Blog published 2/3/1900
East and west cultural differences.
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And here
Not the east nor the west but the culture which picks up all the best values from both cultures and integrate those in third culture
If we look East and west cultures and philosophy in historical perspective, how they are different in perception of the environment and how they make opinion and decisions, that all indicates their overall behavior to dealing with problems.
what are their fundamental differences in philosophy and if we believe in philosophy it shapes up our thought process which is interpreted in our behavior.
If you want to go deep in the dichotomy of east and west please click the word eastern.
Eastern philosophy is holistic in nature, and is not bipedal like western philosophy.
East and West cultural differences.
East and West dichotomy
Eastern philosophy is not all mysticism but a real deal to handle complexity like Buddha’s cataskoti, lays the foundation of Eastern philosophy, means four corners, four possibilities of reality.
1-: Right
2-: Wrong
3-: both
4-:neither
Quantum physics validate four premises, the fundamental building block of reality. The famous thought experiment of Schfodinger’s cat.
Schrödinger’s cat
, the cat in the box is dead or alive, in this thought experiment Schrodinger argue about quantum paricals can exist in superposition.
Western philosophy on the other hand, from onset is bipedal and all of its construct is on the postulation of either and or, premises and established on two principles, Principle of excluded Middle “ PEM” and Principle of No Contradiction” PNC”
Western culture is very smart in technology, tools and systems, science of closed systems but when they deal with complexities like health and medicine they lack the wisdom of nature which is not fit for all or quick fix paradigm. or it is not symptomatic, behind every symptom there is a deep-rooted cause and if you don’t fix that cause and treat symptoms that will be a mess and more complex problem will emerge. Symptoms are indexes, which need our attention to find out the underlying cause and fix it. Now west realize the root cause of the problem due the emergence of science of complexity. On top of that, politics, vest interest,business and industry have implications dealing with realty.
computer has capacity to compute myriad of contributing factors to find out the cumulative effect of these factors and lay down the foundation of knowledge and helps to solve problem comprising myriad factors to find out the outcome or conclusion.
Human brain have the ability to handle hidden factors and compute it unconsciously and talk to mind in the language of feelings and emotion and then our mind make stories to justify those feelings.
Our brain is evolved to deal with safety security issues real quick, food to survive a mate to reproduce, that is our hard wiring brain.
Eastern mindset is calibrated to harmonize with nature, causality of eastern philosophy is based on mythical stories, experience, trial and error method in pursuit of real answers. past experiences and rational thinking are concluded and being used in problem solving that is wisdom, to make right decisions at right time, they developed wisdom which was working good within their time frame, but some of the ancient wisdom is outdated, doesn’t work properly in new paradigms. or doesn’t work at all due to certain understandable reasons. Social and cultural development from a tribal culture to a metropolitan culture, new technologies, discoveries, inventions and insights, etc.. which is a paradigm shift, rules of the game have been changed and new rule are in effect. Ancient wisdom is not enough in 21st Century, now wisdom depends upon big data and algorithms, which our brain Is still the best algorithm bio-machine but to manage our internal world to keep us alive.
Our brain evolved to make quick decisions rather than very precise and accurate decisions because in the survival game in stone age was very crucial, in dangerous situations to make quick decision to act immediately, there are three natural responses to immediate threat fight, flight or freeze. Now we live in very competitive societ, metropolitan cities, well-defined institution, government and regulations, god like technologies and deluge of information, for our brain it is difficult to comprehend big picture and make precise decisions. But intelligent machines with out emotions and consciousness are our big help. Since the dawn of renaissance our authority got changed from scripture, book and religious leader to our feeling. The biggest authority we obey was our emotions and feeling, the philosophy of liberalism was a new sheriff in town. Now we started to depend upon artificial intelligence, big data and algorithms rather than on our own mind. For example using google map or waze in navigation which are free and more precise than our own our own perception and cognition, natural computer, brain and mind is hardwired and evolved for jungle life. To curb our curiosity we invented systematic method to find out the the foundation building blocks at the base of realty and the fruit is science and technologies which are going to change how we do everything.
Our Brain is very powerful computer, nature ever developed, no computer can compete with it in some fields like consciousness but in some fields artificial intelligence have an edge on us like navigation and other problem solving. Computers are becoming more intelligent and smart due to the Artificial Intelligence and machine learning technologies are progressing exponentially. Singularity is on the way not in a distant future rather sooner than our acceptation. Machine will be thousand time smarter than human in next thirty years due to the exponantial nature of digital technology, convergence of diverse technologies, new findings and discoveries in different domains. Matchine have no emotions and feeling, no biases which can deviate it from making accurate decision in problem it all work on big data and algorithms, artificial intelligence like machine learning in solving problems with accuracy and precision. emotion and feelings, may be later. Our brain is most sophisticated computer to deal with body and its system management not competitive in big data calculations consciously when myriads contributing factors are involved.
Change is big coupled with high acceleration and exponential in nature. Due to sophisticated tools, new discoveries and findings in science specially in neuroscience and biotech, info tech, new insights, to conclude and infer from data analyses, new knowledge evolved specially in the last two decades.
