India Unvarnished

In reply to Pankaj : the separation into genes and environment is too simplistic, in my opinion, to really explain anything.

Take height, for example, with the hypothetical maximum height encoded in the genes, and the actual height determined by environment. So, for example, the Japanese in general may have a ``7 foot limit`` encoded in their genes.

Well, here are some questions --

1. How do you determine the ``height limit`` from the existing anthropometric data ?

2. Suppose it turns out that the encoding in the genes for height is simply the timetable for the turning on and off of production of Human Growth Hormone. So, for example, in Japanese, compared to Europeans, children produce less HGF per unit body weight, and hence ultimately end up shorter. If Human Growth Hormone, which we know how to manufacture, is administered, i.e., it is part of the environment, then what happens to the genetic ``height limit`` ?

Intelligence is infinitely more complicated than height, I think.

-arun gupta

re: krashid # 71

let me first explain that I am not a scholar, but only a student...but with my meagre knowledge I`ll try to back up what I have said...as far as I know, Muslims believe that Quran is divine revelation and thus is eternal...however man`s understanding of it is not and keeps changing...but that
for another discussion...the Quran, as far as I know, does not mention the Prophet`s journey to heaven or any of the fine details
...it is through the several ahadith
that the tradition mentions and gives evidence of the prophet`s journey to heaven...the hadith is not God`s word and is a human endeavour and thus is not eternal...furthermore, the different ahadith are not the same and several of them contradict each other...this is why, I believe, scholars are not too sure about the Prophet`s ascension to heaven...but my premise is that even if the ahadith contradict each other on different issues and even if they maybe untrue, should it matter if the matn is beneficial to Muslims? Why should the isnaad be given more preference, especially when the ahadith is a human endeavour, rather than the matn? If the matn, even if the isnaad that has been used to deduce it is faulty, is beneficial to people and improves their lives, then shouldn`t it be accepted? I think this is the same stand as that of Imam Shafi.

regards,

Kabuli

re: krashid # 71

let me first explain that I am not a scholar, but only a student...but with my meagre knowledge I`ll try to back up what I have said...as far as I know, Muslims believe that Quran is divine revelation and thus is eternal...however man`s understanding of it is not and keeps changing...but that
for another discussion...the Quran, as far as I know, does not mention the Prophet`s journey to heaven or any of the fine details
...it is through the several ahadith
that the tradition mentions and gives evidence of the prophet`s journey to heaven...the hadith is not God`s word and is a human endeavour and thus is not eternal...furthermore, the different ahadith are not the same and several of them contradict each other...this is why, I believe, scholars are not too sure about the Prophet`s ascension to heaven...but my premise is that even if the ahadith contradict each other on different issues and even if they maybe untrue, should it matter if the matn is beneficial to Muslims? Why should the isnaad be given more preference, especially when the ahadith is a human endeavour, rather than the matn? If the matn, even if the isnaad that has been used to deduce it is faulty, is beneficial to people and improves their lives, then shouldn`t it be accepted? I think this is the same stand as that of Imam Shafi.

regards,

Kabuli

For more of Murad, those of you interested, he is likely to be around Detroit and the Bay Area starting this weekend 20th August `00 onwards . . . I am sure chowk will forward emails to him for up-front queries . . . especially on that juicy bit about how Indo-Pak foreign policy seems to have been written by his father (Indian side) and taya-chacha-uncle (Pak side)!!!

Catch the guru as he wings it to the USA . . .

Kafir k Khan !

Get out of your castle.

Even if Mohajir are relagated to bottom.

Still Pervez Musharraf and majority of ministers are at bottom.

Moreover Mohajir and MQM is not synonymous.

KabuliWallah #61

I would ask you on a purely scholarly level, why and how did scholars not believe in ascetion.

Because all the points are indicate it.

Scientifically,it is difficult to believe.

But when he returned from his trip, Meccans doubted it just for the same reason, it is humanly impossible. But history records that he told them about caravans he saw on his way and which was later verified when caravan came. Although he never saw Masjid Aqsa in his life, but he told accurately about it and so on and so forth.

Can you put your scholarly comments and/or references on this.

Pullu!

