Ancient India was better than Present India! Why?

Member • Jul 8, 2011

Anoop!!! Awesome... 😀

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Member • Feb 10, 2012

2 days back I heard this shola and started thinking about it. This is the first shloka recited when doing Surya Namaskar since thousands of years . On the first glance it appeared to be praise of Sun God. But it isn't so.
It says, that Sun (सवितृ)is the center of Solar system (सवितृ मंडल ). We should focus here. This is where God reside(नारायण...does it mean energy?).

Or when we say God runs solar system, does it refer to gravitational pull of Sun?
ध्येय: सदा सवितृ मंडल मध्यवर्ती |
नारायण सरसिजा सनसन्नि विष्टः||
केयूरवान मकरकुण्डलवान किरीटी|
हारी हिरण्मय वपुर धृतशंख चक्रः||

Now I have only badly translated it. But I guess there is a deep meaning. It also means that when western world was arguing about Earth being center, we already knew about center of Solar system. There is lot of potential in decoding various Sanskrit Shlokas.

I guess we also knew about the fuel (नारायण)which is present in the sun (Hydrogen-Helium conversion...did we or no?)
These Mantras need to be decoded.

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Member • Feb 10, 2012

Anybody heard of katapayathi sankya?

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Administrator • Feb 10, 2012

Replying to the title of the topic:

Answer: Because people didn't booze. 😨

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Member • Feb 10, 2012

The_Big_K
Replying to the title of the topic:

Answer: Because people didn't booze. 😨

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Member • Feb 10, 2012

We cannot assume that India had all kinds of advanced technology simply bcause some scriptures mention things. A detailed study of the dating of weapons showed that sling shot was about the most dangerous weapon available at the time the Mahabharata Kurukshetra war took place.
If Rama used the gravity defying Pushpak Vimana to travel back to Ayodhya, why did he have to build the Sethu? Why was not air travel commercialised?

There are many such contradictions in ancient Indian literature. It may be that these were written by Isaac Asimovs and A.C.Clarkes of a bygone era.

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Member • Feb 10, 2012

bioramani
We cannot assume that India had all kinds of advanced technology simply bcause some scriptures mention things. A detailed study of the dating of weapons showed that sling shot was about the most dangerous weapon available at the time the Mahabharata Kurukshetra war took place.
If Rama used the gravity defying Pushpak Vimana to travel back to Ayodhya, why did he have to build the Sethu? Why was not air travel commercialised?

There are many such contradictions in ancient Indian literature. It may be that these were written by Isaac Asimovs and A.C.Clarkes of a bygone era.

Absolutely agree with Bioramani sir on this one.
My stance is that India had a great civilization comparable to the ancient Greeks . I feel we should be proud of what we had but we should not boast that we had developed technology superior than todays.
I will quote myself from another post on what all we should be proud of :-

circularsquare
Some examples include - literature such as Mahabharata , Ramayana ; philosophies such as Upanishadas ; poets such as Kalidasa ; unknown sculptors who built magnificent temples all over India ; mathematicians such as Aryabhatta ,Varahamihira , Brahmagupta ; doctors such as Sushruta.And finally men of strong character in all ages - Buddha , Mahavira , Shankaracharya , Madhavacharya , Vivekananda , Gandhi , the list is endless.

We do our ancestors a disservice by not sticking to sincerity and by attributing them imaginary achievements (imaginary because of lack of evidence ,nothing else) ; or by focusing on those ancient sciences which don't stand the test of modern science such as Astrology and other psychic mumbo jumbo.

Most of the stuff in the scriptures is metaphorical. And we should applaud our ancestors to have been the Isaac Asimovs and A C Clarkes and Jules Vernes of their era. But we shouldn't appropriate to them technologies which didn't exist.

There is one major logical flaw in postulating that Indians had developed Pushkara Vimana and what-not.
Why oh why did our country have to face so many invasions from every place imaginable in the past 2000 years ? Where was this arsenal of nukes and aircrafts which our great(^100)- grandfathers had developed ?

