Senses and SenseAbility: Sex-as-a-Sense

Senses and SenseAbility: Sex-as-a-Sense
By Remigius de Souza

Illustration: shows Design by Nature striped to bones shows differences in the skeletons of man and woman. It is only now that the scientists are realising what they so far thought human brain is one is wrong. There are two human brains that of man and woman, reports Hannah Hoag, science writer from Montreal, Canada (“Sex on the brain”, New Scientist, 19 July 2008). Mystery of body deepens.

Sex is a Sense: Its organs are male and female genitals; their functions are cleansing by urination (for both sexes) and menstruation (on puberty for female), and on maturity in union of both sexes the procreation for the survival of the species. The function of procreation or propagation is present by variation of Design by Nature in all the life-forms.

I have not come across any scientist, sociologist, anthropologist, linguist or economist ever considered “Sex as a Sense” (whatever little that I have heard or read). It may be so because of their religious taboos that have become a habit?

In this regard, of course, it is least expected from the religious of many popular brand faiths for whom ‘sex’ is a taboo, though it is dominant on their minds: The topic is expelled from all polite talk; forget they would recognize “Sex is a Sense”. For them “sex” is sinful. Hence the “Sex-Sense” is religiously expelled from the recognized senses and dictionaries! (Remember ‘Lady Chatterley’s Lover’ by D. H. Lawrence that was banned!)

No! We are not talking about the “sex of hedonism” that prevails in the so-called advanced and civilized societies, where prostitution and sexual crimes are rampant, which also receive abundant attention of the media. The developing civilized societies are no exception, for example, the Third World India.

This is obvious fallout of the creation of limitless wealth and waste by Industrial Civilization. Fallout also includes population explosion. And the institutionalized religions cannot do anything about it.

Otherwise, adivasis – aborigine – communities who adore vagina and phallus, neither have prostitution nor population explosion, unless forced by the civilized powerful classes/castes.

Sex being a primal force, sex as a sense has place in Intuition, i.e. the Sixth Sense. Why then it is not recognized and added to the five senses?

I do not know the history of who, why, when, where and how this vital sense was expelled from the popular (populated) religions (if it was ever there) and languages? Yes, I come across news that a lot of research goes on sex-related issues in science labs, either on mice or men.

During my adolescence I was working with a Spanish priest–architect in Mumbai, as an apprentice for a year. On his bookshelf there was a book of measured drawings of classical Greek and Roman architecture. The drawings of buildings also showed sculptures in bass relief of naked men and women on the building surface. This puritan man had cut with skilled scissors 1mm x 1mm pieces of plain paper and meticulously pasted them on the breasts and genitals.

Where I was born and brought up in my native village in Konkan Region – one of the biodiversity hotspots of the world – there was sex every where: dogs, cats, cattle, snakes, flies, hens, frogs… We kids often saw the mating of cow and bull, birth of a calf…

There are innumerable nude sculptures on thousands of temples across India, for example, Khajuaraho Temples. Without knowing the significance western scholars and art critics interpreted them as obscene, erotic, pornographic…

Indian mind has understood the paradox in the genitals – Yoni (vagina) and Lingam (phallus) – Sacred and Profane, for millennia. They even worship them. The Warli tribe in the backyard of Mumbai, likewise many other tribes and cults, worship Fertility Goddess.

However, in modern India, fundamentalist sections of Indian society get touchy and even violent on artistic expressions that depict nude. Perhaps they too are influenced by the slavery under the Firangi’s rule, teachings by Christian Missionaries and Victorian values of morality.

Procreation is certainly a function of genitals. However it is not the cause of population explosion, as is often implied by the vested interests. The real cause is the exploitation of the poor and the powerless of the societies at local as well as global levels by the powerful by military and wealth.

It has been going on for millennia of feudal powers. It continues now at accelerated rate, since the rise of Industrial Civilization in the West and imitated in other regions. It is not only the poor humans but even the insect population is on rise due to global war on insects. The immediacy of the survival of the species comes through Homeostasis – “the wisdom of the body”, not economics.

The experts and specialists in various disciplines of knowledge, the statesmen and politicians and world leaders are either ignorant of this fundamental principle, or ignore it because of their weakness and vested interests. The powerful are the most insecure species (!) amongst humans.

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© Remigius de Souza. all rights reserved.
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Senses and SenseAbility: Sixth Sense

Senses and SenseAbility: Sixth Sense
By Remigius de Souza

Bruce Durie mentioned in passing in his article “Doors of Perceptions” (New scientist, 29 January 2005, p. 34-36) ‘…Some things commonly labelled a “sense” are no such things – a sense of loss, having a sixth sense…’ The term “Sense of loss” is clearly a literary phrase.
But “sixth sense’, or “intuition”, or “inner voice”, or call it whatever you may like, we can’t say, is “no such thing”, only because we can’t put it in a laboratory test-tube, or we don’t perceive it, or experience it or we don’t want to listen. Dr. Deepak Chopra defines intuition as “heightened perception” (that I heard in one of his audio cassettes). In other words, intuition or perception could be developed, by any person – rich or poor, educated or illiterate, of white or black-brown-yellow races, civilised or aborigine.

