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Three civilizational design principles in the VedA. Civilizational continuity in a changing world. A Perspective on Response of Hindu AchAryAs to Changing Patterns of RtA. The non-response to 15th century European incursions in the South of India. Continuing Non-Response to the 21st Century Globalism.

Continuing Non-Response to the 21^st Century Globalism

By Jayant Kalawar, August 29^th 2023

In the 21^st century there are currently two sets of technologies, which through their ubiquitous use, have become an integral part of the patterns within which humans experience their life cycle: technologies to manage female body cycles, specifically menstrual cycles, contraception, surrogate and ivf birthing. The second is telecommunications and computing technologies. These two technologies have enabled substantial amplification of the feminist movement. Some call it cyberfeminism and networked feminism[i], to characterize the  digital revolution, which includes not only internet based social media, but more importantly AI and bio-informatics, leading to emergence of a socialized digital mental life integrally connecting through bio-tech with biological life. These technologies are enablers of both sukshma sharira and sthula sharira in humans.

As we noticed earlier in this paper, invention of double entry bookkeeping and joint stock company organization enabled risk taking projects helped usher in the industrial revolution and made Europe dominant. The feminist movement^{[ii] [iii] [iv]} along with scalable organizational capability of the internet may in the near future lead to a transhumanist revolution^[v]. The civilizational threat (to stability of the materialist state) that AI-Biotech based transhumanist revolution will pose has been given considerable thought: “A general ability to stabilize a vulnerable world would require greatly amplified capacities for preventive policing and global governance”.^[vi] The intellectual drivers for such a feminist-transhumanist revolution, enabled by new technologies, are the elite universities in the  USA^[vii]. The AI-Biotech enabling technologies in the 21^st century are likely to play the role of destruction of labor intensive manufacturing based industrial societies, just as in the 17^th century industrial technology enabled destruction of India’s flourishing handloom textile industry. The desire and will, the sankalpA, required to accomplish dominion through the industrial revolution in the 17^th century was provided by the owners and managers of joint stock companies out of Europe, supported by their Kings. In the 21^st century the technology based drive for dominion is more complex: the desire and will for dominion using feminist-transhumanist revolution is provided by a lose interconnected network of tech billionaires, elite US Universities, media, globalized financial markets, financialized Corporates and the US State institutions^[viii]. This interconnected network seems to have a life of its own, which current Western social theories are unable to explain and therefore unable to develop public policy. We are muddling through the process of adapting social organization processes and technologies to respond, influence and adapt to the feminist-transhumanist revolution.

How will Hindu AchAryAs respond to emergence of such a transhumanist revolution? Is the response going to be pro-active or are we going to repeat our performance of the past, with Hindu AchAryAs not engaging in questions of social organization and processes (“we do not engage with MllechA” being one such response)?

DharmA Futures: For the MAnav jAti

So where do we go from here? How may a VedA based DharmA renaissance arise, while taking into account a globalized interdependent world with multiple mAnav sanghatanA?

First, the two current major competing paradigms, one based on European Enlightenment (Capitalism with Democratic representative or authoritarian state) and Islam (with its global Ummah and local Masjid), claim universal application to the entire mAnav jAti. Any VedA based renaissance may have to clearly and compellingly articulate in a practical way how it will enable flourishing of the entire mAnav jAti and indeed all inhabitants and ecology on mother Earth, not just BhArata or Hindus.

Second, the current Euro Enlightenment based Artha and Kama ShAstrAs supporting globalized world and potential oncoming feminist-transhumanist revolution is based on a) Newtonian-Einsteinian physics which assumes space-time as fundamental reality and b) evolutionary theory of biology which gives primacy to sthula sharira and does not account for sukshma and KAraNa sharira. Despite their limitations, these theories have enabled technology and engineering which have helped very large numbers of GrihastAs in the mAnav jAti^[ix]. For VedA based renaissance to emerge, there may have to be a) a new theory of physics arising out of the concept of space-time being a dependent reality based on prANa-spandanA and b) a new theory of biology based on jIva being seeded in the sthula sharira with the first infusion of prANa from the cosmic spandanA.

