Sunday, April 22, 2012

A dialogue between two agnostics

Somewhere in middle of chaos, out of nowhere, two persons who knew each other quite well started the conversation about God. Both Gautam and Ashok were agnostics but Gautam believed that God is there but was not sure of it. On the other hand, Ashok believed that God is not there but again had his doubts. Gautam had read some of the Indian scriptures and Ashok had read many evolutionary theories. Both however, did not completely believe what they read. They were still doubtful, still had questions and still analysed situations around them to conclude the existence of God. So two people, both not sure about existence of God starts talking with each other and let us see how the dialogue goes.....

Gautam: Hey Ashok, why do you say that nature is everything, God does not exist and humans should follow nature. I was reading an article somewhere arguing who should be the inspiration of human society, the nature or the God. The author was arguing that Nature teaches us that strong kills weak, tiger kills deer etc. which we can call the animal society. However, as humans, one should think beyond the animal society and should get inspired from God where Love exits. Humans should and can make their society filled with love and cooperation.

Ashok: Man is also an animal Gautam and when the resources will be less, automatically men who cooperate with each other in today's era will fight each other for resources and will kill each other. We still do not see lack of water, fresh air and agriculture land around us. In African countries, histroy tells us that tribes vanished fighting for limited resources.

Gautam: I guess you are right. Don't you ever believe that God is there and will protect us from such catastrophy. It sounds scary.

Ashok: Yes it is scary but that's what it is. You know very well that I am doubtful about God's existence.

Gautam: Yes, sometimes even I doubt His existence. Why He created this world? If He is there, why innocent people including infants get killed? Why Satanism exists at all? Why we can not see Him? Questions like this perplex me. Indian scriptures try to answer these questions but they do not sound very convincing. But tell me one thing; India has history of around 20-25000 years. Why no one challenged God's existence?

Ashok: I think people must have challenged but the majority must have dominated.

Gautam: Yes, I think Buddha tried to find God but could not find him but was surely enlightened by deep meditation. He was agnostic, wasn't he? Jainism however, goes on the lines of atheism. They do not believe in God, but believed in meditation.

Ashok: You mean both propounded to achieve the state of tranquillity.

Gautam: I am not sure, if tranquillity is the right word.

Ashok: Fine, tell me more about meditation.

Gautam: Well, we hear about meditation right from the start of Hindu philosophy. Vedas taught humans about it. They also taught humans that God created the nature and jeevatma (including humans) and we can reach Him by meditating i.e. attain Moksh. Later on, one school of thought came that we ourselves are God, we just have to realize this fact by meditation. The world we see around us is Maya, an illusion. These sects of people were called Vedantis. Later on Buddhism and Jainism also continued stressing on meditation but had different thoughts on existence of God. Now it comes to my mind that may be nobody saw God but all these years great saints through meditation reached a different state of mind which some of them called God and some called attaining Moksh.

Ashok: Yes, I think you are right. I have been a pharmacology student and have experienced effects of some neural drugs on my body. Boy, I have done every kind of intoxication, which makes me feel that teasing with mind can take you to higher state but we can’t call it God, can we? It is possible that saints concentrated their mind so much that they reached some sort of higher state which today's scientists are not sure of, but I doubt whether we can call it God.

Gautam: Yes, it might be possible. I have read that after enlightment, people are in such joyous state that nothing around them, good or bad, can affect their joyous state. Also, I remember Sri Aurobindo's philosophy now. He believed that what we see around us are normal human beings and humans will evolve into super humans through meditation. Krishna, he said was such a super human. May be every human being, saints who got enlightened became a super human. By enlightment, I mean that they attained such state of mind that nothing around them disturbed their joyous mental state. In Geeta, such state of equanimity has been termed as Nirwana.

Ashok: Yes, I think you can relate this to today’s scientists and mathematicians as well who are too involved in their work. They sometimes reach different mental state due to their concentration and devotion towards their work. And I have heard classical music singers also reach such higher state of mind while singing.

Gautam: Not to forget, the sufi saints like Bulleshah and saints like Kabir and Tukaram who reached higher state of mind through complete devotion and love for God. I think I can relate this observation to scripture knowledge.

Ashok: Like what?

Gautam: In Geeta, for e.g. three ways have been defined to reach God, which now we can assume this to be the higher state of mind. Gyan yoga, Karma Yoga and Bhakti Yoga. Gyaan Yoga involves deep meditation, Karma Yoga involves doing one's duties without thinking about consequences and Bhakti Yoga involves complete devotion and love towards God. We have discussed examples of followers of each of these disciplines. I think things are getting in line now.

Ashok: Indeed! And I think in Karma Yoga, doing duties without consequences must have been stressed to remove any fear of failure so that mind can concentrate better on work.

Gautam: Yes, you are right. So we can conclude that there is some higher state of mind which has been attained by meditating saints, scientists and devotional saints. But (smiling), mystery of God continues my friend.

Ashok: It always will (smiling)! I personally believe that the concept of God must have come to de-stress people that there is somebody there to protect us, we need not worry.

Gautam: I don't know that but I know this for sure, sometimes it feels very relaxing to know that somebody up there is watching us and protecting us.

Saturday, April 21, 2012

My white paper - Innovation for Growth and Role of Innovation Enablers


Accelerated innovation is less of an option and more of a necessity for growth. Fusing core products/technologies with unanticipated technological shifts has redefined the innovation process and has moved it beyond the environs of brick-and-mortar R&D labs.
Apple is considered one of the most innovative companies in the world today. Is Apple a strong technology innovator? Or, has it managed to transform itself by exploring innovations that are at the cusp of evolving, often unrelated, technologies?
In recent years, organizations are finding new ways to innovate successfully and frequently. Such organizations, often struggle with two key questions while embracing the culture of innovation. These questions are:
  • Within an organization, whose responsibility is it to innovate?
  • How can an organization constantly bring out new innovations, given the limitations of the internal R&D?
This paper aims to address the above two questions, and highlight the role of technology surveillance as an innovation strategy.

Download the white paper which I co-authored with Nitin Chaudhary.