Your remarks

Hindustan MQM Bhai Bhai. is very derogatory.

You cannot put a Charia and Gaf Altaf with Hindustan.

If you equate Hindustan with MQM Bhai Bhai then you are justifying not only in killing Kashmiris but you will be justified in killing Hindus, Christians and Muslims.

I don`t think Hindustan is as bad as you are trying to depict.

Kabuliwala # 66

Thanks for keeping the record straight.

Pullu # 64

BHARAT MATA ZINDABAD

PAKISTAN MATA ZINDABAD

PULLU MATA ZINDABAD

URSTRULY MATA ZINDABAD

satish #57

Thanks for your reply. Perhaps a portion of the funds now going into development of `interpretative` history in India, ought to be invested in investigation of `verifiable` history, which no agenda, political or religious can mar.

How about an `Indian Institute for Genetic Mapping of Indian Migrations(IIGMIM :-)) or a chair for `Verifiable History` at JNU. Or give incentives to in genetic lineage mapping as a business? Sure seems worth the taxpayers money that will be saved from coping with future law and order problems.

Sadhana

re: Urstruly #63

No where in my post have I ``assume[ed] or impl[ied] that a reform in Hindu religion or mythology is being demanded by Muslims``. I was responding to the debate as to whether mythology should be part of religion or not? Hindus could care less if Muslims wanted them to change aspects of their religion, which Muslims don`t in anycase. My example could have been Jesus`s miracles or Buddha`s knowledge of future or any other supernatural event in any religion. My premise was that if mythology has redeeming effects, then it shouldn`t matter if the events in mythology are accurate or not. People`s faith in it and its influence in their lives is reason enough. Please don`t make it a religious issue between Hindus and Muslims.

Kabuli

http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2000/09/kaplan.htm

The Raisanis, numbering some 20,000, speak a Dravidian language of southern India -- unlike the Turco-Iranian Baluchis and the Indo-Aryan Pashtoons, whose languages borrow heavily from Persian.

PAKISTAN covers the desert frontier of the Subcontinent. British civil administration extended only to Lahore, in the fertile Punjab, near Pakistan`s eastern border with India; its Mogul architecture, gardens, and rich bazaars give Lahore a closer resemblance to the Indian cities of New Delhi and Calcutta than to any other place in Pakistan. But the rest of Pakistan -- the rugged Afghan-border regions of Baluchistan and the North-West Frontier Province, the alkaline wasteland of Sind, and the Hindu Kush and Karakoram Mountains embracing Kashmir -- has never been subdued by the British or anyone else. This area was grossly underdeveloped compared with British India; the few entrepreneurs were Hindus, who fled after Partition, in 1947. Even Karachi, now Pakistan`s business center and a city of 14 million riddled by sectarian violence, was only an isolated settlement on the Arabian Sea when the British departed. Karachi`s lack of the prideful identity and civilizing urbanity found in Lahore and the great cities of India helps to explain its current unrest. Islamabad, Pakistan`s sterile capital, with its vast, empty avenues lined with Mogul-cum-Stalinist structures, was not built until the 1960s.

When seven million Muslim refugees, fleeing India, created Pakistan, the role of the military became paramount, by necessity. The refugees were consumed by the need to manage enormous and unruly borderlands and by fear of their much larger, Hindu-dominated neighbor. Furthermore, with local tribal and ethnic identities so strong, civilian politics became a bureaucratic forum for revenge and unsavory tradeoffs. In the ancient tribal and feudal cultures of the region leaders bartered water wells and tracts of desert; in the new state they bartered flour mills, electricity grids, and transport systems

From the mottled-ocher battlements of Attock Fort, I gazed down on the Indus River, which marks the geographic divide between the Subcontinent and the marchlands of Central Asia. Mogul, Sikh, and British conquerors, and then the new state of Pakistan, had all rearranged borders, but the river still expressed a certain inexorable logic -- evinced by the resentment that the Pashtoons of the North-West Frontier on one bank felt for the more settled Punjabis on the other. Here, at this broad and majestic crossing, is where India truly begins, I thought. A forty-five-minute drive east of Attock lay Taxila, where amid the enervating heat and dust are the ruins of Persian, Greek, Buddhist, and ancient Indian civilizations: a lesson in history`s transmutations, with one culture blending with and overturning another. If there is any common thread, it is that India has always been invaded from the northwest, from the direction of Afghanistan and Central Asia -- by Muslim hordes like the Moguls, the builders of the Taj Mahal. And given the turbulence within Islam itself, it is hard to believe that this region has seen the last of its transformations -- or that Pakistan constitutes history`s last word in this unstable zone between mountains and plains.