Third, any renaissance of Hindu Dharma would have to be led by GrihastA well accomplished in desh-kAl-paristhiti (hence not the renunciate Brahmacharis and Swamis) and at the same time knowledgeable and immersed in the knowledge and practice of understanding the human manifestation as sharira treya. Development of robust explanatory descriptions of the emergent phenomena based on first principles of Hindu shastrAs are going to be one of the necessary conditions for such a renaissance to arise. What may a beginning of such shastra based explanatory descriptions look like? Here is a link to my provocative essay Is Marriage Necessary? , if you would like to explore further on this trail, which may take you away from the rutted path we have habituated ourselves to for quite some time. So, will there be a Hindu Civilization in the future? Perhaps it will depend upon how much fire Hindu grishastas generate through their intellectual Tapasya….

[i] “Cyberfeminism and networked feminism (fourth-wave feminism)

The term cyberfeminism is used to describe the work of feminists interested in theorising, critiquing, and making use of the Internet, cyberspace, and newmedia technologies in general. The term and movement grew out of ‘third-wave’ feminism. However, the exact meaning is still unclear to some: even at the first meeting of cyberfeminists The First Cyberfeminist International (FCI) in Kassel (Germany), participants found it hard to provide a definition, and as a result of discussions, they proposed 100 anti-theses⁵² (with reference to Martin Luther’s theses) on what cyberfeminism is not. These included, for example, it is not an institution, it is not an ideology, it is not an –ism.

Cyberfeminism is considered to be a predecessor of ‘networked feminism’, which refers generally to feminism on the Internet: for example, mobilising people to take action against sexism, misogyny or gender-based violence against women. One example is the online movement #metoo in 2017, which was a response on social networks from women all over the world to the case of Harvey Weinstein, a Hollywood producer who was accused of sexually harassing female staff in the movie industry.” https://www.coe.int/en/web/gender-matters/feminism-and-women-s-rights-movements

[ii] One way to describe the feminist revolution in terms of AchArya Abhinavgupta’s teachings is that the IchA of Swantantrya, the desire for individuated autonomy, that is carried in each inward breath, finds much more scope of play, for the female sthula sharira, due to technologies for managing menstrual cycles, birth control and birthing.

[iii] See for example the euro-centric feminist challenge: https://www.draliceevans.com/post/ten-thousand-years-of-patriarchy-1

[iv] “Indian women spend eight times more hours on unpaid care work than men. The patterns are similar across educational qualification, and employment or marital status: women with higher education, or earn their own incomes, do not spend any less time on unpaid care work. Shifting mindsets and rebalancing domestic work
requires coordinated effort from key stakeholders, with public-led investments in care infrastructure and services complemented by soft interventions from private sector employers and community-based
organisations.” Extracted from https://www.orfonline.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/ORF_OccasionalPaper_372_Time-Use-Gender_new.pdf

[v] “Transhumanism is a loosely defined movement that has developed gradually over the past two decades.[1] It promotes an interdisciplinary approach to understanding and evaluating the opportunities for enhancing the human condition and the human organism opened up by the advancement of technology. Attention is given to both present technologies, like genetic engineering and information technology, and anticipated future ones, such as molecular nanotechnology and artificial intelligence.

The enhancement options being discussed include radical extension of human health-span, eradication of disease, elimination of unnecessary suffering, and augmentation of human intellectual, physical, and emotional capacities. Other transhumanist themes include space colonization and the possibility of creating superintelligent machines, along with other potential developments that could profoundly alter the human condition. The ambit is not limited to gadgets and medicine, but encompasses also economic, social, institutional designs, cultural development, and psychological skills and techniques.

Transhumanists view human nature as a work-in-progress, a half-baked beginning that we can learn to remold in desirable ways. Current humanity need not be the endpoint of evolution. Transhumanists hope that by responsible use of science, technology, and other rational means we shall eventually manage to become posthuman, beings with vastly greater capacities than present human beings have.” Extract from https://nickbostrom.com/ethics/values (accessed on October 18th 2022).

