Uncertainty: Catalyst or Obstacle? A Dialogue Between Science, Existentialism, and the Mahabharata

 

Geetha Upadesam

(Mysore Rosewood inlay Painting)

*Richard Feynman’s observation that “If you know that you are not sure, you have a chance to improve the situation” frames uncertainty as a productive starting point, a form of scientific humility that opens the door to deeper understanding. Within the domain of scientific inquiry, this attitude is invaluable. It signals openness to revision, a willingness to question assumptions, and the intellectual flexibility that drives discovery. In science, acknowledging uncertainty about the world is not weakness but strength, for it creates the conditions for progress.

However, when examined through other philosophical lenses, particularly existentialism and the Mahabharata, uncertainty does not always appear as a virtue. Instead, it can represent a weakening of will and an obstacle to authentic action. Here, the distinction between “not knowing” and “being unsure” becomes crucial. To admit ignorance is an act of intellectual honesty that can ignite deliberate seeking. But to confess that one is “not sure” about oneself or one’s commitments reflects a deeper existential instability, a reluctance to claim responsibility and a failure to stand firmly in freedom.

Existentialist thinkers such as Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, and Sartre argue that human freedom demands a fierce clarity of self-awareness. Authenticity, in this tradition, depends on the individual’s willingness to confront their condition directly, without hiding behind ambiguity. Sartre warns against bad faith, the tendency to evade responsibility by clinging to vague or uncertain attitudes. From this perspective, being “not sure” is not a virtue, but it is a refusal to fully own one’s freedom. It signals hesitation to embrace either knowledge or ignorance decisively. Ignorance can propel inquiry, but uncertainty about oneself leads only to paralysis. Clarity, even the clarity of one’s ignorance, is essential for courage and meaningful action.

This distinction emerges vividly in the Mahabharata, particularly in Arjuna’s crisis on the battlefield. Arjuna does not falter because he lacks information, but he falters because he becomes unsure of himself. His doubt is not mere ignorance but an emotional and existential confusion that robs him of the will to act. Krishna does not praise Arjuna for acknowledging uncertainty. Instead, he challenges him to rise above this fog of doubt. For Krishna, uncertainty is a **tamasic state, where one that obscures dharma, corrupts resolve, and clouds judgment. True growth comes not from lingering in hesitation but from disciplined inquiry followed by decisive action. It is the transformation of Arjuna’s uncertainty into clarity and not the uncertainty itself, that enables moral and spiritual progress.

Both existentialism and the Mahabharata converge on a critical insight, whereby the real danger lies not in ignorance but in self-doubt. Ignorance can awaken the desire to learn but self-doubt weakens the will to seek. History and modern life offer striking illustrations of this principle.

Marie Curie ventured into the invisible world of radioactivity not because she doubted herself, but because she trusted the steadiness of her purpose. Nelson Mandela faced the vast uncertainty of a nation in transition not from existential wavering, but from an unshakeable sense of identity and mission.

Similarly, Steve Jobs and Elon Musk, often celebrated for their audacity, did not act from existential confusion. Jobs reshaped personal computing from a near-monastic clarity about design and purpose. Musk pursued electric mobility and interplanetary ambition from a resolute conviction that these were the problems he was meant to confront. Their bold ventures were not products of self-doubt but of self-knowledge. The unknown invited them only because they already knew where they stood.

Rajendra Chola’s reign (1014–1044) offers a vivid historical parallel. His audacious naval expeditions, from Southeast Asia to the banks of the Ganges, did not arise from confusion about identity. They flowed from an unwavering sense of duty, lineage, and destiny. His conquests were not acts of a man trying to find himself, but they were expressions of one who already knew. Anchored in clarity, he extended the Chola realm across oceans, demonstrating that great ventures arise not from existential uncertainty but from inner conviction.

In both science and statecraft, the courage to face the unknown does not arise from confusion about the self but from conviction within it. These lives remind us that exploration, whether of matter or of justice, begins with an inward anchoring.

Whilst Feynman’s statement concerns epistemic uncertainty about the world, the critique here points toward existential uncertainty about the self. Scientific inquiry may benefit from the former, but human action and moral responsibility cannot be built upon the latter.

On the other hand, both existentialism and the Mahabharata insist that one must know where one stands before stepping into the unknown. The impetus to discover does not arise from being unsure but from the confidence that one can confront what one does not yet know.