There are even such extreme schools of thought on this issue which claim that all evidence of the weapons were destroyed as our ancestors turned to spirituality. Such a claim is non-scientific as it is non-falsifiable.

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Administrator • Feb 10, 2012

...why am I being reminded of the movie "No One Killed Jessica?" - because no one saw the murder. 😨

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Member • Feb 10, 2012

bioramani
We cannot assume that India had all kinds of advanced technology simply bcause some scriptures mention things. A detailed study of the dating of weapons showed that sling shot was about the most dangerous weapon available at the time the Mahabharata Kurukshetra war took place.
If Rama used the gravity defying Pushpak Vimana to travel back to Ayodhya, why did he have to build the Sethu? Why was not air travel commercialised?

There are many such contradictions in ancient Indian literature. It may be that these were written by Isaac Asimovs and A.C.Clarkes of a bygone era.

I don't think Sling shot was the only dangerous weapon. I have heard that Chanakya aka Kautilya devised method of making bombs. He worked on making an explosive chemical mixture.

Ashoka summoned his intelligent people and made air crafts. Although he later on decided to keep it a secret so that they should not fall in wrong hands.

As for Aircrafts, Ram did not have any aeroplane. Ravana had it. So while going to Lanka, Ram made Sethu (which is said to exist even today). After conquering Lanka, he went to Ayodhya in Pushpak (aeroplane).

See basically I am not trying to say that we were very great people. But if the scriptures are decoded, we ought to find something concrete. Like Praveen say the KATAPAYADI sankhya (The value of Pi).

I guess Vedas are a source of that forgotten knowledge. It is worth a try. 😀

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Member • Feb 10, 2012

The_Big_K
...why am I being reminded of the movie "No One Killed Jessica?" - because no one saw the murder. 😨

Can we decode this sentence first? 👀

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Administrator • Feb 10, 2012

Issue
Can we decode this sentence first? 👀

It's not that difficult. Just because we don't have evidence...

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Member • Feb 10, 2012

Issue
See basically I am not trying to say that we were very great people. But if the scriptures are decoded, we ought to find something concrete. Like Praveen say the KATAPAYADI sankhya (The value of Pi).
😀

There is evidence for approximate value of pi being known to Indians :-

chaturadhikaM shatamaShTaguNaM dvAShaShTistathA sahasrANAm AyutadvayaviShkambhasyAsanno vr^ttapariNahaH.
Add 4 to 100, multiply by 8 and add to 62,000. This is approximately the circumference of a circle whose diamenter is 20,000.
i.e
correct to four places. Even more important however is the word "Asanna" - approximate, indicating an awareness that even this is an approximation.

<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C4%80ryabha%E1%B9%AD%C4%ABya#Significant_verses" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">%C4%80Ryabha%E1%B9%Ad%C4%Abya Significant Verses</a>

Evidence for a considerable amount of Mathematics in ancient India exists.
No one is denying greatness of ancient India.

Issue
Ashoka summoned his intelligent people and made air crafts. Although he later on decided to keep it a secret so that they should not fall in wrong hands.

This is just the sort of claim which is non-scientific because it can't be falsified.

<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falsifiability" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Falsifiability</a> or refutability of an assertion, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypothesis" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Hypothesis</a> or <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Theory</a> is the logical possibility that it can be <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contradicted" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Contradicted</a> by an observation or the outcome of a physical experiment. That something is "falsifiable" does not mean it is false; rather, that if it is false, then some observation or experiment will produce a reproducible result that is in conflict with it

And someone please explain why India had to face invasions from Greeks , Mongols , Huns , Turks , Moghuls , Portuguese , British , etc. If they had developed aircrafts before these others surely they could be used in warfare. Or was defending one's own nation from invaders against the supremely pompous principle of non-violence ?

