Geopolitical Weekly

We live in a world that is both peaceful and turmoiled at the same time. One moment we hear about a great technological breakthrough in a part of the world and the next moment we hear about a catastrophe in the vicinity of the same area. World's political landscape changes its facade very abruptly. As soon as one tires to catch up with the details of one event, another incident happens to conceal the details of the previous one under the mist of massive information. In order to keep us up with the pace of swiftly changing geopolitical scene, members of StratFor provide us with their geopolitical weekly reports.  In what follows is a reflection of various of StratFor's geopolitical weekly articles that were published over the last decade. The primary reason to write this article is to try to understand the basis of political dynamics of our world.

Around six years ago (possibly in 2007 or 2008), StratFor published an article concerning developments in Russia, China and Iraq. Precisely at that time the US troops were busy in trying to conquer a territory in Iraq. It was possibly a part of their exit strategy. At the same time Russia was gauging up itself to see if it could halt the oil and gas supply to the central Europe (possibly through Belarus) to see if it could achieve any political leverage from such a move. It was possibly a part of Russia's never ending desire, and inherent necessity, to be an expansive hegemony. At the same time Chinese had invented a sort of a thing by which they could destroy shuttles in the outer space. This sort of a thing could be useful in space warfare and could also possibly threaten US domination of world's oceans by challenging them in the space. The article was detailed and in a way provoked a reader loyal to the US to lament its futile and aimless struggles in Iraq and Afghanistan. The article ended in a very nice way, as it normally does, with a catchy phrase from George Friedman, the founder and CEO of StratFor. That was possibly like: In six years the US would regret that while it was fighting for a few streets in Baghdad, it must have thought about its higher stakes. We are probably living in that part of the history now.

Through StratFor we can learn many interesting things about many interesting places, events and phenomena. Through StratFor we learn that why geography necessitates some countries to be expansive and allows a few others to be conveniently adventurous. Russia is an interesting example of an expansive land that is not necessarily so due to its vanity and lust for power, but also due to its geographical constraints. In order to protect itself from foreign intruders it has to expand its borders closer to other countries so that, in time of need, it can fight wars with them in their own territories, closer to their capitals. 

Through StratFor we also learn that why the US is actually not only not an expansive country but also that it does not need to be. It is possibly detrimental for the US to be expansive. The US philosophy is to invade a country, keep it conquered for a while, disrupt its critical infrastructure, such as communications infrastructure, grab the resources and try to get the hell out of the place as soon as the things begin to look bad. Good examples of this are Vietnam and possibly Iraq. 

But these are not the only things we learn from StratFor. It offers us a lot more interesting perspectives and rationale for stimulus various nations have in doing whatever they are doing. The recent US decision to not intervene in Syria is a very good case in this regard. It is quite important to understand the US perspective in this regard. 

The traditional impression in the Muslim world has always been that the US is out to get them. This is so possibly since the early 80s when the US was in a cold war with Russia and had Pakistan and Afghanistan allied to it. The jihad was alright and the relationships were cozy. But there was an air of distrust at least on the Pakistani side. In the Muslim world the US has always been perceived as a villain who is out there to grab resources of technologically impoverished countries no matter what it costed. Incidentally many Muslim countries rich in oil and petroleum resources such as gulf and Arab countries. This explained reasons for keen US interest in those countries and also stimulus for invading Iraq. It is worth emphasizing that the invasion of Iraq was always seen as an attempt to grab Iraqi oil reserves all over the Muslim world. 

Recently the US decided to not to intervene in Syria in wake of the chemical attacks by the Assad regime. It is interesting to see what could have prohibited the US from intervening in Syria this time. 

What happened was that president Obama had announced at some point that it would not interfere directly in Syria until chemical weapons were used. In saying this what he had actually done was that he had raised the bar for its involvement in such a matter. Despite this announcement chemical weapons were allegedly used by the Assad regime. This was possibly an attempt to lure the US into the conflict. And despite some international pressure, particularly from Russia, the US managed to keep away from getting involved in Syria. 

The question is that why did it do this? The answer is provided by StratFor's geopolitical weekly article Obama's tightrope walk, and a series of related reports on Syria. In this article the binary choice that US had in either getting involved or staying away from the conflict in Syria is presented as a moral problem. Use of chemical weapons was a morally bad idea and to stay quiet on this was morally bad on part of the US so something had to be done about this. This is interesting to see as a matter of looking at the American moral landscape. This is also important to understand. The other choice, that is not to interfere in the Syrian conflict, is complicated to look at from an American perspective. However, this has also had a moral perspective. The simplest explanation of this is that the US have been very deeply involved with the Muslim world for more than over a decade. Although they have tried very hard to reform them (for good, from their vantage point) but their efforts have not borne much fruition. As a result a choice was to leave the Syrians on their own and let them evolve while they try to handle their problems themselves. In the article it is also stated very clearly that if the US had gotten involved there would definitely be at least a few deaths and atrocities, as it was inevitable, and that the US would have to bear the blame for all that in the media and elsewhere. As a conclusion, the US abandoned a position of higher morality to choose a position of weaker morality with fewer political consequences and did not get involved in the action. 

This is extremely important to understand and to analyze. Understanding this could have collateral intellectual advantages, even if there weren't any monetary rewards. Specially if the problem of this binary choice is presented to a congregation of Muslims and tell them that the US had to ponder over it for a while to decide which way to go, either no one would believe that the US looked at it from a moral perspective, or people would be disinterested. On the other hand, if you ask people on as to who is messing up Syria, Libya or Egypt, chances are that a large number of Muslims would point to the usual suspect, the US. That is why it is important to at least prolong this discourse a little bit so as to develop a better reflection for the people and also to provide them with more light to reflect upon. It could be good for you to read on irrespective of which part of the world you are from. 

