Integral divine transformation of the entire being

Sri Aurobindo

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The adjective integral was first used in a spiritual context by Sri Aurobindo (1872–1950) from 1914 onward to describe his own spiritual teachings, which he referred to as Purna(Skt: "Full") Yoga. It appeared in The Synthesis of Yoga, a book that first published in serial form in the journal Arya and was revised several times since.^[10]

Sri Aurobindo's work has been described as Integral Vedanta, and psychology,^[11][12] as well as the Integral Psychology (the term coined by Indra Sen) and Psychotherapy that emerges from it.^[13] His writings influenced others who used the term "integral" in more philosophical or psychological contexts.

In the teachings of Sri Aurobindo, integral yoga refers to the process of the union of all the parts of one's being with the Divine, and the transmutation of all of their jarring elements into a harmonious state of higher divine consciousness and existence.

As described by Sri Aurobindo and his co-worker The Mother (1878–1973), this spiritual teaching involves an integral divine transformation of the entire being, rather than the liberation of only a single faculty such as the intellect or the emotions or the body. According to Sri Aurobindo,

(T)he Divine is in his essence infinite and his manifestation too is multitudinously infinite. If that is so, it is not likely that our true integral perfection in being and in nature can come by one kind of realisation alone; it must combine many different strands of divine experience. It cannot be reached by the exclusive pursuit of a single line of identity till that is raised to its absolute; it must harmonise many aspects of the Infinite. An integral consciousness with a multiform dynamic experience is essential for the complete transformation of our nature. — Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, p. 114

Aurobindo's ideas were further explored by Indra Sen (1903–1994) in the 1940s and 1950s, a psychologist, and devotee of Sri Aurobindo and The Mother. He was the first to coin the term "Integral psychology" to describe the psychological observations he found in Sri Aurobindo's writings (which he contrasted with those of Western Psychology), and developed themes of "Integral Culture" and "Integral Man".^[14]

These ideas were further developed by Haridas Chaudhuri (1913–1975), a Bengaliphilosopher and academic who founded in 1968 the California Institute of Integral Studies.^[15]

For example:

• Freudian drives, Jungian archetypes, and myth are pre-personal structures.
• Empirical and rational processes are at the personal level.
• Transpersonal entities include, for example, Aurobindo's Overmind, Emerson's Oversoul, Plato's Forms, Plotinus' nous, and the Hindu Atman, or world-soul.

In 1945, Sen resigned from the University and moved to the Sri Aurobindo Ashram, where his family had already been staying for two years. In following years, through lectures, published writings, and personal contacts, he presented Sri Aurobindo's work to academia and universities, where it became well known for the first time.

In a series of professional papers published from the mid-1930s through the '40s and '50s, he coined the term Integral psychology, to describe the psychological observations contained in Sri Aurobindo's Yoga psychology and philosophy.^[4] He also was concerned with the formulation of integral education as presented in the teachings of Sri Aurobindo and The Mother.^[5]

His papers, which were sent to Sri Aurobindo and later The Mother before publication, were presented at scientific congresses or published in Ashram journals.^[6] It was not until 1986 that these papers were published, by the Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education in book form, as Integral Psychology: The Psychological System of Sri Aurobindo. This has since been issued in a second edition. The field of Integral psychology was later taken up and developed by Haridas Chaudhuri when he founded the Integral Counseling Psychology program at what is now the California Institute of Integral Studies, in the 1970s. Wikipedia

Music And Manipulation: On the Social Uses and Social ...

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Steven Brown, ‎Ulrik Volgsten - 2011 - ‎Preview - ‎More editions

This volume is the first to address the social ramifications of music’s behaviorally manipulative effects, its morally questionable uses and control mechanisms, and its economic and artistic regulation through commercialization, thus ...

I am an epitome of opposites

A new post in the series - When a Picture Leads - Posted by Beloo Mehra - 

In our intellectually egoistic moments we pretend that we have actually transcended these narrow black and white dichotomies and that we don't put people into one or the other category. We like to think that we actually see and appreciate the various grays of the world. We like to tell ourselves (and whoever else will listen) that we don't judge the intention of someone just because the person says or writes something that is ideologically or politically completely opposite to our preferred ideology or politics. 

But that is not generally the truth of ourselves. And the true truth is that we know it. Deep down we know it. We know that we haven't really stopped judging or categorizing people. We know that we still divide the world into black or white. We know that despite all the complex intellectual postmodernism we have consumed we are inwardly still highly fond of simplistic modernistic binaries that are perhaps demonstrative of a deeper truth of the nature of mind, the rough and unrefined instrument we are given to make sense of the world as it exists in its un-evolved existence. 