[vi] The Vulnerable World Hypothesis, Nick Bostrom, Future of Humanity Institute, University of Oxford
Abstract: Scientific and technological progress might change people’s capabilities or incentives in ways that would destabilize civilization. For example, advances in DIY biohacking tools might make it easy for anybody with basic training in biology to kill millions; novel military technologies could trigger arms races in which whoever strikes first has a decisive advantage; or some economically advantageous process may be invented that produces disastrous negative global externalities that are hard to regulate. This paper introduces the concept of a vulnerable world: roughly, one in which there is some level of technological development at which civilization almost certainly gets devastated by default, i.e. unless it has exited the ‘semi-anarchic default condition’. Several counterfactual historical and speculative future vulnerabilities are analyzed and arranged into a typology. A general ability to stabilize a vulnerable world would require greatly amplified capacities for preventive policing and global governance. The vulnerable world hypothesis thus offers a new perspective from which to evaluate the risk-benefit balance of developments towards ubiquitous surveillance or a unipolar world order. Source: https://nickbostrom.com/papers/vulnerable.pdf

[vii] Snakes in the Ganga by Rajiv Malhotra and Vijaya Vishwanathan, 2022, provides insightful perspective of the deep and broad the momentum of this feminist-transhumanist revolution, emerging out of elite US Universities, targeted at BhAratiya society.

[viii] See for example US Government funding for national biotech research and manufacturing https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2022/09/12/fact-sheet-president-biden-to-launch-a-national-biotechnology-and-biomanufacturing-initiative/ and broad range of agricultural products will be produced at vertical urban farms aligned with metros: https://www.usda.gov/media/blog/2018/08/14/vertical-farming-future

[ix] For longer term “death in three stages” impact of the European Enlightenment based Artha and Kama shastrAs see https://www.amazon.com/OUTSIDER-DECONSTRUCTING-EUROPEAN-ENLIGHTENMENT-Death-ebook/dp/B07RHVRV7V

Three civilizational design principles in the VedA. Civilizational continuity in a changing world. A Perspective on Response of Hindu AchAryAs to Changing Patterns of RtA. The non-response to 15th century European incursions in the South of India. Continuing Non-Response to the 21st Century Globalism.

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The non-response to 15^th century European incursions in the South

By Jayant Kalawar, August 25, 2023

Besides the invasions from the north west by carriers of the Islamic flag, Europeans began making incursions in the south of India beginning late 15^th century. How did Hindu AchAryAs respond to these incursions?

Here is a summary description of selected European incursions, beginning with the Portuguese entry into KeralA and subsequently Goa, Daman and Diu, beginning May 1498, while the Vijayanagara Empire (1336 – 1646) was at its peak. These examples show how newer forms of social organization and technologies enabled non-Hindu cultures to gain control over BhArat over long periods of time, implying that with initiative and curiosity Hindus could have learned these new ways and thus maintained and extended their domain into the Central and Western Asia and Europe 800 years ago.

1. The invention of double entry book keeping by Money Lenders / Bankers in Europe in general and Italy in particular beginning in the 13^th century enabled merchants to lend risky long term project funds^[i] (as opposed to specific asset based letters of credit e.g. Hundis) to Kings and Archbishops to finance trade related voyages combined with the cultural project of missionizing Christianity. This funding process helped Spain launch Columbus to the Americas (1492 – the quest was for the Indies but landed in the Americas) and Vasco Da Gama to India (1498). Design and construction of long distance sailing ships with substantial platforms to carry cannons was commissioned through such funds. The financing of these well-armed long distance sailing ships launched Europe’s global imperial project. When Vasco Da Gama arrived in Kozhikode (aka Calicut) he was given permission by theSamoothiri to set up a Portuguese trading post, along with missionaries. Vasco Da Gama headed back to Lisbon. The Portuguese traders were a competition with the Arab traders^[ii] who had set up shop in Kozhikode since the 12^th century. The Arab traders had their own militia for protection of their assets and also served as the Samoothiri’s navy for protection of the port as well as protection against pirates of the trading ships plying to and from Yemen as well as Egypt. The Arab traders persuaded the Samoothiri to expel the Portuguese. The Portuguese sent a ship with the message of an impending siege by the militia of the Arab traders at the behest of the Samoothiri. The trading post was able to withstand the siege for about 3 months, when 3 Portuguese armed (with cannons) ships arrived. It is said that on just the sight of the armed ships, the soldiers who had laid siege ran away (this may be an exaggeration, but the net result is not in contention). That was in 1503.
2. The Portuguese thereafter focused on defeating the Arab naval forces that were controlling the Arabian Sea. A pivotal naval war in 1509 ending with victory of the Portuguese armed ships over the joint forces of India based Sultans, the Ottomans and Egypt^[iii]. What was the Navy of the Empire of Vijayanagara doing? It seemed to be mostly based out of Honavar and focused on raiding Arab ships plying from Yemen and Aden to the sub-continent with horses bred for cavalry of the Mughals and Sultans who were preparing to attack and occupy Deccan. These naval raids secured a channel for supply of cavalry horses for the Vijayanagara Empire. The Vijayanagara naval commander, Timoji, at Honavar was also reputed to have provided intelligence to the Portuguese armada, enabling its victory in the war against the combined navies of the Sultans of Gujarat, the Ottomans and Egypt in 1509. Subsequently, Timoji is also said to have advised and enabled capture of Goa by Afonso de Albuquerque in 1510. For his services, Timoji was briefly made the interim governor of Goa.