Any idea that the US can act morally in handling conflicts or solving wars in nearly incomprehensible in the Muslim world at least. Moreover, Muslims believe in the superiority of the morality of war of Islam as well as they believe in the superiorities of moralities of other aspects of Islam. But a theological discussion is beyond the scope of this article. The truth is that the US has acted a lot more responsibly in dealing with the episode concerning the chemical weapon attack this time specially as compared to its all the previous interactions and interventions in the Muslim world. This must be appreciated. This precedent could also set a trend that could be better for the future of the whole world. President Barrack Obama and his cabinet must be applauded for this decision.

The question is that why does the US have to intervene and find an intervention morally binding? Good intentions, if any, always get diminished under the smog of negative criticism and the potential animosity that the US invites as a result. This has been answered more comprehensively by George Friedman that there is a moral camp in the US too that finds it imperative to intervene and deal with issues in which oppression is involved and atrocities are inflicted. Irrespective of whether this camp of humanists belongs to the civil society or elsewhere, the camp is important and interesting in its own right. That this camp of humanists is actually humane should be taken for granted on the face value. And this camp should be kept engaged for better appreciating various cultural ideas. Such camps can be useful in bringing about meaningful changes in the overall political climate of our world.

StratFor teaches us many other things too. It is a stated policy of StratFor that they are non-partisan and unbiased in preparing and presenting geopolitical intelligence. They also state that they pledge to do this despite the fact that pure non-partisanship and objectivity are impossible. Of course, if you are a Cuban then most of your loyalties will be Cuba, no matter how much you tend to favor a party that is in conflict with Cuba. This is a decent expectation as well. National pride, patriotism and loyalty are emotions worth cherishing. To this end, StratFor lives up to its stated objectives as much as possible as well. Recently StratFor republished a 2005 article that it published in 2005 concerning possible Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and its permanent dilemma. The article was reposted in light of the recent death of Ariel Sharon. It is a very detailed and indeed enlightening article. In this article George Friedman admits that jews encroached the lands of Palestinians as an aftermath of the holocaust. George also throws considerable light on aspects such as the Israeli methods of reducing Palestinian presence in Israel, Gaza and elsewhere. This is commendable in its own right. It is commendable specially given that the US has almost unanimously been believed to be a backer of Israel in almost all of the Muslim world. Any acknowledgement from a mainstream American think tank that uses words like "encroachment" to state the nature of, well, encroachment of Palestinian lands by Israelis is not only commendable but also extremely surprising. It would be additionally very nice of StratFor to find a better word for the struggle of Palestinians for this type of extreme oppression. StratFor continues to use the word terrorism to color all sorts of actions of Muslims. Or either the term terrorism should be described more broadly. I think that this comment of mine is self explanatory and does not need any further explanation apart from the fact that I am not advocating terrorism but only asking for its application to be limited to contexts in which it is actually terrorism that is being referred to. Where the oppression against a group of human beings is so extreme that they have to retaliate with unusual means to express their discomfort, the word terrorism should either not be used or it should be stated that it is being used with slightly different connotation. That no matter how minute that difference in connotations is intended would be less meaningful than the expression of the gesture itself. 

StratFor teaches us many more things than geopolitics of conflict, or merely geopolitics itself. Elections don't matter, institutions do is a very enlightening article written by Robert D. Kaplan. Apart from learning that the author knows that prevalence of widespread bribery in countries where institutions are poorly administered, it is nice to know that how the various Western institutions work. It is indeed a very liberating personal experience to have lived in the European countries and to have interacted with their bureaucrats in various offices such as police stations and passport offices. In the Western countries if the state owes you a right, it delivers it you immediately without any further mention or hint of an extraordinary favor that has been done, possibly by going out of the way. Whatever is your right is yours and the personnel feel naturally obliged to deliver it to you irrespective of whether you are affluent or destitute, an orphan or a son of an influential bureaucrat does not matter at all. This is a beauty of the organization of the Western countries and their institution that no amount of admiration can do justice to its elegance. Honesty comes for free in the European countries with a smiling face. We should hope that this remains like this forever. We also hope that it would change in countries like Pakistan, Afghanistan and India as well.

Another relevant article is about American Public's Indifference to Foreign Affairs. It is a pity to learn that an average American does not even know how to locate various countries on the world map. Michael Moore covered this to some extent in his Fahrenheit 9/11. This article also depicts the same. That americans are merely bothered about what is happening in the world unless it really starts to bother them. As a matter of fact it is a good thing that they do start getting bothered when it needs to be bothered. Otherwise, rest of the world would be at complete and isolated mercy of American foreign policy.

One of the very interesting things about the above mentioned article is that american foreign policy is now bent on taking a more hands-off approach to overseas conflicts. This is incredible.  

StratFor also does not shy away from writing about seemingly minor issues that apparently have no relevance with geopolitics. Have you ever considered that what is the role of a calendar, that possibly only has an aesthetic value at best in our daily life, with the grand geopolitical schemes? StratFor thinks that it does. Read geopolitics of the Gregorian calendar to find the appeal of one calendar system over the others.

In Asian status quo one learns about the nature of conflict between the Japanese and the Chinese. For many people of the world this would be an altogether new thing. They resemble a lot and it is hard to tell apart a Japanese from a Chinese. Their languages also possibly sound similar to the novice. Why then a conflict? But don't Indians and Pakistanis look alike and speak almost the same language?

If you have a decent basis in finance, then new investment platforms raise questions about China's banking system is for you. This is fun to read. At least one develops a view of how financial markets function in wake of hostile banking systems. 

I shall bounce back to where I started this discourse. In the beginning we were talking about StratFor and its prediction of Russia's resurgence as a regional hegemony. Reports Ukraine's Increasing Polarization and the Western Challenge and Ukraine and the Little Cold War talk about how Russia is playing its hand in Ukraine. It is also worth noticing that how it affects the Western European countries. It is also quite interesting to read that how the US is shaping its behavior relative to it.

George Friedman used to write very well. He still maintains his tradition. Now StraFor has a whole team of seasoned writers with it. Robert D. Kaplan's articles are very enlightening and shows a picture from different perspectives. 

