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Showing posts from September 30, 2014

Love at First Sight by Wislawa Szymborska

<3 <3 <3 Focus. They're both convinced Meaning perhaps what they're convinced about is wrong That a sudden passion joined them. Self-explanatory - saw her/him needed her/him loved her/him Such certainty is beautiful But uncertainty is more beautiful still. This uncertainty is what the whole poem is about, as we shall see: Since they'd never met before, they're sure that there'd been nothing between them. The two lovers are under the impression that in their whole loves, they have never once met before, and so could not have had any kind of association or relationship with each other. But what's the word from the streets, staircases, hallways - perhaps they've passed each other by a million times? Now Wislawa points out that they could have met a million times and not known it - on the streets, staircases, hallways. I want to ask them if they don't remember - a moment face to face in some revolving door? perhaps a 'sorr...

A Scientific Religion by V. Raghunathan

About the author: 1.  http://www.thehindu.com/books/a-simple-book-of-reason/article3466719.ece 2.  http://www.vraghunathan.com/home.html To begin with, this guy is awesome. He's dabbled in and mastered such varied fields as banking, CSR, academics and is a prolific writer, having recently authored the book, 'Ganesha on the Dashboard' the link for which is above. The conclusion we need to draw from the essay is that we must have a rational, questioning but not skeptical approach to the issue of religion, rituals, God and faith. Raghunath discusses scientific temper and religion, scientific temper in everyday life, how to develop scientific temper, the convergence of religions, the responsibility of ushering in scientific temper, and proposes a more evolved religion. In the section ' Marrying Religion with Scientific Temper ' the author wonders whether it is possible for religion, based on faith, to be consistent with science, based on reason. Either way, ...