       So it may be that it was in 1509 when BhArat began coming under European hegemony, much before European Renaissance which began in late 16^th century. Rest was just a matter of time^[iv].

Did Hindu AchAryAs guide Hindu kings to establish trading posts in Yemen, Aden, east coast of Africa in the 800 years (since 9^th century, during the RashtrakuTA’s there are references to Arab merchants camping on the west coast) prior to Vasco Da Gama’s landing and later (post Vasco Da Gama) in Europe? What efforts were made to secure and learn techniques of double entry book keeping, funding risky long term projects and building out of the new weapons and naval technologies that were coming out of Europe, post Vasco Da GAmA’s landing in Kozhikode?^[v]

3. Extending double entry book keeping to accounting equation gave rise to concept of risky equity by the second half of 16^th century Europe. That led to formation of the Joint Stock Company as a social organization. East India Company was one of the joint stock companies (1590), with large number of small investors^[vi]. The company was chartered, under the umbrella of the United Kingdom of England and Wales, specifically for investing in a high risk project of setting up trade route to India. The joint stock company social organization and the social contracts with individual investors enabling higher risk ventures continues to be the core social contract across the globe today.

The management of the joint stock company was responsible of making returns for the investors in ways that are legal. In 1757 at battle of Plassey, Jagat Seth financed the war for the East India Company, including bribing Mir Jafar so Robert Clive can win. Did Jagat Seth know about the concept of joint stock company? In 1750s (more than 150 years after its founding) East India Company was in its death throes. Jagat Seth could have taken over the company and made Clive his employee. Was that explored? If not, what kept Hindu money lenders / bankers from learning and exploring about this form of social organization?

In general, people from all over the world came to both the western and eastern shores of India. China sent trading ships to the east coast ports, for example, for millennia. Did Hindus set up trading posts and dominion relationships with any of these countries they sold to? It would be interesting to research to ^[vii]see whether the exports had to be paid for with gold and silver, since there appears to be little reference to what India was importing. If indeed that is so, then it would make sense that so much gold was available in Deva SthAnAs across India. One could even speculate that the importers of Indian products having been under pressure of producing more gold to buy Indian imports would resort to raiding Indian temples for gold as a way for them to then being able to buy Indian products once again.

All of these ways of social and economic behavior (including especially the non-responses) that I have described above makes sense from within the Hindu culture, which teaches us to act as Karma yogins – produce and consume minimally, and celebrate the Divya ShAktis opulently in their Deva SthAnAs. This may come across as a harmonious stable perspective. However, it leaves the Hindu sanghaTanA vulnerable to attack from non-Hindu sanghaTanAs and to dynamic changes in RtA. To non-Hindu materialist outsiders (the MlechhAs) such practices may come across as infantile, of a people needing to be civilized.