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  by  Achilli Family | Journeys 

Soft Power

If you have decided to read through this article a little bit then surely you must have read the title and you may have found it eye-catching. So lets do a small thought experiment before you go any further with your reading. Just close your eyes for a few seconds and think about what ideas come to your mind regarding the term "soft power". It really depends on the mental associations you may have developed with the term over the course of your life. Let me elaborate a little bit from the point of view of my conscious mind. There are actually two ideas that come to my mind by default as I try to contemplate about the term soft power. 

One way of thinking about soft power is process of dominating a group of people with the application of force, either covertly or overtly, with the help of some useful tools of force, such as military equipment. Moreover, to make use of effective incentives in a way that they are enwrapped in appropriate diplomatic wheedling of the group that is being coerced or motivated. And to do it so effectively that the party being dominated cannot refuse the offers that are being made to them. Clearly, this method of applying force resembles that of the people like mafia and  gang leaders. One thing that is obvious about this way of coercion or motivation (or whatever) is that no matter how much the group that is being dominated may be allured about the beauty of the offers, their decision to accept the deal may still be a function of the underlying threat and its consequences if they did not accept the offer.

The other idea that comes to the mind concerning soft power lacks the use any conventional tools of force. According to this theme a person, or a group of people, is motivated in doing what you want them to do in a way that they also love to do it. This is the theme of the paper titled soft power by Joseph Nye. It is basically a theory to make people want what you want them to do. This is quite obvious and self explanatory. This also makes a lot more sense too. The previous explanation given in the paragraph above is not really of soft power, but actually of hard power made to look like soft power.

This theory of Joseph Nye and his whole paper is very important in many respects. Late Samuel-P-Huntington also made passing references to the concepts of hard and soft powers respectively in his clash of civilizations. It has become quite important to comprehend this theory in order to understand the demands of the era we live in. In his paper Nye also gives rationale for why it is important to apply soft power, as opposed to hard power, when it comes to dominating people.

According to Nye the most important question while defining power is "Power to do What?" According to Nye in our times there would be overlapping yet disparate areas that would define a periphery of their own for exertion of power. For instance, while military remains one institution, economics is another independent institution with its independent power structure and interplay not only with its counterparts across borders but also with other disciplines like military and sports etc. Nye suggests that it would be the complex interplay among all such important institutions that would define and shape the geopolitics of our world. According to Nye this would also shape the geopolitical landscape from the vantage point of hegemony. Lastly, and quite importantly, according to Nye, this need for a complex interplay across important and independent institutions would also constrain the employment of hard-power based solutions. Thus, this would give rise to the need of adopting soft power based solutions. 

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  by  Dominic's pics 

Marriage for Beginners

As soon as I got Marriage for Beginners in my hands, I wondered why I should read a book like this specially immediately after reading clash of civilizations.After all both books belong to entirely disparate disciplines. One deals with the institution of marriage and the other is about international affairs and affairs surrounding them. However, I immediately decided to read the book for two reasons in my mind. 

Even though clash of civilizations contains a set of indicators and predictions on as to how various civilizations will interact, and possibly come in conflict, with each other in the future (which is possibly the era we are living in now), it is, nonetheless, a book about civilizations too. In order to understand a civilization it is important to understand its culture and social norms. And I think that marriage is one institution that comprises of a set of rituals through which a culture, and in return, a civilization can be understood fairly easily. 

Marriage for beginners is a marvelous book written by Mary Williams as a guide for newly weds. It covers all the small and deep nitty-gritty details that prospective candidates of marriage may want to know. She has covered almost everything one can think of coming across as a married person. This includes, all the dos and donts, how to cook, how to clean, how to shop, how to window shop, how to make a budget and how to do budget shopping. It also has lost of valuable advice for people getting betrothed. Small emotional aspects like how to live with parents, how to deal with in-laws when they are bad and good, how to have due regards for them when they are being supportive. The book also has quite large tables to assist the reader in planning various things such as budgets and things like that.

It is a very nice book, even though it is quite old (it was written in 1967). It advocates on the adoption of simplicity and austerity in living one's life. To this end, the book has a very nice agenda for grooming people. It is a suitable guide and a family manual for almost any time and era and for any family. It even talks about the role of religion and religious beliefs and rituals on overall happiness in a marriage. Ms Williams has a very peculiar way of conveying her ideas. On the role of religion she says something like that every religious person believes in a heaven and that pursuit of heaven should be made easy for that person on this earth. This comment is both very funny and profound. 

The other, and main, reason why I picked up the book so quickly was that I had a strong idea that it must have been written very nicely. Moreover, and due to this, reading this could be quite useful for improving on reading comprehension and consequently on English. The book is indeed very nicely written. The author has made a very balanced use of vocabulary. The writing style is very nice. And the author also has a very nice expression indeed.

I have to mention that this book was given to me by my mother who was about to give it away in charity (or sell it off as a cheap book) but then she changed her mind just at the spur of the moment. I am happy that she did change her mind.

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  by  firemedic58 

Will of God

Thinking too much has its own benefits and drawbacks like any other thing. Long time ago I used to have really excessive thinking habits. I used to think about almost any thing. Think about it for the while that if you are thinking for a very prolonged time on things that are seemingly so petty. Just think about it for a while that you restrain your natural spontaneity of carrying out apparently trivial tasks by devoting an additional portion of your thought process to, no matter what you do, to think about additional, and apparently, useless things. For instance, if you are thinking about on as to who has the control of your hands as you type in the keyboard. Or think about something so fruitless as when you are going to blink your eye next time as you read this article. Clearly, if you are trying to acquire conscious control over the timing of your eye blinks and, moreover, also thinking about some could-be consequences of that blink, you have naturally, unnecessarily, restricted yourself and there are many practical disadvantages about that. To name but a few, you have sacrificed your focus, attention and a great deal of enjoyment that you could otherwise have availed if you were not thinking like this. 

But think about it like this that there is a person who is trying to optimize his/her life and wants to take all the steps very carefully. If you are living in a socially perilous, for instance, you may also start thinking like this. Well, of course, you may not think about the consequences of your  each and every eye blink, or even a few of them for that matter, but you would definitely be wary of some other things. For instance, consider that you are living in an area that is highly prone to undergoing a bomb explosion. You will be quite watchful about most of the moves you make. You will be watchful about your surroundings as you go outdoors. And possibly, given to the lack of predictability, you might also wonder about the will of God in your moment by moment experience of life.

