Fish Oil

Snake oil is a folk remedy for all sort of ailments … and here in Asia … we run into the occasional salesman … on the sidewalk … pushing the stuff … with an ample demonstration of snake and oil. However fish oil … like the famous cod liver oil … is a health supplement … that reportedly promotes growth … stimulates brain cells … and gives an overall good complexion. They apply themselves to two different conditions in life … and a closer look … creates the impression of these being … dark matter in man.

 

The great Indic bard … Vyasa … the man who penned the Puranas … was once at a ferry crossing … and met the boat person … who carried a trace of fish odor. No doubt living close to the river … as she did … she might have been on a frequent diet of fish. But in the time … she ferried the gentleman across the river … in her wicker boat … his conversations with her … healed her of the offending condition. And that as they say … is the contribution of good poetry to life.

 

The medical discovery of free radicals … in the human experience … speaks of a condition in which the body has come to considerable stress … and the bio-organic impulses of the body … are in a state of heightened excitation. Its suggestive of a condition … in which the mind-passion … management by the individual … has broken free … and the body is … as it were … taking over its own management of itself. The condition is often treated with B-complex supplements.

 

But its curious to think that … our reproductive fluids … and the humors … that are associated with the building blocks of life … are themselves … capable of ferrying us into a lifestyle and condition … that is suited to our temperament in life. A man reportedly relies on that … in the connection between cells … tissue … and mind … and produces an effect on the passions … that is coherent … and is capable of supporting a lifestyle … in a manner that is entirely comfortable and harmonious.

 

The suggestion is strongest about folks in pastoral communities … whose free spirits … and mind of attribution … cultivates a lifestyle … that is basically self willed in its orientation … and produces an attitude in the physical condition … that is entirely self guided. It founds a faith … that comes to exist naturally in its disposition … and in the delicate realm of the life force … it professes a truth about life … that the man … may not yet fully understand by the instruments of his mind.

 

When Vyasa wrote the Puranas … reportedly around 1500 bc … the human condition is observed to have been supported by such a will of its body's free spirit … founded on its reproductive fluids. It formed a personality that was deeply personal … and proposed a relation between man and creation … that suggested a bond that is indistinguishable between man and the creative forces. We discover that condition today … in a part of our passions … that responds with a cognate sense of itself … in response to the mind of inquiry.

 

 In my view ... its this condition … in the human experience … that accounts for the … strange quality of bravado and high confidence … that's prevalent among the young today. It exhibits a quality of the herd mentality … and stays close to its racial group for support. However it experiences difficulties in relating to modern society … in the way that society has come to be cosmopolitan … and is often a mix of several racial groups. And in the growing global nature of societies … its especially critical.

 

The social conditions today … call for a thinking disposition … in respect of our actions … unlike the free flowing cerebral quality of the man of nature … communing with the world … entirely on the boat of his passions. It breaks the natural passions … in its organization of self identity … and secure nature. Thereafter it railroads the individual in tie and suit … into an observation of the laws … social etiquette … and introduces a sense of the impersonal that challenges the personal nature of the individual … or forces it into a bewildered isolation.

 

Quite often it creates a stand off … and threatens each other's thesis … on understanding life … that stays long in the life of the individual. There is no reconciling of its differences … unless the individual undertakes a journey of discovery into the nature of the self … either by the instruments of faith … or in understanding the physical laws of nature. Such a journey removes the vestiges of mystery … blind faith … and promotes self knowledge … by the conscious learning and realization … of the constituents of the self.

 

At a point in the life of the individual … we are all confronted with the comparisons … between the true of the passions … and the quality of knowledge … discerned by the mind … and we wonder at the way that is possible … in these times. Strangely the passion experiences the knowledge as grace … in the same way that … the pagan experience came upon civilization … as an opening to a world … beyond the rudiments of passionate fervor. And to experience these … in our post-industrial societies … is indeed a cause for wonder.

 

On the street … the snake oil vendor is highly animated in the conduct of his salesmanship. Amidst the passing cars … pedestrians on the sidewalk … and the looming skyscrapers nearby … it was testament to the way … our passions of old … are making the effort themselves … to find a way to reach the modern mind of inquiry. I decided I'll pass on that … but picked up a bottle of fish oil … in the convenience store … that's packaged like an energy drink.

 

I recall a time … while teaching in college … when a visiting professor from our affiliated university overseas came over … for a seminar on case studies. I got an opportunity to chat with the man … and raised some specific inquiries the students had brought up for handling case study in the exams. It was obviously concerns he had not encountered before … and his reply  simply was … ' go with the guides … there's no need to re-invent the wheel.' I had left the seminar feeling a little loss of support … for the nature of knowledge represented by the academic tradition.

 

Having taught in college … I'm not without a mild skepticism about the way our educational institutions manage the issue of knowledge. Its an instrument of social organization … product orientation … the gilded cage of careers … and certainly the iconic defense on the intellectual tradition. But its also the only thing … that society relies on for answers to issues … particularly relating to faith … gender relations … family … children … the nature of man … and the general concerns for the future of mankind. Our world today is a reflection of the extent of its accomplishments.