SUBHASH B PILLAI

Physician, evolutionary biologist (when I’m fed up with the former) & history enthusiast: living luminously between two eternities of darknesses!

[Amit Schandillia @Schandillia]

Not sure which exact temple this one is, but a thousand years ago was 1000 AD, give or take. This was the state of the world at the time:

China: Song Dynasty
N. Africa: The Fatimids
W. Africa: Ghana Empire
E. Mediterranean: Byzantine Empire

None of these were exactly “starving” in any sense of the word. Even Western Europe, the economic underdogs of the time, did far better than what one would call starving.

Sure, India was the world’s top economy, perhaps even above China, others weren’t destitutes either.

Having said that, you don’t exactly need ultrasound or modern imaging to know what a fetus looks like in the womb. When miscarriages, stillbirths, and premature births are routine, the inside of a womb is hard to stay a secret.

Midwives, mothers, and early physicians regularly handled expelled fetuses at every stage of the pregnancy. This gave a clear, visual record of human development from the earliest weeks through full term. No esoteric lost science there.

Were such tragedies unique to India? No. So could the knowledge of fetuses be unique to India? Of course not. See this jade fetus from more than 2,500 years ago. The Olmecs made it in Mexico.

Trust me, it is possible to express awe over your own heritage without belittling others. Every civilization has had its greats, the whole point of being a “civilization.”

[insane goals @insanegoals]

The level of awareness u need to have to do this is genuinely crazy

[omar ali @omarali50]

Her problem is not that she is American, her problem is that she is openly and vigorously aligned with a current political ideology (Desi leftism) and against another current political ideology (hindutva) and prioritizes her political bias over objective inquiry.. ie she is not acting in good faith.

[SUBHASH B PILLAI @SUBHASHPILLAI]

@EBiggunz @skedeschi Empire podcast by @DalrympleWill has dealt with this issue several times, including a series on Gaza too. Of all the guests, I found Eugene Rogan’s analysis the most compelling. What happened was a CIVIL WAR, and the first step to reconciliation is to accept it as it is!

[SUBHASH B PILLAI @SUBHASHPILLAI]

@elonmusk Weren’t they against the death penalty all these years?

[Brivael Le Pogam @brivael]

Je veux présenter mes excuses, au nom des Français, pour avoir enfanté la French Theory (qui a enfanté la pire des merdes idéologiques : le wokisme).

Nous avons donné au monde Descartes, Pascal, Tocqueville. Et puis, dans les ruines intellectuelles de l'après-68, nous avons donné Foucault, Derrida, Deleuze. Trois hommes brillants qui ont fabriqué, dans l'élégance de notre langue, l'arme idéologique qui paralyse aujourd'hui l'Occident.

Il faut comprendre ce qu'ils ont fait. Foucault a enseigné que la vérité n'existe pas, qu'il n'y a que des rapports de pouvoir déguisés en savoir. Que la science, la raison, la justice, l'institution médicale, l'école, la prison, la sexualité, tout n'est qu'une mise en scène de la domination. Derrida a enseigné que les textes n'ont pas de sens stable, que tout signifiant glisse, que toute lecture est une trahison, que l'auteur est mort et que le lecteur règne. Deleuze a enseigné qu'il fallait préférer le rhizome à l'arbre, le nomade au sédentaire, le désir à la loi, le devenir à l'être, la différence à l'identité.

Pris isolément, ce sont des thèses discutables. Combinées, exportées, vulgarisées, elles forment un système. Et ce système est un poison.

Car voici ce qui s'est passé. Ces textes, illisibles en France, ont traversé l'Atlantique. Les départements de Yale, de Berkeley, de Columbia les ont absorbés dans les années 80. Ils y ont trouvé un terreau qui n'existait pas chez nous : le puritanisme américain, sa culpabilité raciale, son obsession identitaire. La French Theory s'est mariée à ce substrat, et l'enfant de ce mariage s'appelle le wokisme.

Judith Butler lit Foucault et invente le genre performatif. Edward Said lit Foucault et invente le post-colonialisme académique. Kimberlé Crenshaw hérite du cadre et invente l'intersectionnalité. À chaque étape, la matrice est française : il n'y a pas de vérité, il n'y a que du pouvoir, donc toute hiérarchie est suspecte, toute institution est oppressive, toute norme est violence, toute identité est construite donc négociable, toute majorité est coupable.