Feynman is right when he says that the mind must remain uncertain about the world, for scientific discovery thrives on questioning, revision, and doubt. Yet the self must not remain uncertain about itself, for meaningful action demands inner clarity.

Science advances through doubt, the self-advances through clarity. Feynman’s uncertainty is a tool, not a worldview, while self-knowledge is the foundation upon which responsibility and courage rest. Both are necessary, and when seen in their proper place, they do not contradict but complete one another, allowing us to face the unknown with both intellectual humility and existential steadiness.

Cheers.

ravivarmmankkanniappan@0946171120253.0567° N, 101.5851° E

*Richard Feynman (1918–1988) was a brilliant, unconventional physicist whose work transformed quantum mechanics and quantum electrodynamics. A Nobel laureate, charismatic teacher, wartime researcher, and early visionary in nanotechnology and quantum computing, he charmed the world with curiosity, humour, and a knack for making physics come alive. Somehow, almost by accident, he also lived like an existentialist and a Gita-style Karma yogi, facing life’s uncertainties with playfulness and purpose, proving that one can achieve philosophical enlightenment without ever reading a single sacred text.

**tamasic refers to one of the three gunas (qualities of nature) in Hindu philosophy and this guna is associated with qualities such as darkness, ignorance, delusion, inertia, stupidity and indifference

When Perception Becomes Reality, Does Truth Still Matter?

 

CARRACK SHIP

(Spanish/Portuguese-circa 14th - 15th Century)

Just days ago, the BBC’s Director-General and News CEO resigned following public uproar over a Panorama documentary on Donald Trump. The controversy centred on an edited version of Trump’s January 6 speech, in which the phrase “peacefully and patriotically” was removed, leaving only “fight like hell.” Stripped of context, the edit created the impression that Trump had directly incited violence. More revealing, however, was how readily many viewers accepted this distorted version simply because it fit an existing narrative about him. When media selectively frames content, it doesn’t just report the story, it constructs it, subtly guiding public perception toward a preferred conclusion.

This is hardly a new phenomenon. It echoes the central warning of Wag the Dog, a film that remains disturbingly relevant. In the movie, political strategists manufacture an entirely fictional war to bury a presidential scandal, exposing how fragile truth becomes when political power and media manipulation intersect. What appears satirical is, in reality, a clear-eyed critique of a world where image-making supersedes fact. The film illustrates how easily public opinion can be steered when narratives are crafted with precision and delivered through trusted channels. It serves as a mirror to our present moment, reminding us that when entertainment and news converge, truth becomes a negotiable commodity.

A similar dynamic recently emerged in Malaysia, where an academic from an international university claimed, without credible evidence, that an ancient regional civilization had taught the Romans shipbuilding and imparted several other advanced technologies. Despite the lack of empirical support, the claims spread rapidly across public discourse. The reaction split into two camps, one firmly rejecting the assertions, and another embracing them out of cultural pride. The latter went as far as selectively citing historical anecdotes to reinforce a preferred narrative, even though these anecdotes collapsed under scholarly scrutiny. This episode reveals how identity and emotion can override critical inquiry, allowing speculative claims to be elevated to “truth” through sheer sentiment.

These three incidents expose a deeper condition of the modern information landscape. Narratives no longer succeed on the strength of evidence, they thrive when they cater to identity, confirm biases, or provide psychological comfort. In a society increasingly driven by consumerist logic, truth competes not with falsehood, but with convenience. People gravitate toward truths that affirm their conditioning, convenient truths, popular truths, socio-politically advantageous truths. As a result, objective reality becomes negotiable, shaped less by facts and more by the emotional needs of its audience.

This creates fertile ground for manipulation. Media institutions can amplify selective frames, political actors can weaponize narratives, and even academics can advance claims that resonate more with cultural sentiment than with scholarship. When such narratives are repeated widely and confidently, they gain the weight of legitimacy, regardless of their factual foundation. The erosion of objective truth then becomes not an aberration, but an inevitable outcome of an ecosystem where perception is more valuable than accuracy.

The consequences extend far beyond individual controversies. When societies begin to accept narratives not because they are true but because they feel true, the foundations of informed discourse weaken. Democracy depends on a shared baseline of reality, when that dissolves, public debate becomes a contest of illusions rather than ideas. The BBC edit scandal, the manufactured war in Wag the Dog, and the Malaysian historical controversy all illustrate the same unsettling trajectory, control of the story increasingly eclipses the truth itself.