The mind in its natural state can essentially "accept" only one side of the truth. In order to truly accept all the other possible sides of the truth as equally true, it needs a light from the regions above itself. It needs the assistance of faculties higher than mind. But our un-refined mind refuses to even accept that such light, such faculties are even possible. - See more at: http://letbeautybeyourconstantideal.blogspot.in/#sthash.A4QI6oCr.dpuf

Mother's-five-points-program

Be simple,

Be happy,

Remain quiet,

Do your work as well as you can,

Keep yourself always open towards me –

This is all that is asked from you.

Students' Prayer: "Make of us the hero warriors we aspire to become. May we fight successfully the great battle of the future that is to be born, against the past that seeks to endure; so that the new things may manifest and we may be ready and receive them."

The Twelve Powers Explained by The Mother

Onlife Online

Sri Aurobindo: A Contemporary Reader Edited by Sachidananda Mohanty, Routledge India, 2008

Reading Hegel: The Introductions by G.W.F. Hegel (Edited and introduced by Aakash Singh and Rimina Mohapatra), re.press 2008

Indian Political Thought: A Reader Edited by Aakash Singh and Silika Mohapatra (Routledge, June 2010)

SACAR Degree Programmes in partenership with IGNOU

A critique of the book "The Lives of Sri Aurobindo" by Peter Heehs 

Lives of Sri Aurobindo – Errors

Venter and the Adventure of Consciousness

Cell to self and beyond Economic Times 28 May 2010

Mukul Sharma, ET Bureau

However, ancestry and descent — though important considerations — are not the main concern. Teleology is. How can something digitised out of artificially derived binary mathematical codes have a perception of some ultimate purpose or design — an end towards which its development continually strives, like most religions maintain all life forces do?

But, said Sri Aurobindo, the first life on Earth was also a single-celled organism fashioned out of ancient, inanimate chemical sludge. Its indwelling significance was cloaked at the outset by a dense material of inconscience into which the “obscure, mysterious creatrix” delivered its secret consciousness little by little in minute infinitesimal drops till it reached its climax and exceeded itself in Man who is now evolving into a superconscious being.

It lived, it knew, it saw its self sublime,/ Deathless, outmeasuring Space, outlasting Time, he wrote. Maybe it's true, who knows. But as people like Venter probably feel: it's worth a shot. [Karma, rebirth, and the problem of evil: an interjection in the debate between Whitley Kaufman and Monima Chadha and Nick Trakakis. An article from: Philosophy East and West, The Destiny Of The Body/The Vision and the Realisation in Sri Aurobindo's Yoga, Sri Aurobindo, or the Adventure of Consciousness, Yoga, Karma, and Rebirth: A Brief History and Philosophy Stephen Phillips] 

remote viewers 1 Oct 2005 evergreenessays 

mukul sharma. [et-sq; mon-140305]. although in the everyday world energy is always unalterably fixed (the law of energy conservation is a cornerstone of classical physics), in the quantum micro-world, energy can appear and disappear out ...

series of sorries: bruno, galileo, and darwin 20 Sep 2008 evergreenessays

sorrier than thou toi 20 sep 2008, mukul sharma. church officials, christian theologians and the vatican in particular have been doing a lot of apologising of late. it's for past errors and excesses committed in the name of religion and ... be ready to change quickly and enjoy it again 17 Dec 2005 evergreenessays

who moved my lasting perception? mukul sharma the economic times tuesday, december 13, 2005. in who stole my cheese? author dr spencer johnson tells us to keep the following things in mind: change happens (they keep moving the cheese); ...

Idea of a separate conscious self is false 29 Jun 2006 selforum

MUKUL SHARMA Economic Times FRIDAY, JUNE 30, 2006. What happens when we consciously wish to do something? For instance, we might be sitting at a dining table that's set with a plate in front and a spoon on the side. ...

Instant graphic novel 29 Jul 2006 themusepaper 

Touch of Genius Mukul Sharma The Times of India 29 Jul, 2006. Can't wait to see your favourite novel made into a movie? Very soon you probably won't have to. You could simply scan and digitise the whole book and feed it into a computer ...

2nd Annual Mussoorie International Writers Festival 27 Oct 2008 themusepaper 

Mukul Sharma, a Senior Editor with The Times of India, who's 'an agnostic teetering on atheism', spoke brilliantly on topics ranging from recreational mathematics and spirituality. In the last session on the first day, ... Emphasis on the mental and spiritual evolution of life on earth 29 Oct 2007 feelphilosophy

Survival of the fittest religion 30 Oct, 2007, 0040 hrs IST, Mukul Sharma, economictimes.indiatimes.com. In the west, religion's running battle with science is well known. In the beginning the natural sciences — astronomy in particular ...