Voilà comment trois philosophes parisiens, qui n'ont probablement jamais imaginé leurs conséquences pratiques, ont fourni le logiciel d'exploitation à une génération entière d'activistes, de bureaucrates universitaires, de DRH, de journalistes, de législateurs. Voilà comment on a obtenu une civilisation qui ne sait plus dire si une femme est une femme, si sa propre histoire mérite d'être défendue, si le mérite existe, si la vérité se distingue de l'opinion.

C'est de la merde pour une raison simple, et il faut la dire calmement. Une civilisation se tient debout sur trois piliers : la croyance qu'il existe une vérité accessible à la raison, la croyance qu'il existe un bien distinct du mal, la croyance qu'il existe un héritage à transmettre. La French Theory a entrepris de dynamiter les trois. Pas par méchanceté. Par jeu intellectuel, par fascination du soupçon, par haine de la bourgeoisie qui les avait nourris. Mais le résultat est là. Une génération entière a appris à déconstruire et n'a jamais appris à construire. Une génération entière sait soupçonner et ne sait plus admirer. Une génération entière voit le pouvoir partout et la beauté nulle part.

Je m'excuse parce que nous, Français, avons une responsabilité particulière. C'est notre langue, nos universités, nos éditeurs, notre prestige qui ont donné à ce nihilisme son emballage chic. Sans la légitimité de la Sorbonne et de Vincennes, ces idées n'auraient jamais traversé l'océan. Nous avons exporté le doute comme d'autres exportent des armes.

Ce qui se construit maintenant, en silicon valley, dans les labos d'IA, dans les startups, dans les ateliers, dans tous les lieux où des gens fabriquent encore des choses au lieu de les déconstruire, c'est la réponse. Une civilisation se reconstruit par les bâtisseurs, pas par les commentateurs. Par ceux qui croient que la vérité existe et qu'elle vaut qu'on s'y consacre. Par ceux qui assument une hiérarchie du beau, du vrai, du bon, et qui n'ont pas honte de la transmettre.

Alors pardon. Et au travail.

[Rahul Sagar @rahulsagar]

Indian liberalism has been mocked as little more than mimicry. The British laughed at the ideals preached by “Jabberjees” at the Indian National Congress. Indians have not been much kinder to those raised on an “English diet”. The jibes have only multiplied since 1947 — “kala sahibs”, “Macaulayputras”, the “Lutyens” cabal.

But there was more to India than meets the eye. By focusing on the grievances raised and compromises made by liberals in British India, we have overlooked what liberals imagined and tried to do in Indian India. This is their story…

[SUBHASH B PILLAI @SUBHASHPILLAI]

@Schandillia @Aabhas24

[SUBHASH B PILLAI @SUBHASHPILLAI]

@manujosephsan @sgurumurthy Did you share the same bench (I presume that was the seating arrangement those days) thanks to the same surname?

[Manu Joseph @manujosephsan]

In his first speech as Tamil Nadu chief minister, Vijay said that he grew up in poverty, and that he even knows what hunger is. It's bullshit because he was my classmate in the third standard in Loyola School.
His father was a filmmaker who set up his son for a career in films.
It is possible that like most filmmakers his father may have had periods of financial strife but that's not the same as Tamil-grade poverty. A lot of affluent boys confuse being broke with poverty. Two very different things.

[SUBHASH B PILLAI @SUBHASHPILLAI]

@PurewalAmrit @Schandillia … which, as per Afghan sources, include torturing Shah Shuja’s son in front of his father!

[SUBHASH B PILLAI @SUBHASHPILLAI]

@Schandillia It should all boil down to 2 lines of social contract: 1) That a man be willing, if others too, to lay down this right to all things, and be contented with so much liberty against other men, as he would allow other men against himself
2) A man is an end in himself.

[Greg Lukianoff @glukianoff]

One of the worst arguments against free speech is that it mainly protects the powerful.

History says otherwise. The powerful do well under almost any system. It is the unpopular, the dissenters, and the politically weak who most need strong protections for speech.

[SUBHASH B PILLAI @SUBHASHPILLAI]

@ZahackTanvir Please accept my condolences.🌹

[Garry Kasparov @Kasparov63]

🎯 I’ve referred to Ukraine, and President Zelenskyy, as leader of the free world for a while now. Not only because they’re fighting the authoritarian enemy NATO was created to fight, but leading by example on the values of freedom, human life, and democracy. Once it was America.