One may think that this is quite true about the highly religious people, irrespective of whether which religion they come from. That a religious person would be wary about the will of God in, say, predicting the favorability, or lack thereof, of outcome of things. However, one may argue that an atheist would also wonder about will of God, albeit in other ways, and often also possibly quite critically.

For instance, an atheist or an agnostic, or a student of theology for that matter, may wonder about the will of God in connection with his/her ability to step his/her feet. How did I acquire an ability to step my feet in the first place? That who does it, apart from me? How does it happen? How did I learn to step my feet in the first place? How can I become better at this? And for how long, in the distant future, I would be able to keep on doing this? All of these questions may be considered naive at times and cogent at others. However, they can be posed to pass time in a good way over a cup of tea.  

It may sound like a very naive idea to scribble down one's thoughts like this. However, while we wonder about a topic so esoteric, and apparently pointless, as whether or not we have free will or not, it also make quite a lot of sense to wonder about will of God. After all what the folk out there believe about free will is that human beings have free will and have all the freedom to do whatever pleases them. So why wonder about free will? One of the answers possibly is to dig deep into human personality.

Around a year ago I came across an article by famous Urdu writer and philosopher, lat Sufi Ashfaq Ahmad. Sufi Ashfaq Ahmad was worth listening to always and he was very highly educated and well travelled across the world. He was also extremely well read. The article I found was in his book Zaawiyya. It is a collection of his short stories, inspired by his sensitive experience of life. The article was titled Ahkaam-e-Ilaahi. Its literal meaning in English would perhaps be commandments of God. However, after reading the whole article and appreciating its theme, I would rather call it Mansha-e-Ilaahi, or Will of God in English. The crux of the article is as follows in my own words:

We see weird things happening around us in every day of our life. For instance, we see that a crooked person keeps on climbing the ladder of success as his life progresses (and also keeps on becoming more and more crooked). On the other hand, we also see a very nice, and possibly extremely pious, man drenching further into problems and so on. Sufi Ashfaq Ahmad argued that this phenomenon has been been widely studied both in the West and in the Orient. At the end he argued that West finds alternative reasons for it (such as studying it from different perspectives), oriental people refer to it as the will of God. 

I liked the approach of the writer a lot. Although what he wrote was not universally true, but he did make a point. Allah Karim!

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  by  eviljohnius 

Consequences of the Lament

In response to Reflections on Free Will, by Daniel C. Danett, Sam Haris wrote The Marionette's Lament. In this Sam refutes with the criticism of Daniel about his book Free Will. In the beginning Sam is quite vociferously reactive of the style and tone of Daniel's criticism. In particular Sam finds the reflections of Daniel quite sneering. This may not have been the case with an ordinary reader whose native language is specially not English. In reality, an ordinary reader may have been unglued by a lot of intricacies of the subject as soon as he/she may have started reading the reflections. For instance, on one occasion Daniel describes the reflections as a museum of mistakes. An ordinary reader may not have noticed it as sarcasm or ridicule. Sam did! And responded quite vociferously to it. The fact is that a reader whose native language is not English might have found it quite difficult to appreciate this and other such comments specially because of lack of familiarity with the sense of sarcasm used in the English language or English cultures. A museum is just a museum at the end of the day. And there are so many museums around the world. So why make so much of a big deal about a museum of mistakes, which is just another museum. Isn't it? Oops! I have started to sound like Al-Capone!

After addressing Daniels reflections Sam goes on to explain his own conception of free will. This is done specially nicely when he tries to change the topic in his section "changing the topic". Otherwise, at least I would still have been baffled about the notion of free will he is trying to project. Free will is free will at the end of the day and we all have it. Some of us use our free will in one way or the other depending on how we wish to choose. (More Al-Capone!)

Sam's vantage point becomes specially clear when he distinguishes between first person and third person experiences or influences that shape the personality of a person. For instance, according to what a common person may understand about his notion of free will can be explained with the help of the following example. 

Consider a person who has chosen to become a cobbler. He chooses to become a cobbler because he thinks that it is a benign man's profession. A man can mend shoes and also be safe from many a distractions and dangers in his daily life. All he needs to do is to learn to sew and stitch the shoes well. He hones his motor skills to suit for speedy stitching. This way he gets better and better at making/mending shoes and becomes better and wealthier day by day. Doing so he also evades many chances of getting involved in unnecessary conflicts he would have been involved in otherwise. Had he been a truck driver, he might have been dead already in a road accident. Had he chosen a more sociable profession, such as that of a car mechanic, for instance, he may already have been badly injured due to a dispute with a client or burnt due to exposure to radiator overheating. As a cobbler all he needs to do is to find a solitary corner, sit there and hone his skill to stitch shoes and not his own hands. Pretty safe!

Common man, or folk, would obviously think that the cobbler made some really nice decisions in his life and became what he became, a successful cobbler. Does not the cobbler then have free will? To the common man, he really has that. He thought about a career choice at some stage of his life. Then he took a step to starting working on that. And as he started working he also learnt to have better self control and added to that, better motor skills due to which he can stitch more shoes in a given span of time that he would not have done otherwise.

Sam argues that this is really the illusion of free will the common man, or folk, suffer from. Daniel comes along to agree with the folk for their respite. According to Sam's framework of free will, however, the cobbler exactly does not have that freedom. Sam would argue that the circumstances, that shaped the cobbler to become a cobbler, have/had been governing his decisions throughout. The external environmental threats and influences forced him to become a cobbler. For instance, the cobbler may have feared at some stage of his life that taking up a more sociable profession was hazardous for him in some sense. His yearning for personal security urged him to take a professional choice he would not have taken otherwise. What if the cobbler had wanted to become a news editor instead but was too shy to have become that.