The traditional religious model is also a top-down one 26 Feb 2007 seof

MUKUL SHARMA The Economic Times TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 2007. What can one say about developing a religion where the ultimate organising principle is not one derived from divine inspiration but, instead, relies on the wisdom and ...

a conspiracy of silence 11 Nov 2006 by Tusar N Mohapatra savitriera

on years of tracking the columns of mukul sharma, the high priest of spiritual journalism in india, one does not recall if he has mentioned the mother and sri aurobindo ever. same is the case with others of his ilk, like narayani ganesh ...

Explorations towards a New Creation of the Society

The Awakening Ray

The Gnostic Centre brings out a journal focused on self-development, called 'The Awakening Ray' (since 1997). Each issue focuses on a new theme relevant for application of Integral Yoga concepts in one's daily life and work.

Current Issue : Vedas: a promise for the future (online)

Editorial : Ameeta Mehra
The Awakening Ray : Sri Aurobindo
Unveiling the Veda: Sri Aurobindo
The Three Creations : Vladimir Yatsenko
Night and Dawn : Vladimir Yatsenko
Lost Herds of Light & Angirasa Rishis : Sri Aurobindo
The Promise of the Vedic Age: The Mother
An Introduction to the Vedas : Nolini Kanta Gupta

Recent Events WORKSHOPS 

29th January EDUCOMP

Facilitated by Ameeta Mehra and Vladimir Yatsenko 

6th December GARDENING FOR BEAUTY & THERAPY

Facilitated by Mr. Satish Mathur 

21st November LEADING THE CHANGE

Facilitated by Anuradha & Roohi Kapur 

14th November EVOKING YOUR CHILD'S TRUE POTENTIAL

Facilitated by Anuradha & Roohi Kapur 

7th November AIM OF LIFE

Facilitated by Ameeta Mehra 

25th October HARNESSING THE POWER OF NATURE

Facilitated by Mr. Satish Mathur 

24th October THE WILL TO LEARN

Facilitated by Anuradha & Roohi Kapur 

20th September THE GREEN EDGE

Facilitated by Satish Mathur 

13th September NURTURING YOUR CHILD'S NEEDS

Facilitated by Anuradha & Roohi Kapur 

PROGRAMMES & COURSES 

08th February onwards

THE UPANISHADS IN THE LIGHT OF SRI AUROBINDO

Online PG Certificate programme (16 credits, 6 months) by ICIS:

Course 1: Isha & Kena Upanishads
Course 2: Aitareya & Taittiriya Upanishads
Course 3: Research Practicum in the Upanishads
accredited by IGNOU; facilitator: Vladimir Yatsenko

(This course is 6 credits, 2 months) 

08th February onwards

AN INTRODUCTION TO INTEGRAL STUDIES: KEY PERSPECTIVES

FROM THE WORKS OF SRI AUROBINDO & THE MOTHER

Online Pre-requisite Course (4 credits, 2 months) by ICIS:

online, accredited by IGNOU; facilitator: Monica Gupta

(This course is a part of the PG Certificate programme for those without a prior background in Integral Studies) 

TALKS 21-26 January

HYMNS TO SURYA-SAVITRI

by Vladimir Yatsenko 

17 January MEDICINAL USES OF TREES & PLANTS - NEEM, PEEPUL & BANYAN

by Dr. Shashibala 

20-24 December KENA UPANISHAD

by Prof. Chandrasekhar Rath 

12 December MEDICINAL USES OF TREES & PLANTS - GOOLAR, AMLA, HABISCUS & HARSRINGAR

by Dr. Shashibala 

8th August OUR TIMES & SRI AUROBINDO'S VISION

by Prof. Manoj Das 

CLASSES & STUDY CIRCLES

'Explorations towards a New Creation of the Society (Wednesdays 6.00-7.00pm) by Ameeta Mehra' study circles are being held every Wednesday, 6.00pm to 7.00pm) (facilitator: Ameeta Mehra)

'Savitri: A Legend & a Symbol' study circles are being held every Saturday, 9.00am to 10.00am) (facilitator: Ameeta Mehra)

FITNESS CLASSES 

7th February FOLK & STREET GAMES OF INDIA 5-10 YEARS OLD by Durjee 

24th January FOLK & STREET GAMES OF INDIA 5-10 YEARS OLD by Durjee 

20th December ADVENTURE ACTIVITIES FOR 5-10 YEARS OLD by Durjee 

6th December ADVENTURE ACTIVITIES FOR 5-10 YEARS OLD by Durjee 

SPECIAL EVENTS 

28th March GNOSTIC CENTRE ANNIVERSARY

Short film on 'new perspectives in higher education', display of ICIS online courses fallowed by Meditation 

21st February THE MOTHER'S BIRTHDAY: Darshan day Meditation 

5th December SRI AUROBINDO'S MAHASAMADHI DAY Meditation 

17th November Mother's Mahasamadi Day Meditation 

15th August SRI AUROBINDO'S BIRTHDAY CELEBRATIONS 'Savitri' reading & Special Meditation