[Александр Елесев | Доброум TV @dobroum]

Моя любимая краткая история СССР.

Как только умер Ленин, оказалось, что второй человек в партии, товарищ Троцкий - предатель. Каменев, Зиновьев, Бухарин и Сталин свергли Троцкого и изгнали из СССР.

Но через пару лет оказалось, что Каменев, Зиновьев и Бухарин тоже враги и вредители. Тогда доблестный товарищ Генрих Ягода их расстрелял.

Чуть позже Ягоду, как вражеского агента, расстрелял Ежов.

Но через пару лет оказалось, что и Ежов не товарищ, а обычный предатель и вражеский агент. И Ежова расстрелял Берия.

После смерти Сталина, все ��оняли, что и Берия тоже предатель. Тогда Жуков сверг и расстрелял Берию.

Но вскоре Хрущев узнал, что Жуков враг и заговорщик. И сослал Жукова на Урал.

А чуть позже вскрылось, что и Сталин-то был врагом, вредителем и предателем. А вместе с ним и большая часть политбюро. Тогда Сталина вынесли из мавзолея, а политбюро и примкнувшего к ним Шепилова разогнали честные партийцы, во главе с Хрущевым.

Прошло несколько лет и выяснилось, что Хрущев был волюнтаристом, проходимцем, авантюристом и врагом. Тогда Брежнев отправил Хрущева на пенсию.

Вскоре Брежнев умер, и выяснилось, что он был маразматиком, вредителем и причиной застоя.

Потом было еще два маразматика, который никто и запомнить не успел, потому что дохли, как мухи.

Но тут пришел к власти молодой, энергичный Горбачев. И оказалось, что вся партия была партией вредителей и врагов, но он-то сейчас все исправит...

Тут-то СССР и развалился. А Горбачев оказался врагом и предателем.

[SUBHASH B PILLAI @SUBHASHPILLAI]

@Schandillia Totally new information. Thank you! 🌹

[Written by J.K. Rowling @rowlingmore]

‘Trans people exist. I have no desire for them not to exist; indeed, I wish them safety, happiness and health. However, 'existence' does not, and should not, mean the violation of other people's right to privacy, dignity and freedom of speech, or the reconfiguration of society to indulge a fallacy.’

J.K. Rowling on Twitter/X.

[Afshine Emrani MD FACC @afshineemrani]

The Only Part of You Left "Awake" 👁️

​Your brain paralyzes nearly every muscle in your body during REM sleep. It leaves only three exceptions: the diaphragm so you can breathe, the inner ear, and the six muscles that move each eye.

​That last exception is where it gets haunting.

​The "Jennifer Aniston" Neuron

​In 2015, researchers at UCLA placed intracranial electrodes directly into the brains of 19 patients. They mapped "concept neurons"—specific cells that fire only when you see a certain face or place. A Jennifer Aniston neuron. An Eiffel Tower neuron.

​Then, they waited for sleep.

​Every time the patients' closed eyes darted, those same neurons fired in a burst identical to the signature they produced while awake. The brain was behaving as if a physical image had just been presented to the retina.

​The image was internal. The brain wasn't just "imagining"—it was seeing.

​The Dream is Realer Than Imagination

​A 2018 follow-up with lucid dreamers proved something even more chilling. If you try to imagine a moving object while awake, your eyes jerk in "saccades." Your imagination isn't strong enough to trick your biology into smooth movement.

​But inside the dream? Their eyes followed objects in smooth, continuous pursuit. The neural circuitry for tracking physical reality was being driven by something that had zero retinal input.

​The Scanning Hypothesis

​Your eyes are tracing the exact same paths they would use to look at a real scene, pulling visual data back out of your memory the same way it was filed in.

​The dream is running on the exact same machinery as vision.

​What you see in your sleep isn't a "movie" behind your eyelids—it's a biological hijacking of your visual system. Rapid Eye Movement is the only part of your body the brain refuses to shut off while it watches a world that doesn't exist.

[Greg Lukianoff @glukianoff]

How do you stay nonpartisan in a culture that demands you to take sides?

You pick a principle and refuse to bend it.

At @TheFIREorg that means defending speech regardless of who says it. Not when it’s easy. Not when it’s popular. Always.