Any developed nation will have to think twice in the modern age before attacking India as we can do considerable damage too using our nuclear weapons. This is what is known as 'deterrent' , and it was absent in Ancient India. 😔 😔

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Member • Feb 11, 2012

I am not disclaiming the great developments in mathematics that Indians achieved as in medicine and surgery. Just think of it. Even with a geocentric concept, working out the apparent orbits of planets - some of which have to have a retrograde motion - was a major feat. They could predict eclipses with great accuracy.
Before the current spate of engineered molecules, Ayurveda did have medicines like Sarpagandhi (Serpasil of Western medicine derived from the same plant) for hypertension as well as drugs for diabetics. The surgical practice and tools developed were really good.
The last and 18th Purana called Brahmanda Purana describes how the whole universe came from a small egg that exploded.
My contention is that to claim that they thought of Big Bang based on this is untenable because the rest of that scripture goes into a pantheon of divine personalities.
India also seems to have gone through a Dark Age when we seem to have lost quite a bit of know how.

However, there is quite a bit of chaff with the grains of wheat.

Daal mein kuch kaala hai

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Member • Feb 11, 2012

bioramani
The last and 18th Purana called Brahmanda Purana describes how the whole universe came from a small egg that exploded.
My contention is that to claim that they thought of Big Bang based on this is untenable because the rest of that scripture goes into a pantheon of divine personalities.

A slight digression :-
I would like to add that the Big Bang is not an explosion in the normal sense of the word.
Whenever a bomb explodes the volume of space which the matter occupies increases but no change occurs in space as such.
But in the case of Big Bang space itself expands. That is to say the distance between any two objects increases. And the farther they are the more the distance between them increases.

An exploding bomb has a surrounding space to expand into. Whereas in case of Big Bang the expanding 'space' doesn't have anything 'outside' it to expand into , since what could be 'outside' the Universe.

An interesting read from Scientific American :- #-Link-Snipped-# .

Anyways my point is , this is definitely not what the verse in the Brahmanda purana implies.

The big bang theory is not the final word in cosmology , as initial boundary conditions are yet unexplained. There are many competing theories currently doing the rounds.

That some of them matches one or the other theology is a matter of coincidence. For example , the cyclic universe model will always be compared to our theology.

Since the past 3-5 millennia there have no doubt been various hypotheses produced around the world , only in today's age have we built the technology which can lead us forward to verify some of the hypotheses :-

1) <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilkinson_Microwave_Anisotropy_Probe" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe</a>
2) <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planck_(spacecraft)" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Planck (Spacecraft)</a>

The major difference between ancient science and modern science is the importance given to fact verification.
The ancients all over the world used to feel real knowledge can be gained via thought alone hence subjects such as Mathematics were very well developed.
The modern scientists feel some knowledge can be obtained only via experiments i.e the knowledge of facts.

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Administrator • Feb 11, 2012

By the way, did anyone of us even consider the innovation India's done over the ages in cooking? I'm quite confident that Indians know more number of recipes than any other region in the world. Am I right? Kitchen is one of the biggest laboratories in the world - believe it or not.

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Member • Feb 11, 2012

The_Big_K
By the way, did anyone of us even consider the innovation India's done over the ages in cooking? I'm quite confident that Indians know more number of recipes than any other region in the world. Am I right? Kitchen is one of the biggest laboratories in the world - believe it or not.

One of the best things about Indian cooking is the emphasis on using whole wheat to make the Indian bread - i.e rotis. Many foreign countries are now waking up to the advantages of whole wheat. Earlier they used to eat white bread only.

Of course , the biggest innovation India has done to cooking is in the vegetarian cuisine. No other country must be having so many dishes at least in the vegetarian menu.

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Member • Feb 11, 2012

The_Big_K
By the way, did anyone of us even consider the innovation India's done over the ages in cooking? I'm quite confident that Indians know more number of recipes than any other region in the world. Am I right? Kitchen is one of the biggest laboratories in the world - believe it or not.

