The Ship of Theseus: The Illusion of the Self

 A Srinivas Rao                                                                                                             June 2013

This article was written as a dedication to Sri Ramana Maharshi and was published by Sri Ramanasramam in their quarterly Mountain Path April Jun 2014.           

                                                                                   

“Since every other thought can occur only after the rise of the ‘I’-thought and since the mind is nothing but a bundle of thoughts, it is only through the enquiry ‘Who am I?’ that the mind subsides.”- Sri Ramana Maharshi  “Who Am I”[i]

Contemporary studies on the nature of the self, find significant convergence about the illusory nature of the self, yet surprisingly they are a divided house on the nature of consciousness. Despite the materialist underpinnings of these studies often clubbed under the rubric of ‘consciousness studies’ that are cross disciplinary and span the neurosciences, psychology and  philosophy, they offer fresh insights into the ancient question ‘Who am I?’.  Please note that the term ‘self’ as used in the article refers solely to the individual ego and not the transcendent ‘ground of being’. It would be appropriate if the term ego is used as synonymous for self in this article.

 ‘No man ever steps into the same river twice’ declared the Greek philosopher Heraclitus (c 535- c 475 BCE), indicating, like the Buddha, the constant nature of change.  Plutarch (c 46-c 120 CE), another Greek, in response to this formulated a paradox called ‘The Ship of Theseus’. 

“The ship wherein Theseus and the youth of Athens returned from Crete had thirty oars, and was preserved by the Athenians down even to the time of Demetrius Phalereus, for they took away the old planks as they decayed, putting in new and stronger timber in their place...”.Plutarch Theseus[ii]

Plutarch’s question, which divides philosophers up to this day is whether a ship that is totally reconstructed is still the same ship.  Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679), the British philosopher, added his own twist to the paradox of Theseus. What would happen if the original planks were gathered up after they were replaced and a second ship constructed?

Yuganta: End of an Epoch

A Srinivas Rao 

23rd August 2014

Dr Manesh L Shrikant

With a cockiness that only an unthinking youth could state, i said that the verse of the chariot analogy was from the Kathopanishad and not the Gita and that the Gita had borrowed it from there, as he had asserted. I wondered if that answer would have disqualified me at the admissions interview at an ungenial interest in obscure subjects to gain attention at my dimunitive frame. But then neither could i shake off a fascination with the questioner, a middle aged gentleman elegantly dressed and urbane despite the unmistakable Gujarati accent, rumored to be an industry tycoon with a strange interest in academics with a string of venerable degrees like trophies that crowned his thinning pate. I had heard some horror tales of his qualifications and his decimation of candidates in the anteroom as i waited for my turn at the admissions interview. Ever since then and for a very long time i shadowed his work and was charmed by this fascinating man consciously or unconsciously. I think I obsessively sought his approval which impelled me towards a standard of work and thought that he would regard as good. As his student i imagined that his classes were the most inspiring ones, that were remarkably insightful, creative, pointed, and unusual and indeed changed the course of my life. It left us breathless long after his lecture ruminating on the scattered lessons we gleaned from the rich learning. He instilled in us a confidence to question the thought of a remarkable array of thinkers, Gunnar Myrdal, Naisbitt, Porter, Mao Tse Tung, Roosevelt, Chester Barnard, Herbert Simon, Drucker (his favourite though our most dry thinker) apart from engaging case discussions on administrative issues which he thought as at the heart of management. His assignments were to me the most precious as  they were unusual and i sought his attention in strange ways. He wore his genius lightly though he never was quite recognised for his abilities in public. Few peers if any had the same combination of alacrity of intellect and managerial experience that he had that balanced the many softer aspects of administrative judgement. It is a pity that he was overlooked so often by so many. Having seen many such leaders of business schools some of who have been honoured by the Padma awards by the President and other such public recognition, he remains a towering giant amongst a gaggle of dwarves, known to a few and cherished by them all.

Swami Vivekananda and the Journey of the “Hero”

Swami Vivekananda and the Journey of the “Hero”

A Srinivas Rao                                                                January 2013

Swami Vivekanada’s 150 birth year celebrations conclude on 12^th January 2014. I wrote this article over a period and the article was published in the “Mountain Path” published by Sri Ramansramam in Tiruvannamalai Jan-March 2014. It is being published here with permission. An additional paragraph (second last) has been added in this version on hindsight for a more complete assessment.

This article draws its framework and argument from the work of Joseph Campbell (1904-1987) in his path breaking book “The Hero with a Thousand Faces”. Published in 1949 this book became one of the most influential books of the 20^th century influencing psychiatry, mythology, anthropology, literature, filmography and other fields.

