This is a brief review of the Rasa theory of Indian aesthetics and the works I have done on the same. A major source of the Indian system of classification of emotional states comes from the ‘Natyasastra’, the ancient Indian treatise on the performing arts, which dates back to the 2nd Century AD (or much earlier, pg. LXXXVI: Natyasastra, Ghosh, 1951). The ‘Natyasastra’ speaks about ‘sentiments’ or ‘Rasas’ (pg.102: Natyasastra, Ghosh, 1951) which are produced when certain ‘dominant states’ (sthayi Bhava), (...) ‘transitory states’ (vyabhicari Bhava) and ‘temperamental states’ (sattvika Bhava) of emotions come together (pgs.102, 105: Natyasastra, Ghosh, 1951). This Rasa theory, which is still widely followed in classical Indian performing arts, classifies eight Rasas or sentiments which are: Sringara (erotic), Hasya (comic), Karuna (pathetic), Raudra (furious), Vira (heroic), Bhayanaka (terrible), Bibhatsa (odious) and Adbhuta (marvellous). There was a later addition of the ninth sentiment or Rasa called Santa (peace) in later Sanskrit poetics (pg.102: Natyasastra, Ghosh, 1951). According to ancient Indian aesthetics (especially in the context of Bharatas’ ‘Natyasastra’, Anandavardhana’s ‘Dhvanyaloka’ and Abhinavagupta’s ‘Abhinavabharati’), ‘Rasa’ is the relishable state of elemental human emotions called ‘Bhavas’. Bharata’s ‘Natyasastra’ originally spoke of eight Rasas. The concept of the 9th Rasa was a later interpolation by the Kashmiri Shaivist Abhinavagupta (10th Century AD) and also his predecessor Anandavardhana (9th Century AD). Abhinavagupta extends the eight Rasas by adding the concept of the Santa Rasa which he regards as the essence of all Rasas. It is this 9th Rasa which according to Abhinavagupta lets the Rasika attain the aesthetic detachment and savour the essences of all other Rasas and therefore the true aesthetic delight. The introduction of 9th Rasa integrates the concepts of Bharata’s Rasasutra and Patanjali’s Yoga theory – the detachment necessary to introspect inwards into the inherent state of freedom and bliss (aesthetic consciousness). (shrink)

First time in the history of India, in 1958, a Sankaracarya visited West. The author, His Holiness Jagadguru Sankaracarya Sri Bharati Krsna Tirtha of Puri, went to America at the invitation of the Self Realization Fellowship, Los Angeles, to spread the message of Vedanta. This book is a compilation of some of his discourses delivered there. These discourses by a saint-yogi and master of ancient Indian scriptures, also well-versed in modern sciences, give the essentials of Vedanta. They combine authenticity (...) of thought with simplicity of language. Being couched in the contemporary idiom they will be found to be particularly suited to the modern mind. Though addressed to American audiences, the discourses carry a message of eternal truth and of universal application. The steps of spiritual inquiry and the paths of God-realisation outlined in them will be of immense practical use to the readers in their quest for the Supreme. (shrink)

This is a brief conceptual analysis of the limitations of 'scientific' empiricism which I tried to convey without any possible scientific or philosophical jargon which are commonly used by scientists or philosophers and which are difficult for others to understand. The terms which appear as jargon here do not need to be understood literally as they are supposed to convey mere examples rather than meaning.

This photo-essay analyzes the politics of dwelling of the inhabitants of ‘outcast’ Calcutta - the city that is the nightmare of urban planners and whose squalor, filth and poverty are taken to be indexes of the failure of the postcolonial urbanism as such. The city that turned itself into a barricade during the street-fighting years of the 1960s is now about to turn its back on its own subalterns (migrants from poorer areas), participating in urban cleansing drives that derive from (...) neo-liberal dictates. Showing that the squatters also dwell and forge solidarities underpinned by an ethic of survival, this essay draws attention to non-state political formations emerging out of the negotiations of the City Form with the non-civic but enabling life-forms prevalent in subaltern Calcutta. (shrink)

