What is freedom

Thanks to Praveen for starting me on this .. :) I would have posted something on freedom may be a couple of posts down the line but any way here goes.........................

Freedom is often miss-interpreted as free will. Why ? Because people have different concepts of freedom Btw -- Has nothing to do with "free will" check my earlier post about "free will"

Freedom has multiple meanings .. again depending on what the point of view is

1. Political Freedom – It is the absence of interference with the sovereignty of an individual by the use of coercion or aggression. Freedom is commonly known as a state of being free from government oppression. The opposite of a free society is a totalitarian state, which highly restricts political freedom in order to regulate almost every aspect of behaviour. In this sense ‘freedom’ refers solely to the relation of humans to other humans, and the only infringement on it is coercion by human

Or

2. Economic Freedom – It comes from the libertarian tradition emphasizing free markets and private property, while another extends the welfare economics study of individual choice, with greater economic freedom coming from a "larger" (in some technical sense) set of possible choices

Or

3. Freedom (Ethical) – Here we are speaking about morality – what is good / bad , right/wrong . I see it as the justification that you give your self after taking any action or inaction

Are these three definitions different?

I don’t think so all of them depend on ethics .. well then what is ethics

Ethics is a branch of philosophy that deals with moral responsibility.

I could go on about ethics but will stop here to see what everyone has to say about Freedom

….. Ethics we can cover in another post

C

ps: I could be wrong :) remember its my point of view .. would like to discuss this and other ideas to learn about other points of view ... Keep posting guys

What is your Purpose in Life

Looks like i am on a roll .... :)

I had posted almost a year ago a sentence from a book i was reading at the time.. for those that have forgotten here is the line again

"The Point of life is not to get anywhere - It is to notice that you are, and have always been, already there . You are, always and forever, in the moment of pure creation. The point of life is therefore to create - who and what you are, and then to experience that."

During this period some of the questions on my list of questions to my self have been answered and some removed as they are no longer relevant but at the same time my list of questions has been growing longer and answers not forthcoming; As a result I have thrown my self into work and have neglected a basic necessity of life... that is to think and resolve all questions when they pop up. Looks like its time to start answering those difficult questions again.

Well the subject of this post is the question I would like to ask my self today; and I guess by now the readers would have guessed the reason for my posting that line from that book. The question has troubled mankind since the beginning to time, and the line I have posted answers the question but throws up a set of new questions.

The only way to answer what your life purpose is to ask your self who you are and what you are, (not simple) because the normal answer to the first new question is “ I am so and so son/daughter of so and so , husband/wife of so and so etc etc…” Is that who you are? Is your existence defined by the existence of others? If that is the case then you have not discovered who you are and then the true purpose of your life would be to discover who you are and then experience that.

So how does one discover what he or she is ? Well try this

Sit at home with a paper and pen, try to clear your mind of all thought. You will reach an instance when you realise that there was no single thought in your head a moment ago. At that instance ask your self who am i?

The answers might come in a rush. Start penning them down; all of them without trying to analyse what the answer is.. Just write them down as they come…After a short while your mind will start to wander again. At that point look at the paper and see what you have written down

I have done it and will be doing it again in a day or two.. Will post my new result on the blog as a reply to this post… Would love to see what every one else gets

Regards

C

Food for thought

Hi all ... been a long time since any one made a post .. so here goes

Couple of questions

1. All religions say that man is composed of something that god made and that god decides what has to happen ... where is the space for free will in this ?

2. All modern philosophies say that man is made up of molecules that came together at the right time .. and that electrical impulses decide what man is and does. These impulses can be shown to have a definite pattern in a lab ... again where is the space for free will in this ....

finally what is free will .......................

hope u guys have sleepless nights figuring out the answers

C

Movie Review : Slumdog Millionaire

My rating: 3 out of 5 stars.

Although I have been watching promos of this movie since last 4 months, I never got around watching it until last night. After all, I had to see what all the buzz is about. Every now and then a low-budget movie comes around that no one has ever heard of which ends up winning several international awards. Slumdog Millionaire is one of those movies.

Slumdog is a brilliantly directed movie with a great screenplay. If you didn’t know, the movie is based on the novel ‘Q & A’ by Vikas Swarup and directed by Danny Boyle. I have never heard of either of these names. Neither have I heard of the main characters in the movie Dev Patel and Freida Pinto. But still, this movie will entertain you till the end.

In spite of being a common bollywood love-story ( a boy, a girl, a villain, struggling life from rags to riches and a cheesy love song at the end), Slumdog doesn’t have the typical non-sense masala that you see in most of the bollywood movies. Jamal Malik's life starts in the filthy slums of Mumbai along with his elder brother Saleem and a friend Latika. They go through a series of unfortunate events and eventually the lovers get separated. In order to get his love back, Jamal decides to go on the famous TV show; Kaun Bangea Cororepati (fine performance by the host Anil Kapoor) because he knows Latika likes to watch that show. That’s where Jamal gets surprise of his lifetime when he discovers that all the questions on the show are somehow connected to story of his life. As he cruises through the questions, everybody on the show including the host starts to doubt that how does this kid from the slums possibly know answers to all these questions. Irfan Khan plays a cop who interrogates Jamal because they all think he cheated. The end of the movie is predictable. A R Rehman’s magical music adds a desi flavor to the movie.

Had this movie been directed by an Indian director, I don’t think it would have achieved anywhere close to the success that it has achieved today. Directory Danny Boyle has done an excellent job in giving an international platform to this film. Personally, I think except the people directly involved with this project, nobody (I mean no Indians) deserve to beat their chest about the success of the movie.

The only reason I am giving it three stars because we have seen the slums and the love stories several times. I just want someone to make a movie about modern India. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely don’t have problem in accepting the fact that such slums and child-abuse scandals still exists in India. That is a fact.

Go see this one. Not for kids due to some foul language.