Education of youth the world over has increasingly been skewed towards building skills and competencies to fulfilling their economic needs and less towards a synoptic and inward awareness. In other words while one of the first aims of education is to prepare a person for a livelihood, there are wider aims to make him appreciate his role in society, that he should consider himself a legatee of the range of human experience, as a part of nature and history; that he learns to enjoy the arts and creative pursuits in connecting himself to human culture and refinement; finally that he ponders on the meaning and purpose of his own life. It is the latter aims that are more enduring and timeless and don't change with age or culture. It is such a synoptic education that develops for the youth their self worth, belonging, autonomy, security and self awareness. The heroes whose narratives populate youthful imagination often provide shorthand to the range of skills and capabilities, values and identities. The ideal of the Hero across cultures show a remarkable consistency across time and cultures. The Mahavira or great hero of the Indian imagination has since the shramanic traditions of the axial age has been more grounded in self conquest before he brings his light to the world. Do the lives of individuals born in the full noontide of human history display similar patterns to those in the pantheon of heroes mythical or otherwise who bring light and a promise of redemption unto their fellow men? This is the question that this note attempts to address through the life of one of India’s great modern sons, Swami Vivekananda.

Canine Concerns – A Dog’s Sad Tail

Srinivas Rao

23 June 2013

I write this piece with some distress and probably to alleviate my sense of despair. I have loved animals but at a distance. I have feared dogs since childhood having been bitten sometimes, have been chased, snapped at the feet and baked hostilely at and suffered the inevitable anti rabies vaccines.  So it was rather unlikely that I would have tried to nurse a very sick dog that landed at the entrance of our building emaciated, weak and unable to move. I was watching this dog, tied to a post lying near a drain from my window and wondered whether it might even die.  I was unable to take her off my mind and attend to my reading and decided to take a closer look at what the problem was.  A deep brown coat and biscuit brown limbs she had large ears and with large doleful imploring eyes the canine had no energy to move and tentatively shook her tail just a bit, unsure whether this human specimen peering at her was friendly enough.  Full of ticks and mites it seemed she was a corpse living to feed the innumerable beasties on her body.  Feeling pity and helpless in equal measure I offered her some food which she refused opting to drink large quantities of water.

The Bhishma Pitaamaha Syndrome: Gerontocracy’s oldest Metaphor in India

A Srinivas Rao

13^th June 2013

Few would have suppressed their smiles at the unseemly drama when LK Advani blogged about the slights that Bhishma Pitaamaha suffered apart from the entire bed of arrows he was lain on by Arjuna.  While Mr Advani enjoyed the embalmed self description and the episode does invite some deeper understanding of the Indian reluctance to part with power and the gerontocracy’s justification for perpetuation of its rule. (It is not that the Congress party exactly covers itself with glory, with its first family and their inheritance of the Party chair and the sycophancy it entails; but that’s a different story. Besides the BJP’s genuflection while not at 10 Janpath is certainly at the RSS Sarsanghchalak at Nagpur).  I shall examine in this article the Bhishma Ptitaamaha’s life critically, drawing entirely from the brilliant analysis of the noted sociologist Iravati Karve in her compelling portrait “Yugant”.  The reason I also wish to direct attention to this note is the enormous leadership blockages in Indian institutional infrastructure that is really headed by an inept gerontocracy filled with retired judges, bureaucrats, of all hues and to occupy positions of authority in exchange for political favors that mirrors the Jajamani patronage system.  Having been also personally witness to my own octogenarian dean at SP Jain Institute as his subordinate or minion and his steadfast refusal to step down and enable a smooth succession, I thought this article was ringing in my mind at many levels. 

Originary Concepts of Classical Indian Art Part II

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Rasadhwani –Emotive Resonance or Rapture

A. Srinivas Rao

31st May 2012

“Raso vai saha. Rasam hyevayam labdhva anandi bhavati” Yajur Veda, Taittiriya Upanishad 2.7 “For He indeed is Rasa, having obtained which, one attains bliss”.

Padmapani, Ajanta, 450-480CE

Art experience or encounter with an art object is not an intellectual engagement but an intuitive insight, of feeling and resonance with one’s life experience. It is “an experience in being and not in knowing”. In the last essay we examined the direct encounter with an art object through its form rupa which is sensory. The content of the art object artha is revealed not merely by its sensory features but revealed as structural, metaphoric and suggestive meaning through inference and intuition. What has not been discussed is its capacity for resonance with feeling or emotion that is central to art. What we need is an idea that integrates the sensory data and emotive content into an epistemic (knowledge) framework. This framework is provided by Rasa, the subject of this essay.  

Originary Concepts of Classical Indian Art Part I

Originary Concepts of Classical Indian Art Part I: Rupartha –Form and Content

A. Srinivas Rao

30^th May 2012

“Rupam rupam pratirupam bhavati” Rig Veda 6.47.18

“Every form is an image of an original form”.

