Questions of Philosophy

 Questions of Philosophy 

• If we are biologically meant only to procreate and pass on genes, where does the cap for population lie? 

• Does empathy play any role in evolution? 

• Or is population balance restored only through calamities? 

• What is pain? 

• Why do we fear? 

• Is suffering inevitable? 

• What means exist to reduce pain — analgesics, anaesthesia, opioids, or perhaps understanding? 

• What is coma, sleep, dream, consciousness, and waking? 

• If all were blind except one person, how would science develop? 

• Could there exist an extra sense beyond the five? 

• Why do we lose track of time? 

• What is time itself? 

• What is space? Is it a construct of sight and position? 

• How do the blind dream? 

• What is hunger? 

• Why do we survive? 

• Which is stronger — survival or the instinct to reproduce? 

• Is there a purpose to life at all? 

These are questions which have bugged me for the longest of times. The blog is perhaps a humble attempt at making these questions bug the reader too.  

Arjuna’s Questions — The Human Search for Meaning 

The Bhagavad Gita (BG) opens with a chapter entirely on  Arjuna’s despondence, his confusions and innermost internal crises. And scatterred all throughout BG are his philosophical queries nagging Krishna at every juncture, not accepting everything he says as just commandments. This is intrinsic to Sanatana Dharma, and I dare say to humankind at large. Humans are born inquisitive. We create stories. We question stories. We question authority. We question our selves. This is the fundamental universal right we must preserve at all costs- the right to question. It is indeed the safest way of both curious enquiry as well as foundational bricks to build much needed reforms for society with the ravages of time. Here is a collection of important questions, which we still ask, to this very day. 

2.8 

“I see no way out of this all-consuming grief. 
Even if I were to gain dominion over gods and men, 
it would not quench this burning sorrow within.” 

Later he adds, 

“I do not wish to live a life bound by duty and power. 
Better to renounce it all —  
to wander as a beggar, living on alms, 
than to carry this unbearable burden of war.” 

Here speaks not cowardice, but the soul’s fatigue —  
the existential cry of one who sees no peace either in victory or retreat. 1,638 × 2,048

2.54 

“O Keśava, what do you mean by a sthita-prajña —  
a person of steady intellect, of tranquil wisdom? 
How does such a one walk, speak, sit, or act in the world?” 

This is the timeless human inquiry: 
What does it mean to live awake? 

6.34 

“The mind is restless, turbulent, and obstinate. 
It rushes headlong towards pleasure, 
drawn by the path of least resistance. 
To control it seems as impossible 
as to still the wind itself.” 

A verse that every seeker, ancient or modern, has whispered in frustration —  
the confession of one who knows the theory of calm, but not its reality. 

11.32 

“Tell me, who truly are You, O Kṛṣṇa?” 

Having beheld the terrifying splendour of the Viśvarūpa —  
the all-consuming cosmic form —  
Arjuna trembles and asks the question that underlies all religion: 
Who or what is God? 
What is this power that creates, sustains, and devours? 

(Substitute here your own Iṣṭa Deva — the image of the Divine you know best —  
and the question remains just as piercing.) 

8.1 

“What is Brahman — the Absolute? 
What is the Self? 
What is karma? 
What is matter, and what is spirit? 
What is religion, and what is ritual? 
And what, O Lord, should a man remember 
at the moment of death?” 

This, perhaps, is the sum total of philosophy —  
every question humanity has ever asked, 
compressed into a single breath before the Infinite. 

Unanswered questions put to the Buddha 

“Is the world eternal or not?  Is it infinite or finite?  Are the self and the body the same or different? 
Will the Tathāgata — the Enlightened One — be reborn or not?”  

To all these questions, the Buddha remained utterly silent. From an Advaitic perspective, these are not ordinary metaphysical riddles; they cut straight into the very heart of enquiry — the nature of the relationship between Brahman and Māyā, the eternal paradox between the Real and the apparent. In a more Tantric light, the same mystery is phrased as the relation between Śiva and Śakti, Puruṣa and Prakṛti. 

Each of the Darśanas of Indian philosophy, in its own way, stumbles upon this very question — that of evolution: 

How does the One become the many? 
How does the still become the moving, the changeless become change? 
How does truth become falsehood, the Creator become creation, the Devas fall before Asuras, the  s pirit condense into matter, ecstasy turn to uffering, the infinite become finite? 

And conversely, the question of devolution — how does matter regain spirit?  How does the jīva transcend guṇa and become Puruṣa once more? 
How does the fragmented mind merge into God? 

The Vedas themselves present numerous creation hymns attempting to answer these twin enigmas — and yet, each concludes not with certainty but with wonder.  Even the Nāsadīya Sūkta ends in a question:  “Who truly knows? Perhaps even He who is above does not.” 

Science, with all her dazzling instruments, likewise hesitates before this mystery. She may chart galaxies and genes, but she fears to lose her prestige the moment she crosses into metaphysics. 

And then, there is that last, subtle question — one that distinguishes Nirvāṇa from Mokṣa. 

While Mokṣa is described as the cessation of birth and death, Nirvāṇa is the cessation of sorrow. 
One dissolves existence itself; the other redeems it from suffering. Perhaps that is why the Buddha kept silent —  
for silence alone could hold what no doctrine can express.