I agree fully. India's kitchens do constitute a giant cauldron of nutritional development.
With a huge geographical spread, regional vegetables and grains and cultural mix has really created a 5000 year old cooking pot.
I have not heard of any other country's medical practice that classified foods under Saatvic, Rajasic and Tamasic categories. Indian cuisine uses extensively spices of various kinds. Many of these are now being proved by modern nutrition research as preventing cholesterol deposition, controlling obesity, reducing cancer proliferation and such. Onions and garlic have been shown to increase athletic stamina and improve energy bursts (Rajasic). Turmeric and garlic also modify clotting of blood by current thrombosis research.

The vegetarian dishes with heavy emphasis on pulses and beans effortlessly takes care of protein supply.

During my protracted sojourn in the four southern states, I found that each region developed a cuisine that handles the local climate and food that grows best in that region. I also found that problems start when regional cooking gets 'exported' to other states. All of Andhra cooking does not suit Tamilnadu or Kerala.

Indian cooking has hundreds of ways of titillating the taste buds. Toor daal has a built in ajinomoto kind of taste enhancer.

One can say about Indian Cooking what Shakespeare said about Cleopatra: Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale her infinite variety.

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Member • Feb 11, 2012

I would like to ask how many of the people here are vegetarians ? Earlier I used to consume meat once a month on average. I have even stopped that since 4 years.
I am ovo - lacto vegetarian i.e I consume eggs , milk and vegetables.

I think India is the only country with so many vegetarians . Average meat consumption per capita per year for India is 3-4 kgs while for USA is 70-80 kgs .

There may be very few people in India who consume meat everyday. Majority of those who are non - vegetarians consume it once a week.

How many of you feel that the world's hunger problems could be reduced if more people turned vegetarian ?
I asked this question once on a forum where majority of people were from USA and they replied that the problem doesn't lie with the world not having enough food but with there not being proper distribution channels. I didn't buy their argument.

Have a look at these :-
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_effects_of_meat_production#Water_resources" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Environmental Effects Of Meat Production Water Resources</a>
the ratio of water requirement for a protein rich soybean to that of beef is 1:8.

Even if hunger problems aren't solved ,don't we owe it to the Environment at least. And in this I think India can play a significant role in teaching the world vegetarianism.
I am not saying people should become abstinent but at least they should reduce meat consumption by a factor of 5. Anyways red meat is not good for the heart.

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Member • Feb 11, 2012

Quote:Have a look at these :-
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_effects_of_meat_production#Water_resources" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Environmental Effects Of Meat Production Water Resources</a>
the ratio of water requirement for a protein rich soybean to that of beef is 1:8. Endquote

1 kg rice represents a virtual water volume of about 2000 litres in the traditional method of agriculture. Israel has developed methods to minimise this. We should spend time on this aspect of agriculture in India.

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Member • Feb 11, 2012

Sadly, agriculture in India is largely dependent on the quirks of Jupiter / Zeus / Indra - i.e on rainfall.

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Member • Feb 11, 2012

circularsquare
Sadly, agriculture in India is largely dependent on the quirks of Jupiter / Zeus / Indra - i.e on rainfall.

My concern is about the use of ground water.

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Member • Feb 11, 2012

A vegetarian diet is mostly derived from plants.
Aren't the vegetarians cutting down plants to feed themselves? Even more plants are cut to feed the farm animals.
So who are the real 'killers' here?
Herbivores who eat the plants?
Carnivores who eat other animals?
Humans who eat both?

Quoting this from a #-Link-Snipped-#:

The foremost reason people are vegetarians is that they do not want to harm animals. This is actually a superficial, and incomplete description of what's actually at play here: We are empathetic creatures, more so than many species that live on this planet. What this means is that we have mental faculties that allow us to feel the pain others feel. Essentially the act of not harming another animal, is leading to a reduction in harm to the self; more so since harming plants does not appear to cause the same reaction, simply because the pain is not visible to our intuitive senses.