Such an argument is typical by the scholarship or expertise that goes on single tract. This is also typical of the advance societies of missing the direction: a “circular path”, which enables to reach back to “value” to all human beings and all the living beings.

However, Mark Buchanan concludes his article “A billion brains are better than one: a single microbe won’t have much to say for itself. But put a lot of them together and it’s a different story” (New Scientist, November 20, 2004, p 34-37), with following words:

‘As we find out more, we will perceive microbes as more like ourselves, or
discover the roots of our own social behaviour in the supposedly “simple”
microbial world. Perhaps our ability to talk and communicate, to form teams and
root out and punish the freeloaders, goes all the way back to our days as
bacteria.’

Among bacteria, however, there are different species; human are one species irrespective of colour, race, religion, nationality, patriotism, etc. The world of bacteria gives us clues to how DEMOCRACY should function, which is not developed with thousands of years of civilised society. Of course, the aborigine tribes function in democratic way even to this date, despite all the atrocities caused by the civilised societies over a period of time. Democracy is still languishing in the chaotic conditions created by the past barbarian feudal powers that now lead by a new garb called “leadership” – a new avatar of centralised power within the so-called democratic nations.

To reach the democratic level of “simple” bacterial world is a tall order achieve for the so-called democratic states in contemporary times.

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© Remigius de Souza. all rights reserved.
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Senses and SenseAbility – 7: Seeing

Senses and SenseAbility – 7: Seeing

SENSE OF SEEING is the function of eye. Seeing, when one is looking, witnessing, going beyond a cursory glance, reveals many facets of an event. Perhaps one may discover roots of some great event in an ordinary one. Fr example, Galileo watching a chandelier swing back and forth at the Cathedral of Pisa or Newton looking at the falling apple, or Dronacharya (of Epic Mahabharata) demands a thumb from Ekalavya as his fees [a dakshina or deed of gratitude] for being an absentee guru.

The descendants of Ekalavya, the Bhil tribe do not use their thumb even to this day. This is his living memorial that signifies Aryan atrocities on the aborigine communities. The aborigine, then, though assimilated in the Aryan society, its purpose was to add a service class, which was identified as Shudra caste. Even in the free democratic India the discrimination continues. In the era of Industrialization in India the peasants are now facing the onslaught of elimination. In the last decade, between 1997 and 2005 about 150,000 farmers have committed suicides (Ishwari Prasad, “Significance of Farmers’ Suicide”, Janata, Vol. 69, No. 32, August 31, 2008, p. 3-8, Mumbai), one of the reasons is farming is no more sustainable.

Such a seeing or watching or witnessing also combines other senses. The whole body becomes an eye, as in archery, which has iconic dimensions in eastern cultures. Or for example, a cricketer who throws or hits a ball: be alert or miss the target.

Observing (without malice, likes-dislikes, taboos or judgments) during even the ordinary routines such as, seating, reading, eating-drinking, walking, traveling etc. or watching the people watching TV, the ordinary activity of seeing becomes an action, which could be a creative action.

Such an action, which involves self and the outside, has values of entertainment (leisure) and education both. No investment. No time schedule. No rules and regulations. No legal curbs (in case you don’t intrude in other’s privacy). No losses in time-money-health… on the contrary, by being alert the senses become sharp.

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Scientists say all animals received vision some 540 million years before now (identified as Cambrian Explosion); they were in the sea then. It is said the vision brought great change in their lives also: the conflict between the pray and the predator accelerated (see: Andrew Parker, ‘In the Blink of an Eye’). “Pikaia”, our remote ancestor, survived: thus we are.

In modern times the sense – vision – has overtaken even other senses. ET-IT has taken this change to great heights. We live more and more in virtual reality than ever before through canned visuals, canned music, canned games, canned wars, canned education… on cell phones, computers, TV screens… The worst victims are the youngest, younger and young generations in the increasing proportions. The poor little ones, who have not yet seen even a smallest fraction of real world, are trapped by the game called virtual reality. It is happening before our eyes but we don’t see or notice it.

A few decades ago the children were provided with toy-guns and toy-cars. Now as they grow a little they are with violent games in the Vice City or Road Rash or Sports of cricket or football etc. on the TV mast, and quietly Porn enters…

Neither parents (citizens) nor educationists nor the planners, and never the governments of any brand, dogma, right or left or fundamentalist ever think of play grounds for the children of different ages within their neighborhoods. And they boast of holding Asian Games and Olympics: indeed the height of hypocrisy.

