Gandhi, Non-Violence, and Philosophical Anarchism

Oct. 2 was Gandhi's birthday and I stumbled across this when Google changed its logo to mark the event.

Gandhi Quote From Wikipedia:

The science of war leads one to dictatorship, pure and simple. The science of non-violence alone can lead one to pure democracy...Power based on love is thousand times more effective and permanent than power derived from fear of punishment....It is a blasphemy to say non-violence can be practiced only by individuals and never by nations which are composed of individuals...The nearest approach to purest anarchy would be a democracy based on non-violence...A society organized and run on the basis of complete non-violence would be the purest anarchy

I have conceded that even in a non-violent state a police force may be necessary...Police ranks will be composed of believers in non-violence. The people will instinctively render them every help and through mutual cooperation they will easily deal with the ever decreasing disturbances...Violent quarrels between labor and capital and strikes will be few and far between in a non-violent state because the influence of the non-violent majority will be great as to respect the principle elements in society. Similarly, there will be no room for communal disturbances....

A non-violent army acts unlike armed men, as well in times of peace as in times of disturbances. Theirs will be the duty of bringing warring communities together, carrying peace propaganda, engaging in activities that would bring and keep them in touch with every single person in their parish or division. Such an army should be ready to cope with any emergency, and in order to still the frenzy of mobs should risk their lives in numbers sufficient for that purpose. ...Satyagraha (truth-force) brigades can be organized in every village and every block of buildings in the cities. [If the non-violent society is attacked from without] there are two ways open to non-violence. To yield possession, but non-cooperate with the aggressor...prefer death to submission. The second way would be non-violent resistance by the people who have been trained in the non-violent way...The unexpected spectacle of endless rows upon rows of men and women simply dying rather than surrender to the will of an aggressor must ultimately melt him and his soldiery...A nation or group which has made non-violence its final policy cannot be subjected to slavery even by the atom bomb.... The level of non-violence in that nation, if that even happily comes to pass, will naturally have risen so high as to command universal respect.

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi
Philosophical anarchism

My Brightest Diamond, Nina Simone, Feeling Good

Birds flying high you know how I feel
Sun in the sky you know how I feel
Reeds driftin on by you know how I feel

(refrain:)
Its a new dawn
Its a new day
Its a new life
For me
And Im feeling good

Fish in the sea you know how I feel
River running free you know how I feel
Blossom in the tree you know how I feel

(refrain)

Dragonfly out in the sun you know what I mean, dont you know
Butterflies all havin fun you know what I mean
Sleep in peace when day is done
Thats what I mean

And this old world is a new world
And a bold world
For me

Stars when you shine you know how I feel
Scent of the pine you know how I feel
Oh freedom is mine
And I know how I feel

Four Seperate Ideas

Dreaming Big

Every so often a venue opens up where ones success is only limited by the audacity and grandness of ones dreams. As I look around the world I see random events. Things happening just because they ended up that way, good things and bad, especially the bad. As I look around I also see something crazy great, the Internet and the communities being built on it, free to create connections across time from the past to the present, across geography from one culture to another, and across wealth with few barriers of cost. So the stage is set. We can take our dreams of how we wish the world worked and begin to change it from this dreary place where we have to live with what we happen to randomly get, to a place where everything that needs to happen does.

Truth Telling

The world is hard to understand. Our brains have a go at it and often get it wrong. Its part of the everyday. The trouble is that recognizing a mistake is often more difficult than making the mistake to begin with. And its not fun to be wrong. In fact being wrong about a major life choice can be a disaster (religion is an example). Not many people go looking for all the ways they are wrong. The nice thing about the world though is that there are experiences where the truth of something leaps out with a good chance of being right, a truth telling event. As a programmer, every day I build something that if it is faulty I have only myself to look to as the cause. I come face to face with my mistakes and how I make them, day after day. And I think this is the best way to find the truth, to go looking for it, to inundate ones mind with views and perspectives where you can experience that moment where the truth leaps out with clarity, even if it is a disaster.

Luxury

What do you value? When have you been happy ? ... Not the giddy rush of adrenaline but the moment that you remember with quiet earth-shaking tears of joy. Was it material ? ... something constructed with great precision and difficulty like a watch or a car? ... Or was it a moment where a dream touched Earth and became real. Dreams of action, of wrongs corrected, of dignity restored, of possibilities never before seen, of diseases cured, of space explored, of the environment saved, of lives changed. Would you exchange one form of luxury for the other? Would you draw a line above which you gave away to change the world, perhaps forever? Your money is your vote.

The Culture of Work

Do you have a career? Do you acquire job skills? Do you think about peddling your skill set among the highest bidders? And at the end of the day you take your money and do what you really want to do? Does this skew economic activity toward the basic necessities and what people do in their free time? What is money in an economy supposed to do? First and foremost it allows people to specialize and be more productive and then trade their services in a free market. All of their own free will with no central organizer and it all works wonderfully. Well not quite. Ever try to start a business? It often takes allot of work to put things together before their is a profit to keep things going. So most people settle for working for someone else, serving the interest of a business, perhaps a large one. What if you don’t like your job ? How much misery is endured by people around the globe simply as a result of a lack of choices brought about by the high barrier of creating a business and that business's inability to find those few that would love to work there? If you could solve that problem you could change the culture of work. People would set out to accomplish some activity instead of having a career. They would create businesses around something they love. What people do with their daily time might actually matter to them beyond just income. People might invest in businesses they love, maybe more just to get it done. What would get accomplished then? Would we call it work?

Quote

I am certain of nothing but the holiness of the Heart's affections and the truth of the Imagination. ~John Keats

Moments from Radio Lab

Why is this so great ?

Richard Feynman on doubt,uncertainty and religion

Led Zeppelin Concert Backdrop

kashmir from Steve Scott on Vimeo.

More ...

Great Stuff Found on StumbleUpon

• MP3: Scientific Attempt To Create Most Annoying Song Ever (Its so bad its good)
• The dancing pipe cleaner.
• Hippo Eats Dwarf
• Squirrel Slingshot
• The Most Alien-Looking Place on Earth
• Awesome Storm Pics
• Sad story of online dating.
• Modern-Day Greek Robin Hood

More ...

Adam Savage (of MythBusters) Talks about Obsession

Link

Grim Reaper at Home

The Wire

I am finding Bill Moyers Journal to be the height of my weekly ritual. The ideas are rich and deep. This week was no different. David Simon was a crime reporter for the The Baltimore Sun
and creator of the HBO series The Wire. Here are some highlights of what I walked away with:

• All institutions corrupt themselves as individuals distort the truth for personal gain. Without good investigative journalism allot of it goes unreported and uncorrected. Examples include politicians, police commissioners, and educators who "juke the stats" to create the appearance of success. These same institutions are entrusted with solving problems and they don't.
  
• The underclass in America is seen as disposable to decision makers (including voters). When tough choices and priorities are set those that are not needed get left out.
  
• The drug policy in the US is broken. The drug trade is the only viable economic activity for someone facing no meaningful future. Prisons don't solve it.
  
• The balance between personal gain and public good could shift as watchdogs like newspapers and an informed public erode.

The full video of David Simon on Bill Moyers Journal is available online here.

Charter for Compassion

I found the ideas of Karen Armstrong on Bill Moyers Journal to be one of those gems that make searching through the world of ideas worth while. The profound philosophy of the golden rule, stepping outside oneself, seeing the value and viewpoint of other people, the destruction that comes from ego having to conquer all, and that truth is found standing in someone else's shoes.

Karen Armstrong on Bill Moyers Journal (includes video)
Karen Armstrong at the TED conference
Charter for Compassion