We now live in a world where perception functions as currency, traded and manipulated by those who understand its power.

The pressing question, then, is not merely who shapes our narratives, but who safeguards the truth, and whether we still care enough to demand it.

Cheers.

ravivarmmankkanniappan@1203141120253.0567° N, 101.5851° E

IN THE GLOW OF MANY NAMES, ONE LIGHT REMAINS

 

Arunachala Hill,

(In the foreground, Annamalaiyar Temple Gopuram)

Thiruvannamalai, TN, India.

Every year, as the new moon (Ammavasai) of Kartika* darkens the sky, Hindu’s all over the world will light up Vilakku (oil lamp). The day when Deepavali or Diwali (often called the “festival of lights) is celebrated. But beneath its glow lie layers of history, faith, and regional memory that make it one of the most diverse celebrations in the world.

In parts of north India, people remember the homecoming of Lord Rama after fourteen years of exile and his victory over Ravana, an event described in the Ramayana vividly. As the story goes, the people of Ayodhya lit oil lamps to welcome him back, an image that still defines Deepavali’s luminous heart.

In south India, the same night recalls another triumph of good over evil, Lord Krishna’s slaying of the demon Narakasura, freeing the world from tyranny. The ritual oil bath before dawn is not just a cleansing act but a symbolic washing away of ignorance and ego.

Across western India, traders close their account books and perform Lakshmi Puja, inviting the goddess of wealth and prosperity into their homes and businesses.

In the east, the night belongs to Goddess Kali, fierce and protective, who destroys darkness to make way for renewal.

Beyond Hinduism, Deepavali carries light across different beliefs. Jains mark the liberation of Mahavira (the last Tirthankar aka Guru of Jainism). The Sikhs on the other hand, make reverence to Guru Hargobind Ji’s (the Sixth Guru of Sikhism) release from captivity and the event is called the Bandi Chor Divas (The Day of Liberation).

The stories differ, but their message converges, in the year’s darkest night, humanity lights its lamps, of hope, courage, and inner clarity. Deepavali endures not just as a festival, but as a reminder that light, in all its forms, must be tended.

But beyond the events that has occurred over time as above mentioned that makes it a day for reflection, contemplation and action, is there any other astronomical, astrological or scientific explanation for this day to be auspicious?

Astronomically, Deepavali marks the end of one lunar cycle and the quiet beginning of another, a cosmic reset. In Indian thought, the Sun represents consciousness, and the Moon represents the mind. When they unite, the mind dissolves into pure awareness. Lighting a lamp, then, is not just ritual, it’s a symbol of inner awakening.

Astrologically, this new moon (Ammavasai) occurs in Libra, ruled by Venus (Sukran), the planet of balance, beauty, and prosperity. The Sun, said to be humble here, reminds us to seek harmony, to pause before the new harvest or business year, and to honour both material and spiritual wealth.

 

Then, there is an all-practical reason too, Diwali arrives just after the monsoon, when dampness breeds insects and disease. So traditionally, oil lamps, incense, and fireworks helped purify the air, while the custom of cleaning homes and exchanging sweets renewed community bonds and morale.

But then what does the scriptures say about this entire phenomenon that reverberates in the conscience of Hindus.  As the monsoon retreats and India prepares for winter, the Hindu calendar unfolds one of its most meaningful spiritual sequences, from Mahalaya Paksha to Deepavali, and finally the Karthigai Deepam. Though each carries its own rituals, together they form a single journey, from remembrance to renewal, from ancestral gratitude to cosmic connection.

The cycle begins with Mahalaya Paksha (this year it was between 7th-21th September), a fortnight devoted to honouring one’s ancestors (Pitru). The tradition holds that during this period, the veil between human and ancestral realms thins, allowing blessings to flow through generations. The rituals of tarpanam (ancestral offering) is not act of mourning but of continuity, reminders that our lives are extensions of countless lineages. Today, science offers a poetic parallel, our genetic code literally carries the memory of those who came before us.

When Mahalaya ends, the focus turns outward. Deepavali (this year celebrated on 20^th October), when the new moon of the Karthigai month, marks the year’s darkest night, when the Sun and Moon align, and the sky turns inwardly quiet. Lighting lamps and bursting firecrackers often seen as mere celebrational, but in actual sense they symbolize the guiding of ancestral energies back toward the cosmic source, echoing through light and vibration. It is a ritual of farewell and renewal, a recognition that life and death, light and darkness, are part of the same cycle.