We are dealing with open, complex systems, which are dynamics and adoptive in nature, mean intelligent. Can you imagine how nature deal with complex problems when we can not even perceive the complexity of those problems.
Last five year’s Knowledge of neuroscience surpass the knowledge of entire human history and that is the start to understand our brain and we are on our way.
Nature is smarter than our mind.
to be continued…
Education a global faith
The problem on our part is that we need to enhance our cognitive abilities, to be more effective in problem solving.
Education is the global faith and technology is the hope.
Nature has its own ways of balancing the ecosystem and doesn’t consider anything ethically, not even human beings; in other words nature is not moral and nature does not care, how human will be effected adversely or suffer from her actions. Global warming is not nature’s problem- she will solve it in her own way as she has been solving problems in the past. It is our problem, we humans have to suffer from whatever we have done to nature, we have to pay back and the price tag is very high. If we don’t take it serious enough to address these problems urgently and with full efforts, nature is not going to forgive us. Nature never accepts one-sided defeat but takes revenge of even its minor defeats. She is ruthless in this perspective, otherwise she is nurturing and nourishing and motherly, that’s why we call her the Mother Nature; we should compete with nature not to defeat her, but harmonize with her and adopt her; life is not a war against nature but a dancing with it.
Due to the developments of new technologies, specially infotech, biotech and nanotech , we have new insight, foresight and recent discoveries in neuroscience, new technologies like fMRI electroencephalography EEG techniques, philosophical insights and role of language in education, we are better equipped to understand Nature than prior to the digital revolution. Language has been considered as a tool of communication. Now we have clear scientific evidence that language is not only a tool of communication but also a tool of cognition, thoughts, tool of orientation in the world, and also a tool of deception, the negative aspect of language.
It is not only the information matters the most, but also the process by which the information or knowledge is delivered and perceived and also what kind of motivation is behind that mode of delivery. The way we deliver knowledge is fundamental factor to decide what kind of attitude we are cultivating in our behavior. On top of that the learning environment and who is the agent matter too. Due to scientific discoveries and victories of science in closed systems our mindset evolved into a linear thinking , mechanistic, cause and effect in linear fashion and every phenomena we deal with.
mechanistic, Newtonian mindset, that works excellent in closed system but doesn’t work in complexity and living systems which are dynamic and adaptive in nature, having different parameters and prehaving different scientific approach is needed to understand and analyze to predict its future outcomes.
Just recently awareness about complex systems got attention in different domain of complexity, few decades back when scientist noticed that in complex system initial conditions matter a lot and a small change in initial conditions make a big difference in outcome. That was the time when science of complexity born, thinkers and scientist are working on it vigorously and rigorously to figure out the laws and principles which govern complexities.
To be continued
We are the Information Processing Machines
Education is a process of learning skills, collecting valuable information, finding and using resources to perform different functions, planning, problem solving, policy making etc.; for all kind of human activities we need some kinds of skills. We are hardwired to perform certain functions but to survive in the complex, ever-changing environment and the social jungle, we need extra knowledge and skills other than nature’s gifts which we got before birth in the form of instincts and innate potentials. As a human its our obligation to facilitate the child to convert his potential to ability on a natural timeline. Potentials open in sequence on a timeline already hardwired or innate. Language center are very active until 7th year, we need to help child to learn language during that time period. After that, till 11th birthday the logical and rational brain is developing, strong synaptic connections among neurons are fully developed. And after that timeline pruning of synaptic connections starts and only those are preserved which have been fully developed by our activities. As the developmental psychology indicates at different timelines, potentials open up and if they get the right feedback from the environment these potentials change into abilities.
In the learning process we have a myriad of misconceptions due to valid and invalid reasons. Valid reason is that we started from hardwired information, just like a child at birth, and learned bit by bit in a natural process in time/space frame of reference. Humanity has learnt in the same way over a historical (time/space) frame of reference, and is still learning. At the onset of life, that is at birth, we have got innate tools which nature gave us for survival, propagation and sustainability, in the form of our senses, body and (brain/mind). These have limitations, as we can not see atoms, molecules and microscopic life with naked eye and we can’t see long distances objects; therefore, we invented tools like microscope, telescope and other very sophisticated tools to support and enhance our perception, cognitive and physical abilities to facilitate our survival, growth, and contribute our genes in the gene pool, and to achieve happy and longer life.
We developed systems, institutions and invented tools to discover and uncover nature’s secrets and mysteries to understand and manipulate natural laws in our own benefit. In the process of development of institutional foundations, we did not only create knowledge but also developed systems to store and preserve it systematically so that it is easy to be retrieved, and transferable to other ignorant humans as well as to the new generations . We went through a long journey of storing information by memorizing to hieroglyphics to pictographic, symbols, signs and indexes, writing, printing, and digital storage, to cloud computing and the journey is still going on. We can digitize any information in any form like audio, video, text and store it on a chip, retrieve it, transmit it to millions of people with just a click. Knowledge is breaking jails, getting free and comes with no price tag.
Technology is dirupting every domain of life and it is deceptive in nature, the effects are as follow.
digitization, democratization, demonetization, decentralization and dematerialization.
…to be counted in next blog