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
47 comments
Read more

The Little Girl

The Little Girl is a short story by Katherine Mansfield given in the class 9 English course of NCERT. Maggie gave an assignment to her students based on the story and one of her students, Athena Baby Sabu, presented a brilliant job. She converted the story into a delightful comic strip. Mansfield tells the story of Kezia who is the eponymous little girl. Kezia is scared of her father who wields a lot of control on the entire family. She is punished severely for an unwitting mistake which makes her even more scared of her father. Her grandmother is fond of her and is her emotional succour. The grandmother is away from home one day with Kezia's mother who is hospitalised. Kezia gets her usual nightmare and is terrified. There is no one at home to console her except her father from whom she does not expect any consolation. But the father rises to the occasion and lets the little girl sleep beside him that night. She rests her head on her father's chest and can feel his heart...
18 comments
Read more

The Ghost of a Banyan Tree

  Image from here Fiction Jaichander Varma could not sleep. It was past midnight and the world outside Jaichander Varma’s room was fairly quiet because he lived sufficiently far away from the city. Though that entailed a tedious journey to his work and back, Mr Varma was happy with his residence because it afforded him the luxury of peaceful and pure air. The city is good, no doubt. Especially after Mr Modi became the Prime Minister, the city was the best place with so much vikas. ‘Where’s vikas?’ Someone asked Mr Varma once. Mr Varma was offended. ‘You’re a bloody antinational mussalman who should be living in Pakistan ya kabristan,’ Mr Varma told him bluntly. Mr Varma was a proud Indian which means he was a Hindu Brahmin. He believed that all others – that is, non-Brahmins – should go to their respective countries of belonging. All Muslims should go to Pakistan and Christians to Rome (or is it Italy? Whatever. Get out of Bharat Mata, that’s all.) The lower caste Hindus co...
122 comments
Read more

Unromantic Men

Romance is a tenderness of the heart. That is disappearing even from the movies. Tenderness of heart is not a virtue anymore; it is a weakness. Who is an ideal man in today’s world? Shakespeare’s Romeo and Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay’s Devdas would be considered as fools in today’s world in which the wealthiest individuals appear on elite lists, ‘strong’ leaders are hailed as nationalist heroes, and success is equated with anything other than traditional virtues. The protagonist of Colleen McCullough’s 1977 novel, The Thorn Birds [which sold more than 33 million copies], is torn between his idealism and his natural weaknesses as a human being. Ralph de Bricassart is a young Catholic priest who is sent on a kind of punishment-appointment to a remote rural area of Australia where the Cleary family arrives from New Zealand in 1921 to take care of the enormous estate of Mary Carson who is Paddy Cleary’s own sister. Meggy Cleary is the only daughter of Paddy and Fiona who have eight so...
39 comments
Read more

Books and Rebellions

Books become my ideal companions in times of political turmoil. Right now, as you’re reading these lines, there are dozens of active armed conflicts going on around the world. Besides, developed countries like America are asking foreign students as well as others to leave. The global economy is experiencing significant instability, characterised by weak growth projections, persistent inflation, high debt levels, and geopolitical conflicts. Even when a country like India advertises itself as becoming the third largest economy, the living conditions of the poor aren’t showing any improvement. Nay, the world isn’t becoming any better than it ever was. It's when such realisations hit you from all sides, you need the consolations of an abiding hobby. Reading is at the top of my list of such hobbies. First of all, books help us understand current events in a broader context . They can reveal patterns in history: how democracies falter, how propaganda spreads, how resistance movements...
8 comments
Read more