The journey culminates in Karthigai Deepam (this year will be celebrated on 4^th December) , when countless lamps are lit again, this time reaching skyward. The Agaya Deepam (lamp of the sky) represents light freed from the confines of earth and body. In Tamil Nadu, the great flame atop Arunachala Hill in Tiruvannamalai embodies Shiva as eternal fire, the infinite consciousness into which all life ultimately merges.

Viewed together, these festivals form a spiritual continuum rooted in both astronomy and awareness. From Mahalaya’s remembrance to Diwali’s renewal and Karthigai’s cosmic light, the message remains timeless, we are part of a living chain, of energy, memory, and light. and every lamp we kindle is both a tribute to the past and a beacon for the future.

Let us celebrate the illumination of light meaningfully.

Cheers.

ravivarmmankkanniappan@123521102025 3.0567° N, 101.5851° E

*In most of northern and western India, where the lunar Amanta calendar is followed, the new moon that marks Deepavali concludes the month of Ashwin and ushers in Kartika. Hence, it is celebrated as Kartika Amavasya. In contrast, Tamil Nadu and parts of South India follow a solar calendar, in which the same Amavasya usually occurs within the month of Aippasi (mid-October to mid-November). Thus, Tamils celebrate Aippasi Amavasai as Deepavali.

When the Soul of Education Dies at Home

 

Photo of Teachers from Standard Type Primary School Tamil

Lanadron Estate, Panchor, Johor.

My late Pappa is seated 6th from the right.

(circa 1959)

There was a time when schools were sanctuaries, places where children not only learned to read and write but also to think, feel, and grow into moral beings. Today, that sanctuary feels fractured. What once promised hope now often breeds fear, anxiety, and alienation. We read too often about bullying, suicide, violence, and neglect within the school system. These are not isolated tragedies, but in fact they are reflections of a deeper national ailment, the slow death of our educational soul.

But the decay didn’t start within the classroom walls. It began at home.

Education was never meant to be confined to textbooks or classrooms. It begins in the earliest moments of a child’s life, in the warmth of family, in the habits modelled by parents, in the values taught around the dinner table. Yet, the modern household has become a space of exhaustion. Parents are stretched thin, working tirelessly to put food on the table. In their struggle to survive, the art of nurturing has been sacrificed to the altar of necessity.

Among the more privileged, the problem takes on a different form. Many believe that as long as they provide access to gadgets, tutors, and “good” schools, their duty ends there. The upbringing becomes transactional, where education is outsourced to institutions, empathy delegated to teachers, and discipline left to the algorithmic influence of digital media. But virtue cannot be outsourced, and character cannot be downloaded.

Children now grow up with the internet as their moral compass. They learn not through wisdom passed down by their elders, but through trends and viral content. They mimic what they see, without the grounding of right and wrong. The result is a generation that can code, create, and communicate, but struggles to empathize, reflect, or apologize. They are intelligent, but emotionally adrift, connected, but spiritually hollow.

Within schools, the crisis is equally dire. Many teachers have become job holders rather than educators. This is not entirely their fault, the system has conditioned them so. Teaching, once a calling, has been bureaucratized into a career defined by key performance indicators and endless administrative tasks. Teachers who once inspired are now buried under paperwork and digital reporting systems, leaving little room for genuine engagement with their students.

When passion is replaced by procedure, and creativity is constrained by compliance, schools cease to be centres of learning. They become factories for exam results.

The consequences are grave. A half-trained doctor might take a few lives, but an uncommitted educator, one who teaches without heart or purpose, destroys generations. The loss isn’t immediately visible, but it reverberates through society, in workplaces devoid of ethics, in public discourse devoid of empathy, and in leadership devoid of vision.

Our national discourse on education remains trapped in shallow metrics, exam scores, rankings, and policy slogans. We celebrate rising averages while ignoring the psychological and moral collapse beneath. When a student dies by suicide or another is bullied into trauma, the response is always the same, statements of concern, promises of investigation, and silence that follows when the news cycle moves on.

The real crisis is not academic but cultural. It is the collective surrender to mediocrity and moral detachment. We have allowed education to be reduced to performance, not purpose. We value efficiency over empathy, results over relationships, and prestige over principle.

Reform, therefore, must begin not in ministries but in living rooms. Parents must reclaim their role as the child’s first teachers. Schools must rediscover their purpose as spaces that shape human beings, not merely produce workers. Teachers must be freed from bureaucratic chains and empowered to teach with passion again. And as a society, we must redefine success, not as grades or salaries, but as the ability to think deeply, feel compassionately, and act responsibly.

