Truth, Shiva and beauty

In Hindu thought artha, dharma, kama and moksha are considered the four goals of life. These concepts are the undercurrents of the stream of all life and are not contradictory.

Artha and kama as the urges of human instinct represent the truths of life. These become beautiful when enjoyed in accordance with the principles of righteousness.

Dharma is shivam or kalyankari. It takes negativity out of wealth and sex and purifies them. Wealth is involved in goddess Lakshmi and we are exhorted to earn as much as we can so that it can be used in public service.

Kama too has a god in Kamdeva. Shiva destroys him the moment he emerges with the feeling of physical gratification but when it is enjoyed with love without lust and to offer progeny, it becomes pure beauty and magic of life. The truth of life is thus at once virtuous and base, savage and gentle, ugly and immensely beautiful, with joy and sorrow, light and shadow. Death-in-life completely envelops in itself life-in-death. Destruction is as sacred as creation because destruction quickens new birth. One who knows this Truth also knows that since it is the law of Nature it has to be kalyankari for all life. Nothing bad ever happens in Nature, because it is the concrete manifestation of the love of Lord.

In his poem Ode to a Grecian Urn Keats says "Beauty is truth, truth beauty" and "that is all/ Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know." To Keats beauty is the touchstone of truth. "To see things in their beauty, is to see things in their truth" wrote Arnold. In a letter Keats wrote: "What the imagination seizes as beauty must be truth." Plato similarly thinks that beauty is the splendour of truth. The whole of creation is beautiful and this is the truth of life. But it is the partial truth. Hindu thought adds the word Shivam to it and the concepts of beauty and truth are at once raised to a lofty realm. Shivam comes after truth. That means the ultimate, truth is to know that life in its numerous variety of forms is sacred and this alone is its beauty.

Truth is epitomised in Goddess Kali .She is the primordial energy of the cosmos and is worshipped as Shakti—the sustaining principle of life. She incarnates consummate beauty of death; she incarnates perfect beauty of life, simultaneously violent and tender, grotesque and beatific. Shiva, her consort, personifies Shivam –all that is good on earth. He is the destroyer of creation, but for its preservation, He has drunk poison and kept it in his 'kanth' or throat and has come to be known as 'Neelkantha'. This makes him ultimate in kindness and magnanimity.

Shiva is revered by devotees because He is considered to have never refused a boon to any one. He is the benefactor of all. Together, Shiva and Kali become the quintessence of Satyam Shivam Sundaram. Truth, well being of all, and beauty are the basis of creation and the guiding force of all life. Any concept that leads to bahujan hitaya or common welfare is inevitably going to be for bahujan sukhaya or happiness for all -- and this truth alone is the underlying beauty of life.

List of men you shouldn't marry

1. Mummy's boys

2. Men who are bad with money

3. Men with no friends

4. Men who put you down in public

5. Men who are rude to waitering staff

6. Men unable to laugh at themselves

7. Men unwilling to share authority

8. Men who never make demands countering yours

Tea therapy: To lose weight, don't add milk to your cuppa

LONDON: It's a known fact that tea contains antioxidants that help you lose weight, but a new research led by an Indian scientist found that this fat-fighting ability is neutralised if milk is added to it.

It has long been found that tea contains high levels of antioxidant such as theaflavins and thearubigins which help reduce the amount of fat absorbed by the gut and can also cut cholesterol. Now, researchers at the Tea Research Association in Assam, India, found the compounds also help prevent obesity when given to rats that were on a highfat diet.

The benefits are cancelled out by proteins found in cows' milk, they said. "When tea is taken with milk, theaflavins and thearubigins form complexes with the milk protein, which causes them to precipitate ," Devajit Borthakur, a scientist at the Tea Research Association , said. "Therefore, it is always advised to take tea without milk," he said.

The scientists at the centre are now looking for ways of making the antioxidants less susceptible to being neutralised by milk.

Google owns world's second-largest search engine too!

oon www could stand for world wide watching. Unknown to most, YouTube—the six-year-old video-sharing website—has become the second-largest search engine in the world after Google. It gets two billion views a day, up 50% since 2009.

A startup set up by three PayPal employees in 2005, YouTube was bought by Google in 2006 for $1.65 billion. Now it is gearing up to compete with TV.

"We believe that the distinction between internet and TV viewing will fast disappear as on-demand video takes centre stage," says Gautam Anand, director, Google (Asia-Pacific Japan). YouTube is adding new streams of content and figuring new ways to make money. In the US it has signed up with MGM and CBS to let them upload films and TV serials with advertisements. Last year, it launched an online film rental service in the US. But online video services like Netflix, Hulu—and even Facebook—present formidable competition.

The India journey

It has nearly 20 million unique users in India. Top hits here mirror what works globallymovies and sports. So Bollywood content dominates and cricket isn't far behind. Dabangg premiered on YouTube in India. Google says Indian content producers lead in adopting and experimenting with YouTube.