Maltz's patients often had expectations that were not satisfied by plastic surgery

Maltz found that his plastic surgery patients often had expectations that were not satisfied by the surgery, so he pursued a means of helping them set the goal of a positive outcome through visualization of that positive outcome.^[3] Maltz became interested in why setting goals works. He learned that the power of self-affirmation and mental visualisation techniques used the connection between the mind and the body. He specified techniques to develop a positive inner goal as a means of developing a positive outer goal. This concentration on inner attitudes is essential to his approach, as a person's outer success can never rise above the one visualized internally.^[1]

Psycho-Cybernetics [Wikipedia] is a classic self-help book, written by Maxwell Maltz in 1960 and published by the non-profitPsycho-Cybernetics Foundation.^[1] Motivational and self-help experts in personal development, including Zig Ziglar, Tony Robbins, Brian Tracy have based their techniques on Maxwell Maltz. Many of the psychological methods of training eliteathletes are based on the concepts in Psycho-Cybernetics as well.^[2] The book combines the cognitive behavioral technique of teaching an individual how to regulate self-concept developed by Prescott Lecky with the cybernetics ofNorbert Wiener and John von Neumann. The book defines the mind-body connection as the core in succeeding in attaining personal goals.^[3]

Maxwell Maltz (March 10, 1899^[1] – April 7, 1975^[2]) was an American cosmetic surgeon and author who developed Psycho-Cybernetics, a system of ideas through which, he claimed, one could improve one's self-image and, in turn, lead a more successful and fulfilling life.^[3] He wrote several books, among which Psycho-Cybernetics (1960) was a long-time bestseller that influenced many subsequent self-help teachers.^[4][5][6] His orientation toward a system of ideas that will provide self help is considered the forerunner of the many self help books that have now become so popular.^[7]

Maltz graduated with a doctorate in medicine from the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1923.^[2]

Psycho-Cybernetics: A New Way to Get More Living out of Life was first published in 1960 by Prentice-Hall and first appeared in a pocket book edition in 1969. The book introduced Maltz's view that a person must have an accurate and positive view of one's self before setting goals, otherwise he or she will get stuck in a continuing pattern of limiting beliefs. His ideas focus on visualizing one's goals. He believed that self-image is the cornerstone of all the changes that take place in a person. If one's self-image is unhealthy, or faulty, all of his or her efforts will end in failure.^[3]

Maltz also wrote fiction, including a play called Unseen Scar (1946)^[8] and a novel, The Time is Now (1975)^[9]. His autobiography, Doctor Pygmalion: The Autobiography of a Plastic Surgeon (1953)^[10], was popular and influential,^[11] being discussed in many subsequent books on body and identity.^[12] It was re-titled Doctor Psycho-Cybernetics after his self-help work was published.

Although the book Psycho-Cybernetics was first published in 1960, as of 2008 the book is one of 50 recommended in the book “50 Self-Help Classics".^[13]

Birkhoff, Whitehead, and Synge; Weyl, Eddington, and Dirac

*Cosmos* from Marginal Revolution by Tyler Cowen

The author is John North and the subtitle is An Illustrated History of Astronomy and Cosmology.  Excerpt:

Other alternatives to Einstein's general theory of relativity were the theories of gravitation developed by G.D. Birkhoff, A.N. Whitehead, and J.L. Synge.  All of them had cosmological implications.  They were symptomatic of a period of great intellectual vitality.  They were no doubt partly motivated by a desire to create something comparable with what Einstein had produced.  Some ideas of a very different kind were then being put forth by Hermann Weyl, Eddington, and Dirac -- the first two in 1930, and Dirac in 1937-38.  They seemed to many to be suggesting that cosmological observation was superfluous, and that all could be deducted from the constants of physics.  Eddington, for instance, thought that all the dimensionless constants (pure numbers) obtained by suitably multiplying and dividing powers of the constants of physics -- the mass of a proton, the charge on an electron, and so forth -- turn out to be close to unity, or of the order of 10 raised to the power 79.  This vast number he thought might characterize the number of particles in the universe. 

This is a truly splendid history of science book, especially if you are snowed in for a weekend.  It has plenty of material on the early history of astronomy and on the one topic I know something about -- the Aztecs -- it seems very good to me and very accurate.

Mechanosphere

Digital Individuations from Larval Subjects by larvalsubjects

I have often argued that the task of philosophy is to think the present. In my recent interview I observed that philosophy cannot proceed without its others. These two issues are interrelated. In striving to think the present, philosophy strives to think the differential of its time and of a life that requires new conceptual creations seeking to comprehend the real of reality. If there is a greatness to Marx and his historical materialism, it is in the manner in which he strives to think the present. When Marx analyzes, for example, the factory and the working day, the aim is not simply to engage in a moralistic exercise of denouncing exploitation.