Head of Buddha, 4th -5th CE Gandhara

Most writing on Indian art tends to gloss over the substantial conceptual basis to its aesthetic foundation, which though not systematic is yet insightful. However Indian aesthetic ideas often spill from literary to performing to plastic art forms and gives rise to what maybe considered synesthetic of a mixture of media and having what some have called an oneiric or dreamlike quality. It is a story that needs to be told with care as it is sometimes dismissed as less intellectually robust than “Western” art. Aesthetics takes as its subject matter beauty and is studied by non artists (as humorously suggested) and as the gag goes “Aesthetics is to artists what ornithology is to birds”. Aesthetics, the content of this subject in India takes its roots from grammar, dramaturgy and literature spilling over into sculpture, architecture and painting and finally into music and dance. Its axial conception is the spectator centric aesthetic experience also called “Rasa” whose translation is loosely “sapience”.  We shall in this essay explore the elements of “Form and Content” or “Rupa-artha”, and reserve the complex idea of “Rasa” for another essay.

Conflict of Interest and Professionalism in the American Corporation

A Srinivas Rao

I cannot but contain the quiet indignation and outrage while watching the film “Inside Job” (2010) by Charles Ferguson. The film is an intelligent critique on the financial crisis of 2008 pieced together with good research into the “Fall of the Wall” of our present times i.e. Wall Street. This film while a critique on the disastrous consequences of deregulation in the financial services industry in the US, throws into the foreground the underbelly of corporate cupidity and caprice and more so the hollow posturing of professionalism. That the US Federal Reserve is influenced, not merely by lobbying by, but staffed by Wall Street at its highest levels of policy making (Rubin, Paulson, Geithner-almost as though Goldman Sachs and Citigroup ran the Treasury) to stymie any regulation of the industry shows how thin the Government line is, in being a custodian of a public trust and espoused values. That, the champions of deregulation included several professors and economists from the best Business Schools and Economics faculty (Summers, Bernanke, Hubbard, Mishkin) makes it sound almost hopelessly corrupt. While some have pointed out that it was the Democrat led Clinton Administration that not only repealed the Glass Steagall Act in 1999 but initiated wholesale deregulation, purportedly against the campaign contributions by professional services firms, it is a partisan view.  In this entire tale what gets overlooked is the fact that the genesis of this lay in dissolving the sentinel like vigil for over seven decades, the regulation to avoid conflict of interests and monopoly power instituted by the New Deal of the depression years of 1930s and in it lay the foundations of the institutional infrastructure of the American Corporation; the prototype for all corporations worldwide. 

Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) in India - “May their tribe increase”: Some reflections

 A. Srinivas Rao

A few days back an old student called up to inform me that he was starting an NGO and I wasn’t sure whether to commend him or dissuade him. NGOs are complex and fragile ecosystems, with a fascinating and combustible mix of ideas, ideals, and great people and sometimes a hubris born of virtue & self sacrifice. I have often found among their ranks a strange mix of people who are inspiring and humbling as well as those profoundly sensitive and profoundly delusional. It is this often contradictory and protean image that makes them so difficult an organisational species to understand and grasp with any certainty.

India had 3.3 million NGOs in 2009 reported the Indian Express July 7^th 2010 quoting a Government commissioned study, that gives us a questionable distinction of having the largest number of NGOs in the world. In other words, India had according to this study one NGO for every 400 people in the country; a fertile breeding ground in more ways than one. That is more than what we can count for in access to schools and health centres. The figures provoke wonder and to some derision, like the recent census data that India has more mobiles than toilets (and according to World Bank poor sanitation costing the exchequer 54 billion USD or 6% of its GDP mainly through pre-mature death Hindustan Times Dec 21^st 2010). However India hasn’t followed Bangladesh where the NGOs have taken up most economic activity unlike a healthy private sector and created huge NGO corporations like the BRAC, Grameen etc; which contests the very idea of an NGO as a space within civil society that stands independent of government and the market as the third sector. The large numbers ironically are testimony to a democratic political functioning of the society, despite their many failings and that the number is driven by the size and ethnic, cultural and religious diversity of the country.

The Importance of Being Jain

This article is written for the alumni of SP Jain institute of Management, the group I am a part of.

The title mimics the brilliant play by Oscar Wilde and I am amused at the strange and unforgiving recurring patterns of history. In the year 2005 there were a spate of mails that had polarised the alumni group about the decision to globalize SP Jain institute (apart from an appointment of a director who was anyway out within a year) with several members commending and others including myself condemning the same. It was not globalisation that was on contest, however though that was the ostensible reason which made some of us look like Luddites opposing the inexorable march of global capitalism (forget the occupy protesters). It was the curious case of the Jains trying to buy back what they considered as truly Jain i.e the brand name. Let me clarify. That global brand dream has soured. The decision to go global at SP Jain was being questioned not because globalisation was bad but because there seemed too much at stake in diluting the brand, intersecting dissimilar governance systems between a profit and a non profit organisation, a larger than needed proportion of the Jain family members on the governing council and likelihood of uneven standards especially in admission despite the inadequate strength of core faculty being spread like peanut butter or rather salt from Dharangadhra Chemical Works of the Jain business lines.