You eat plants and once upon a time these plants lived too. It's JUST how Nature made it - one living being can't survive without the sacrifice of another being, whether it's animals or plants.

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silverscorpion

Member • Feb 11, 2012

Dancer_Engineer
A vegetarian diet is mostly derived from plants.
Aren't the vegetarians cutting down plants to feed themselves? Even more plants are cut to feed the farm animals.
So who are the real 'killers' here?
Herbivores who eat the plants?
Carnivores who eat other animals?
Humans who eat both?

The issue is not whether vegetarians are killers or not..
The issue is that non-vegetarian food requires more resources than vegetarian food, at the end.

Say, u grow a goat from birth until maturity and then you slaughter it for food. The amount of resources you must have spent for its food and maintenance, the space and the water used for growing that food, etc.. must be calculated. The point mentioned here is that the same amount of resources, when used for producing vegetarian food, will be able to feed more number of people than that goat will be able to do.

So, from an environmental perspective, veg food is better sustainable in the long run than is non-veg food. Seeing from a moral or a humanitarian perspective, yes, plants do have a life and they suffer when cut too. But seeing that we humans unfortunately can't prepare our own food, we need some source to sustain ourselves. And eating plants is better for all of us in the long run, is the point conveyed here.

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Administrator • Feb 11, 2012

@dancer_engineer: You've just reignited the age old debate between the vegans and non-vegans. But I think it's no longer a debate anymore.

First, the parts of the plants that are most used in vegan diet are the ones that are meant to be picked: Leaves, fruits - and they grow again. The nature's designed it in that manner. I doubt picking a flower or a fruit actually 'hurts' the plant. The parts that are meant to be discarded do not hurt. Example: Cutting hair or nails won't does not hurt us. Same analogy should follow with the plants.

Second, man is not designed to be carnivore. There are several factors that point to it. We do not have claws, teeth & intestine like carnivores. Human digestion system has been designed to consume plants; not flesh.

Carnivore animals would not store food in their stomach for long time because the meat starts decaying very quickly. While humans store it for longer durations - basically means we're herbivore. Monkeys (I think at least the ones we evolved from) eat plants & fruits, not flesh. It's just the lazy and intelligent brain of us humans that we set our eyes on animals.

Third, as silverscorpion pointed out - humans *can't* eat raw flesh. Has anyone tried eating fresh fish just out of water? But you *can* eat an apple picked from the tree. Again points to humans being designed to be vegans.

Fourth, I'm quite convinced that ancient India was all vegan. The variety of food items can be grown in almost every part of it. It's unlike most part of the world where you don't have much option than potatoes.

Fifth, non-vegan dishes involve plants + animals : More killing, right?

Sixth, killing animals is cruel. Picking fruits from plants isn't. Removing nails isn't cruel; removing a complete body part is.

Seventh, I think it's common sense to be a vegan. It's healthy & offers more protein than non-veg food. To hell with the 'protein deficiency' thing among vegans.

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Ankita Katdare

Administrator • Feb 11, 2012

The_Big_K
@dancer_engineer: You've just reignited the age old debate between the vegans and non-vegans. But I think it's no longer a debate anymore.

First, the parts of the plants that are most used in vegan diet are the ones that are meant to be picked: Leaves, fruits - and they grow again. The nature's designed it in that manner. I doubt picking a flower or a fruit actually 'hurts' the plant. The parts that are meant to be discarded do not hurt. Example: Cutting hair or nails won't does not hurt us. Same analogy should follow with the plants.

Second, man is not designed to be carnivore. There are several factors that point to it. We do not have claws, teeth & intestine like carnivores. Human digestion system has been

Carnivore animals would not store food in their stomach for long time because the meat starts decaying very quickly. While humans store it for longer durations - basically means we're herbivore. Monkeys (I think at least the ones we evolved from) eat plants & fruits, not flesh. It's just the lazy and intelligent brain of us humans that we set our eyes on animals.