No, Marx is no Luddite, nor is he a moralist. He is not a Luddite because his aim is not to return us to a prior form of pastoral social organization. He is not a moralist because he does not begin with a set of pre-defined, a priori normative values, but instead seeks to determine how particular sets of values emerge out of the organization of the historical moment. Rather, while Marx sniffs out forms of alienation and exploitation in these new forms of social organization, he also seeks to determine the affordances or potentials that have been rendered available as a result of how bodies are individuated or formed within these new machines.

For example, Marx argues that the factory disciplines the worker and forms a collective organization that affords the possibility of a revolutionary overturning current regime of production. The factory is not simply a site of alienation and exploitation for Marx, but is a milieu of individuation that forms a new type of body and subjectivity that opens the possibility of a new social order.

I think this sort of analysis is what is missing in a number of the conservative critiques of the new technology. Rather than lamenting the manner in which people are not good readers and writers in the way they were fifty years ago– which is much like lamenting the manner in which workers are not like feudal peasants, i.e., apples and oranges –we should instead seek to determine the new individuations that are taking place within this mechanosphere, the emergent forms of subjectivity, the new structures of cognition, and the new affordances for very different ways of living.

Thursday, July 23, 2009 Interview with Levi R. Bryant
Today we interview Levi R. Bryant, author of Difference and Givenness: Deleuze’s Transcendental Empiricism and the Ontology of Immanence and co-editor (along with Graham Harman and Nick Srnicek of the forthcoming The Speculative Turn: Continental Materialism and Realism. Many of you will also know Levi from his excellent blog Larval Subjects.

I thus think there are two Heidegger’s. There is the Heidegger that went very far in the deconstruction of ontotheology and what I like to call the “little demiurge” or the sovereign subject, but there is also this other Heidegger that seems to perpetually recoil from this destitution, striving to discover some new ground, meaning, or identity. This has led to a lot of mischief both in his own life and in subsequent engagements with his work. For example, technology studies have been pushed back a great deal as a result of his moralizing and Luddite attitude towards enframing. anotherheideggerblog

Pride characterizes modern life

Nietzsche’s Prophetic Voice Still Speaks

from Per Caritatem by Cynthia R. Nielsen

On a close, non-literal reading of the text, Nietzsche’s madman is not rejoicing in the death of God but is deeply troubled by it. As he says, “We have killed him-you and I. All of us are his murders. But how did we do this? How could we drink up the sea? Who gave us the sponge to wipe away the entire horizon?’” What does Nietzsche mean by horizon, and what happens when the horizon is erased? A horizon carves out a space for vision. Or you might say the horizon creates a space within which we can live because it sets a boundary of sorts for what we can see. So what happens when I “wipe away the entire horizon?” I destroy the very boundaries that define human existence. Again, the madman does not take joy in this situation. Rather, he is describing where we are in history, what we’ve become as a society. We are a people who think we don’t need God; we’ve become, as Nietzsche says explicitly, a prideful people. In fact, pride characterizes modern life (and a good bit of postmodern life as well)...

According to Nietzsche, we’ve become prideful in a number of ways. First of all, we built grander and grander conceptual edifices (what Nietzsche poetically calls, “columbaria”) that lead us away from the forces of life and toward a culture of death. We forget that our metaphors have lowly origins and believe that our columbaria are impenetrable. Having such great confidence in the progress of modern science, we believe that with enough time we can even overcome death. In such an environment, Nietzsche asks, who needs faith? We have denied our finitude, have made ourselves gods; thus, practically speaking God is dead. The madman laments this situation. Do we? Or do we continue by the way we live our lives to confirm Nietzsche’s prophetic judgment? Я виновна, as the Russians say.

On Early and Late Derrida

from Critical Animal by Scu

As the question of the animal intensifies in Derrida's thought we see a continued distance being placed between Derrida and Heidegger, and so often and repeatedly over the question of the animal (from the 1968 The Ends of Man, to his 2001-2002 lectures The Sovereign and the Beast). And if we are to take Derrida at his word, that the most fundamental disavowal for him is the disavowal of the animal, then it should come as no surprise to us that his more political and ethical writings should become more central in his work at the same time that the question of the animal enters his work with a stronger and greater frequency. The argument here isn't just that you can't understand Derrida without understanding his work on animals, though that is part of my argument, it is also that you can't understand the specific shift of his work away from a strong heideggerianism and towards a strong political and ethical focus without understanding the way the question of the animals plays in the economy of Derrida's writing.