When homes lose their warmth and schools lose their soul, a nation loses its moral direction. What we are witnessing today, the rising violence, the emotional emptiness, the apathy, are symptoms of that loss.

If we do not change course, we will raise a generation that is intellectually brilliant yet spiritually bankrupt. A generation fluent in technology but illiterate in humanity. And when that happens, no policy reform or ministerial statement will be able to save us, because by then, we would have already forgotten what it means to educate a person.

Cheers.

The school today,

Originally built in 1903

(Photo courtesy, from Google Map)

ravivarmmankkanniappan@124318102025 3.0567° N, 101.5851° E

GOD AND INTELLECTUALS

 

Bust of Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara

(aka the Bayon Bust, teakwood bust at home)

King Surya Varman I of Cambodia was instrumental in creating the Thousand Linggas 

in Kbal Spean, to recreate the Ganges to flow into Angkor) 

Recently I chanced upon a book, “How Intellectuals found God” by Peter Savodnik, and I was truly intrigued by his assertion. His reference were people like Mathew Crawford, Paul Kingsnorth, Jordan Hall, Ayaan Hisri Ali, Jordan Peterson and also Elon Musk. Except for Ayaan, all other reference made were within the sphere of western, male and elite demography. ( I must say that I had to stop here, because of domestic duty calls)

(I am back to now, but accompanied by my dear friend Jameson),  indeed feeling highly spirited but still on track on the topic.  Savodnik’s main thesis is rather sociological, he asserts that the rationalist, technocratic worldview has run dry and he asserts that humanizing corrective is not necessarily “proof of God,” but evidence that meaning and morality can’t be sustained by materialism alone.

So is there a mass transmigration of intellectuals towards the entity called God. But then again do the world of believers need an endorsement from these intellectuals to validify the existence of the God Entity.

Thiruvalluvar, a saint/philosopher from the 3^rd Century BCE (era still disputed), who was considered to be the epitome of secularism, mentions in his first couplet in his famous Thirukural (deemed to be the Supreme Tamil literature on Virtue, Wealth and Love), “Akara muthala elluthellam aathi Bhagavan muthatrae ulaghu."  (அகர முதல எழுத்தெல்லாம் ஆதி பகவன் முதற்றே உலகு). This couplet states that just as 'A' is the first letter of the Tamil alphabet, the primordial God is the first and source of all in the world. So the first Tamil secularist has honoured the God entity as the opening couplet of his 1330 couplets that describes universal ethical and moral principles, guiding individuals through life's three core pursuits. Firstly it’s virtue (Aram), secondly, wealth and governance ((Porul), and thirdly, love (Inbam). It is a secular work containing lofty wisdom on a wide range of subjects, from individual morality and domestic life to social and political issues, offering timeless guidance for all of mankind regardless of caste or creed.   

In ancient Greece, we have Plato (427 – 347 BCE), inherited Socrates’ critical stance toward traditional religion, rejecting the Homeric gods as immoral and anthropomorphic. But in later dialogues (Timaeus, Laws), Plato developed the idea of a single divine craftsman (Demiurge) who created the cosmos rationally and benevolently. This was a major shift from scepticism about mythic gods to belief in a rational, transcendent God, a proto-monotheistic move that influenced later Christian theology.

So this transmigration of from a non believer  to a believer of some sort is not new. It has happened from time immemorial, since the dawn of civilization but at different pace according to the socio-political-economic evolution of mankind, contextually connected to the time.

I have often heard amongst my circle of network as well in my reading, many identify themselves of being spiritually connected but not identifying themselves with any ambit of a religion.  I just thought it’s just a fashionable rhetoric to differentiate themselves from the masses who are more rooted in rituals and the book of God.

J. Robert Oppenheimer (1904–1967), the theoretical physicist who led the Manhattan Project, was not religious in the traditional sense, but he was deeply spiritual, philosophical, and culturally religiously informed, at least that was what has been described about him. Oppenheimer himself described his upbringing as “Jewish in heritage but not in faith.” Oppenheimer rejected a personal God who intervenes in human affairs. According to his autobiography, Oppenheimer believed in an ordered, intelligible cosmos, where beauty and morality arise from understanding reality. His tone appeared reverential but non-theistic, sometimes described as “religious awe without religion.” In one of his interviews he says, “There are no gods, but there is the mystery of the universe, and that is enough”. I would say that, Oppenheimer was not religious in practice or doctrine, but he was profoundly spiritual, ethically reflective, and philosophically theistic in temperament. Based on my reading I can infer that Oppenheimer found that in the world’s religious traditions (especially Hinduism) a language of awe and moral gravity that science alone could not provide.