Sam would also argue that the cobbler's yearning for becoming something other (a mechanic, a driver, or a news editor) than what he actually became (a cobbler) also does not show in any way that the person had any free will. All his desires emerged from circumstances and influences that were out of his control. To this end, Sam indeed does have a point and he also takes us out of the misery of endlessly wondering about the real point of his argument.

How does then Sam's theory of free will cope up with the cobbler's acquiring better motor skills. His decision to learn to become a better stitcher can be ruled out using the same reasoning as above to show that free will is an illusion. The fact that he somehow acquired motor skills can also be ruled out same way. It is just a part of his decision to learn better shoe stitching and since he made that decision under the influence of external factors (factors emerging from events happening in systems other than his self), he simply does not have free will. However, how about his experience of dextrous stitching. The experience one can observe fast, near perfect mechanism of stitching shoes, with almost no flaws. How does one account for this fast stitching process as one observes it as what Sam calls a moment by moment experience of life? Sam would argue that this also suggests that the cobbler does not have free will. 

The robot-like skills that the cobbler has acquired through years of hard work and practice also suffers from third person influences. Actually, as any experience does, it may as well suffer from bunch of external influences. 

Grave Consequences: By suggesting that people do not have free will what Sam intend's to show is that people cannot be held responsible for their actions. Here, Sam's intention can sound both innocent and astute at the same time. Does not it make sense to say that since people are not the ultimate designers of their decisions and actions, it is irrelevant to hold them responsible for what they do.

Actually Sam has a deeper point when he suggests this. In a meaningful sense, he wants to liberate people from many things, such as a sense of guilt and sin and to free them out of prisons when they have been considered wrong and morally defunct by the society and the judiciary. This is done by saying that since people do not be held responsible for their actions it is absolutely irrelevant to hold them responsible for what they have done. In some sense this is what it means.

It is, however, not understandable at this point that how Sam actually thinks or would propose a newer judicial system to look like. A person who has murdered now is considered a murdered presently and accordingly he is sent to jail. If Sam's framework became applicable at some stage, how would that take into account this aspect and the associated repercussions at some latter stage.

A Deeper Point: I thought about Sam's work for quite a while. I have been reading him for quite a few years now and I know that he is an atheist. Indeed, as it appears from his writings, it is one of the life goals of Sam Harris to systematically argue against religion and hence existence of God. I seriously hope and pray that that would change at some stage of his life. But this is not the point I am trying to make, it is just a comment. So, as Sam is an atheist, one can wonder that how would Sam argue about an act of, let us say, terrorism (a bombing or whatever, we know of many such things) committed by someone. In particular how would Sam argue about the action of the person in light of his framework of free will? This is a very cogent question indeed. If a person does not have free will and he has committed a heinous crime such as creating a huge bombing event, how would Sam propose a justification of that or of his conception of free will. I propose, that Sam would propose, that that person, like all the other people, also did not have any free will. The person did that under the influence of things that have influenced him over his lifetime. More explicitly Sam would argue that it is not the person who should be held responsible for his action. Instead, it is the religious teachings he had had during his lifetime that should be attributed responsibility to. In short, Sam would argue against the religion instead of the person. This point would have far reaching consequences specially if his theory of free will is to be taken seriously. Allah Karim!

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  by  BrynJ 

A Reflection on Reflections

I managed to read the "Reflections on Free Will" by Daniel C. Dannett twice. This is a review of the book of Sam Harris named Free Will. I read the book twice due to the concern that I may have missed the point. Keeping in mind to not to miss the point is very essential in my point of view specially concerning this type of philosophical work. There are at least three cogent reasons for keeping in mind that the point not be missed. 1) This is a very delicate topic. On a superficial level it may sound artistic and, thus, easy to comprehend, but in reality it demands a lot of attention. 2) Sam Harris is a very elegant writer. There is no doubt about that. In as much as there might be a lot of his critics, I am sured he is admired by many due to his way of writing and the way he translates his thought process on paper (or a computer based book or blog for that matter). I also admire his writing its style and content. He poses very cogent questions at times. But there is one thing about Sam Harris's writing style that at times it appears that he swings his whole argument. He moves his discourse in a sort of a spiral and comes back to square one. One may really wonder at that instant on as to what is his point. That is why I believe that it is very important to re-read and to try to fully understand what he has really written and implied. Pun not intended! 3) Sometimes we can be shallow readers. Our not too good reading comprehensions, short attention spans, lack of focus, time varying interest, and dwindling energy can actually play a role in us missing the whole point altogether in an otherwise such an engaging and lengthy discourse. 

However, reflections has been written by Daniel C. Dennett and not by Sam Harris. And this one is actually not very confusing. In reality it really demystifies many of the conceptual caveats one may have about the subject of Free Will (while possibly creating others in the form of various esoteric thought experiments or whatever). So the point number 2 (among the 3) listed in the above paragraph might not really hold true in this case. However, since reflections on free will is actually a reflection of the work of Sam Harris, point 2 might begin to hold true to some extent for this book as well.

So what is reflections really all about. Reflections refutes the argument of Sam Harris that free will is an illusion. What Daniel argues about is that we human beings really have free will. This is the whole idea of this book. However, I was interested in understanding the subject in a bit more detail and on a deeper level. I was interested in understanding if there is something really deep about the subject of free will. And indeed there are a few really deep things about the subject of free will. I shall point out three things here that I came across in the book for the purpose of brevity. The real purpose in writing this (sort of a) summary is to create a stub about the subject so that I can revisit it latter at some stage for my own perusal, at least. In what follows, I am trying to write my concerns from memory. The reason for this is that I am already trying trying to struggle with other distractions as I am writing this.

The first thing I have noticed and I find worth commenting and contemplating about has something to do with the mention of immaterial souls. In the start of reflections, Daniel tries to defend the position of Sam Harris by somewhat suggesting that when he asserts that human do not have free will, his theory applies to our immaterial souls. And since we do not have immaterial souls (and since we are just lumps of biochemicals), the theory does not apply to us. This is what I have inferred at least. I admit that I could be wrong. My understanding could be flawed. Specially since I am writing this from memory and I do not have the draft of reflections opened in front of me. My concern is that irrespective of the fact that we have immaterial souls or not, what would be the repercussions of applying a similar scrutiny that whether we have free will or not if we actually had immaterial souls.