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A true story of an extreme case of a computer-nerd

“Y”, a young man, is, or now was, a student of engineering in second year. His father – a professional engineer, mother – a high school teacher, sister – a medical student. Y spends hours on computer, almost an addict, many a times late at night, while other family members are fast sleep. (I don’t know what he was looking at, and don’t want to know). His eye sight was very low from childhood. On one fateful day, or perhaps night, Y’s both the eyes started bleeding profusely, it was a hemorrhage. The veins busted. There is no remedy. Y is permanently blind. I don’t give the names for obvious reason. Hid kin should have informed all their contacts and the public about the gory incidence as a warning and caution. Precisely because the cause is absolutely foolish, though unfortunate and sad it may be. The educated could be ignorant in many, many ways.

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Vision – inner vision, light, an eye, eyesight etc. – has been a subject of visionaries and scientists, of metaphysics and scientific discoveries… There are a great number of volumes on vision written by scientists and pundits; great schools of theories have been founded; great monuments have been erected.

Yet vision is still elusive, still a mystery, and the mystery deepens with every invention… Reading about them my eyes have gone foggy, but in vain. No salvation. What am I to do? In my ordinary life I must find my own answers. When I took and followed an advice and took a curative measure I saw the ‘Rainbows’.

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© Remigius de Souza. all rights reserved.
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Senses and SenseAbility – 6: Smell

Senses and SenseAbility – 6: Smell


Smell goes with breathing, a vital function. Indic people believe that our life span is measured (or decided) by how we breathe – or the number of inhales and exhales, and not by days or calendar years.

It is a common experience that taste, smell and seeing also goes together when food is seen. Smell of food prompts appetite – attraction, or repulsion, in certain environment, for example when we are hungry. Infant wrapped in mother’s sari, as many people do in India, recognizes her smell, not only when she is physically close by.

How does our sense of smell get diluted when in familiar environment, or after we get familiar? For example, pollution of land and water and air – the three vital links to life – and in urban habitat, is unmistakable to nose, though not for our egocentric or helpless mind – whatever we are in social – political – economic hierarchy.

Plants have aromas, and their company on daily basis can rejuvenate our living. But we go on hacking them to make concrete jungles, to build industrial empires etc. for monetary gains. We don’t spare even the forests to make hill stations for our sensual pleasures.

Isn’t it absurd to destroy trees in the urban neighbourhoods, and travel miles away to enjoy nature, or build holiday houses there? Can’t we (or the experts) plan corridors of woodlands for the neighbourhoods in the new town or existing cities that are under revision every twenty years? Such green corridors would give safe passage to wild life (not necessarily tigers) and neighbourhood people would have company of plants and wild life at a walking distance. Instead we put them both in the compartments of reservations. Indeed we are becoming intolerant to other forms of living beings, consequently other humans, which may belong to other caste, class, religion, language, province or nationality.

The thoughtful technology (science, research, industry and trade hand in hand) is ready with remedies – deodorants, cosmetics, drugs… And when we fall to live a life of vegetable, it offers healthcare. We go on pumping deadly toxins in the soil and waters and air in the name of progress and development and economic gains: We neither think of posterity nor improve living of all the citizens on equitable basis.

Plants are helpless because they can’t move. However nature helps them to move far and wide and to propagate by various means, one of them is other living beings (other than man), whom also we eliminate along with plants.

Our love of plants ends with our love for visual aesthetics and imported exotic species, which at times overpower and destroy indigenous species, just like the firangis who came to India to buy spices. Under the influence of our past colonial masters, anything desi – local or indigenous – is detested, though it is Nature-given. I deliberately don’t use the term God-given. How God has messed up our lives, or to put it other way, how we have messed up our lives in the name of God?

Fragrance of Soil rises from the Earth with first shower/s of monsoon, which I relished for decades. But in this concrete jungle of Mumbai it is rare; I feel homesick when monsoon comes. In one of his stories G. N. Dandekar mentions an ascetic presents a small bottle of the perfume containing fragrance of soil to a passionate collector (“Kuna Ekaachi Bhraman Gatha” (Marathi).

Fragrance of Mahuva flowers have left with me their sweet memories forever, which I enjoyed many times during the Holi festivals among the Bhil tribes. Summer is the bloom time for Mahuva trees; the fields, forests, villages, wherever the trees are, are filled with sweet fragrance. So also the fragrance of its precious liquor, which is used on special occasions such their religious rite. The Mahuva flowers are the part of the Bhil’s staple food: vegetables, rotis and biscuits of maize flour… Indeed palm and Mahuva are inseparable part of tribal people.

Collectors of Fragrance: Like honeybees that collect honey, the orchid bees are ardent collectors of fragrance, various fragrances, all types of fragrances; from flowers to woods, decayed woods, even shit, perhaps to impress the females with their collection.

