From: mece21x@rosie.uh.edu (Yesudas, Michael)
Newsgroups: soc.history,soc.culture.indian,soc.culture.china,soc.culture.pakistan,soc.culture.sri-lanka,soc.culture.iranian
Subject: Re: Indhist Prelude 2: The problem of the destitute East
Keywords: Civilizations, History, Metaphysics.
Date: 27 Sep 92 16:28:00 GMT
Article-I.D.: rosie.27SEP199211283050
Organization: University of Houston
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41

In article <1992Sep27.062427.27747@massey.ac.nz>, A.Raman@massey.ac.nz (Anand V Raman) writes...
>    This article is the second and final prelude to the posting of the
>    archive for Indhist.  It is also available  within the distributed
>    archive.  Watch  for postings with  the subject  "Indhist (shar)."
>    The "Newsgroups" line has been slightly enlarged upon request from
>    various users who replied to the previous article. -- &
> 
>1. INTRODUCTION
> 
>	     Do you have enough food for everyone in India?
>	     ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> 
>   Admittedly, it  doesn't  help much  to  reply "No.   But we  did have
>plenty of food  way back  a few thousand   years ago."  But  I'd like to
>point out   that  this is  still  a   much better  answer  than one that
>implicitly denies that fact.  Suppose one replied "Look, I know we don't
>have enough food in India.  But then,  we are adopting the (your) modern
>Western method of farming.  We  should  soon have a radical agricultural
>revolution which will bring enough  food to all  Indians," then not only
>is that person apologizing for the poverty  of  the starving millions in
>India, but he  is also  confirming  the questioner's  possibly  implicit
>assumption that the current western method of farming  is the only truly
>successful one there is, and that without it there could never have been
>enough food in India.  But this is clearly mistaken;  as mistaken, to be
>sure, as one that blindly  insists that the  West has  got it all wrong.
>History   points unambiguously  to the existence   of   highly  affluent
>civilizations in the East when most of Europe  was still in its infancy.
>Sir Monier Williams observes of India, for example:
> 
>   It will not,  of course, be supposed that  in our Eastern  Empire
>   we have  to deal with  ordinary races of men.   We  are not there
>   brought in  contact with savage tribes who  melt away  before the
>   superior  force and intelligence  of  the Europeans.  Rather  are
>   we placed  in the midst of  great and ancient  peoples, who, some
>   of them tracing back their origin to the same stock as ourselves,
>   attained a high degree of civilization  when our forefathers were
>   still  barbarians,  and  had  a   polished language, a cultivated
>   literature, and abstruse systems of  philosophy, centuries before
>   the English existed even in name. [1]
> 
>A similar observation about China is made by Prof. Joseph Needham:
> 
>   During the first fourteen centuries of the  Christian  era, China
>   transmitted to Europe a  veritable  abundance of discoveries  and
>   inventions  which were often received by  the West with  no clear
>   idea of where they had originated. [2]
> 
>   So what is it that  has turned the  tables now?  How come exactly the
>same things that once used  to flourish  in  the East have  now migrated
>to the West, especially as
> 
>   between the second  century  B.C. and the   sixteenth century A.D.
>   East Asian culture was much more efficient than  the European West
>   in applying human knowledge of Nature to useful purposes? [3]
> 
>Why has the East  degraded to such an extent  that the average Westerner
>today has  developed  a powerful   psychological resistance against  any
>identification with it whereas just a few thousand years ago, the Greeks
>identified even their  gods with those of the  East? [4] Why  is it that
>even  a   benevolent scholar like   Schrodinger who concedes   a certain
>profundity of   insight to the   East is  careful  not  to (mis)identify
>himself with it, by repeatedly stressing the value of Western methods in
>logic and reasoning [5] which, I'm sure, he also knew  to be appropriate
>to the other hemisphere?
> 
>   It is very hard   to give   convincing  answers to  these  questions.
>Almost every one of the attempted solutions grinds to  a halt when faced
>with the terminal question - Why should there be so  much poverty in the
>East today if it was really  as good  as  they say it was?  Needham, for
>instance, after   careful  analysis   of the   prevailing socio-economic
>conditions in  the eastern  civilizations, attributes the  degeneracy of
>the  East to failed social systems  that became excessively bureaucratic
>[6].   Some people say that while  his answer could  well be correct, it
>still hasn't answered the basic question at hand as  it has only shifted
>ground to a different  issue.   "If  the East  was really so clever, how
>come they couldn't come up with  a successful  social system?"  would be
>the next most obvious question that would spring up in this context.
