Tolerance is tricky when it comes to applying it to our daily living. As a humanist, I find myself struggling to keep my compass oriented toward goodness while trying to differentiate between ‘wanting’ good and ‘imposing’ it. There is also this incentive to check my moral outrage from aligning with bigots who can use myContinue reading “The Tolerance Paradox”
Category Archives: Skepticism
Coming Out As a Non-Believer
Coming out to our loved ones – and this is imperative – only whose feelings matter to us and who love us truly – is a difficult thing for most nonbelievers. For the rest of the world, our disbelief shouldn’t really generate much angst. But with loved ones, the act requires you to have clarityContinue reading “Coming Out As a Non-Believer”
Oblivion
We humans are wired to be lazy. Evolutionarily, we conserve energy. Calories were expensive. Our nervous systems evolved to reward efficiency. We prefer shortcuts. We automate habits. We stick to routines. We resist change. We jump to conclusions. We use tools. We assume patterns. We adopt group opinions. We follow fashion. We avoid difficult conversations.Continue reading “Oblivion”
The Singaporean Experiment
Singapore is by most measures a very successful country. It is an economic powerhouse ranking as one of the most open and globally competitive countries with strong financial and manufacturing sectors. It boasts one of the world’s highest GDPs per capita and strong economic stability across all social strata. It is a major player inContinue reading “The Singaporean Experiment”
No Harm, No Foul?
I’ve come to a place where I don’t feel the need to fight every belief anymore. As long as a belief isn’t harming someone, physically, psychologically, or financially, I’m okay letting it be. And that’s a big shift for me, because I used to think that bad ideas had to be confronted everywhere, all theContinue reading “No Harm, No Foul?”
Beyond Science?
Humanity’s singular gift to itself, Science, the systematic pursuit of knowledge through cumulative faculties of observation and experiment, is not an institution but a method – a disciplined way of knowing that transcends cultures and epochs. At its core, science is a neutral compass: observe, hypothesize, test, falsify, refine. It does not care for values,Continue reading “Beyond Science?”
Dissonance-led Deconversion
Some beliefs hold on to us, even after we have dropped them, simply because we grew up with them. Also because the people closest to us hold on to them. These are organised in cohorts of functional heuristics that are deeply entrenched into our psyches. Fear-based admonishment is one such embedded belief- retention premise. DeliberatelyContinue reading “Dissonance-led Deconversion”
The Past Tense
Be wary of insecure people who look backwards into foggy memories of their past and claim those were the good times. These are incomplete musings of the fortunate who form the majority of our society’s demographic. Heavily dosed with innumerable biases, such memories are selective and most times don’t feature the unpleasant, or as aContinue reading “The Past Tense”
Thoughts on Hinduism
As someone raised within the deep folds of India’s Hindu culture, I am frustrated when non-Indians draw parallels from the Abrahamic religions to Hinduism, assuming a one-to-one, monolithic correlation… and right away stumble in their understanding. I don’t claim to have exclusive ‘insider’ status as a commentator particularly since I don’t reside within the geographicalContinue reading “Thoughts on Hinduism”
Ignorance, thy name is God.
The more we know, the less we need a god. The more we grow, the lesser god becomes. The more light shed on our past, present and future ideas, the duller the notion of god shines. The more bridges we build across conflicting systems of human welfare, the more god justifications fall through the gaps.Continue reading “Ignorance, thy name is God.”
My 2 cents 