Marc speaking about the Earth Days in Auroville

From the Earth to our soul Written by Marlenka & Mas Friday, 17 April 2009

Today's news features an excerpt of an interview with Marc speaking about the Earth Days in Auroville. The Earth Day, celebrated over the world April 22, is a day designed to inspire awareness and appreciation for the Earth's environment. It is held annually during both spring in the northern hemisphere and autumn in the southern hemisphere. Mentioned also in the news: a live jazz concert coming up, tango class and practice every week and, guest speakers to be heard at Savitri Bhavan. AurovilleRadio

The core and its connections

About the Earth's Core
By Andrew Alden, See More About: structure of the earth core of the earth geomagnetism

A century ago, science barely knew that the Earth even has a core. Today we are tantalized by the core and its connections with the rest of the planet. Indeed, we're at the start of a golden age of core studies... Our main tool for core research has been earthquake waves, especially those from large events like the 2004 Sumatra quake. The ringing "normal modes," which make the planet pulsate with the sort of motions you see in a large soap bubble, are useful for examining large-scale deep structure.

***

Inner core
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (Redirected from Earth's core)

The inner core of the Earth, its innermost layer as detected by seismological studies, is a primarily solid sphere about 1,220 km (758 mi) in radius, only about 70% that of the Moon. It is believed to consist of an iron-nickel alloy, and it may be hotter than the Sun's surface[1].

The superorganism has castes; Individuals are automatons

The Superorganism from Marginal Revolution by Tyler Cowen
The subtitle is The Beauty, Elegance, and Strangeness of Insect Societies and that is the new book by Bert Hölldobler and Edmund O. Wilson... Here is a New York Times review of the book [By STEVE JONES
Published: November 21, 2008]

Hölldobler and Wilson’s central conceit is that a colony is a single animal raised to a higher level. Each insect is a cell, its castes are organs, its queens are its genitals, the wasps that stung me are an equivalent of an immune system. In the same way, the foragers are eyes and ears, and the colony’s rules of development determine its shape and size. The hive has no brain, but the iron laws of cooperation give the impression of planning. Teamwork pays; in a survey of one piece of Amazonian rain forest, social insects accounted for 80 percent of the total biomass, with ants alone weighing four times as much as all its mammals, birds, lizards, snakes and frogs put together. The world holds as much ant flesh as it does that of humans.

Karl von Frisch, discoverer of the famous waggle dance of the honey bee, said in the 1930s that “the life of bees is like a magic well. The more you draw from it, the more there is to draw.” Plenty of excellent science still springs from that source, and Wilson and Hölldobler gather some classics here. How does an ant work out how far it is back to the nest? Simple: by counting its steps. Glue stilts onto its legs as it sets out and it will pace out into the wilds; take them off and it will walk only part of the way back.

The superorganism has castes, based not on genetic differences but — like our own social classes — on the environment in which they are brought up. Sometimes, a chemical message does the job, but cold and starvation can be just as effective at condemning an individual to a humble life as a worker.

A few simple rules produce what appears to be intelligence, but is in fact entirely mindless. Individuals are automatons. An ant stumbles on a tasty item and brings a piece back to the nest, wandering as it does and leaving a trail of scent. A second ant tracks that pathway back to the source, making random swerves of its own. A third, a fourth, and so on do the same, until soon the busy creatures converge on the shortest possible route, marked by a highway of pheromones. This phenomenon has some useful applications for the social animals who study it. Computer scientists fill their machines with virtual ants and task them with finding their way through a maze, leaving a coded signal as they pass until the fastest route emerges.

Too much time spent on introversion could lead to depression and lack of spontaneity, joy, and gaiety

Discovering one's own golden mean
K. VIJAYARAGHAVAN, ET, 17 Nov 2008

The term ‘golden mean’, according to Chambers dictionary means “moderation, a middle way between extremes.” An ancient Tamil proverb also notes that even the elixir of life (amrita) can become poison, if taken in excess.

Doubtless, life has to be marked by dynamism, extroversion and action but too much of these could also be damaging. Similarly, too much of ‘take it easy’ attitude or even reflection and introspection could lead to stagnation, with life drifting away without any tangible accomplishment.

The ceaseless and excessive dynamism of the warriors of Ulysses (Odysseus) and also their subsequent metamorphosis to lethargy and introversion, as portrayed by Tennyson, would suggest that there should be a golden mean between these extremes.

The ‘middle path’ concept, centred on finding the right ‘golden mean’, for sustained excellence, as applicable to each aspirant, would eventually depend on individual nature and needs. However, certain broad, practical and time-tested concepts in evolving this could serve as guidelines.

Those habituated to a busy bee life in search of fruits — they themselves may not be sure of and pushing themselves to near physical and psychological burn out — would do well to remember that all their activities would become counterproductive unless tempered with moments of needed reflection, solitude, relaxation and meditation.