[i] https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/234631058.pdf The origin of double entry bookkeeping is generally associated with Luca Pacioli. As a matter of fact, the history of accounting cannot be complete without highlighting the wonderful work of Luca Pacioli. His book “Suma de Arithmetia, Geometria, Proportioni et Proportionalita” which was published in 1491 had two chapters – de Computis et Scripturis – describing double entry bookkeeping. His idea reflected the business activities of the Venice at as that time, especially the way they recorded financial transactions. This is to say that even before Pacioli published his book, the Merchants of Venice actually maintained accounting records which of course, they did in a particular way. So in his book, Pacioli simply described this peculiar method used by the early merchants to keep their records. This method was referred to as “the Method of Venice” or “the Italian Method”. This is to say that Luca Pacioli did not invent the double entry system of accounting. He only described the method of accounting practiced at that time.

[ii] “VAsco Da GAmA, for example, might never even have reached India had he not been guided there from the Adrican coast by an experience Arab pilot. And when, after an epic voyage of more than 12,000 miles, he and his men finally did arrive in the subcontinent, they were astonished to be met in the harbour of Calicut by two North African Muslims, both of whom could understand Portuguese” Pp 16-17, Casale, Giancarlo, The Ottoman Age of Exploration, Oxford University Press, 2020.

[iii] The Indian and Arab vessels carried gunpowder weapons, but even the largest dhows, built shell‑first with flexible hulls, were too weakly constructed to mount heavy guns. The Portuguese seized the weather gauge at the start of the engagement, testimony to their ships’ sailing qualities; this enabled them to engage or disengage at will. The Portuguese squadrons apparently fought in line ahead using broadside fire to systematically devastate the more lightly constructed, heavily manned Arab and Indian craft.87 The victory was clearly decisive. Further resistance to the Portuguese at sea was either sporadic or dependent on external support.

The next serious challenge to the Portuguese came in 1508 in the form of an expeditionary force mounted from the Red Sea under Mamluk direction with Ragusan and Venetian technical assistance and based on a hard core of Mediterranean war galleys. Reinforced with a large number of local vessels provided by the Sultan of Gudjerat, the force, under Hussein Pasha, caught a Portuguese squadron at anchor in the River Chaul and attacked with overwhelming numerical superiority. The Portuguese held out for three days before being overwhelmed, eloquent testimony to the defensive power of their vessels and the effectiveness of their ordnance. Of three naos and five caravels engaged, only two caravels got away a circumstance which suggests that the critical determinant of escape was handiness under sail and that the Portuguese could defend the low-lying caravels as well as the tall naos. Whether because of a lack of direction or heavy losses and the need for repairs, Hussein’s squadron retired to Diu where it was caught in port and annihilated the following year by a Portuguese squadron under Almeida. https://www.angelfire.com/ga4/guilmartin.com/Revolution.html

[iv] The core reason for Portuguese naval success, against the Arab-Turkish navy in the Arabian Sea, was superior naval technology emerging out of Europe: Carracks and Caravelles, long sailing ships designed to carry powerful (for that time) heavy cannons. Such development was made possible by funding for risky long term projects becoming available, enabled by double entry book keeping. The Vijayanagara as well as the Arab-Turkish navies used dhonis (powered by oars, rather than long sails) to carry armed infantry, ram the opponents ship, board them and take them over. That dhoni based naval strategy did not stand a chance against the sails and cannon combination, which bombed opposing ships from a distance. Source: Ibid

[v] The Ottoman’s, after the defeat in 1509 in the Arabian Sea, hired Venetian ship builders to build out its navy with the latest available technologies. There is evidence that such technology was available to Hindu kings. For example with Portuguese armada that arrived in 1503, to protect their trading post in Kozhikode, there are references showing that there were agents of weapons sellers from Venice on board that armada. After all, the armada was manned by privateers, mercenaries, in the pay of the King of Portugal dependent on loans funded by merchants. Some cannons were sold to the local Hindu kings, and with training, they were used against the Portuguese armada. That seems to indicate that Hindu kings could potentially have developed allies in Europe for selling their products directly to merchants in Europe, rather than through the trading posts that European kings were forced to send to India when the Ottomans cut off trading routes to India. Was that done? If not, what prevented Hindu kings from doing so?

