Why is life difficult?

I think there is something seriously wrong with the way humans live. All the issues we face can be seen to be a direct result of the priorities we have set for our life, or the living style we are following. We now admit, the early humans maintained many an erroneous idea, like those about the objects in the sky. Why should the errors they made be limited only to those objects? Doesn't this call for a re-examination of every idea that has come from the past?

What makes a Country Peaceful?

I have noted elsewhere, for various reasons, human society is perpetually in turmoil. I think, like all other species, we humans also live in a society that always face some unrest. But, unlike all other species, such disturbances do not get cancelled out, mainly owing to mutual exclusivity, a human trait. Since we entertain a set of priorities, named beliefs, the disturbances gather in strength, where those are in tune with those beliefs. Only in societies that maintain or celebrate the presence of a wide variety in every facet of life, such disturbances stand to get weakened by mutual opposition.
One can easily confirm this by examining the social atmosphere prevalent in a society vis-a-vis the cultural diversity existing in it. An examination of the ten most peaceful and least peaceful nations of the world can prove this beyond doubt. The peaceful nations can be seen to be constituted mostly be non homogeneous, multicultural societies, whereas the opposite is true, as far as other nations go. Moreover, all those non-peaceful nations have many temporary or local divisions with acute dissonance, in spite of the cultural homogeneity.
When I examine the least peaceful societies, an interesting fact comes to light. All of these are made up of quite homogeneous societies. However, there are many artificially separated sub-societies that are perpetually at war with each other. And when I examine the most  peaceful ones, the exact opposite is true. All these societies are made up of people of dissimilar cultural backgrounds. And here, mutual respect and admiration seems to be the uniting force.

Iceland, Austria, Canada, Denmark, etc. belong to the peaceful ones, and Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Afghanistan, etc., to the others.

This leads me to my next Maxim: The less homogeneous a society, the more peaceful, the life.

Book Review: The Selections from the Principles of Philosophy

This book, by René Descartes, is airing the author's thoughts on a variety of issues of philosophy. The first part of the book begins with the principles of knowledge, the significance of doubt and the role of free will, the absolute need of a god and the necessity for examining the secrets of creation, and how our mistakes are our own while our good deeds are not. The second part deals with the principles of things, where it pontificates on issues like the grounds on which the existence of material things may be known with certainty. How space is not in reality different from corporeal substance, how the world is indefinite, and what motion is, and many other questions of such nature are discussed here. The third part discusses the world that we view. Why we need not think too highly of the works of God, why all things can be thought to be created for the sake of man, are a few questions covered here. Next and final part looks at the earth, how should we perceive, what we perceive. The book concludes with a statement, 'I desire no one to believe anything I may have said, unless he is constrained to admit it by the force and evidence of reason'.
I have come across this quote, I think, therefore I am, many a time. Almost always for justifying one's limitless foray into thoughts, while rest of the mankind waits for some action. I found in this book, rather than thinking, the author gives great importance to the result of thinking, doubts. Doubts are specific to humans, the book proclaims. 
It is as though 'I doubt, therefore I am' should have been the idea we grasped. Had we done so, we would have been seeing a different world now.

Water Woes

Why is water an issue? Once we treat water as a medium, there should be no problem. By instituting appropriate steps for cleaning, and revitalizing, we can think of reusing it.
In fact we then shall be treating water just like we treat air. You see, we happily breathe the air that might have gone through many cycles (natural ones) of use - re-energize - reuse.

Why slavery persists?

Many a study I went through. The argument everywhere is focused on the desire for quick wealth, scant regard for law, the fall in moral standards, and a few more of this ilk. And, the bulk of attention falls on the slave trader. I think one important issue is being forgotten. People chose to become slaves, whether willingly or otherwise, since they already would have been in a condition worse than slavery. Or, they found slavery, a lesser evil. If we concentrate here, slavery also will make a fast exit.

Irrational, again

Human, like all other forms of life, like to to indulge with the irrational, that too without any worry about the repercussions.
Sometimes the irrational happens to be helpful to oneself, appealing to all, or generally beautiful. Sometimes not. When it is the former, we see intellect, providence, luck, or hard work, and we venerate, celebrate, or reward appropriately. Call it science, good conduct, correct principle, divine gift, etc.
But when it is the latter, and only when we can't close our eyes to it, we object.
Things like faith, art, knowledge, and all other facets of human nature would have originated from this.