Love can be just as delusional as religious belief.

It's one thing to possess intelligence, and another to actually use it.

The world moves by special interest groups and organizations. So if you want to change something, get interested and organize.

Science is the soul of technology, and technology is the muscle of science. Science inspires technology and technology moves science.

Philosophy is useless, without real life to practice on.

Economics is the new religion and money is the new God.

Where are the "science missionaries" reaching out to the needy and poor, and offering food, clothing, shelter and a better life for becoming skeptics and scientists!

"Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence."
- Albert Einstein

Absence of evidence against presence is not evidence of presence.
- My rebuttal to people quoting Albert Einstein's quote to make their case.

Happiness is a state of mind not based on achievement, but realization.

A Conversation: Solution to India's Government Problems

I often involve myself into arguments about various social and political issues with some of my friends. Here's one of them about a solution to India's governance issues, one of my friend posted, and I got into a back and and forth. 

Hope you find it interesting and enlightening ;).

Amit: 

 Problem - we as a nation are too lazy and corrupt. we keep our houses clean but our roads dirty. there's filth on the roads on which our kids walk to school daily. there's so much smoke from cars that our kids develop asthma. there's hardly any park or open space where our kids can play and hence they end up playing videos games or browsing the internet or shopping in malls, resulting in weakening of eyesight and sometimes diabetes. to get a thing done in the system, we need to win the favors of many people or take help from middlemen to avoid the rush.

Solution - the problem is that the system is too much dependent on us to work. if we wait for everyone to turn honest and do their bit, it'll take a millennia to solve our problems. so we design a system that takes decision with the least possible human intervention. where emotions are underplayed, but are not fully ignored, and statistics take centre-stage. where we don't solve problems once they occur but think of solutions much before problems develop. where infrastructure is key to our progress. where internet rules and middlemen disappear. a system which thinks of the bigger picture than petty politics. where caste, religion, sex or reservation don't matter but humans do. where we don't fix our existing systems and create new laws but create new systems without many laws. where we design systems which evolve with the changing times and not remain stuck even as we keep progressing. where money disappears and talent rules, the paper games are stopped (money) and a new system emerges that respects people for who they are and what they are capable of achieving. a system which doesn't discriminate but empowers. where everyone is given every opportunity.

now that would be really something!!!

Abhijit: 

Old stuff dude!! Looks like I m ahead of your time ;)

http://beingabhijit.blogspot.com/2011/05/significant-part-of-solution-to.html

‎... on this one. ;)

MS: 

I agree Amit. Who is belling the cat? Are we even capable of electing the right people that can change systems to work for us?

Amit:

 Mondal - u saw people as part of the porblem which is true but then should u wait for people to change or rather change the system????

MS - the current political system needs to collapse...its logical...since politicians are incapable of solving any real life problems...we need doctors, engineers, artists, etc. to solve any real life problem....

Abhijit:

I mention both possibilities.. Personally, I would more comfortable around better people than a/an entity/system policing us with its 10/1000 commandments. It would be a mark of disgrace to human intelligence and judgement. Sooner or later people will stop thinking and rely on this system for judgement... guess whats next.... the system becomes a God like figure.

Mutual respect, trust & social contact are important parts of being human. If we all can't do it my way (as in blog), we might as well plug ourselves into a virtual reality and act as batteries for a superior system/race... aka the Matrix. ;)

There is no shortcut dude!!

"Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve." 

- George Bernard Shaw

If its not working, we are not doing it right. Got to be more active.

Here's Democracy's big flaw: http://beingabhijit.blogspot.com/2011/06/democracy-only-guarantees.html#links

About Politicians - they thrive on conflict and fear. That is what brings and keeps them in power.

They are not there to solve problems.

"When the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem begins to resemble a nail." 

- Abraham Maslow

When you don't want to solve the problem, no tool or system is going to be of any help.

Amit:

agreed a system with a set of controls can become something akin to dictatorship, but tuney likha hai apne blog mein ki that system would be unbiased and free from corruption....now every decision that we take might have various aspects to it - cultural, economic, social, technical, etc. and for all such decisions we can't always rely on our own judgement.....

think about it in this way -

1. design a system that helps us in keeping ourselves from getting dirty or getting killed on roads, example - waste management and traffic system.

2. design a system that takes care of infrastructure development, distribution of goods and information dissemination, example - automatons and AI

3. design a system that takes care of mining resources, power distribution and maintenance of water supply - again by AI and automaton.

