Skip to main content

Buridan’s Ass


Source
Buridan’s Ass, named after 14th century French philosopher Jean Buridan, is both hungry and thirsty.  It is placed midway between a stack of hay and a pail of water.  If the ass decides to exercise its free will, it will starve to death.  When it turns to the haystack, it can exercise its freedom to choose water first instead.  And when it turns to the water, its free will can interfere again.  Thus it can go on exercising its freedom of choice until it dies of starvation amid food and water.

The current theme of Indispire, Love vs Freedom - what would you choose? ( If you land in a situation where you can get true love but not freedom of expression) #freedom, reminded me of Buridan’s Ass. 

Let’s take the example of Kashmir.  Indian patriots are supposedly in love with that piece of land.  Their love denies freedom to the people of the land to choose their own destiny.  Hence the civil war kind of situation in the state. 

The question is whether the Indian patriots are really motivated by love.  Or by greed for the land.  Or by nationalist pride.  Or plain greed, hatred or sheer perversion.

Love does not create the kind of situation that prevails in Kashmir.  Love liberates.  It does not enslave.  It cannot go about shooting unarmed people (unless stones are counted as arms) with machine guns.

The people of Kashmir are caught between freedom and love.  They love their homeland and they want freedom to live in that homeland.  Freedom from gau rakshaks, for example.  Freedom from people who impose themselves in the name of culture, religion, gods that include cows.

What’s the consequence?  Strife.

The ass needs both food and water.  Buridan’s Ass will not die of starvation except in philosophical discourses because the ass will choose one or the other and get on with life.  It needs both the hay and the water. 

We need both freedom and love.  Existence without one is a hypothetical conjecture fit for blogging discourses.  Denial of any will lead to destruction of the individual.  Or to strife.


Labels:

Comments

  1. Amit AgarwalAugust 19, 2016 at 11:53 AM

    'freedom to the people of the land to choose their own destiny..'?
    I beg to differ, Tom sir. That means the Indian government (irrespective of which political party runs it) should allow Khalistan, Bodoland, Tamil Liberation and the likes too to choose their own destiny?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalAugust 19, 2016 at 8:10 PM

      Yes, Amit ji. If the people have strong reasons for their demands the govt must listen to them and find solutions. In fact, many of these are creations of the govt itself for political purposes. Khalistan was Indira Gandhi's political agenda. Bodoland is based on genuine grievances that need be addressed. Tamil liberation was Sri Lanka's problem, not ours. Kashmir problem has been aggravated by Muslim bashing in India. It has now gone out of control... Time to ask whether we can find amicable solutions and stop hatred-based policies.

      Delete
  2. Pranju chakrapaniAugust 19, 2016 at 1:13 PM

    I can get what you are saying, the freedom and love are equally important and a choice from two equally weighted options presents and confounds indecision.

    But love towards homeland and freedom from intolerance of a particular section are two things which are not equally weighted. If they have more love for their homeland than their need of freedom, then a solution to come across is a possibility. And I am betting that they do have more love towards their homeland. It would be scary to think otherwise.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalAugust 19, 2016 at 8:17 PM

      The notion of freedom assumes some worthwhile significance only in some socio-political context. That's why I brought in the Kashmir example. In individual affairs, the issue is rather insignificant.

      In the case of Kashmir, the people have been alienated from the majoritarian nationalism and the solution lies first of all in ridding ourselves of that attitude and the ideology which drives it. But that's only part of the story. Pakistan has played a terribly nasty game in that region which has muddled the game way too far for any solution that is acceptable to both sides. So we will go on asserting that Kashmir is ours and even POK is ours. And they will go on fighting for the same pieces of land. So the fight is the only option. Might is right. Will it lead to nuclear might and its rightness? What will be the fate of the people on both sides of the border then?

      Delete
  3. sunaina sharmaAugust 21, 2016 at 5:58 PM

    Love and freedom co-exist. Love can not be in a place that takes your freedom away. In that situation, there will only be fear. Politics of possession has neither love nor freedom, only greed, and desire to dominate.

    ReplyDelete
  4. AnanyaAugust 23, 2016 at 12:07 PM

    Nice read ..I agree we need BOTH :)


    BlacknWhite Abstract Prints

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl
44 comments
Read more

Remedios the Beauty and Innocence

  Remedios the Beauty is a character in Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s novel, One Hundred Years of Solitude . Like most members of her family, she too belongs to solitude. But unlike others, she is very innocent too. Physically she is the most beautiful woman ever seen in Macondo, the place where the story of her family unfolds. Is that beauty a reflection of her innocence? Well, Marquez doesn’t suggest that explicitly. But there is an implication to that effect. Innocence does make people look charming. What else is the charm of children? Remedios’s beauty is dangerous, however. She is warned by her great grandmother, who is losing her eyesight, not to appear before men. The girl’s beauty coupled with her innocence will have disastrous effects on men. But Remedios is unaware of “her irreparable fate as a disturbing woman.” She is too innocent to know such things though she is an adult physically. Every time she appears before outsiders she causes a panic of exasperation. To make...
4 comments
Read more

The Death of Truth and a lot more

Susmesh Chandroth in his kitchen “Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought,” Poet Shelley told us long ago. I was reading an interview with a prominent Malayalam writer, Susmesh Chandroth, this morning when Shelley returned to my memory. Chandroth says he left Kerala because the state had too much of affluence which is not conducive for the production of good art and literature. He chose to live in Kolkata where there is the agony of existence and hence also its ecstasies. He’s right about Kerala’s affluence. The state has eradicated poverty except in some small tribal pockets. Today almost every family in Kerala has at least one person working abroad and sending dollars home making the state’s economy far better than that of most of its counterparts. You will find palatial houses in Kerala with hardly anyone living in them. People who live in some distant foreign land get mansions constructed back home though they may never intend to come and live here. There are ...
10 comments
Read more

The Covenant of Water

Book Review Title: The Covenant of Water Author: Abraham Verghese Publisher: Grove Press UK, 2023 Pages: 724 “What defines a family isn’t blood but the secrets they share.” This massive book explores the intricacies of human relationships with a plot that spans almost a century. The story begins in 1900 with 12-year-old Mariamma being wedded to a 40-year-old widower in whose family runs a curse: death by drowning. The story ends in 1977 with another Mariamma, the granddaughter of Mariamma the First who becomes Big Ammachi [grandmother]. A lot of things happen in the 700+ pages of the novel which has everything that one may expect from a popular novel: suspense, mystery, love, passion, power, vulnerability, and also some social and religious issues. The only setback, if it can be called that at all, is that too many people die in this novel. But then, when death by drowning is a curse in the family, we have to be prepared for many a burial. The Kerala of the pre-Independ...
14 comments
Read more

Koorumala Viewpoint

  Koorumala is at once reticent and coquettish. It is an emerging tourist spot in the Ernakulam district of Kerala. At an altitude of 169 metres from MSL, the viewpoint is about 40 km from Kochi. The final stretch of the road, about 2 km, is very narrow. It passes through lush green forest-looking topography. The drive itself is exhilarating. And finally you arrive at a 'Pay & Park' signboard on a rocky terrain. The land belongs to the CSI St Peter's Church. You park your vehicle there and walk up a concrete path which leads to a tiled walkway which in turn will take you the viewpoint. Below are some pictures of the place.  From the parking lot to the viewpoint The tiled walkway A selfie from near the view tower  A view from the tower Another view The tower and the rest mandap at the back Koorumala viewpoint is a recent addition to Kerala's tourist map. It's a 'cool' place for people of nearby areas to spend some leisure in splendid isolation from the hu...
30 comments
Read more