Third, as silverscorpion pointed out - humans *can't* eat raw flesh. Has anyone tried eating fresh fish just out of water? But you *can* eat an apple picked from the tree. Again points to humans being designed to be vegans.

Fourth, I'm quite convinced that ancient India was all vegan. The variety of food items can be grown in almost every part of it. It's unlike most part of the world where you don't have much option than potatoes.

Fifth, non-vegan dishes involve plants + animals : More killing, right?

Sixth, killing animals is cruel. Picking fruits from plants isn't. Removing nails isn't cruel; removing a complete body part is.

Seventh, I think it's common sense to be a vegan. It's healthy & offers more protein than non-veg food. To hell with the 'protein deficiency' thing among vegans.

So true! 👍

I have only one point in the vegan vs non-vegan debate.
Humans can plant trees. Humans can't produce animals.

Hence, when human beings consume fruits of one plant, they can at the same time grow 100 plants. ☕

Hail vegetarianism 😍

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Member • Feb 11, 2012

AbraKaDabra
So true! 👍

I have only one point in the vegan vs non-vegan debate.
Humans can plant trees. Humans can't produce animals.

Hence, when human beings consume fruits of one plant, they can at the same time grow 100 plants. ☕

Hail vegetarianism 😍

Oh wow! Nice one AKD! 😀

Still, I saw somewhere about this, which says, in countries like the United States where meat is not as expensive, though, people choose to be vegetarians for reasons other than cost. Parental preferences, religious or other beliefs, and health issues are among the most common reasons for choosing to be a vegetarian. Many people choose a vegetarian diet out of concern over animal rights or the environment. And lots of people have more than one reason for choosing vegetarianism.

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Ankita Katdare

Administrator • Feb 11, 2012

Praveen-Kumar
Oh wow! Nice one AKD! 😀

Still, I saw somewhere about this, which says, in countries like the United States where meat is not as expensive, though, people choose to be vegetarians for reasons other than cost. Parental preferences, religious or other beliefs, and health issues are among the most common reasons for choosing to be a vegetarian. Many people choose a vegetarian diet out of concern over animal rights or the environment. And lots of people have more than one reason for choosing vegetarianism.

This is great. I don't need a reason to be a vegetarian.
Here is a disturbing video from PETA that someone shared -

PS: We are moving away from the topic of this thread.

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Member • Feb 11, 2012

AbraKaDabra
So true! 👍

I have only one point in the vegan vs non-vegan debate.
Humans can plant trees. Humans can't produce animals.

Really Humans are animals!

Awesome debate. I am missing my Aai's food very much 😭 Preparing horrible meal since few days
Anyways here is something I would like to share 😀

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Sahithi Pallavi

Member • Feb 11, 2012

Old is Gold. Ancient India is the better, best than the Present India either in technology or in Health and in all the things.

Awesome debate going on here 👍

And between Me too a Vegan here 😀

Issue
Really Humans are animals!

Awesome debate. I am missing my Aai's food very much 😭 Preparing horrible meal since few days
Anyways here is something I would like to share 😀

A Small correction. From what I've learned - Humans are Social animals 😉

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Member • Feb 12, 2012

Dancer_Engineer
A vegetarian diet is mostly derived from plants. Aren't the vegetarians cutting down plants to feed themselves? Even more plants are cut to feed the farm animals. So who are the real 'killers' here? Herbivores who eat the plants? Carnivores who eat other animals? Humans who eat both? Quoting this from a #-Link-Snipped-#:

The difference is that though plants have life and some form of consciousness, they do not seem to have a central nervous system. They suffer significant amount of damage without dying. How many times we see roadside trees cut off at road level sending up fresh shoots? Not only that, if the cut pieces of the original plant are put in soil, they will grow too. This does not happen with animals. Each animal is an individual. A plant is not.

AKD is right, though. We are going off topic.