Peter Savodnik’s How Intellectuals Found God is less a theological argument than a cultural diagnosis. He is not proving God’s existence or presenting new philosophy; instead, he observes that a surprising number of modern thinkers, people formed by secular, rational traditions, are turning toward faith. What Savodnik is really saying is that the intellectual climate itself is shifting. After decades in which materialism and skepticism dominated elite thought, many writers, scientists, and public figures are realizing that reason alone cannot satisfy the human need for meaning, morality, and belonging.

Though Savodnik’s insight may appear “obvious” but people have always sought transcendence when rationalism feels hollow. Yet Savodnik’s point is that this return to belief among high status intellectuals signals a broader cultural fatigue with purely secular explanations of life. For him, these conversions are less about dogma and more about recovering a sense of wonder and ethical grounding. In that sense, Savodnik isn’t just repeating what’s obvious, he’s documenting a moment of re enchantment in Western thought, when intellect and faith, long estranged, are beginning to speak to each other again. His work captures that emotional and philosophical tension rather than resolving it.

The tension between intellect and faith is not something any writer, doctrine, or philosophy can fully resolve. Every religious and mystical tradition ultimately points inward, the real discovery lies within the seeker, not in external authority. Books like Savodnik’s can illuminate paths, reveal patterns, or awaken longing, but they cannot walk the road for us. The journey toward truth is profoundly personal, experiential, and evolving.

Religious dogma, philosophy, or science each offer frameworks, signposts rather than destinations. They can prepare the mind, but the real transformation occurs in consciousness itself, through reflection, doubt, surrender, and insight. That is why sages across traditions, from Socrates to the Buddha, from Rumi to Meister Eckhart, emphasize self-inquiry over mere belief. The intellect may describe God, but only direct experience gives meaning to that description.

So when Savodnik captures the tension between intellect and faith, he touches on the universal paradox, the mind seeks certainty, but the spirit seeks communion. To resolve that, one must turn inward, not to escape reason, but to integrate it with inner awareness, where understanding and faith cease to be opposites and become dimensions of the same quest for truth.

Cheers.

ravivarmmankkanniappan@2150141020243.0567° N, 101.5851° E

IMPERMANENCE

 

Pic Taken at Pashupati Arya Ghat, Kathmandu, Nepal.

“Up to the doorway, kin will walk with you.

Up to the street, your wife will stand beside you.

Up to the graveyard, children will follow in tears.

But at the final step, who is left with you?

 

Dance as long as you can dance,

Speak as long as words will carry.

Gather wealth, gather friends,

But none will travel past the fire.

 

For the cradle, there is the mother’s care,

For the bed, there is the maiden’s love.

For hunger, there is food,

For sorrow, there is wisdom.

 

Ask the one who has left this world,

He will call you to follow.

Ask the one who has just arrived,

He will beg you to stay.

 

The body will fall, the soul will slip away,

The flame will rise, ashes will scatter,

And what remains?

Only silence,

Teaching us what endures, nothing but truth.”

(Translated from Kavignar Kannadasan’s Veedu Varai Uravu-1962)

 

Kannadasan’s “Veedu Varai Uruvu” is not just a song, it is a mirror held up to life’s impermanence. Written for the film Paadha Kaanikkai, the lyric glimmers with the wisdom of Advaita Vedanta philosophy, echoing the truths of detachment and mortality that have shaped centuries of thought. What lends the song its quiet power is its unflinching honesty, family, friends, wealth, and possessions accompany us only so far, and no further. They walk beside us to the doorstep, to the street, perhaps even to the cremation ground but when the final threshold is reached, we are left alone. This stark recognition punctures the illusions we wrap ourselves in, the illusions that relationships and riches can shield us from the inevitable.

Yet Kannadasan, in his genius, does not plunge the listener into despair. Instead, he offers a wider lens. He speaks of the cycles of existence, birth, nurture, desire, and finally, the wisdom that mortality affords. The song is not a lament but a call, to live clearly, to live wisely, and to remember that truth alone outlasts the pageant of life. In this way, impermanence becomes not a shadow, but a lantern.

