Viswanathan K's Thoughts

Ancient Rome by Simon Baker is a history book written like a thriller. It leads me to say something nobody ever says about a history book: it’s a page turner! Rome, from the time of its foundation, hated the idea of being dominated by one man rule. Their solution? To form a republic. It was a trial and error system of government that evolved with time and events: -          They create a body of aristocrats called the Senate. The Senate, however, could not pass laws and had no legal powers. Instead, all adult male citizens voted in the assemblies for the passing of bills. But, of course, the money of the aristocrats still wielded influence. -          From amongst the senators, two were elected as “consuls”, not by the people, but by the senators themselves. The two consuls would have the power of a king. But just for one year, after which they returned to the Senate. Why two of them? So one could...

Citing the examples of Trump, Brexit and Modi, Santosh Desai fears that the very nature of democracy world over is changing: “A new grammar of democracy has begun rooted not on the lofty ideals of how humanity should aspire to be, but on what it might really be deep down. The fears and hopes that are being funneled through the political process today come from a place of anxiety and insecurity.” But what exactly is this older form of democracy, the one called “liberal democracy”? Yuval Noah Harari, in his book Homo Deus , explains both its history and values. Once upon a time, people believed (and feared) that “if humans stopped believing in a great cosmic plan, all law and order would vanish”. So what happened once God was dead, as Nietzsche famously put it? Who or what stepped in to fill the moral void? The answer: the (then) new creed of humanism. It is best described, says Harari, by these lines by Jean-Jacques Rousseau: “Listen to yourself, follow your heart, be tru...

It is well known that girls can see far more shades of color than guys. Really. It’s not just that guys don’t care (we don’t); what we consider as shades of a color are often different colors to girls. I learn such things… by being insulted by my daughter. A couple of years ago, we went to this mall and decided to let my daughter pick a nail polish of her choosing. She pointed at one; and I told the sales girl to get us the yellow one. I was promptly and loudly corrected by the kid: “That’s golden, not yellow.” More recently, she asked me to name the color of the nail polish on her mom’s hand. Brown, I said. No, it’s maroon, she corrected. My wife then explained to her that guys can’t differentiate as many colors as girls. I often play matador-and-bull with my daughter (she’ll charge like a bull at whatever cloth I am waving). The other day, while watching some bulls on Discovery , I explained to her that bulls are color blind, and so it’s not the red cloth that trigger...

In an earlier blog , I wrote about Jared Diamond’s theory that agriculture was the pivotal point in deciding why Europe (instead of Africa or native America or the Aborigines) went on to dominate the world.  That leads to the next question: why did the next big transformation, the Industrial Revolution, largely happen in England, not some other European country? William Rosen’s answer to that question is part of his terrific book, The Most Powerful Idea in the World . It all started when the British began to think there was a way for anyone to become rich. At that time, “everything of value… was either land or the produce of land”. Since land was limited, by definition, it could be redistributed, but not created anew. Was there some other way? Enter Edward Coke. He carved out a law that legalized patents that could be awarded to the “person who introduced the invention to the realm”. Next on the scene was John Locke, who felt that “rightful property is derived from the la...

I found these points by Krish Ashok to be very useful advice as to how people like us (“privileged, urban, middle class”) should avoid dealing with fraught topics, be it “demonetisation or Jallikattu or whatever tears us apart next”: 1)       Remind yourself that the media will only highlight the rare/out of the ordinary event: “What would   you   report on? That most Jallikattu events are largely injury and death-free? Or on the one instance where chillies, lime juice, and alcohol were involved?” 2)      Resist the urge to take a side: “After being misinformed in the first place, we now take that misinformation, add our confirmation biases, and grab the pitchforks to battle for the stance we’ve decided to take.” 3)      Remind yourself that, quite often, you are hardly qualified to understand the topic, let alone form an opinion: “I have zero emotional attachment with rural life or the remotest ap...

When you have a guy like Yuval Noah Harari who is well versed in multiple fields and who can communicate brilliantly, the books he writes are inevitably awesome. Like his recent book, Home Deus . Among the hunter gatherers, religion, says Harari, was animist in its world view: “They believed that there was no essential gap separating humans from other animals… People talked with animals, trees and stones, as well as fairies, demons and ghosts.” Then came the religions of the post-agricultural era, like Christianity, by which time man was into agriculture and used cows and horses as tools: “While animists saw humans as just another kind of animal, the Bible argues that humans are a unique creation… (In a book full of miracles) The only time an animal initiates a conversation with a human is when the serpent tempts Eve to eat the forbidden fruit of knowledge.” Harari thus concludes that religions reflect the relation between man and nature at the time of foundation of t...

At school, my 5 year old gets tested on the spellings of 10 new words each week. The list of those 10 words is published upfront; and so parents have to make the kid practice and learn them during the course of the week. The first week, she got all of them right; an “Excellent!” and 2 stars from the teacher; and applause from the class (the applause was for all the kids who got all 10 words right). Boy, was she proud and happy! As we worked on the words for Week #2, by Day 5, I was irritated that she was always confused about the spelling of “parents” (is it “pa” or “pae”?). Upon which she snapped and we had this very amusing conversation: She : “So you want me to get all 1o right all the time, is it?” Me : “Yes, that is exactly what I want.” She : “Why? Even if I get 9 of them right, my teacher will still give me a star.” As Hobbes once told Calvin , she had me “wriggling in the crushing grip of reason”. Anyways, I stuck to my guns, and by the day of the test, it...