4. healthcare system - again by AI, automation and human beings (for emotional aspect)

ETC.

now once we take care of our basic day to day tasks we can leave the rest of the decision making to humans, example where to travel, what to eat, what to watch....in short a combination of machine and human control....let machine control those things that are deemed repetitive and humans control those things that are deemed creative.

a balance is much better than taking an extreme.

when i was in UK, life was very organized but the social life was dull. thanks to the govt. for taking care of basic necessities and leaving the rest to people. i want something like that for our country as well. and as a human for the entire species. many countries are under-developed, exploited, discriminated, etc.

as you said realization is the first step towards a change but since the species is so widely divided based on various factors it would be difficult to wait for that long. better let the best take care of our basic problems and then let everyone participate as a whole.

Abhijit:

In that case you will need to wait another century. Technology is kind off going in that direction, but it would take time. It would be good to implement some of the things you saw in UK and I m seeing in US. For example driving on US roads feels so easy and safe. But its possible b'coz everyone/majority follow the traffic rules. U will be amazed to see the coordination and courtesy people show when a signal stops working at a junction or how they clear the road when they hear a fire truck or ambulance siren. Mind you... these are no extraordinary ppl.

There are some problems that can be only solved when a majority contributes. The Indian independence movement is a good example for this. Gandhi might have been the main leader and symbol, but the accomplishment was not possible without everyone's participation.

I don't think the problem is that we have no solution. The problem is we don't follow the solution sincerely.

Continuing my snobbery, I quote my blog again. ;): http://beingabhijit.blogspot.com/2011/07/world-is-turning-into-this-place-where.html#links

Amit:

there's too much competition for the money circulating in our country...hence we don't follow rules and its not enforced strictly....

lets say i follow the rules and 100 other people also follow the rule. but then 10 extra people break the rule and the traffic police catches them. these 10 people either pay a fine and escape or pay a bribe which goes into the pocket of the police.

now if the salaries of the police is so low, what other choice do they have in this age when everyone wants everything for their family. nothing wrong in having but no means to achieve it so bribing works for them. and since this works, many people break rule. and so it keeps on happening everywhere. the infrastructure is also crumbling so most of the people want to break such rules to get to their destination as soon as possible with as min. discomfort as possible. i myself try to get home early, because of so much dirt, smoke and broken roads that waiting at a signal becomes a real pain sometimes.

in our country laws are broken and manipulated most by the rich, elite and the politician, they never rot in jail. but the common man suffers for lack of money. so how do you change the will of such people? they don't earn enough to feed their children so if they end up in jail they will lose a lot, and hence bribing works.

where is the solution in your answer to the problem of our country????

our population itself has become a burden, many hands to earn but few jobs to earn from. so much competition and so much chaos that people just run away or give up. if i don't work someone else will at a cheaper rate.

how do you solve such problems without introducing some control over certain basic decision making which is unbiased.

also though technology is not yet developed, we are partly to blame. how many of the human intellectual capital is actually being utilized to solve these problems. we are busy in our own little lives in earning and saving for the future that we can't think beyond our problems. and this includes me as well. think if the human mind is free from the repetitive tasks then won't we progress much more quickly???? the creative freedom is what is missing in our times.

all i'm trying here is to come up with a framework which can help all of us.

Abhijit:

Whatever be the framework, if you can't get enough/all people to work on it and implement it, it won't work.

We are 2nd most populous country. I think you wud be better of finding simpler methods to reach more ppl to get behind you, rather than finding the ideal solution/framework. As you and I have seen in the US & UK, systems similar to ours are already working.

Amit:

 but that's because there is less population...US has about 400 million people spread across a giant country with 10 different timezones....

agreed we need more people to accept the framework...but rather than implementing this on the large scale, why not implement this on a small scale to attract attention.....???

Abhijit:

Sure! Don't we already have efficient systems working well in small scales.. Every now and then I see ppl post about Gujarat.

How much is your small scale?

Amit:

just read this about Modi -

http://www.tehelka.com/story_main53.asp?filename=Ne180812Cup.asp

my small scale would be a city....with a population limit....

Abhijit:

Now read this part too: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gujarat#Economy

Modi is not everybody in Gujarat.

I think your arguments are getting biased towards implementing your system to solve the problem and not solving the the problem. I also sense anger and frustration. You are selectively considering your facts (cherry picking) to back your idea (like religion ;)).