> 
>2. THE INADEQUACY OF THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD FOR SOCIOLOGICAL PROBLEMS:
> 
>   The truth is, Needham's answer is about the best we can  ever hope to
>get for this problem within our empirical framework.  We currently don't
>have a good scientific explanation for it.   And sadly, there is none in
>sight either.  Although a  scientific solution  to this  problem  is not
>evident, that a  purely scientific  solution  cannot  be found is.   The
>reason is that the problem involves the workings of the human  mind, and
>the  way in which  our  desires, or  the predominant  desires  of  whole
>communities within a given cultural backdrop are formed.  When one talks
>about Desires, talk about Freedom is inevitably seen to follow.  This in
>turn leads to talk about Personal Identity, at which point it is usually
>safe to say that the scientific arena has been left far behind.
> 
>   Consequently, far from directly observing the cause of degeneracy, or
>even inferring it, we are forced to speculate upon it.  What we then end
>up  with is not  a Science of history.  Nor  even  is it a Philosophy of
>history.  It has become the  Metaphysics  of  history.  And  born out of
>this    kind of metaphysical     speculation   is  the  conjecture  that
>civilizations must be likened to living  organisms, with a consciousness
>and identity of their own, people being  to them  what specialized cells
>in our body are to us.  Among the older philosophies of  history, we see
>one version of this view at least among the ancient  Greeks  and Indians
>[7].  Among the more recent ones, Oswald Spengler is seen to advance it.
>I even venture so far  as  to say that such  a theory is also completely
>compatible with the modern claims of Strong AI [8].
> 
>3. OBJECTION FROM COMMON SENSE
> 
>   Now,  this  hypothesis  is  not  inherently  unfalsifiable.   So   it
>possesses a  viability even  in scientific  circles, depending upon  the
>amount of confirmation it  receives.  From this  point of view, however,
>it  appears  highly implausible   at  first  sight because  it   is  not
>corroborated by  common sense.  Social  progress, it  seems to  us, is a
>one-way street - successful social systems, like  democracy for example,
>once instantiated, could never go out of existence.
> 
>   The reason we think so is because we find  it extremely  difficult to
>imagine one of us `unlearning' useful  things.   That is, forgetting the
>value of tested information is seen to  be unnatural.  We generally tend
>to believe that dynamically  useful knowledge is  learnt  for good.  But
>that is false.  Sometimes  what common sense  tells us cannot be farther
>from the truth.  That is because common sense is largely a collection of
>inductive conclusions  which  don't always   hold  good under   rigorous
>philosophical testing.  We do happen to forget things in many ways other
>than just the atrophy of our knowledge of them.  Senility, accidents and
>amnesia are examples.  While some  of these attacks can be  prevented by
>careful protection of the memory banks of an organism,  some  others are
>not.  Natural death is an example  of an inevitable process  by which an
>organism's memories are irreversibly destroyed, a scientific explanation
>for which is still lacking.
> 
>   Before I am  misunderstood, let me quickly clarify  that last point a
>little further.  I am   not  saying that  there   can be  no  scientific
>explanation for the phenomenon  of death.  I'm  only saying that even if
>there  is one, it would be  so complex  that it would  be  far easier to
>speak of the phenomenon  at the level  of metaphysical abstraction, just
>as even  though   we  know  that  the weather can  be  deterministically
>predicted, the formidable complexity of the initial states and governing
>laws forces us to use statistical methods.
> 
>   Thus, even though a society could have once had a flourishing culture
>and a successful social system that encouraged the growth of science and
>the arts, it is still subject, for a variety of complex reasons which we
>might never fully know at one time, to lose the knowledge  which  it had
>known to  work in its  favour.   Alexander Fraser Tytler is  supposed to
>have   said  that even  a  system like democracy, (which, by the way, is
>essential  for the progress of modern  science according to Needham [9])
>cannot  last although it    receives confirmation   every day   of   its
>existence:
> 
>   A democracy cannot exist as  a permanent  form of government.  It
>   can  only  exist until  the voters  discover   that they can vote
>   themselves money from the  Public Treasury.  From that moment on,
>   the majority  always votes  for the candidates promising the most
>   benefits from the Public Treasury with a  result that a democracy
>   always  collapses  over loose fiscal   policy always followed  by
>   dictatorship. [10]
Beautiful!! But doesn't that happen because the Public Treasury has enough
money with it, by taxing people more than what is required for the regular
functions to be carried out?  