Similarly the dreamer and one involving himself continually with substantial reflection, analysis and meditative exercises would also be benefited through forays into activities calling for dynamism and physical exercises marked by zest and exhilaration. In fact, too much time spent on such acts of introversion could also become counterproductive, leading to depression and lack of spontaneity, joy, and gaiety.

Research on depressed and schizophrenic patients has revealed that ‘work therapy’ and involvement with dynamic activities often work where passive counselling, analysis and even medication could fail. Indeed, work is worship. The business of life, if it were to be fulfilling, is to get on with it with briskness and natural ease, not cluttered by perceived ideas of excessive introspection, etc.

This natural approach could often prove to be the right sadhana for inner purification. Doubtless, the crux of all true accomplishment lies in discovering for oneself his own workable ‘golden mean’ and to build his dreams on this stable foundation!

Sharing as social exchange was a social construct, never a biological adaptation

Why economists should study the origins of bargaining?
from Adam Smith's Lost Legacy by Gavin Kennedy
European Association of Evolutionary Political Economy,
Rome, November 2008
The Pre-History of Bargaining: a multi-disciplinary treatment (Part 1) [i]
© Gavin Kennedy (Heriot-Watt University)

The whole point of the quasi-bargain was to share the spoils between the catchers and the matrifocal family. Therefore there had to be a social mechanism to ensure that the chasers shared with the non-chasers, otherwise individuals and the group faced local extinction. In a Darwinian sense, the individual may not care about the group (natural selection works on the individual not the group) but an individual had to care about the fate of some minimum number of other individuals if he was to achieve his own survival goals. A chase was more successful if it was conducted by several of the most fleet-footed individuals, backed by the best stone toolmakers and the bravest perimeter skirmishers and pickets who warded of rival predators. A race with each other it was not.

To succeed in worthwhile scavenging the Ancients had to discover that there was safety in numbers and how to make noise near the carcass to ward off intruders. Scavenging induced co-operation, supported by stronger-willed enforcers. It also induced stone-tool creation and use. While predators were busy in a stand-off, or a snarling fight, the scavengers had time to risk a sneak snatch at whatever meat they could get. On such occasions their stone cutting and scraping tools and their disciplined numbers gave them a small enough advantage. Chimpanzees in a display charge can chase off a leopard; several Ancients screaming in an aggressive charge, catching predators with accurately aimed heavy stones, waving heavy branches, beating a predator’s body with clubs, and generally creating mayhem, could drive off even fearsome predators, at least for a short while. Meanwhile, the cutters would get to work. Skilled and brave distracters were party to the quasi-bargain too.

In principle, gatherers shared most of what they gathered, killed or found. In principle, strong quasi-bargains within the band’s matrifocal families embraced them all.[xxvii] Did this mean they all pulled their weight together in whatever way they could best contribute? Probably not; they were as riven by the usual dissents found in any group of Homo before or since. When it ‘worked’ reasonably well, it was an evolutionary stable compact. But there were wide variations in the behaviours of the individuals whose co-operation was essential for it to ‘work.’ Groups fell apart when laggards predominated; they were destroyed by careless acts in the vicinity of predators; they were scattered by internal discord and, in consequence, survivors may have endured generations of misery.

Gathering plant food, insects, and small animals, was more reliable than relying on opportunistic scavenging. But gathering was subject to variability, which imposes a cycle, sometimes severe, of ‘feast or famine.’ Some variability was the ‘fault’ of the individual, such as a lack of skills, effort or learning, and sometimes it was bad luck, injury, illness, the chosen search pattern, or attacks by predators. Where there was variability, there was pressure for sharing among sociable hominids. With multi-lateral promiscuity, sharing whatever food was collected was a small but significant behavioural step for males from merely feeding themselves. Establishing the sex-for-food norm, and policing it effectively, took generations to evolve into a culture of sharing, with additional norms to cope with exceptions, to constrain selfish behaviours and to establish taboos that enforced the metanorms. Sharing undoubtedly enhances the survival of the individual amidst scarcity. Sharing as social exchange was a social construct, never a biological adaptation.[xxviii]

It arose directly from the psychology and practise of the quasi-bargain. If the Ancients suffered cycles of scarcity and abundance, and the cycles were asynchronous (while one individual enjoyed a feast, the other endured famine) a transfer of resources between each other to even-out the cycle proved beneficial (though that does not mean it always happened!). Over the cycle, sharers benefited. But could they co-operate despite the nature of their ‘prisoner’s dilemma problem (whether to do what was best for oneself or what was best for one’s partners and one’s self)? [xxix]

Frank Marlowe identified six useful distinctions between types of food sharing and by changing the order we glean its possible social-evolution:[xxx]