Amit:

 let me tell u this....an example right from Chennai which i have observed....when you come to the main city, you feel that the city is full of big wide clean roads starting from the airport, a beautiful flyover, which will soon connect a metro line to the most posh areas of Chennai....and then there is the other side...neglected regions which are away from main roads and main political premises....where filth keeps on accumulating where roads never get repaired, where children need to walk in the overcrowded, dirty potholed roads to their schools....on one hand you have a clean city and on other hand you have a crumbling city....

i would consider a city great, when the entire populace is able to enjoy all the facilities in a clean and healthy environment which is accident free....even the OMR road where u used to work, is lying in shambles....but on paper Chennai is booming....not sure whether i should read the numbers or see the facts....

http://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/homes-and-gardens/article3750748.ece

similarly Gujarat might have two sides to its coin, but i'll never be able to judge that....so never judge a book by its cover.....

a booming economy means dirty roads, heavy traffic, increasing pollution....

dude we will soon realize that our ways of progress is only destroying our habitat and making us sick.....

not cherry picking facts here but only telling what i observe on a daily basis when i commute....and the idea is akin to propaganda but without force....if we don't want to change even after observing the chaos and filth around, then we deserve to stay like this....

the same OMR which u left which remains mostly the same even after 5 years of development and toll-tax collection....u just can't ignore this...and this is happening everywhere...planning without a foresight.....

Abhijit:

With new conveniences comes new problems. citing individual problems will get us no where.

My toilet is clean because I keep it clean. It flushes waste because I pay for it to do that, and if something ever gets stuck in it i either try to fix it myself or call the plumber to get it fixed. I have a roommate so we both share the mutual need and responsibility of maintaining it that way. Sure we could develop a robot to do it for us, but we are not there yet or cant buy one if there is one. This the simplest I can break down my point to you. Consider everything else i said BS.

Amit:

oversimplification of a problem :)

Abhijit:

Nope. Getting to the point through the all the bullshit. To believe the existence of a idealistic system that will make everything right is like believing in an all powerful God who is making everything happen for a purpose.

"There are no shortcuts to success." - paraphrasing someone

Amit:

u r getting it wrong again....

there is an existing system which is not working....period....now either we sit and wait for either people to change or we try to change something.....

no point being emotional here or trying to argue that i'm trying to propose a GOD-like system.....in fact i'm just proposing something different since the current system is not working at all....its like making some progress - for example, we built a chair, then we built a sofa and then a recliner....we evolved the existing chair to suit our comforts....the same way we need to evolve the system to suit our comforts....currently the system is causing a lot of discomfort....and no point arguing that the system is good and men are at fault....it maybe so in UK and US but there's a lot of shit happening in the current system in India....we are nowhere close to even achieving a developed country status - power shortage, healthcare shortage, water shortage, less no. of jobs, shortage of educational institutions....dude there's definitely something wrong and it needs to be fixed....

Abhijit:

Great!

I was not saying there was nothing wrong.

We were arguing about the possible solutions. You propose changing the system and I propose upgrading the people running the system. Unless India is ready to turn into a China, I don't see your system working. I guess unless our population reduces significantly, my solution wouldn't work either or work very very slowly (in generations).

As for your chair to recliner example - if you use bad wood or material (analogous to people) for making/running your chair/sofa/recliner/lazy boy, no matter how advanced the seating furniture, you will not get any comfort. In fact it might break and hurt you.

Amit:

true again....we would need some kind of communism initially to get over the inertia of progressing slowly....similar to China...and then moving to Democracy if needed....

Abhijit:

and who will rule us as communist?? How will you decide who rules?

the Congress? BJP? Mamata Banerjee?... the army?

Amit:

 as an idea not as a party....as i told before politicians are useless....

Abhijit:

Well you need people to interpret and implement any idea. Don't you?

Amit:

we do....

Abhijit:

So we are back to square one. We need better people. ;)

Amit:

we need better people...but not the entire population need to be better....the few who do realize can help us change the situation....

Abhijit:

 ... And how will these few better people come to power?

Amit:

no need of coming to power....to implement the change, start small, use that as an example and then go big...

Abhijit:

 I am going to put this argument in my blog later :)

Amit:

saale u always keep quoting ur blog....:), quote someone else for a change .....

Oye!!! I also quote others here. 3 ppl to be exact.

 and how many times did u quote urself??? ;)

Abhijit:

Yes. I quote myself, because I make my own conclusions based on facts and ideas, not on other people's opinions. Cut, copy, paste to minimum. :)

I like being ORIGINAL. It needs some mental hard work. :)