Monetisation

Google isn't ready to disclose if YouTube is profitable yet, but the company says it will continue to offer free content and monetise the traffic to generate ad revenues. It is monetising over 2 billion video views in the US every week and has more than 1,000 partners. Advertisers like Samsung say YouTube's 24/7 availability , specially to office goers is a big draw.

HSBC, SBI, HUL, Coca-Cola , Hero Honda, GM, Airtel and Nokia are among the advertisers on YouTube India. For now, YouTube and its rivals could hope that www will also stand for world wide wealth.

Lady delivers hubby's kid 5 years after his death

AHMEDABAD: In 2009, Anurita, 40, flew down from UK to Ahmedabad with lot of hope and two samples of semen of her deceased husband, safely frozen in a container of liquid nitrogen. She desperately wanted to conceive the child of her dear husband. And now, she is expecting!

"Anurita came for a second embryo transplant through IVF in February 2011 as her first cycle had failed. She was shattered at that time. This time, she was reluctant to get a pregnancy test done as she feared the disappointment that would come with a negative result. In fact, we had to coax her to get a test done from Ahmedabad and it has come positive. She is finally expecting her deceased husband's child", said Dr Falguni Bavishi of Bavishi Fertility Centre.

Anurita, an NRI who works as a civil servant in UK, had married Michael, an engineer of Italian origin, in 2001. In 2006, Michael succumbed to blood cancer. "Michael was an amazing person. He loved me so much that I cannot describe it. After his death, I realized that I just could not love another man. I will love him till death. Hence, I want his child so that I can get my Michael back," Anurita had told TOI on her first visit to Ahmedabad.

Anurita's eggs were fertilized with her husband's frozen sperms. The embryo was then transferred to her womb. However, unlike other women undergoing IVF, Anurita had limited semen samples; so, she was desperate to conceive fast. Her husband had left only five samples, of which three were used unsuccessfully on her in hospitals in UK, Turkey and Mumbai.

In UK, before initiating chemotherapy, hospitals offer to freeze semen samples as cancer treatment is known to affect fertility of patients.

"She had come with two samples which we were split into 10. This is the first time that a young woman who has lost her husband has come to us. In fact, after the embryo was transplanted this time, she wanted to go to a church to pray. Her prayers have been answered," said Dr Himanshu Bavishi.

Source -- Times of India

Hasan Ali, ED officers need protection: Report

NEW DELHI: The Enforcement Directorate has submitted to the Supreme Court a status report on the Hasan Ali Khan money laundering case. The Pune stud farm owner is currently in judicial custody.

According to the report, Khan and all ED officers, including the director, need protection. The ED also submitted that it is on the verge of a breakthrough in the case.

The apex court asked the government as to why it had not investigated the source of black money and its impact on national security. It asked the government to consider setting up of a multi-discipline task force to investigate black money.

'Onions, cow dung reduce radiation impact'

ALLAHABAD: The threat of nulcear radiation in Japan has raised widespread concerns across the world. India too, which has many nuclear plants, needs to be worried, specially for its population living near the nuke plants.

TOI spoke to associate professor in physics department, KN Uttam, about the nuclear radiation and ways to prevent it. He said some traditional Indian practices can help in minimising the effects of Gamma rays, the most harmful rays emitted in nuclear radiation.

"Traditional methods like keeping onions in pockets and applying a layer of Cow Dung on the outside walls of houses absorb the harmful gamma rays," Uttam said. "Cow dung, in fact, can absorb all the three rays -- alpha, beta and gamma. Among these,alpha rays cannot penetrate the layers of cloths whereas beta falls after hitting the same but the Gamma rays penetrate the body tissue and is the most harmful," he added. If the outer walls of houses are coated with thick layers of cow dung, it will absorb the gamma rays and in turn people would be safe, said Uttam who has worked in the ministry of science and technology and MHRD.

Similarly, research has shown that onions too absorb the Gamma rays. Besides, Indian practices based on herbal methods, including applying gram flour (besan) and mustard oil on the human skin, too minimise the effects of radiation, Uttam said.

"The leafy vegetables like spinach, basil, fenugreek leaves (methi ka saag), mustard leaves (sarson ka saag) etc., too have radiation but it's negligible and hence not harmful," he said.

These leafs have Sodium 23 and 24 along with Potassium which is infact essential for body growth. These isotopes has a short life as Potassium 42 half life time is 12 hours (after which the quantity of the same comes to half) whereas that of Sodium 22 is 2.5 years. Similarly, there are different Beta emitters like Sodium 22 and 24 Potassium 45, Iron 59 but are non-hazardous. There are many naturally occurring isotopes which are non-hazardous as they do not cross the natural limit, said Uttam.