The second aspect about the book is the spectrum of various positions we can assume between free will and determinism. I have still not really understood the deep meanings of various positions such as combatilism, incombatilism etc. I do understand that combatilism implies that determinism and free will are compatible; both of them can exist (I wonder if exist is the right word) at the same time. Incombatilism is the converse. It means if free will can happen, determinism is false and vice versa. The problem is that it is really important to deeply understand these notions.

The third is the understanding of free will. The position Sam assumes is that free will is an illusion. That I have decided to read about free will. That I may have wondered at some stage on as to what it really means to have free will. That I eventually managed to find some thinkable reading material on it. Eventually I am writing about free will now. According to Sam's framework, I was not really free in choosing to come up to this point. According to Sam, there must have happened events in my life that were beyond my control that may have urged, motivated or influenced me to do all of this. For instance, I may have been impressed by philosophy at some stage. And at some stage prior to that I may have been told that philosophy was an enterprise worth getting impressed about. Daniel has argued that this does not imply that we do not have free will.

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  by  Tomas Sobek 

Clash of Civilizations

Clash of civilizations has been on my reading list for a very long time. Fortunately, I managed to find a copy of its Urdu translation in my own house. Ideally I would have loved to read the English version. However, as soon as I found the book (in Urdu) I found it so much enticing that I did not really care whether it was in English or whatever. I hope that the translation does not violate any copyright laws. Otherwise it could give rise to a new dimension to this "clash of civilizations". The translation of the book has been published by a gazetted publisher, namely, Nigaarshaat Publishers, Lahore. It is written on the relevant page that the publisher owns the copyrights of the book. The author of the book is Samuel P. Huntington. The name of the Urdu translator is Abdul-Majeed Tahir.

So what is clash of civilizations really all about? Clash of civilizations is a theory about international conflict that is supposed to shape the political and social dynamics of the post cold war world. To this end, in as much as the book must have been a geopolitical prophecy at the time of its writing, it possibly represents the era we are living in right now. Or it might be alright to say that either we are living in the post- clash of civilizations era or that we are briskly headed to it. 

So what is the theory of clash of civilizations all about? The theory of clash of civilizations colors and classifies the human world according to cultural and civilizational distances. It looks at and further draws boundaries between groups of people through various vantage points. However the main markers or factors that are used to bind a group of people together and to draw boundaries between other groups are social in nature.

The author goes in great details in describing the nature of Western civilization. West, according to the author, is composed of Europe, North America and Latin America. Whatever is left is termed as the rest according to the author. The author further proposes that the clas of civilizations can also be supposed to be a clash between the West and the rest. 

The other major civilizations that are figured out by the author are the Muslim, eastern Asian and Subcontinental Indian civilizations. Eastern civilization according to him is led by China, under the influence of Confucianism and also contains other cultures such as Japanese and Taiwanese. The author also talks about Russian as an actor playing under the influence of Orthodox Christianity.

The author also talks about the tilt in balance of power between various civilizations. According to the author it appears that the West is loosing, or would loose, the power and superiority of its civilizational doctrine rapidly. This shift of balance appears to be more favorable particularly for China.

In terms of conflicts it is predicted that on a macro level the conflicts would be between the West and the Rest. Whereas on a micro level conflicts would happen between Islam and the rest. The author also talks about other factors related to inter-civilizational conflicts such as terrorism, nuclear proliferation and arms race. The author also suggests remedies and precautions that could sway, abate or dissuade the risks of conflicts. 

Obviously the book is more detailed than this small summary. It is indeed worth reading the book. It is particularly quite appropriate for the times we live in. 

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  by  T-Hino 

A Hospitable Hospital

Last year I was in Copenhagen. On one odd Sunday I had an unprecedented attack of asthma. I left my apartment early in the morning and went out looking for a hospital. Eventually I ended up in Ritz hospital while the asthma was on. I was sent off to the intensive care unit where a nurse immediately applied all the paraphernalia on me that was required to abate the intensity of the attack.  For instance, the nurse fixed an oxygen mask on my mouth and checked other things such as the blood pressure, and so on.

After that I was moved to Hvidovre hospital in an ambulance. This hospital is also located in Copenhagen. There I was given a room and a bed to sleep in. Adequate care was also taken about my illness. I lived there for around a couple of days (or nights). The doctors gave me appropriate inhalers and noted down my medical history properly. I was also given nice food. As a matter of fact, I remember, that on one occasion when a food menu was given to me, I inquired whether the meat was halal or not. I was assured that all the meet that was cooked in the hospital was halal keeping in view that the hospital was frequented by Muslims. I found it quite impressive.

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I stayed there for a couple of days and that time was quite relaxing. Similarly, a few months prior to that I also had a chance to spend a couple of nights in the same hospital (i.e. Hvidovre hospital). The reason was that a friend of mine was sick. He also had asthma. We went to the RedCross first. They have an office close the HovedBaneGarden (the central railway station of Copenhagen). The personnel at RedCross are also very friendly and extremely vigilant about the random patients that come to them. They sent us off to Hvidovre Hospital seeing the emergency of the poor plight of my friend. 

My friend was admitted immediately in the hospital. I remember that a funny doctor came in to see him. He had a complete look at his condition. He then weaved his hands in the air and told him, "I will not let you die tonight." To sum it up, he was also taken care of very well. I also stayed in the hospital with my friend. It is also worth mentioning that all of this nice treatment was given both of the times free of charge. This is to say that we were not charged any penny. And I believe that this is important to acknowledge.

Other people in the hospital were also very nice and humane. I am particularly very impressed by the egalitarianism of Europe in general. This was exhibited to a great extent by the staff of Hvidovre hospital and the RedCross. I hope that the vast majority of our country would also adopt this kind of service oriented attitude. I deferred writing about this for a long time. However, I believe that this is quite important to acknowledge such events and gestures in a reasonable manner.