• Mutualism: food for foraging partners, particularly, but not exclusively, for kin;[xxxi]
• Tolerated scrounging (TS) - food for peace (sometimes known as ‘tolerated theft’);
• Costly signalling (CS) – ‘food for non-food benefits, such as sexual access’ -
• Reciprocity:
• Not-in-kind exchanges - ‘food A for food B’; [xxxii]
• In-kind exchanges with delayed reciprocity – ‘food now for same food later’ (e.g., human equivalent of bats with blood);[xxxiii]

Open, generous, equal, frank and kind

Health News The beauty of flowers
Naini’s Page Monday, September 17, 2007 12:4:37 IST Mind Matters

Have you been amongst flowers early in the morning? Or seen them facing the sun waiting its advent? Felt the aspiration that surges all around when watching a bud slowly open its petals one by one. Seen the earth after a few drops of rain and realise how the flowers like little multicolored hands come out in a gesture of thanks giving. Walked by a bush at night and smelt the beautiful fragrance of the raat-ki-rani. Wondered why flowers make you so happy, peaceful and filling you with joy and love?

Says Sri Aurobindo in Savitri: “The worlds senseless beauty mirrors gods delight its hued magnificence blooms in leaves and flowers.”

Flowers have been an intrinsic part of my life- my grandmother's vast collection of plants from around the world, dad's constant pottering in the garden, mother filling the house with marigolds, asters, rajnigandas and mogras, my aunt weaving garlands with all of us joining in, especially during functions and weddings. Starting my morning by picking up a beautiful champa from the ground, placing it behind one of my ears gives me immense pleasure.

The mother of Pondichery always said, “Be like a Flower”. 'They are open, generous, equal, frank and kind'. Do you know why?

• Open — to everything and everyone that surrounds it.
• Generous — without restrictions, dispels its very own perfume which it sacrifices entirely for our pleasure.
• Equal — It has no preference. Everyone can enjoy its beauty without rivalry.
• Kind — Its presence fills us with joy.
• Frank — It hides nothing of its beauty everyone can see what it is.

They are made an important part in the ashram life - teaching people the charm of silence and thus the self giving which demands nothing in return. Flowers have a spiritual significance and are extremely receptive. No wonder, flowers have charmed and attracted men and women alike. They have been associated with religion, love, myths, legends, deaths, remembrance. For they say it more profoundly than words representing peace, joy, purity, beauty aspiration, love humility, and surrender.

Cherish your flowers. Watch them bloom naturally or in a vase. Let them be till they are fresh, collect them when they are no longer and give them back to the earth for what it has given us or otherwise we will become poor. www.cybernoon.com/

If one pursues the quest, one would locate it — the source of all creativity

The human aspiration and integral yoga Wednesday August 20 2008 10:37 IST HEALTH
Manoj Das

THE aspiration often finds expression through our activities in the fields of art, literature, sculpture, music, dance, etc. But that does not stop there. It seeks the very source from which inspiration for such activities comes. If one pursues the quest, one would locate it — the source of all creativity.

The problem, however, is, by the time one locates that sublime source, the normal activities, the external demands of our gross life, assume a certain unreality, appear unsubstantial. As a consequence one tends to break away from the mundane life, pronouncing upon it the judgment that it was either false or illusory.

In other words, for centuries past, the spiritual path has been looked upon as a path opposite to the so called worldly way.But a deeper reflection would tell us that this vast and complex life could not have been conceived and allowed to flourish only to be abandoned by the enlightened. It has a purpose, it has a destination. One realises that however engrossed we may be in ignorance, we are nevertheless looking for knowledge; however we may be overwhelmed by sorrow and suffering, we are looking for delight.

Are these aspirations for light and delight vain? Did some unfathomably mighty power create this world and then forgot all about it, for it to ever rotate in darkness? Sri Aurobindo asserts that despite all signs to the contrary, a dynamic consciousness is unfolding itself gradually with all its splendours. True, with the unfolding of the manifold capacity of mind and intelligence, man has misused it in various ways.

While he has enriched life with a million inventions scientific and technological, he has also devised the terrible destructives. With the growth of intelligence, he has proved greater efficiency in corruption and hypocrisy.But such contradictory developments do not cancel the truth of the mind's growth. They only show that something greater than mind must control the activities of mind. A moral or ethical principle is too weak to give any spontaneous direction to mind towards its right use.There has to be a transformation, a qualitative change. In Sri Aurobindo’s own words,

“It is indeed as a result of our evolution that we arrive at the possibility of this transformation.As Nature has evolved beyond Matter and manifested Life, beyond Life and manifested Mind, so she must evolve beyond Mind and manifest a consciousness and power of our existence free from the imperfection and limitation of our mental existence, a Supramental or Truth-Consciousness and able to develop the power and perfection of the spirit.”

His Yoga, the Integral Yoga, shows the way. Manoj Das The author is a Padma awardee, recipient of the Saraswati Samman, Hon. D.Litt. from several universities and the Sahitya Akademi's highest honour, the Fellowship.