At the end of my visit to Pakistan, I sat with a group of journalists trying to fathom why Nawaz Sharif, when still Prime Minister, had reportedly turned down an offer of several billion dollars in aid from the United States in return for agreeing not to test nuclear weapons. A Pakistani friend supplied the simple answer: ``India had tested them, so we had to. It would not have mattered who was Prime Minister or what America offered. We have never defined ourselves in our own right -- only in relation to India. That is our tragedy.``

http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2000/09/kaplan3.htm

Urstruly #re 53

How many types of brotherhood does Pakistan have, besides the ubiquitous Islamic brotherhood?

Now you are espousing the cause of Punjabi brotherhood. What do you plan to do with your existing brothers? Dump them in the Arabian Sea..!

Given a choice you would actually want buffer states all along the pakistan border.

``Waise Dil behlaane ki liye Khayal achha hai!``

If there ever existed so much brotherhood there would have been no partition. I am sorry but Punjabiyat could not withstand the Muslim fears of being ruled by the Kafirs.And Indian Punjabis are quite happy about it. :)

Your post only confirms what many Indians at chowk have stated before. Even if kashmir is solved you will find another issue. When Paki involvement in Punjab was high, kashmir was pleasingly calm.

And You could not pass Afghans as Sardars!

``The status of Khalistan as a buffer state

between India and Pakistan is in favor of all three parties. It will definitely prevent any (mis)adventure from either side. ``

Three parties....couldn`t help being amused.

Even DREAMS ought to be rationed in Pakistan now.



HAR HAR PAKHTOONISTAN!

SINDHUSTAN KI JAI HO!

BALUCHISTAN AMAR RAHE!

HINDUSTAN-MQM BHAI BHAI!

Pullu

RE; Kabuliwalla # 61

It is wrong to assume and imply that a reform in Hindu religion or mythology is being demanded by Muslims. As long as Hinduism doesnt interferre with Muslims they are indifferent.

Krashid # 60, Kafir # 58

Dear Krashid:

Thanks for the correction, though the ``mistake`` was intentional; just forgot to put two smiling faces :) :) in front of my slogans.

I agree with you on Dole issue. Never trust a man who addresses himself as second person singular.

Dear Kafir,
Thanks but no thanks for starting the chicken or egg discussion.

A lot has been said of how Hinduism as a religion believes in a lot of things that are steeped in mythology and cannot be conclusively proven. And so it has been more or less said that Hindus, because of their religoin`s mythological link, should practice a more realistic religion. But why is something that is mythological but still good and redeeming be discarded? If people have faith in something, isn`t that faith all that should matter. Don`t Muslims believe in the story of the Prophet`s ascension to the heaven on a supernatural beast? Don`t Muslims believe that he ate and drank milk with prior prophets in Jerusalem and then proceeded with his journey to heaven? Scholars say that the Prophet`s journey to heaven is not backed by evidence and is probably a tale, nothing else. But the story of the Prophet`s ascent to heaven has a moral and rejuvinating quality to it. Shouldn`t that be reason enough for Muslims to believe in it irrespective of its authenticity. And that is the real scenario also. Muslims could care less if the story is real or not. People believe in it. In fact I`m not sure if most Muslims know that there is actually doubt about the authenticity of the Prophet`s ascent to heaven. That is the extent of their belief.

Similarly Hindus believe in the Ramayana and Mahabharata, the events in which may or may not have happened. But Ramayana and Mahabharata are basically moralistic scriptures that teach people a certain code to live by. So what is wrong with people believing in them and living by that code, even if the events in them didn`t happen? They have faith that those events happened and that faith is all that should matter.

regards,

Kabuli.