All this talk about animals makes me recall what the curator of the then Madras Zoo told me in mid fifties. In those days the zoo was adjacent to the Madras Central Railway station. The entrance was through a large arch on which the Dasavatar (the ten incarnations of Lord Vishnu) were depicted as statues. When I asked the relevance of this, the curator told me: The ten avatars depict evolution. Starts with an aquatic life, progresses through amphibian, onto mammals, a pygmy and ending as God.

Who knows, may be the ancients were clued in on Darwin's theory of evolution way back.

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durga ch

Member • Feb 12, 2012

Many seems to be quite thoughtful about the ancient INDIA, sadly I am not yet such informed. but my cent about both topic and off topic is-
Yoga has been developed in INDIA, World is taking over it now( with god only knows the variants of it), simialry, Turmeric has been patented by USA(can you even believe this???) so is Basmati rice.I came to know China has scriptures created during time of Ashoka , I am not attributing there astronomical success to that script, but its just that they have preserved it. This is my percerption though! The ancient INDIA respected and wroshipped every form of life (hence we have million gods- one god form for each life form) and source of all thsi life was sun (Sun god). Obvious that we dont go kill a god and eat, hence i think our ancestors were all vegans.
These days I have been seeing a rather silly photo about harming enviroenemnt by eating vegan food. I dont understadn it , nor I support it. Amount of energy and money spent in raring up a animal only to eat it for some 100rs a kg (i dont know the exact price) is far more compared to growing chillies and tomatoes in your own backyard.Vegan food is basically eating only things what are reproducible, like leaves, frutis veggies , shoots (sugar cane). one might aruge how about oniions and potatoes, they are roots, but you replant a eye back and it grows into another plant. so technically a life is not being destroyed. whereas when meat is consumed, we end up taking life what we did not create.

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Member • Feb 12, 2012

I'm clearly not stating here that I'm a non-vegetarian or a vegetarian or I just don't consume food. 😀

Vegetarians do consume animal products (by-products) like egg, cheese, milk and butter.

Lets see how wheat is produced:
According to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheat#Pests" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Wheat Pests</a>,

To reduce the amount of wheat lost to post-harvest pests, #-Link-Snipped-# scientists have developed an â€œinsect-o-graph,â€ which can detect insects in wheat that are not visible to the naked eye. The device uses electrical signals to detect the insects as the wheat is being milled. The new technology is so precise that it can detect 5-10 infested seeds out of 300,000 good ones.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheat#cite_note-84" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Wheat Cite Note 84</a> Tracking insect infestations in stored grain is critical for food safety as well as for the marketing value of the crop.

Check ARS link.

My point is killing of any organism (animals / plants / human beings) is a Sin, quantity / size should not matter here.

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~on*kiyu

Member • Feb 12, 2012

then the theory of the survival of the fittest will become false.
you say killing any organism is a sin then how would we eat our daily food including the wheat rice and all other grains?

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Member • Feb 12, 2012

~on*kiyu
then the theory of the survival of the fittest will become false.
you say killing any organism is a sin then how would we eat our daily food including the wheat rice and all other grains?

Survival of the fittest?!
Jainism 'could' be the answer.
Read on: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jain_vegetarianism" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Jain Vegetarianism</a>

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Member • Feb 12, 2012

Dancer_Engineer
I'm clearly not stating here that I'm a non-vegetarian or a vegetarian or I just don't consume food. 😀

Vegetarians do consume animal products (by-products) like egg, cheese, milk and butter.

Lets see how wheat is produced:
According to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheat#Pests" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Wheat Pests</a>,

Check ARS link.

My point is killing of any organism (animals / plants / human beings) is a Sin, quantity / size should not matter here.

Like others pointed out this is going a bit off topic . 😀 . But we weren't discussing about vegetarianism from the point of view of animals. We were discussing it from human point of view. Vegetarianism may possibly reduce burden on environment and help reduce hunger. Why not have a new thread on vegetarianism or non-vegetarianism , what say mods?