Neurofilaments and microtubules are important components of the neuronal cytoskeleton. In axons or dendrites, these filaments are aligned in parallel arrays, and separated from one another by nonrandom distances. This distinctive organization has been attributed to cross bridges formed by NF side arms or microtubule‐associated proteins. We recently proposed a polymer‐brush‐based mechanism for regulating interactions between neurofilaments and between microtubules. In this model, the side arms of neurofilaments and the projection domains of microtubule‐associated proteins are highly unstructured and exert long‐range (...) repulsive forces that are largely entropic in origin; these forces then act to organize the cytoskeleton in axons and dendrites. Here, we review the biochemical, biophysical, genetic and cell biological data for the polymer‐brush and cross‐bridging models. We explore how the data traditionally used to support cross bridging may be reconciled with a polymer‐brush mechanism and compare the implications of recent experimental insights into axonal transport and physiology for each model. BioEssays 26:1017–1025, 2004. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Commentary on a portion of Tattvacintāmaṇi, basic work of the neo-Nyaya school in Hindu philosophy.

On the Dvaita school of Hindu philosophy, propounded by Madhva, 13th century Hindu religious leader.

The Gita is a central text in Hindu traditions, and commentaries on it express a range of philosophical-theological positions. Two of the most significant commentaries are by Sankara, the founder of the Advaita or Non-Dualist system of Vedic thought and by Ramanuja, the founder of the Visistadvaita or Qualified Non-Dualist system. Their commentaries offer rich resources for the conceptualization and understanding of divine reality, the human self, being, the relationship between God and human, and the moral psychology of action and (...) devotion. This book approaches their commentaries through a study of the interaction between the abstract atman (self) and the richer conception of the human person. While closely reading the Sanskrit commentaries, Ram-Prasad develops reconstructions of each philosophical-theological system, drawing relevant and illuminating comparisons with contemporary Christian theology and Western philosophy. (shrink)

The COVID-19 vaccine has been a miraculous, life-saving advance, offering staggering efficacy in adults, and was developed with astonishing speed. The time from sequencing the virus to authorizing the first COVID-19 vaccine was so brisk even the optimists appear close-minded. Yet, simultaneously, United States’ COVID-19 vaccination roll-out and related policies have contained missed opportunities, errors, run counter to evidence-based medicine, and revealed limitations in the judgment of public policymakers. Misplaced utilization, contradictory messaging, and poor deployment in those who would benefit (...) most—the elderly and high-risk—alongside unrealistic messaging, exaggeration, and coercion in those who benefit least—young, healthy Americans—is at the heart. It is important to consider the history of COVID-19 vaccines to identify where we succeeded and where we failed, and the effects that these errors may have more broadly on vaccination hesitancy and routine childhood immunization programs in the decades to come. (shrink)

The Caraka Saṃhitā (ca. first century BCE–third century CE), the first classical Indian medical compendium, covers a wide variety of pharmacological and therapeutic treatment, while also sketching out a philosophical anthropology of the human subject who is the patient of the physicians for whom this text was composed. In this article, I outline some of the relevant aspects of this anthropology – in particular, its understanding of ‘mind’ and other elements that constitute the subject – before exploring two ways in (...) which it approaches ‘psychiatric’ disorder: one as ‘mental illness’ ( mānasa-roga), the other as ‘madness’ ( unmāda). I focus on two aspects of this approach. One concerns the moral relationship between the virtuous and the well life, or the moral and the medical dimensions of a patient’s subjectivity. The other is about the phenomenological relationship between the patient and the ecology within which the patient’s disturbance occurs. The aetiology of and responses to such disturbances helps us think more carefully about the very contours of subjectivity, about who we are and how we should understand ourselves. I locate this interpretation within a larger programme on the interpretation of the whole human being, which I have elsewhere called ‘ecological phenomenology’. (shrink)

On the life and philosophy of Jiddu Krishnamurti, 1895-1986, Indian philosopher.

Pt. 1. The lives and teachings of the three Ācāryas and Narayana Guru -- pt. 2. Ideas of the three Ācāryas unitively revisualised.