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  by  t_scholz 

Does Willpower Exist

Almost for the past one month I have been thinking about writing about willpower. The idea may sound trivial to the casual reader. However, it is interestingly not so. Why am I interesting in writing about this curiously has a very cogent reason. That is that while we are not so sure about whether we possess free will or not, how can we assume that possess willpower.

Quite interestingly my curiosity has coincided with the recent publication of Daniel C. Dennetts Reflections on Free Will. Sam Harris recently wrote a book titled Free Will. In response to that Daniel wrote a possible rebuttal to that. I have not been able to read Free Will possibly due to shortage of time and lack of access to a decent library that would host such books. I am sure it must be a very interesting book. On the other hand Daniel's rebuttal also sounds promising. In Sam's own words the rebuttal itself is as long as the book. 

Luckily I have been able to give it an initial eye-ball, something that I could possibly only do given my tough routine over the past few weeks. Daniel has some very interesting reflections on Sam's notions of free will. I could not comprehend everything, but one definitely gets a good deal of an idea even through casual reading. It is interesting to note that both Sam and Daniel hold interestingly opposing positions on existence of free will. While Sam argues that we as humans do not have free will, Daniel proposes the converse. However, the argument is not that simple. It becomes quite obfuscated specially when we involve compatiblist and incompatiblist theories into account. It is true about me at least that I find a lot of things difficult to comprehend. It might not be true for many other readers (or students). However, I presume that a more focused reading may help in alleviating my problem of understanding the whole gamut of "free-will" "no-free-will" theories. 

Assuming this knowledge of free will as a basis one may pose another interesting question: Does willpower exist? Often we hear success stories about ordinary people who dealt with extra-ordinary situations and came out as victorious. We tend to say that so and so person has tremendous willpower simply because he/she struggled very hard against so many unprecedented and unfavorable circumstances and eventually came out as victorious.

Mountaineers climb high mountains. In the due course they fall off high and rocky cliffs. They get emotionally shattered and physically crippled. However, they do not give up on their ambition to climb. Is this determination and audacity an exhibition of willpower?

I stopped blogging almost a month ago due to other important chores that I was supposed to undertake. As I stopped blogging I made a vow to myself that I would think about a few ideas about writing and come back and write with more zeal and passion as soon as I got a new idea. The very fact that I have somehow managed to come back and written off this article, is this suggestive that I possess some level of willpower in some  meaningful sense? 

In order to understand this we would initially have to understand what willpower simply means. In its simplest interpretation willpower can mean the ability to execute one's will. To this end, one should have the ability to have will or to will, irrespective of how a philosopher may believe that it is suitable for us to have it or not. Anyhow, if we agree with Sam Harris that we do not have free will at all, how can we have willpower? 

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  by  joiseyshowaa 

Effective Rules For An Excellent Life

Effective rules for an excellent life is a very elegant book written by Hakeem Tariq Mehmood Ubqari Majzoobi Chughtai. Hakeem Tariq is the founder of Ubqari Trust. The book is about personal development and self help. It is a very nice resource for anyone who is looking for emotional well being and valuable tips for improving various spheres of life. It is quite worthwhile to present a short summary of the book.

The first thing is that this book is written from an increasingly Islamic point of view. It mentioned quite frequently that it is important for any human being to have firm faith in the existence of God and to submit to His divine will. Various examples are given from the life of Prophet Muhammad (may Allah's peace and blessings be upon him). People are generally advised top live their lives according to the tenets of Islam and by following the example of Prophet Muhammad (may Allah's peace and blessings be upon him). 

However, the author does not shy away from quoting events from the lives of other noteworthy and influential people. These include Buddha, Saint Paul and the work of Dale Carnegie, to name but a few. The book has a huge set of sections and chapters.

One of the first sections of the book discusses the power of the human mind. Various aspects of our conscious minds and sub-conscious minds are discussed. The author then goes on to suggest ways to develop a magnetic personality. Emphasis is paid on time management and energy saving.

One of the sections is dedicated to analyzing the consequences of bad habits in the light of teachings of Islam and modern science. The author then goes on to advocate that human beings should strive to develop piety and sobriety in their personalities. The author also discusses various familial customs in the light of Islam. The benefits of positive thinking are discussed. It is advised to develop a habit of positive thinking and enjoying life. Mental health and depression are also discussed in a great detail.

The author then moves on to work related aspects of life. it is advised to fully absorb in one's work and change working style if necessary. It is advised to adopt healthy and interesting hobbies. The author also emphases quite a lot on health and to develop a positive attitude towards life. Aspects such as analytic skills, risk taking tendencies, dedication and aims are discussed and valuable advice is given on as to how to adjust and channelize them in the right direction. The author also discusses about the importance of family planning in life.

The author also discusses issues such as inferiority complex and lack of self confidence and advises cures for them. The authors suggests ways to deal with stress and to adjust one's cor beliefs and ideologies. One of the great things the author suggests is that a person should stop doing a postmortem of the past in order to get rid of it. Just move on, is the advice!

The author also suggests a scheme for performing self hypnosis. Schemes for self analysis are also discussed. The author also suggests ways for adapting better colloquial skills. To this end, the examples of Hazrat Muhammad (may Allah's peace and blessings be upon him). The author also discusses psychological effects of lying. Rights of the humanity towards a human being are also discussed.

This is a remarkable book. Anyone who would read it would not regret the investment. It is specially suitable for the curious mind.

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Based on a work at http://www.psyops.tk/.
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  by  mikebaird 

Texsana Rens Og Vask

A close friend of mine, Muhammad Naveed Aslam, has a laundry in Denmark. A few months ago I told him about my rather new interest in writing and Internet marketing. I also told him that I wanted to create a website for him. I was particularly fond of writing good content for his website.  After some effort I created a website for his laundry in WordPress. The laundry is called Texsana Rens og Vask. It is located in Taastrup, Denmark. Actually it is just opposite the Taastrup S-tog station. It has a beautiful location and is very nice indeed. We also created a facebook fan page for the laundry as well. 