[vi] Dalrymple, William, The Anarchy, Bloomsbury Publishing Inc, 2019, Pp 7-8 “the EIC was from the very first conceived as a joint stock corporation, open to all investors”. And “The idea of a joint stock company was one of Tudor England’s most brilliant and revolutionary inventions”.

[vii] There are a few exceptions of kings sending trade and dominion missions from the east coast of India going to south east Asia as well as east Asia. Kalinga was one of them – and that came to an end with the invasion by Emperor AshokA about 2300 years ago. The kings of Tamil Nadu also ventured forth in first millennia CE. What caused them to lose influence is a question that needs to be researched.

Three civilizational design principles in the VedA. Civilizational continuity in a changing world. A Perspective on Response of Hindu AchAryAs to Changing Patterns of RtA. The non-response to 15th century European incursions in the South of India. Continuing Non-Response to the 21st Century Globalism.

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Civilizational  Continuity in a Changing World

By Jayant Kalawar, August 23, 2023

About 3500 to 2500 years before now, there seems to have been a phase when DharmA in BhArat, was in a long period of decay especially in its political economy (governed by Artha ShAstra) and social formations (governed by KAma shAstra). Research and analysis may be required to understand how the decay in the network of bronze age civilizations^[i], beginning about 3500 years before now, played into such decay of DharmA in BhArat. In the meanwhile, the contradictions in the Dharma SutrAs of GautamA for example, provide us a glimpse of how DharmA was applied during that range of time. The SutrAs describe how large masses of the mAnav sanghatanA were to be treated with an iron hand. On the other hand, those entrusted with understanding the changing nature of RtA and use of the over-arching principles given by the Rishis to adapt DharmA to desh-kaal-paristhiti, did not seem to be active. As a reaction to such prevailing decay of DharmA, there seems to have emerged an energetic reaction among the mAnav sanghatanA, around about 2500 years ago there began emerging multiple intellectual responses to this civilizational slide. KautilyA in India. Aristotle in Greece. Han Fei in China. All three intellectual responses were focused on humans as social and political beings – thus the formulations were in terms of KAma and Artha shAstrAs^[ii]

At around the same time, BhArat also experienced a different response to this crisis: that of Siddharth Gautama (about 5^th century BCE) was one manifestation. Siddhartha Gautama not only gave up his Kingship role (Raj DharmA) but also his role as GrihastashramA. He seems to have articulated the challenge that Hindu AchAryAs had failed to provide guidance on how DharmA practices should adapt to changing in RtA. However, instead of working on re-building VedA based DharmA, Siddhartha Gautama chose a different path: of an assertion that samsArA was full of suffering with personal liberation (NirvANa) the only way out of that suffering of endless births.

Siddhartha GautamA’s response with his pivot to personal liberation as the only path to release from samsArA was  mainstreamed by Emperor AshokA about 2300 years ago. Subsequent to this pivot, intellectual conversation on social technologies  based on VedAngAs (which form the basis for Artha and Kama shastras, including state building) seems to have come to a stand-still among Hindu AchAryAs^[iii]. The capacity on the Hindu civilization to respond to changing dynamic nature of RtA declined. Hindu civilization became vulnerable to attacks from non-Hindu mAnav sanghatanA.

To understand this point of dynamic nature of RtA better, let me take a short diversion. Humans are able to observe certain (very limited) bandwidth of cosmic rhythms (the major part of RtA). For example the rhythm of the Moon that is correlated with the tides, Sun’s annual (solar year, which is how humans broadly share and manage time globally in this epoch) north-south pulsation giving rise to seasons. There are other pulsations of much lower frequency: consider the axial precession of the Earth, which apparently has a frequency of about 25,800 solar years. Our ancestors were cognizant of this. Shastras based on Vedanga Jyotish were an attempt to research and regenerate a more subtle human understanding of RtA. The HC has not tended to researching and developing of this area of knowledge for at least more than a millennia. Consider for example, the possibility that annual solar cycles undergo small changes which accumulate and result in climate changes in the hemispheres, through the progression of precession of the equinox^[iv]:

Axial precession makes seasonal contrasts more extreme in one hemisphere and less extreme in the other. Currently perihelion occurs during winter in the Northern Hemisphere and in summer in the Southern Hemisphere. This makes Southern Hemisphere summers hotter and moderates Northern Hemisphere seasonal variations. But in about 13,000 years, axial precession will cause these conditions to flip, with the Northern Hemisphere seeing more extremes in solar radiation and the Southern Hemisphere experiencing more moderate seasonal variations.