The resonance of these words was felt with chilling force during the COVID-19 pandemic. Suddenly, mortality was no longer an abstraction reserved for philosophy or poetry. It was intimate, palpable, threaded through the air we breathe. Streets fell silent, hospitals overflowed, and the news became a litany of loss. For a fleeting moment, humanity seemed awakened to impermanence. We saw, perhaps more starkly than ever before, how fragile life is, how thin the veil of certainty really was. And yet, as swiftly as this awareness descended, it evaporated. Like morning dew dissolving under the sun, the clarity faded. Greed returned, ego reclaimed its throne, and the world rushed back into the arms of acquisition and pride, as though nothing had been learned.

The larger world tells the same story, only on a grander stage. A World Bank study now lists 39 fragile and conflict-affected countries that have been driven into deeper turmoil since 2020, where it is witnessing economies collapsing, violence rising, humanitarian crises swelling. The Peace Research Institute (Oslo) reports that battlefield deaths have reached a 30 year high, spurred by wars that escalated or reignited in the wake of the pandemic. What could have been a moment of global reckoning instead became  a return to old appetites, power, possession, and domination.

Into this fragile landscape, step leaders who amplify denial rather than humility. When Donald Trump declares that climate change is a hoax, or sneers that Europe is “going to hell,” it is not simply bluster, it is the voice of a culture unwilling to confront impermanence. His words echo the very pride and carelessness Kannadasan warned against, and the fact that such rhetoric carries weight in the world’s largest economy speaks to the perilous path humanity treads.

And still, even with more international institutions than at any point in history, bodies designed to safeguard peace, health, and justice, the world remains more fragmented than ever. These institutions, too, fall prey to self-interest, each absorbed in its own orbit, each chasing narrow agendas. The irony is striking. Humanity has never had more mechanisms for unity, yet it has rarely felt more divided.

Can it be otherwise? Perhaps. But only if we allow impermanence to be more than an idea. If we see it not as a gloomy shadow but as the absolute truth on which all else rests. To live with this awareness is to strip life of its vanities, to loosen the grip of greed and ego, to seek instead what endures beyond death’s boundary: compassion, wisdom, and clarity.

Kannadasan’s lyrics, in its gentle cadence, whispers what our times demand in a thunderous voice, all that we cling to will dissolve, but in embracing this truth, we may finally learn how to live. Like a river returning to the sea, our journey is not one of loss but of return, of flowing back to the source from which we came, carrying nothing but the wisdom of having passed through the world with open eyes.

What we may lose is borrowed time, but instead we will gain the clarity of return.

Cheers.

 

ravivarmman@1304260920253.0567° N, 101.5851° E

Cheap Migrant Labour or Structural Malaise? Rethinking U.S. Policy on Work Visas and Sustainable Employment

 

Pic from my Refrigerator Magnet

In recent years, the US administration has voiced increasing concern that foreign workers are undercutting American employees, particularly in high-skilled sectors such as information technology. Policymakers argue that this influx of international talent not only threatens job security for American graduates but also constitutes a broader economic and national security risk. The statistics appear to support these anxieties, for example H-1B visa allocations in the IT sector rose from 32% in 2003 to over 65% by 2024, while unemployment among U.S. IT graduates has climbed to 7.5%, a rate higher than most other fields of study. Between 2000 and 2019, the number of foreign STEM workers in the United States more than doubled, even though overall STEM employment only grew by 44.5% during that period.

These figures, coupled with reports of American IT workers being compelled to train their foreign replacements under nondisclosure agreements, suggest to many observers a systemic effort by U.S. companies to replace domestic employees with cheaper foreign labour. Critics warn that such practices may discourage young Americans from pursuing careers in STEM fields, thereby creating vulnerabilities in national security, as critical data and digital infrastructure could increasingly come under the management of non US nationals.

Yet while the fear is understandable, focusing exclusively on “cheap migrant labour” misidentifies the root of the problem. What is framed as a labour market distortion caused by immigration is, in reality, a symptom of deeper structural choices within American capitalism. The more fundamental challenge is the reluctance of employers to internalize the true costs of production, whether through paying wages that reflect U.S. living standards or through consumers, especially the affluent, accepting higher prices for domestically produced goods and services. So long as this underlying dynamic persists, reliance on foreign labour will remain attractive to firms, regardless of how restrictive immigration policy becomes.