Humans may boast their superiority over the animal world, but they can’t beat orchid bees. Bijal Trivedi informs, ‘talk to any performer and you will discover that brewing a top-selling fragrance is mostly art and very little science. These olfactory connoisseurs travel the world roaming markets, gardens, jungles and rivers to sniff out exotic new scents – their brains trained to tease apart complex odours and describe them in words” (‘Smells rank’, New Scientist, 17 Nov. 2007, p.48-51). And the urbanites that choose to live in urban jungles must surely envy the tribal folks!

It’s plent! It’s all free!! For decades I enjoyed aroma of paddy farms. When you enter Konkan region you can’t miss it if you are travelling by automobile or by railway. During summer, the aromas of cashew and mango in blossom are distinct. Like Mahuva liquor, aroma of feni – cashew liquor – also spreads in the atmosphere.

The rich biodiversity of Indic region provides pleasant fragrances in the environment through all seasons for us to enjoy. And it comes free for all; you need not bottle it like kings and emperors. We have six seasons; the Chinese have twelve seasons: how keen interest the Chinese people must have in the environment. No, we are not talking about the Chinese government; the governments come and go; the civilisations come and go; the people prevail.

Modern city is a parasite, alienated from the nature. Not only does it devour the nature (in land, waters and living beings), but also denies the citizens their kinship with the nature. It becomes increasingly destructive with its growing size; its reach extends beyond and across the continents and the oceans. The modern city is a by-product of Industrial Revolution and handiwork of the centralised powers.

Remigius de Souza
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© Remigius de Souza. all rights reserved.
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Sense and SenseAbility – 5: Taste

Sense and SenseAbility – 5: Taste

Illustration: Aesthetic Taste

Taj Mahal, India: precious/semiprecious stone studded fantasy mausoleum (in feudal era).
Bra: diamond studded fantasy (in democratic era).
Beijing Olympic Stadium and Inauguration: Technology gimmicks studded fantasy leisure (in autocratic state).
Qualitatively their taste ethics and aesthetics don’t differ much from one another.



We are thinking, here, of taste, a physical sense, the phenomenon that goes long way from mouth to the entire gamut of environment-ecology-energy of Terra Incognita Indica, for that matter, of entire globe. Taste, here, is a business of mouth: To eat, drink and chew – primarily to satisfy the Basic Need, besides to speak, and to sing, and perhaps abuse...
We are not talking about that taste in the abstract realm of fashions and styles, arts and artefacts; they are but transient in time-space and places.

A new born baby sucks nipples of mother’s breasts (or teat of feeding bottle). Thankfully, s/he is not to be or cannot be taught by any high culture / low culture, or by any civilisation, or by any power savvy authority that would at once jump at the first opportunity.

Oh, that cones in other areas. The onslaught on their taste starts from the day one. The new born are generally on the supplementary feeds – drugs, vitamins, vaccines etc. For various reasons prescribed by the specialists (of course, to those who can afford; 90 percent Indians can’t). So, their taste buds now start getting tuned to the modern social and economic development, in other words, they are baptised in the Dharma of Industrialisation.

The onslaught also comes from the omnipresent Market, the manufacturers, the show-biz – the pop stars farting on the TV screens every 10-15 minutes intervals, and so on. It comes with ready to serve canned and packed conveniences in attractive wrappings: That includes processed foods and drink – sweet – sour – pungent – salty (bitter and astringent excluded). The shelves are always full at the glitzy mall.

It could be so, because the mothers or parents or families are under constant pressure of time-crunch, that’s for one. Hence, the market is ready to serve. And other is knowledge-crunch. Because in the nuclear family raj, there probably is no grandma’s legacy left. They have spent their formative years (till 20 to 25) learning specialised courses – arts, sciences, commerce, ET-IT, engineering, business management etc at mass schooling. Their data bank is empty in this vital field of health about “when-where-why-who(m)-how” of right food to keep healthy. Well, some information filters through the print media, like guide books of their school days. But what is its reach?

In the cities, however, till now, the grocery shops and (vegetable) markets have number of varieties of great variety of grains, condiments, spices, dry and fresh fruits, tubers, rhizomes, leaves and roots in vegetables: I don’t know even the name of many. I wonder perhaps the medicos may know.

In the villages generally there should belocally grown grains, fruits and vegetables, and supplements from forests, woodlands and wetlands, if any still survive, and if accessible through the clutches of various departmental authorities. However, sooner or later the Market would take over to supply.... But why is there such a great exodus from the village to urban areas?

In Indic region there has been great natural biodiversity. In the Indic region there has been a great natural biodiversity. It has influenced all the aspects of culture, not only food and clothing, in short, the four aspects of our daily living: Work, Leisure, Education and Health.