> 
>4. OBJECTION FROM THE PSYCHOLOGICAL FRONT
> 
>   Our hypothesis also makes an interesting prediction that lends itself
>to testing.   It  is the claim  that  people in different  cultures have
>intrinsically different desires.  But psychologists  are quick to object
>to   this.   Prof.  Toynbee, who  had   perhaps already thought  of  the
>possibility of  this kind of hypothesis informs  us of  the results of a
>psychological investigation as follows:
> 
>   ...in our   common human  nature, there  are   variations that
>   constitute so  many distinctive `psychological types'; but the
>   evidence indicates  that the representatives of  each of these
>   different types are to be found in approximately equal numbers
>   in  any sample  of mankind.  There  is no  indication that the
>   types   are   sorted  out  and   segregated  from   each other
>   geographically. [11]
> 
>   But correct as  the  objection  is, I  have to  say that it  does not
>falsify the hypothesis simply because it is not  directed  at it.  Taken
>in isolation, as is usually done in a psychological test, humans exhibit
>a common behaviour  and disposition pattern that  is consistent with the
>above observation.  But our hypothesis is  concerned with the behavioral
>dispositions  not of individual persons,  but  of individuals  within  a
>given cultural backdrop.  Obviously  their desires in  relation to their
>societies is different from what it would have  been in different social
>arrangements.  As a migrant, I can attest to such a distinction at least
>in my own case.  Also, it is precisely because  individuals taken out of
>their cultural context revert to standard behaviour that assimilation is
>made possible.  Thus we see an Indian, Ethiopian,  Latin  American, or a
>Greek be a high achiever in the culture of the United States, but not in
>his own country.  A  more holistic  picture than just  of singular human
>beings  is necessary   to   account for    such  behavioral  variations.
>Unfortunately, psychology does  not cater for  such  an analysis  of the
>person because it involves extra-personal causes and effects.
> 
>5. POSTULATION OF EXOMNESIA OR EXTRA-PERSONAL MEMORY
> 
>   It might seem  here that I am postulating  a  kind  of `exomnesia' or
>extra-personal memory for this  to work.  How  else can the desires of a
>given individual  be  of one kind  in one  country  and of  a distinctly
>different kind in another?  But before being branded as a mystic, let me
>say that  there is  indeed empirical evidence for  the kind of exomnesia
>that this hypothesis requires.  You can see what I mean when you go into
>any library today.  Libraries,   newspapers, schools,  ethical precepts,
>social taboos  and stigmas all  constitute confirmation   for exomnesia.
>Man is largely conditioned by the society he lives in  and by the things
>he learns from others before him.  Without exomnesia, we would each have
>to start with a  clean slate.  There would be  no ready-made professions
>we  could fit neatly  into.  There   would not even be  these apparently
>tailor-made natural  languages  which  we learn  to speak.  Simply  put,
>without exomnesia  there would  be no progress.  But if  it is exomnesia
>that  initially causes  progress, it is  also  exomnesia that eventually
>causes degeneracy.  Knowledge of the futility of  the striving  of one's
>forefathers  after  material  accomplishment,  faithfully    handed down
>through the generations via libraries and word of mouth, forces a person
>into complacency, indifference and  eventually into inactive acceptance.
>To quote Tytler again:
> 
>   The average  age of the  world's greatest  civilizations has been
>   200 years. These nations have  progressed through  the  following
>   sequence:
> 
>   From bondage  to spiritual faith;  from  spiritual faith to great
>   courage; from courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance; from
>   abundance to selfishness; from  selfishness to  complacency; from
>   complacency to apathy; from apathy to dependency; from dependency
>   back into bondage. [12]
Excellent!
> 
>6. IMPLAUSIBILITY OF THE WEST BECOMING PASSIVE AND PESSIMISTIC
> 
>   There  is one more implication  of   this  hypothesis  that could  be
>disturbing  to both Easterners and Westerners.   It is that the  West is
>different from the East in  the same way  that a youth is different from
>his grandfather.  