My friend offers a number of services at his laundry that are related to cleaning of clothes. He is also planning on creating a section on Genbrug where he would buy and sell used clothes. That would be really nice indeed.

The really good thing about my friend is that he is extremely generous. The other day an old nice Danish lady came to the laundry. She had to take her clothes. Somehow she did not have enough money with her to pay the dues. She complained that she could not pay since she was on a pension. Naveed gave her a huge concession seeing her condition. She was quite impressed and happy. It was quite nice to see her leaving happily.

Anyhow, it was fun to create and write content for his website. If you like the website, its outlook, its content and also its facebook fan page, please do not forget to click on the like button.

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  by  frankdouwes 

Right to Die

I just came across a news story that has got something to do with terminally ill peoples' right to die possibly with the aid of a doctor. I have not read the complete story. However, I understand the crux as it is a familiar one. 

This is a familiar story because a few months ago I read a similar story concerning an Irish ex-lecturer named Marie Fleming. I hope she is alive and gets better soon. At the time of reading she was suffering from multiple sclerosis. As much as I have an idea about this disease is that it renders the person totally dysfunctional and ambulatory. The whole story was sad as the whole family had appealed to the Irish supreme court for her to be given the right to die with assistance. This is indeed ironic specially concerning that the most instinctive of the human desires is to actually live and not to die. However, I presume that when pain overrides pleasure, people's desires shift.

At the time when I read the story I tried to find her contact details through the Internet. I was not fortunate enough to have found something valuable to that end. Finally I did manage to find the contact details of a few important personnel belonging to some Irish society of multiple sclerosis. I mailed a lot of them. I even called a couple of them on phone. The response I got from them was, however, not at all prompt or encouraging. 

In the process of finding those details I also came across a facebook page for a Canadian organization called Dying With Dignity. They help people in dying with some assistance. It is assisted suicide of some sort.

The reason I called them was that at the time when I came across the news, I was also listening to a lecture by Ubqari Institute. In the lecture, Allama Hakeem Tariq Mehmood Chughtai told the listeners that if a person having any sort of neurological illness listened to surahs (chapters) At-Taghaaban and Ar-Rehman (the Beneficent) of the Holy Quran, he/she would heal. I do not remember now that for how long these should be listened to. I think it was recommended to listen for 41 days regularly and possibly 41 times daily. I am posting links to these surahs below. You can also download an audio file containing both of these surahs from the website of Ubqari. The audio file is designed to play one surah in one ear and the other in the other. Click here to download. Please appreciate the fact that recitation of the Holy Quran is in itself quite euphonic. Also try to read the translations. They are also nice.

So this was the reason I was trying to call them. Another thing I wanted to share was about death itself. One of the surahs of Quran is called Yasin. One of the functions of this surah is that if this recited close to a dying man, the process of death becomes easy. The dying person dies a peaceful death. A link to surah Yasin is also below.

If you or someone you know are suffering very badly then spiritual shower is for you. It is really good for instantaneously feeling good. Again you can read the pages of Ubqari magazine for many prescriptions for treating incurable diseases. There are many herbal as well as spiritual philters and prescriptions etc. that are really nice. 

Check this out on Chirbit

The reason I refrained so much from posting this information here is that at the end of the day I do not feel like posting so much stuff pertaining to religion here. I felt that I should write about something else. However, I hope that this message would be sent across to the ears of Marie Fleming and the likes. May Allah forgive us all for our sins and remove hardships from us through his endless blessings.

On a separate note, there is no harm in listening to these videos specially if you are so much willing to die. Why not do something like listening to the Holy Quran before taking the last breath. What is the harm after all. May you live long though. And if you know Marie Fleming or anyone in her family in any way, please convey this message to her.

Death is inevitable. This is how a really sad letter titled approaching death by a late Toronto based lawyer, Edward Hung, begins. It is very sad indeed to read how he died and that he had to travel all the way to many places around the world to get himself cured as well as to arrange for someone to take his life. It is a pity that he had to die such a tragic death. So if death is so much inevitable and there is a person out there who is so eager to die, then why not try something different even if it is only for a while. Moreover, it is absolutely free.

 

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  by  andrewosterberg 

Mind Wandering

Consider that you are sitting in a large room around a dining table. In the room there are a handful of happy people. There are also a few familiar faces that you have not seen in a while. They are possibly your friends and relatives. The room is ornate with candles and balloons and the table is adorned with gifts, refreshments and a nice birthday cake. Everyone is happily clapping and singing birthday carols. You are their center of attention. But there is something wrong about the whole event. That is that you are not quite there. 

Numerous situations like this can be recollected. In an important meeting when you are supposed to pay attention to the minutes, you are mentally in your office. While you are bathing in the washroom, you are thinking about the badminton court. And while driving your car, you are cribbing in your mind about that comment your boss punningly made at your attire last week.

If you are suffering from a problem like this that wherever you are present physically, your mind has flown away to somewhere else, then you are suffering from mind wandering. Mind wandering can be a desirable quality on one hand and it can be quite dangerous behavior on the other.

Of course if you can naturally stretch your imagination about matters meriting some significance in times when you had otherwise been sitting idle, you can possibly use those moments to solve some important problems. Consider about the ample time you may have while you are traveling in a bus to get to work. If your mind wanders during the journey to the technical caveats of your work, you may as well find a solution to your professional issues. 

However, mind wandering can cost you a substantial price too. For instance, think about those cribbing thoughts you may have had about the sarcasm of your boss at your dress. Had you extended that thought train a little bit further and developed an argument, it may not only have become a cause for loosing your job, it could have been life threatening too if you had lurched your car on the road as a result of that mental aggression.

Research suggests that the posterior cingulate cortex of our brains is responsible for this type of behavior. Research also suggests that with continued meditation this region of the brain can become rich in gray matter density. An attribute that is responsible for lesser mind wandering. Research also suggests that there is an inverse correlation between mindfulness meditation and mind wandering. Do you wonder where you can find good recipes for developing mindfulness? Consider sufism, dhikr and meditation as cures.

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  by  Samuel Peters