Biodiversity in India has resulted in rich medical systems – Ayurveda, Siddhayoga etc. It is there in the occult cults – Tantra, Mantra, magic practices. However much of the knowledge is with the ethnic and tribal communities that remain incognito (perhaps under a cloud of modern day superstitions or prejudices), besides in the treatises. What’s the point in giving official recognition to the systems, but not its bearers, the people, who are treated as second class citizens?

Shamefully, the visible reality down to earth is the country’s most of the green cover, woodlands, forests and wetlands are either get pollute or are disappearing, consequently the loss of wild life, diminishing surface and subsoil water, and comes expanding desert. Another consequence is people’s knowledge and skills, preserved through generations. are vanishing. In the place of biodiversity there comes monoculture of plants and monoculture of mass society is being groomed through mass schooling. All this is for the delight of bureaucrats and the ruling powers for the easy control, and modern development of economic by regimentation.

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© Remigius de Souza. all rights reserved.
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Sense and SenseAbility – 4: Hearing

Sense and SenseAbility – 4: Hearing
-- Remigius de Souza

Hearing: It is a second sense, though some musicians may claim it’s a first sense. Never mind. Now modern science says listening to music while in the womb improves the child’s mathematical power.

We have heard stories from Itihasa – Epics and Puranas. Abhimanyu, while in the womb, learnt about how to enter the Chakravyuha – a strategic circular maze formation of army in war – while his father Arjuna was telling his mother. He, however, did not hear about how to come out. During the great civil war of epic Mahabharata took place, Young Abhimanyu was defeated and killed. Perhaps he did not use his senses…

Another story is of sage Ashtavakra (bent in eight places in body). His father while reciting Vedas made some errors. Ashtavakra, from his mother’s womb, pointed out the errors. The father was offended and cursed that he will be deformed in eight places in his body, and thus he was born with eight deformations. Later in his youth he preached a king on spirituality, which is known as “Ashtavakra Gita” or “Ashtavakra Samhita”.

We may have heard these stories several times. What we understand and how we interpret them is another matter. Sri Krishna and many saints have preached “Sahaja Dharma” – natural dharma or inherent nature. Accordingly one may deduce there could be seven billions of dharma – religions.


What do the foetuses in modern urban environment hear? Isn’t it ring tones on cell phones, 24x7 noises on TV sets, household electronic gadgets including their electromagnetic radiation, noises in the city…? No wonder some children are born with deformation. Viva!

Hearing with attention (not concentration, said J. Krishnamurti) becomes listening. So also, seeing with attention becomes noticing. Listening and noticing reveals many facets of an event, even an ordinary one.

Silence, it is said, is the heart of music. Listening to silence is supreme. The silent spaces in between words and sentences, and the silence before the storm…

Woefully we are so much used to the noise (and hurry) that silence unnerves us; we are irritated by silence, particularly in urban environment. We want 24x7 excitements.

Our governments, too, have lost the capacity to listen notice the reality. Unless people take to the streets, burn the public and private properties, a few people are dead by police-and-or-public violence, they can’t take notice of the malady. Of course, of course, we all know the government is a faceless entity.

Hence, hearing loss is a common phenomenon. Loud noise with impact, for example, a gunshot close by, could cause deafness. However, on such an event, if we observe, mouth opens instantly to counter the impact on the eardrum from inside. We call it reflex action; perhaps that’s homeostasis.

An extreme example of hearing loss

I know at least one person who became permanently deaf because of noisy work environment in an industry. Mr. Lobo was working at one of the oldest cement plant at Savalia in Gujarat State. That was a few decades ago. I don’t know how many were affected like him?

© Remigius de Souza. all rights reserved.
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Sense and senseAbility - 3.2: Touch

Sense and senseAbility - 3.2 Touch
-- Remigius de Souza

Sense of Touch is attributed to the skin.

Senses and SenseAbility are important for our personal and social health, in fact, all the four aspects – Work, Leisure, Education and Health – for our survival (survival means, said J Krishnamurthy, living sanely).

In the blind the other senses are highly active and enhanced. Their sense of touch works in the feet even while wearing shoes, not only hands, and cane.

In the growth of babies, emphasised Margaret Mead, anthropologist, in her famous book, ‘Coming of Age in Samoa’, it is important to hold them close. Among the young from their infancy, their senses are alert and highly active. In the course of time, their senses and creative ability are stunted by the contemporary education here in India. Even the educated parents are hardly aware of what is happening.

As we know the skin is the organ largest in area. It is also the youngest as the body continues to shed the skin until last. When one gets a fever – say, malaria fever or love-fever – the skin is an indicator.

It is not only the nose, the skin also breaths, and protects us. (Buchanan mentions there are millions of microbes on our skin as well as in the gut.) Hence we call the clothes, a second skin, and house is the third skin of man – both are expected to breath (particularly in the tropical climate0 and protect. Well, whatever may be the result of synthetic fibres and, and the houses with sick building syndrome!

