Five days from today, a letter will go under an auctioneer’s hammer. No big deal about this except that this letter was written by one of the world’s most influential scientists to one of the world’s well-known philosophers. The content: views on god. The opening bid: $3 million, though it could fetch many times that amount. Read more

As the backlash against Innocence of Muslims, a film on Islam, gains political momentum across geographies, I wonder whether the key driver of this violence, this intolerance is really a fragility, and not the protection, of the world’s second-largest faith. Read more

Come, dear sisters and brothers
Let’s rejoice on this anniversary
And celebrate our perversions Read more

Not sure whether it’s serendipity or destiny, I’m inclined towards the latter. Over the past few months, I have been thinking actively about learning Sanskrit. The reason is just one: having read almost every volume written in English, finally I want to be able to read and enjoy the Mahabharata and the Vedas in their own language, perhaps even attempt a translation of my own. It is difficult for me to call it the language of the Gods, but there is something magical in the power of its words. Read more

In my column today (Save social media from itself, put an end to anonymity), I argue that anonymity in the virtual world — the one armour that hostiles on the Internet use to create trouble, chaos and even public disorder as we saw recently — must end. Blame it on technology, its falling cost, its abuse, but if we take a few steps within, the problem remains human. Read more

Every year, as India celebrates Independence Day, there is one hero who escapes our attention. Today, on India’s 65 I-Day celebrations, a minute of deep silence — Silence — on the 140th birth anniversary of freedom fighter and spiritual guru Sri Aurobindo, whose words, ideas and actions will outlive history. Read more

How silly of me, how naïve! All this while I was thinking that the practical ban — not a legal one, please note — on Peter Heehs’s biography of Sri Aurobindo was because a few people felt he “denigrated” this great poet-seer. Read more

The angry Hindu will read Hinduism in a particular way. He will quote selectively from the Bhagwad Gita, the Vedas and the Upanishadas. He will breathe technology into shlokas and “prove” that India was a super-advanced nation millennia ago. Read more

I’m still not sure about how the Higgs boson is anywhere close to god, but if hundreds of millions of people, across the world believe that there is an inexplicable divinity around this particle, I suspect a new religion is on the way. The poor particle and its team of physicist-creators may explain the phenomenon in hundreds of ways, but the forgotten fact remains that every frontier of science opens up new doors to the unknown. Read more

As the power of organising societies evolved from primitive groupings based on fear and incentives to complex networks powered by science and reason, the role of religion has for all practical purposes become irrelevant to public discourse. Read more