Liberalism and pluralism are seen as being in tension in liberal Western nation-states, while multiculturalism, as a policy of resource allocation to minority groups, has been the standard response to pluralization. This limits the pluralist potential of a constitutional liberalism. The fusion of a liberal theory of autonomous individuality with a pluralist theory of multiple belonging has to look beyond multicultural policy in order to enhance liberal commitments to citizens through pluralist provisions. An analysis of the Indian Constitution's Fundamental Rights, (...) as a normative document, shows that the citizen can be understood as an autonomous individual given identity through belonging to a plurality of groups. Consequently, rights are taken to accrue to all citizens equally as autonomous individuals, but also by virtue of their belonging to groups, with special provisions made available for vulnerable ones. Rights for a plurality of vulnerable groups should not be seen as illiberal additions but integral to the conception of liberalism. If such a view of citizenship were to be integrated into the liberal constitutions of irreversibly pluralizing Western democracies, then a pluralistic constitutional patriotism could be fostered amongst members of vulnerable groups, while demonstrating that standard liberal rights guarantee equal citizenship for all. (shrink)

English translation of Bhagavadgītā from chapter 1-18 with commentary in English.

Study of Upaśamaprakaraṇa of Yogavāśiṣṭharāmāyaṇa, work on Vedanta philosophy.

Complete discourses on Vedanta, by a Hindu philosopher.

Based on original translations of passages from the works of three major thinkers of the classical Indian school of Advaita (Sankara, Vacaspati and Sri Harsa), but addressing issues found in Descartes, Berkeley, Hume, Kant, Wittgenstein and contemporary analytic philosophers, this book argues for a philosophical position it calls 'non-realism'. This is the view that an independent, external world must be assumed if the features of cognition are to be explained, but that it cannot be proved that there is such a (...) world, independently of an appeal to cognition itself. This position is constructed against idealist denials of externality, realist arguments for an independent world and the sceptical denial of the coherence of cognition. (shrink)

Classical Indian debates about ātman—self—concern a minimal or core entity rather than richer notions of personal identity. These debates recognise that there is phenomenal unity across time; but is a core self required to explain it? Contemporary phenomenologists foreground the importance of a phenomenally unitary self, and Udayana's position is interpreted in this context as a classical Indian approach to this issue. Udayana seems to dismiss the body as the candidate for phenomenal identity in a way similar to some Western (...) philosophers. He also provides some inkling of how alternative ways of defending phenomenal unity without self fail. A criticism of some Western phenomenological theories of self is that they do not explain how unity is provided by the ‘mineness’ of cognition. Udayana's suggestion that a sort of agency provides such an explanation can be developed as an original argument for a phenomenally unitary self. (shrink)

Bruce Janz, Jessica Locke, and Cynthia Willett interact in this exchange with different aspects of Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad’s book Human Being, Bodily Being. Through “constructive inter-cultural thinking”, they seek to engage with Ram-Prasad’s “lower-case p” phenomenology, which exemplifies “how to think otherwise about the nature and role of bodiliness in human experience”. This exchange, which includes Ram-Prasad’s reply to their interventions, pushes the reader to reflect more about different aspects of bodiliness.

This volume is a collection of Devi Prasad’s essays on Gandhi, social justice and social change. The different essays address themes ranging from Gandhi’s ideals of satyagraha and ahimsa, civil disobedience and non-violence, to the Gandhian approach to education as founded in making and crafting as well as participation in the political and social movements of our times. They also engage the revolutionary potential of Gandhi’s thought, drawing parallels between Lenin and Gandhi and analysing the historical significance of Gandhi’s (...) anti-imperialist yet non-violent political philosophy. In sum, the volume dwells on the continuing, critical relevance of Gandhi in our times. It will be of interest to those in education, political science, peace and conflict studies, history and philosophy, as well as to the general reader interested in Gandhian thought. (shrink)

Study on the mathematical philosophy and logic of Bertrand Russell, 1872-1970, a British mathematician, logician and philosopher.