The touch is the first sense that we experience in our mother’s womb that is oceanic. There is tradition among Indic people. They wrap newly born baby in soft cotton linen, which is mother’s recycled sari. The mother and the infant/s stay in confinement room that is dark. Modern gynaecologists may differ, though!

Touch obviously reminds us of the Untouchables in India (see: A tale of a scavenger in India). It continues in spite of efforts by the most revered saints of India across the country for centuries and in modern times by several social reformers: they could not eradicate this obnoxious distinction.

In very recent times, the young Indian elite had been holding agitations and campaigning against the reservation for the untouchables (official term is Scheduled Castes) in educational institutions and jobs in the name of equality. Perhaps they did not check the worth of this British-made education? The atrocities on the untouchables in various forms sometimes result in killings, house burning, rape, and physical assaults.

Another class of untouchables is the women when in menstrual cycle. Though it is less due to contact with the urbanised, the women do not enter the places of worship and the temples. Traditionally they suppose to ‘sit out’ i.e. do not cook, not even enter the kitchen, and touch to any person, and actually sit in out side veranda. The orthodox families and those who perform religious rites and rituals and magic – Mantra-Tantra, and those who practice traditional medicines strictly observe this custom. Perhaps it may continue for unknown time.

I would not judge, like or dislike, or accept or reject any of these issues, but prefer to examine in historical, social and scientific context, keeping aside what the western societies believe or approve of.

Until now what I understand that both the classes of untouchables originally were service classes in the civilised Indic societies. In the course of time, as population increased, the high castes and men, to keep their power, attached the stigma upon them as untouchable. Perhaps the original context of the rites and rituals and customs were lost and got distorted in the course of time.

We, however, can’t ignore a fact that society, which refuses to evolve, which remains stagnant like water in a pond, stinks. Do such things happen in the Industrial Society, which would lead it to decadence? Or has the decay already begun?

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Sense and Sense-Ability -3.1: Homeostasis

Homeostasis: The Wisdom of the Body
(Continued from the previous Part 2)


Body houses our senses, perceptions, memory, mind, intellect, intelligence… and soul.

Unfortunately in the modern times, “body” is yet another four-letter word like Self, Soul, Love, Life, Work etc. that are much abused in our fast pace of hedonic lifestyle.

We take our body too much for granted: Mind has become the colonial master that colonises the body like a bonded labour and exploits it without restraint, until it is exhausted, in part or full. Just check our work pattern/s. certainly we decorate it, beautify it; it is rather to satisfy demands of our egoistic mind than to elevate.

We take even our senses for granted. While eating/ drinking, for example, most of the time, we rarely pay attention to the action of eating. We simultaneously are involved with something else: daily news, TV shows, talk over the matters of business or gossip, think over the “urgent” matters on mind, or flatter our taste buds forgetting the need of the body: We at times call it a passion.

It is almost the same situation, more or less according to our passions, with other senses (except perhaps sex impulses: We shall come to that later).

Quite often we ignore or forget, if we know, that body too has intelligence just as we have. At least, we as Indic people have recognised the body-mind connection for a considerable time.

Body, however, continues to work, whether we are awake or asleep, till the end like a “Nishkam” – without desire for fruit – Karma Yogi. And whenever necessary, when something goes wrong with the system, sends us the signal – hunger or starvation for example. But we are too busy with our mental flights, passions or addictions: We tend to ignore it.

A Case of My Ailment of Heart

My own experiences are not very different from what I just mentioned above. However I have also been aware of the “Presence of Body” on several occasions. One of them was my ailment of heart, some fifteen years ago.

I started getting palpitations. In the beginning it remained for a second of two and recurred at interval of a couple of weeks. There was no apparent cause: fear, or worry of any kind. It would appear any time. Later it was for 2-3 minutes at a few days’ interval. I had started taking medicines, including exercises in self-hypnosis under a guidance of psycho-therapy specialist. I stopped the medicines and exercises.
One day the palpitations remained from noon to midnight. That was an opportunity for check up while it was on. With a note from family doctor I met a heart specialist at a neighbourhood hospital.

After the necessary check-up he diagnosed and told me in simple words, that my heart is sound, that it is a case of “electrical short circuit” in the heart, and the present rate of palpitation is at 250 per minute. He added, if the rate increases to 400-450 per minute it would be fatal – an instant death. That was music to my ears.

For me the diagnosis was enough. The specialist, however, did not tell me why it happens. He advised me to get admitted there and then in the ICU for observation and prescribed some medicines. Of course I flatly refused both. He was furious. I returned home, remained on fruit diet, gave rest to my mind and body.

After two days, I left for Delhi to attend a workshop on “People, Law and Environment” organised by Centre for Science and Environment. It was very romantic episode though I report it in brief.

I, then started dialogues with my body, and observations – or call it meditations as I am inside my body – without judging, my likes-dislikes, prejudices etc. leaving the information baggage.