Symptom versus Disease

The rhetoric around “cheap migrant labour” is politically potent because it offers a visible, tangible culprit. But the displacement of US workers is not driven solely by immigration policy. It is driven by the structural incentive of capital to minimize costs in pursuit of shareholder value. Employers resist paying wages that align with the dignity of American living standards, while consumers, particularly in higher income brackets, refuse to absorb the higher prices that would make domestically produced goods and services viable. The result is a systemic reliance on cheaper labour, whether sourced abroad or imported through visa programs.

To confuse this symptom with the disease is to risk designing policies that address appearances rather than causes. Attempts to restrict visas or penalize companies for hiring foreign workers may yield short-term political wins, but they fail to alter the structural drivers that make outsourcing or migrant labour economically rational in the first place.

The Risks of Protectionist Policy

This blind spot is evident in the recent policy statement under the Trump administration to impose a $100,000 fee on each work visa issued to foreign employees. The intent is clear, to create financial disincentives for companies reliant on international labour and to redirect opportunities toward American workers. But the likely outcomes are more ambiguous.

In the immediate term, such fees will significantly increase operating costs for firms, particularly in high skilled industries such as technology, healthcare, and engineering. Companies will respond by reconfiguring their hiring practices, accelerating automation, or shifting investment abroad. Over the medium term, some businesses may adjust and rebalance their labour strategies, but it remains uncertain whether the policy will meaningfully reduce unemployment among US graduates. Structural challenges such as skill mismatches, global competition for talent, and the rise of automation complicate the assumption that jobs freed from foreign workers will seamlessly flow to American citizens.

Ironically, by making the US less attractive to global talent, protectionist measures risk pushing innovative firms to relocate overseas, hastening the very decline they were designed to prevent. In the pursuit of an “America for Americans,” the administration may inadvertently create an America less competitive on the world stage.

The Need for a Paradigm Shift

If the aim is truly to revitalize opportunities for American workers, the solution cannot rest on piecemeal fixes or punitive immigration policies. Instead, it demands a broader reorientation of the socioeconomic system. At its core, the problem lies in how labour is valued within US capitalism. So long as labour is treated as an expendable input to be minimized, any attempt to patch the system will only deepen systemic instability.

A paradigm shift would involve rebalancing the relationship between capital, labour, and consumers. Employers must be willing to pay wages that reflect not only market demand but also the cost of sustaining dignified living standards in the United States. Consumers, particularly those who have benefited most from globalization, must accept the discipline of paying more for goods and services produced under fair conditions. And policymakers must move beyond symbolic gestures to design structural reforms that address wage stagnation, invest in education, and reduce the skill mismatches that make US workers less competitive.

Without this deeper reorientation, policies will continue to treat symptoms rather than causes. Visa restrictions may temporarily slow the inflow of foreign workers, but companies will still seek cost arbitrage, either through outsourcing or automation. Workers will continue to feel displaced, and national security concerns about reliance on foreign expertise will persist.

Navigating a Post Pandemic Economy

The urgency of structural reform has become even clearer in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Global disruptions revealed that economic shocks are no longer exceptional, they are a constant feature of the modern economy. Businesses worldwide have had to strengthen risk management, diversify supply chains, and build resilience into operations, all of which have raised the baseline cost of doing business.

Within this context, measures such as the $100,000 visa fee risk compounding existing pressures on firms. While intended to prioritize American workers, such policies may instead accelerate the search for cheaper alternatives abroad or through automation. Over time, they may even undermine the resilience of the U.S. economy by restricting access to the global talent pool essential for innovation and growth.

Conclusion-Beyond Tinkering at the Edges

The American debate over foreign workers has been framed in terms of unfair competition and national security threats. But to frame the problem as “cheap migrant labour” is to confuse the symptom with the disease. The deeper crisis lies in the refusal of American capital to internalize the true costs of production and in the reluctance of consumers to support a sustainable domestic economy through higher prices.

Policies that focus narrowly on restricting visas or penalizing companies may offer short-term relief, but they risk long term damage, such as, demoralizing future generations of STEM workers, pushing firms abroad, and weakening U.S. competitiveness. A sustainable solution requires more than tinkering at the edges. It requires a systemic reorientation of values, where labour is no longer treated as expendable but recognized as central to national prosperity and security. Only through such a paradigm shift can the United States address the root of the problem and chart a path toward an equitable and resilient economic future.

Cheers.

ravivarmman@160022092025 3.0567° N, 101.5851° E