred thousand registered vehicles. And the biggest killer of men & women of our armed forces during peace time is road accidents, not terrorism. And in our own city, Bangalore, about a 1000 lives are lost every year and should be a serious cause for concern, more than any epidemic.

Finally, one can quote any number of reasons for not following the laws, be it traffic or any other laws, but there should be one over riding reason to follow the laws in letter and spirit. And that should be a matter of principle. We surely have a very lousy attitude for the laws of our own land.

Here are some samples of our madness on road collected over last few weeks.