I am aware of the “Presence of Body”, and this awareness is constant like breathing, even during my pet indulgences and petty vices. There has been no palpitation for last fifteen years.

A decade or so after this episode, while reading “The Ages of Gaia” by James Lovelock, I came across the word “Homeostasis”, which now has a meaning.

Links to MINI-TEXT :1. Solemn Celebration and 2. Body Dharma


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Sense and sense-ability-2

Sense and sense-ability-2

OUIR FIVE SENSES are attributed to five body organs: touch to skin, hearing to ears, smell to nose, taste to mouth and vision to eyes; it’s a common knowledge. Where does ‘perception’ reside? Obviously it is in the brain, where thoughts occur and flow continuously, sometimes connected, sometimes disconnected or random. There also occur emotions, dreams, daydreams, ideas and concepts (creative and/or destructive)… If observed, there is, as if, infinite space without boundaries, identical to space outside.

The senses and organs do not work in compartments or in departments like manmade occupations and organisations for example, governments, corporations, institutions etc. they work in association or in coordination with other senses and body parts. Just mention a word “tamarind” while talking in a group and someone’s mouth starts watering. Even a memory of an event may raise hair in the skin, or give a vomiting sensation in the breath, or even miss a breath.

The whole body, not only the brain, is a most complex and intricate system; it is right with us to watch. It works smoothly except for our indulgencies (egocentric that we are) by committing various sins or crimes against its functioning. By our indulgencies, by going beyond moderation, we, perhaps, may boast that we patronise many manmade systems and organisations in the name of research and development and progress etc. which give job opportunity to many, including ourselves, and the state, whether monarch, democracy, totalitarian or fundamentalist.

The body, however, is far more superior and sacred than any manmade institution, or machinery – from kitchen gadget to a spaceship. Despite all great inventions and the great leaps in various branches of sciences, thereby technologies, in the context human body (and mind), they are still groping to understand it. The mystery deepens. To compare brain to a computer (artificial intelligence) is preposterous and arrogant.

Some time ago I read an article on senses, “Doors of Perceptions” by Bruce Durie (New scientist, 29 January 2005, p. 34-36), which give a table of several senses. It reports, the scientists have names and added five more senses in addition to the five known to us, which are called “conventional” senses. It may not be out of place to mention them here: Pain, Mechanoreception (balance), Temperature and Interoceptiors (blood pressure). All 10 are further divided into 21 “accepted” (by the scientists) senses, and they are further divided into 33 sub-sub-divisions called “radical”. The article is informative, and does not necessarily advocate them. Thankfully, he adds, ‘they are flawed… the table is incomplete… though in the end, it may not matter at all’.

It was amusing. It reminded me of Indian caste system: four ‘varna’s that that have turned into few hundred castes, sub-castes and sub-sub castes over centuries. And see what kind of mess we have been in!

In modern societies there are classes, occupations, specializations, careers and classes… In sciences alone the specialisations break into several divisions. Of course the division of labour is a basic characteristic of any civilised society (We don’t include any tribal – adivasi – aborigine communities, which still survive, though few, among them).

Hence my perception tells me, more advance a civilised society more the divisions of labour (you may call them varnas, castes, classes or occupations…) more divided (read fragmented / decadent) the society. Though the western society, which thinks itself superior to all societies on the globe, is not an exception; perhaps it’s the worst example (count the wars in the past two centuries; assess the plight of the underclass, which is rarely reported, and the racial and gender atrocities).

A body – human, animal or plant – would not function, not even survive, even to a span of breath, if it has to follow such a prototype of advance civilised society. May God help the clones, morons, zombies to die soon, if any amongst us!

Characteristically the western society (and the westernised) still continues to think in a linear and deductive ways, thus go haywire, as is evident from the “Doors of Perception”. I wonder would they ever complete a cycle – circle? Anyway, till then let them enjoy their adventures and enjoy spending dollars, a plenty that they have earned at the cost of the Earth’s resources as if they alone own her, for the survival of their institutions…

At one place Bruce Durie says, ‘When we talk of senses, what we really mean are feelings or perceptions. Otherwise we would be operating not much above the level of an amoeba or a plant’. This is indeed very sad.

First, our remote ancestor was bacteria from whom the plant and animal world was evolved, even before “pikaia” that swam in the seas long before hominid was born, which scientists agree.
If I have to believe, ‘bacteria live like a superorganism and collectively decide their actions by communication… [A]s with human language, bacteria possess a lexicon, or vocabulary…’ as says another author (Buchnan, Mark. “A billion brains are better than one: a single microbe won’t have much to say for itself. But put a lot of them together and it’s a different story.” New Scientist, Nov 20, 2004: p 34-38) then the statement by Bruce is either wrong or incomplete. Perhaps he operates in different division, which is hardly holistic.