> 
>Northrop writes:
> 
>   They (The  East and  the West) can   meet, not  because  they are
>   saying the same thing, but because they are  expressing different
>   yet complementary  things, both of  which   are required  for  an
>   adequate and true    conception  of   man's    self     and   his
>   universe...Each also needs the other. [13]
> 
>   We might agree with him  that the  achievements of the  East and West
>are complementary things.  But our  hypothesis here precludes the second
>statement that each needs  the other,  because it predicts that the West
>will one day   attain  what Northrop calls  the  aesthetic component  of
>knowledge   even  unaided by  the  East, for  that   is the most natural
>outcome of the mature phase of any progressive civilization.
> 
>   This is, of  course, shocking and  difficult to digest.  How can what
>is usually called the  metaphysical and sometimes pessimistic philosophy
>of  the  East be the   final product  of   the  empirical and optimistic
>philosophy that characterizes the West today?  But it is true.  A little
>reflection  will  show why.  For  the  most  part,  we will  understand,
>technological breakthroughs have  not  really improved the average state
>of mind of human beings at all.  I can only think of Professor Toynbee's
>penetrating observation that is so appropriate here:
> 
>   Our lives continue  to  be painful  because  the worst   pains and
>   difficulties of human life are spiritual, not physical.   Surgery,
>   anaesthetics,   plumbing, and  central   heating cannot   diminish
>   spiritual suffering. [14]
> 
>   Our strifes and sufferings  still remain  very much the  same as they
>were thousands of years ago.  Only, technology  has changed the level at
>which  we  encounter them.  If  our    ancestors desired newer,   faster
>chariots,  today we desire newer, faster  race cars.  Sure, we  can cure
>far more diseases today than before.  But even that to me, is not why we
>should call ourselves any more  advanced than  our ancestors.  There  is
>still the unavoidable problem  of death, of  unsatisfiable  desires, and
>even should these be solved,  the terrible  problem of boredom resulting
>from  too  much   leisure [15].  Technological   breakthroughs are  only
>stepping stones on our way to realizing that the end which  is currently
>not in sight,  does  not really exist at all.   This  is the realization
>that marks the completion of a cycle within a civilization.
> 
>7. CONCLUSION
> 
>   The West, then, with all  its technological  superiority, is still in
>its infancy as far as real progress is concerned.   (Of course, being an
>infant is a far healthier alternative to being senile  or incapacitated;
>so one  can't say  that today's East is better  than today's West.)   If


In other words are you hinting at the fact that the east is dying today 
or is it getting rejuvenated? 


>this is the case, however, the prognosis for the  human race  appears to
>be rather dim.  The highest state a civilization can ever attain is that
>which  has   already been attained hitherto and   can be seen  below the
>massive shambles of the East today.

Debatable! Even the Romans thought that they lived in a very modern era.
Even on terms of spirituality which you say is the highest point of
civilization may not have been attained. And thinking otherwise would
simply be the height of complacency!

> 
>   Homo Sapiens, or `Thinking' Man is on the last rung of the  ladder of
>intellectual  evolution.    Reflection  on   human suffering,   and  the
>realization  of its    omnipresence   is the  high water   mark  of  any
>civilization.  Thereafter, although it  might hold  the  stage  a little
>while   longer, it cannot  develop  the  play    any further.   It  must
>eventually quit and let it's successor start all over again.  And so the
>cycle of relentless reorganizations  of matter, of the incessant  births
>and deaths  of  consciousnesses  and sub-consciousnesses   continues  on
>forever.
> 
>   While  this apparently pessimistic  picture  is very   distressing to
>believe, we must not overlook the grain  of consolation in it which says
>that  we  aren't really  missing out  on  anything  in  the twenty-fifth
>century.  It also says, besides, that we will never be to some allegedly
>super-civilized aliens what dogs and cats are to us.  Should such beings
>one day decide to invade us and colonize our planet, I'm sure we will be
>able  to ask  them some serious questions  that even  they can't answer.
>What's still more satisfying to our ego, I believe we will  even be in a
>position to suggest to them some  very  compelling solutions to the most
>abominable problems that any consciousness is prey to.
> 
>- & (anand v raman)
>20 September 1992

Very well written!! Keep up the good work!!
