I recently came across a book with the same title as this post, by a British historian Ian Morris, that tells an obscurantist history of the West, attributing its successes to geography. There have been similar books (e.g., Collapse by Jared Diamond) that attribute the rise and fall of empires to climate changes, availability of …
The Varṇāśrama system is divided into four classes—Brahmana (priests), Kshatriya (rulers and warriors), Vaisya (farmers and businessmen), and Sudra (workers). If these classes follow their prescribed duties and are not misguided by greed, lust, and envy, then society is free of class clashes. If, however, people in these classes neglect their duties or are guided …
Even as I often criticize quantity thinking, I don’t mean to say that it is completely useless. Many quantitative truths are pervasively true. 2 + 2 = 4 in all situations, for example. This truth can be used for practical purposes like counting the number of people, animals, and houses. Numbers can be used for …
The Vedic tradition has always had a very weak interest in chronological history. Vedic texts only record the important events—e.g., those about the incarnations of God on earth, or those of great devotees of God, who then spread devotion to God all over the earth. Everything else in history is presented around these two basic …
There is a popular narrative in India at present that Islamic Invaders and British Colonialists destroyed India’s traditional culture and civilization. That is not entirely false. But any serious student of history is led to ask: Why did these invaders succeed in conquering India when numerous such invasions were repelled previously? The Mauryan Empire in …
Species in modern science are defined by the type of body and often by their DNA, and they evolve through random mutations and natural selection by the environment. Cracks in this notion of evolution appear when one zooms out to look at ecosystems. An ecosystem is defined by interrelations between species and the study of …