Even before our desi scientist J C Bose (November 30, 1858 – November 23, 1937) discovered in his laboratory, what the Indian peasants have believed, that plants have feelings. Sir Jagdish Chandra Bose claims that plants can “feel pain, understand affection etc.," from the analysis of the nature of variation of the cell membrane potential of plants, under different circumstances. According to him a plant treated with care and affection gives out a different vibration compared to a plant subjected to torture. Perhaps Bruce did not pay attention to this past research and people’s belief.

But science, which exists from the time hominid existed, need not be condemned because no scientist can conclusively proclaim “truth”, and agree with others, and they may not, because they too are human. The entire human race is a miniscule part in the whole schema of Nature.
We shall dig more in the senses in the following posts.

P.S. I am not a scientist. My education in science is up to matriculation that was few decades ago. I am just an ordinary citizen and don’t claim any authority in any subject.

(Link to previous post: Sense and Sense-ability )
Remigius de Souza
09-06-2008
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© Remigius de Souza., all rights reserved.


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Sense and sense-ability

Sense and sense-ability

WE GENERALLY recognize five senses: touch, hearing, smell and vision. Intuition is considered the Sixth Sense. There may be more than Five Senses. The five senses help us to perceive the world, and learn. Intuition is developed through perception. Dr. Deepak Chopra said, intuition is heightened perception, which I had heard in is recorded lecture.

Indeed, our perceptions need to be heightened, widened, deepened – developed – constantly, thereby our intuition; it’s a lifelong process which is important for survival. It also helps our creative ability in whatever we take up – occupation, profession or vocation.

In the process of developing our perceptions there is no age bar, no gender bar, no caste bar, no class bar, no race bar or no place bar; there is no need of officially recognized qualifications. It is possible for anyone, inside or outside the portals of academia – varsities, libraries, Internet… or any school of thought or dogma, or a workplace. It is beyond and above all of them on the necked ground of reality – down to earth. It is possible wherever we are, here and now. Such a perception is a many-faceted gem – holistic.

Otherwise a perception based on impressions remains shallow at a cursory level, and invariably produces knee jerk actions (as sometimes by the governments), or impulsive reactions (as in the riots and murders), which may be most hazardous in extreme cases.

The present pace of fast life in urban areas is also spreading / affecting rural regions around. Hence the development of perception through the critical use of all the senses becomes our critical need, just as food, shelter and clothing are.

There are many issues that crop up in urban and rural areas, now and then, that involve and affect us, directly or indirectly, by design and default, in our individual and collective living, where we have no say , or we don’t exercise our right to say. Aren’t we sufficiently informed in this age of Information and Communication Technology?

Yet, we naively or faithfully or in blind belief look up to governments, experts, specialists, planners, god persons… who work in their respective compartments with their departmental/ ideological/ dogmatic blinkers on. What could they offer us, with their poor perceptions of the ground reality – your reality and my reality and our collective reality? Their solutions are just knee jerk actions, which create more problems to create further solutions to create further problems to create…

Take any issue that are dear to our individual and collective living (I avoid to use the word – ‘life’ – that is much abused.) broadly: Work, Leisure, learning and Health, or in particular: children, gender, the aged, the displaced, hunger and sickness, terrorist acts and riots, inflation and safety to life, rampant corruption and extortion… There is a long, long list.

I, in my various avatars, as a politician, bureaucrat, law-maker, law-keeper, industrialist, industrialist, specialists in various fields, or a part of the rioting mob, may forget, while in the chair, that I am also a citizen of the civil society. Occasionally though I may shout popular slogans: ‘Bharat Mataki Jai’ – ‘ Hail Mother India’, ‘Hindustanki Kassam’ – ‘In the Name of Hindustan’ etc. Patriotic, that I may be, as if politics and profit and power matter not the people and the posterity.

Invariably though I, as a citizen, may push the issues aside, to enjoy this ‘one life’, by getting intoxicated in an IPL frenzy, canned music, or in weekend partying in food and booze, or in how to make (loose) money on the stock exchanges, or how to make a small car for my poor developing country, or get intoxicated in our glorious past, or in the speculation of a rosy future… hapless, helpless or apathetic.

Don’t we all belong to the same stock?

‘What are the different tastes?’ I ask my students (when teaching architecture, the discipline that mainly, and scandalously, concerns visual aesthetics, which has its roots in the feudal past).
‘Namkeen – Teekha – Khatta – Meetha (Salty – Pungent – Sour – Sweet)’ Prompt come the answers.
‘How do you judge my talks?’
‘Bitter.’ They add one more taste.
‘Do you know or remember the taste of Amala?’
‘Ah, yes. Yes. It’s astringent that you talk, not relay bitter. Sorry Sir.’
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Remigius de Souza
20-05-2008
Mumbai
© Remigius de Souza., all rights reserved.
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