There have been variations in seasons even within the 13000 years, which then have given rise to changes in rhythm for humans. This may have lead to seasonal migrations from the steppes to the plains, with annual raids as a means of production against the settled agricultural societies. Not only is RtA dynamic, its patterns reflect the entire range of short and long term spandanA of the cosmos.

The question that arises, if we were to assume dynamic nature of RtA, is: How can mAnav jAti shape and maintain DharmA by continually aligning with dynamic RtA?

Diminished Capacity of DharmA to Help Grihastashrama Flourish?

Hindu DharmA may have seen diminished capacity to provide the protection (physical security) and abundance (economic security) due to the intellectual pivot away from focus on supporting Grihastashrama and towards aspiring for moksha as the solution to suffering of samsarA, about 2500 years ago. I would like to offer a more contemporary perspective on the challenge that Hindu AchAryAs face if they wish to be responsive and adaptive to dynamic nature of RtA in the 21^st century.

As many of you know, there are broadly two types of Artificial Intelligence (AI – neural network programmed big data computing) models. One is classificatory AI model that can be trained once and then used for ever to select cat images from among a large collection of random images. The basic building block for this type of classificatory modeling is the subject-predicate-object model. Same as the core of the VyAkaraNa rules laid down by Maharishi PANini^[v] about 2500 years ago for Samskrit. These classificatory models can then begin generating sentences with meaning as well (see for example Open AI GPT-3). Flourishing of Samskrit literature post PANini did that as well.^[vi]

The other broad type of AI model is time series based, where it keeps learning and training itself, based on new data it actively looks for. For example Alpha Go. The reinforcement learning method enables opening up new areas that humans have not thought of. The latest example, at this time of writing, is successful use of Alpha Tensor to develop a more efficient way to do matrix multiplications, which are core to AI and require considerable computing power and therefore energy^[vii]. Cultures which have this capability to learn from changing environmental patterns may have a better chance of adapting and of being resilient to protect and sustain their Grihastashrama configuration. Hindu AchAryAs due to their focus on personal liberation^[viii] (Moksha Shastra) led by non-Grishastas (Brahmacharis, Swamis, renunciates from KAma and Artha) in about the last 2500 years, may have under-cut its cultural intellectual capacity to monitor, learn and respond to changing patterns of RtA. For example, consider how the following popular verse from the Bhagavad Gita was interpreted by most (and perhaps all) SAmpradAyA Gurus^[ix] from the Moksha shastra lens (and I then offer an interpretation through my Artha Shastra lens):

कर्मण्येवाधिकारस्ते मा फलेषु कदाचन।
मा कर्मफलहेतुर्भूर्मा ते सङ्गोऽस्त्वकर्मणि।।2.47।।^[x]

Sri RAmAnujAchAryA’s commentary is helpful in providing perspective for this verse through the Moksha ShAstra lens: “As for obligatory, occasional and desiderative acts taught in the Vedas and associated with some result or other, you, an aspirant established in Sattva, have the right only to perform them”^[xi]. First, the AchArYA narrows down the actions to KarmAs (actions) prescribed in the Karma Kanda of the VedAs. He further narrows it down to say the guidance is being given to those already established in Sattva (thus being devoid of Rajas and Tamas). And the guidance is that such individuals should perform actions set forth in the VedAs without asking for anything in return and without expecting any fruits from performing the VedA prescribed Karma KAnda actions.