> 
>Notes:
>~~~~~~
>1.  Williams,  Sir Monier: "Indian Wisdom,"  Chowkamba  Sanskrit Series,
>    Varanasi, 1963, p.xvi
> 
>2.  Needham, Joseph: "The Grand Titration,"  George Allen &  Unwin Ltd.,
>    London, 1969, p.57
> 
>3.  Ibid., p.16
> 
>4.  Strabo: "Geography," Book XV:I.69, Translated by McCrindle, John. W:
>    "Ancient India," Philo, Amsterdam, 1971, p.74
> 
>5.  Schrodinger,  Erwin: "Mind and  Matter," Cambridge University Press,
>    London, 1959, p.55
> 
>6.  Needham, Joseph:  "The Grand Titration,"  George Allen & Unwin Ltd.,
>    London, 1969, p.175
> 
>7.  Toynbee, Arnold, J: "Surviving the Future," Oxford University Press,
>    London, 1971, p.73
> 
>8.  Strong AI (Artificial Intelligence) is  a theory that postulates the
>    immanence of consciousness in all things.  One of  the  most popular
>    examples used by Strong AI advocates is the thermostat which is said
>    to exhibit conscious behaviour in responding to temperature changes.
>    For arguments against   Strong AI you could   look at John  Searle's
>    (in)famous Chinse Room  experiment, which is  also discussed in some
>    detail in   Roger  Penrose's  "The   Emperor's  New Mind,"    Oxford
>    University Press, NY,  1989.  Douglas  Hofstadter presents   several
>    views in favour of Strong AI in  his books  "Godel, Escher and Bach:
>    An Eternal Golden Braid," Harvester Press  Hassocks,  1979  and "The
>    Minds I," Harvester Press, Brighton, 1981.
> 
>9.  Needham, Joseph:  "The Grand  Titration," George Allen & Unwin Ltd.,
>    London, 1969, p.152
> 
>10. This passage is supposed to be found in (the  book) "The Decline and
>    Fall of the Athenian  Republic." by Alexander  Fraser Tytler (1748 -
>    1813).  It  was mailed to me  by a  friend some time ago.  I haven't
>    managed to locate the book or a reference to Tytler's works yet, but
>    have reason not to doubt its authenticity.
> 
>11. Toynbee,  Arnold, J:  "Change and  Habit,"  Oxford University Press,
>    London, 1966, p.74
> 
>12. See Note 10 above.
> 
>13. Northrop, F.S.C:  "The meeting of   the  East and West,"  Macmillan,
>    1958, p.454
> 
>14. Toynbee, Arnold, J: "Surviving the Future," Oxford University Press,
>    London, 1971, p.53
> 
>15. Toynbee, Arnold, J:  "Change and  Habit,"  Oxford University  Press,
>    London, 1966.  The boredom that results from excessive mechanization
>    and   leisure     is  discussed in   Chapters   XII  "Mechanisation,
>    Regimentation, Boredom"  and Chapter XIII  "Affluence and  Leisure",
>    p.212-227
> 
>PS:
> 
>Please don't change the subject line if you  want to post a follow-up
>to this article.  Like most of you,  I only get to  consistently read
>s.c.i. for few weeks  a year.   Rest of the  time,  I must rely on an
>occasional grep to notify me of the interesting articles.
> 
>--
># The following record is a random selection from Indhist 1.0
># For more information on Indhist, mail A.Raman@massey.ac.nz
>--
>Their [the Indians']  span of  life is not less than  forty years, and for
>all this time they are in the bloom of youth and they know neither old age
>nor disease nor want.  But though  India is actually in  the  enjoyment of
>all  these blessings, there are  nevertheless   men called Brahmans,  who,
>bidding adieu to the rivers and turning away from those with whom they had
>been thrown in contact, live apart, absorbed in philosophic contemplation,
>subjecting their bodies  to sufferings of  astonishing severity, though no
>one compels  them, and submitting   to terrible endurances.   It is  said,
>further,  that they possess a  remarkable fountain --  that of truth -- by
>far the  best and most  divine of all -- and   that any  one  who has once
>tasted it can never be satiated or filled with it.
> 
>- Dion Chrysostom (1st cent) Oratio XXXV.434
> 
> 
------------------------------------------------------------------------
|  Michael Yesudas         |  The control of the means of production   |
|  Mechanical Engineering  |  of wealth is the absolute control of     |
|  University of Houston   |  human life itself                        |
|  mece21x@jetson.uh.edu   |                    --   Hilaire Belloc    |
------------------------------------------------------------------------