Well , if you consider killing plants a sin , and starving yourself as something better - but then aren't you harming a higher sentient being - namely yourself ?

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Member • Feb 12, 2012

bioramani
The entrance was through a large arch on which the Dasavatar (the ten incarnations of Lord Vishnu) were depicted as statues. When I asked the relevance of this, the curator told me: The ten avatars depict evolution. Starts with an aquatic life, progresses through amphibian, onto mammals, a pygmy and ending as God.

Who knows, may be the ancients were clued in on Darwin's theory of evolution way back.

Sir , there was a Greek philosopher too who had said something similar to Darwin. His name was Anaximander. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anaximander#Origin_of_humankind" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Anaximander Origin Of Humankind</a>

<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anaximander" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Anaximander</a> speculated about the beginnings and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Evolution</a> of animal life. Taking into account the existence of fossils, he claimed that animals sprang out of the sea long ago. The first animals were born trapped in a spiny bark, but as they got older, the bark would dry up and break.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anaximander#cite_note-37" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Anaximander Cite Note 37</a> As the early humidity evaporated, dry land emerged and, in time, humankind had to adapt. The 3rd century Roman writer <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorinus" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Censorinus</a> reports:
Anaximander of Miletus considered that from warmed up water and earth emerged either fish or entirely fishlike animals. Inside these animals, men took form and embryos were held prisoners until puberty; only then, after these animals burst open, could men and women come out, now able to feed themselves.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anaximander#cite_note-38" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Anaximander Cite Note 38</a>
Anaximander put forward the idea that humans had to spend part of this transition inside the mouths of big fish to protect themselves from the Earth's climate until they could come out in open air and lose their scales.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anaximander#cite_note-39" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Anaximander Cite Note 39</a> He thought that, considering humans' extended infancy, we could not have survived in the primeval world in the same manner we do presently.

Of course his theory was way too crude than Indian one. As he did not explain any missing links between the fish and humans.

What surprises me is the innumerable parallels between ancient Indian mythology and Greek mythology.

However , as you pointed out about Brahmanda Purana we can't take this mythological hypotheses too seriously.

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Member • Feb 12, 2012

circularsquare
Like others pointed out this is going a bit off topic . 😀 . But we weren't discussing about vegetarianism from the point of view of animals. We were discussing it from human point of view. Vegetarianism may possibly reduce burden on environment and help reduce hunger. Why not have a new thread on vegetarianism or non-vegetarianism , what say mods?

Ok, got it.
After reading the posts here. I went on to read about vegetarianism and then non-vegetarianism, and then about animals and plants. So! Ok, we could debate in another thread. 😀

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Administrator • Feb 12, 2012

Feel free to start a new thread. The age old debate needs its own space on CE 😁 . Never thought so many engineers would debate on it 👍.

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Member • Feb 12, 2012

The_Big_K
Feel free to start a new thread. The age old debate needs its own space on CE 😁 . Never thought so many engineers would debate on it 👍.

While we are crazyengineers no doubt , we are also hungryhumans. 😀

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Member • Feb 12, 2012

Dancer_Engineer
Survival of the fittest?!
Jainism 'could' be the answer.
Read on: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jain_vegetarianism" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Jain Vegetarianism</a>

I don't think there is any connection to religion. Or I should rather say, the topic of vegan V/S non vegan should be connected to the food habits of different religions (people).

As Ramani sir puts correctly, food can be classified as Satvik, rajasik and Tamasik. Non-veg food being Tamasik in nature makes the nature of that person angry and full of anxiety on many occasions.

I have seen people who consume meat day and night only to have adverse effect on their health and consequently their nature.

No doubt, it is said, the way to mind is through stomach!

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Member • Feb 12, 2012

Sada
A Small correction. From what I've learned - Humans are Social animals 😉

Yep, there was whole subject called social science, I always secured less marks in that ☕
To hell with that social animal 😁

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