More recent pracharaks and commentators of the Bhagavad Gita, while recognizing the Gita as a Moksha Shastra, no longer nuance that the actions it references are Karma Kanda actions and applicable only to those established in Sattva (hence free of Rajas and Tamas). The exhortation of doing work without expectations of fruit is made applicable to all actions and to all individuals^[xii]. How does such guidance, provided through the Moksha shastra lens, impact functioning of GrihastashramA in a rapidly changing material world that most Hindus experience? From their commentary it is clear that Hindu AchAryAs approach the Bhagavad Gita as a Moksha Shastra. How does that help with encouraging curiosity and initiative required to monitor, learn and adapt to be resilient in a dynamic RtA? How does it assist in applying the desh-kaal-paristhiti principle to enable robust GrihastashramA?

Now let us see how an alternative perspective of the first line of the Bhagavad Gita verse 2-47 from an ArthA perspective may provide different guidance:

You may act (karmaNye) to the best of your competence (the adhikAra you have acquired). However, the fruits from your actions (phaleshu) are not (mA) certain (kadAchana).

Introducing the sense of certainty / uncertainty may enable exploration of the dynamic nature of RtA in particular desh-kaal-paristhiti states. It may open up curiosity for ways of collaborating in the rapidly moving theater of the Devi. An integral part of the script in the Devi’s theater for mAnav sanghatanA is playing out of GrihastAshramA. The backdrop in the theater and other actors and scripts (whether climate, natural environment, multiple mAnav sanghatanA each with its own culture) they speak may keep changing. But the core RtA, enduring pattern, for mAnav sanghatanA is an effective and enduring GrihastAshramA process. So what may help Hindu Civilizational renaissance is VedA based DharmA that is dynamic and cognizant of the changes in RtA to enable flourishing of Hindu GrihastashramA.

MAnav sanghatanA experiences changes in RtA from two broadly different sources: a) the change in patterns of natural environment and b) the change in patterns due to human produced technologies. Given the rapid development of human constructed technologies in the last two hundred years, this source of changing patterns needs to be recognized while considering DharmA configurations to support Grihastashrama in the 21^st century. These pattern changes have been introduced by technologies developed mostly by non-Hindu mAnav sanghatanA. Have Hindu grihastAs adapted to these technology driven pattern changes through ad hoc imitation, rather than thoughtful DharmA based adaptation? That is explored in the next section.

[i] Research about late bronze age civilizational network has mostly been focused in the eastern meditarranean. See for example: https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691208015/1177-bc . The BhAratiya civilizations may have been a key player

[ii] See for example http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/politics.html and https://phi.project.sinica.edu.tw/%E5%BB%96%E6%96%87%E5%A5%8E/1939The%20Complete%20Works%20of%20Han%20Fei%20Tzu%20A%20Classic%20of%20Chinese%20Political%20Science%20(scan).pdf

[iii] I include brahmacharis and Swamis associated with MathAs as being buddhi-jeevi, Hindu AchAryAs.

[iv] https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2948/milankovitch-orbital-cycles-and-their-role-in-earths-climate/

[v] In turn based on the core model of human cognition given by the VedAs: prameta-pramANa-prameya.

[vi] Hindu culture is well accomplished in this classificatory model, with its major regional languages adopting PANini’s VyAkaraNa as their grammar, beginning sometime in the 8^th-9^th century CE (Kannada language is said to be the first regional language to have accomplished this through the RashtrakutA court).

[vii] https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-03166-w?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email accessed on October 10^th 2022.

[viii] Hindu AchAryAs use the tools they gain from study of MimAsA (structured interpretation) based on VyAkaraNA (grammar of MaharishI PANinI) and TarkA (logic again based on VyAkaraNA). These are tools help generate abstract mental models that are internally consistent in their logic. They do not support modeling and production of systematized knowledge of the vibrant pulsating cosmos that humans experience with their every breath.

[ix] See translations of commentaries by Acharya Sri SankarA, Acharya Sri AbhinavguptA and AchAryA Sri RAmAnujA at https://www.gitasupersite.iitk.ac.in/srimad?language=dv&field_chapter_value=2&field_nsutra_value=47&setgb=1&etassa=1&etradi=1&choose=1

[x] https://www.gitasupersite.iitk.ac.in/srimad?language=dv&field_chapter_value=2&field_nsutra_value=47

[xi] Ibid

[xii] For examples, see Swami Vivekananda as quoted at https://vivekavani.com/bhagavad-gita-chapter-2-verse-47/