“PAVENA PARANDEL” OF WESTERN SCIENCES AND TECHNOLOGIES - III

Let me thank Prof. N. A. de S. Amaratunga giving me an opportunity to describe at least some of the knowledge I have created during the last twenty five years to those who have not read them in Sinhala. This dialogue between him and me is a result of an article by Prof. Amaratunga or de S. Amaratunga (since he also uses the title Professor I have no doubt that he is Professor Emeritus, and I can refer to him as such without fear as I do not want to be sued by the University of Peradeniya for giving titles of the University to those who are not entitled) to the Island under the title “Tamil Problem and World Power Polarization”, where he referred to “some analysts who seem to be obsessed with a cultural determinism tend to go at a tangent and lose sight of this ultimate aim of the neo-colonialist.” I knew that he was referring to me not because of a case of “putting on the hat if it suits you” but for sometime he had been at this game of referring to my work on “Chinthanaya”, “relativism” (he thinks it is determinism) “reality” erroneously understanding what I have been writing. Having come to the national struggle or the nationalist movement (“Jathika Vyaparaya) just before he retired from the university service he may have thought it fit to sweep all the false concepts due to me and also to expose my bad influence on “Jathika Chinthanaya” probably because he thought that I was a nuisance in the nationalist movement, who had differences with his “mentor” Dr. Gunadasa Amarasekera. Very few people would have realized that there were differences between Dr. Amarasekera and myself though it was well known among those who read our articles between the lines or who had private conversations with us on “Jathika Chinthanaya”.

I thought I should reply to Prof. Amaratunga without mentioning his name and I did so in my article on “Is the west against Sri Lanka – I” that was published on 26th August. I quote below what is relevant completely as many would have read that part without realising that it was a reply to Prof. Amaratunga. “There are some Sinhala nationalists including professors who think that the west is doing all these to exploit us economically. These people think of the present western policy as neo colonialism and would believe that the west is only after the wealth of our countries. They stick to some old fashioned theories on colonialism and neo colonialism and would like to pontificate to “ignoramus” such as us that we should not ignore the economic background of the entire Tamil problem. In any event there is no so called cultural determinism in our theories unlike in the case of some western theorists who would try to reduce everything to economics. These people claiming to be anti neo colonialists are happy with western theories and still go behind western concepts that have been able to divert our attention from some of the main problems associated with colonialism. If these people think that by supporting the LTTE the west can exploit any oil that may be found in the northern areas of the country and other resources in the east coast then they are mistaken. Why did the British support the English speaking Tamils over the English speaking Sinhalas early in the twentieth century when their allegiance to the British was not different from that of the Sinhala counterparts? Even culturally these two groups were not different but the British never tolerated the Sinhalas especially the Sinhala Buddhists and always wanted the Tamil leaders to be the leaders of the entire country. One could say that this was the general policy of the British throughout the world and they had always supported the minority against the majority. However, it is not a general theory that could be applied in the case of Sri Lanka as it was the Sinhala Buddhists who have challenged the British from 1817 continuously up to the present time. Though there may have been some Sinhala leaders who were willing to serve the British the Sinhala people in general have opposed the British unlike the ethnic communities. In this regard we should not forget the reports sent by the British governors to the colonial secretary complaining of the “undue” influence the Bhikkus had over the Sinhala Buddhists. The British were scared of the Bhikkus more than anybody else including the so called working class and it was not for economic reasons that the British did not like the Bhikkus. The fact that our ancestors had more wisdom than some of the patriotic professors who have entered the nationalist struggle on the eve of their retirement from the university is shown by the clauses that the former had insisted to be included in the Sinhala British agreement of 1815. The then Sinhala leaders had wanted the British to promise that the latter undertook to protect and nourish what is referred to as Buddhagama and Devalegama. It should be clear even to a lately woken up patriotic professor that this clause had more cultural connotations than those economic.”

Prof. Amaratunga promptly replied in his article on “still a Marxist” that appeared on 31st August. It was time to mention names and he referred to me by name and he made three points in his article. Firstly he said “colonialism includes these aspects - economic conquest as well as cultural conquest and that they often go hand in hand much like twin brothers.” Then he went on to describe it as follows. “The Western powers use these depending on the extent to which they could use them to achieve their ends. This should be obvious to us who have suffered at the hands of these conquering powers. What is interesting is how these three powers used these two strategies to varying degrees to achieve their end. The Portuguese were almost totally bent on cultural conquest, probably under the impression that total cultural subversion must precede any economic exploitation. In other words cultural conquest – spiritual conquest was their priority. How successful they have been is seen by the ironic situation that Prof. Nalin de Silva himself continues to use that cultural endowment – Silva!” According to him the Dutch were “more interested in economic exploitation” and the British having realized that a “cultural – spiritual conquest was a near impossibility” “confined themselves to economic exploitation using a comprador class made of upper class Sinhalese and Tamil leaders.” Ay this point I would like to point out how he has somersaulted from his earlier position that colonialism is nothing but economic exploitation when he was criticized. The following paragraph id from his Tamil Problem and World Power Polarization.

“Some analysts who seem to be obsessed with a cultural determinism tend to go at a tangent and lose sight of this ultimate aim of the neo-colonialist. They forget that the rich West could maintain their luxurious life style only by plundering the poor. The purpose of the cultural domination that the West attempts is nothing but economic exploitation. The war against the Islamic culture is aimed at maintaining the grip on the oil rich Middle East. That against the Chinese culture is to stop Chinese expansion. Cultural domination by itself is meaningless unless it opens the avenues for economic exploitation.” What happened to the twins who go hand in hand? I will answer the Silva question later. (Honda Honda netum eliwena jameta) Secondly he reiterated his false accusation that I was obsessed with cultural determinism, and said “this cultural obsession has made Prof. Nalin de Silva come out with such inanities as Sinhala Science, Sinhala Biology, Sinhala medical science! They may boost our ego but would culturally take us back to the Dark Ages much against the liberal attitude espoused by our Sinhala Buddhist Culture.” Thirdly Prof. Amaratunga felt sad that “Prof. de Silva is out to make a mockery of that valuable concept Jathika Chinthanaya enunciated by Dr. Gunadasa Amarasekera.” He also had the following to say. “By trying to make it an all-encompassing great narrative, he (Nalin de Silva) is bound to make a mockery of it. This is what ails all Marxists. Prof. Nalin de Silva, I am afraid, is still a Marxist though he says he has given up Marxism! Marx was no Marxist.”

In the first part of my reply to Prof. Amaratunga that appeared on 9th September I challenged him to quote “an instance in my writings either in English or in Sinhala where I have said that everything is culturally determined” and “in particular where have I said that knowledge is culturally determined”. I then mentioned that the “valuable concept Jathika Chinthanaya enunciated by Dr. Gunadasa Amarasekera” had been first used by Mr. Kuliyapitiye Prananda and that Dr. Amarasekera had copied it from a westerner, whom I identified as Waliki in my second part of my reply. In that first part I briefly said that in my view knowledge is relative to the culture, the mind and the five senses and not determined by culture as such. I had to tell Prof. Amaratunga that there is a difference between cultural determinism and relativism, which I am afraid he does not seem to understand. It would at least save the time of the readers if this Professor even after retiring understand the difference between determinism and relativism. I asked whether Prof. Amaratunga could “give an example for a knowledge that is not relative to either to the culture or shall we say the six “indriyas”.

I had only prepared the ground in my first part and on the same day the second part appeared Prof. Amaratunga comes out with a “reply” to my first part. He did not come out with any instance where I have said that knowledge is determined by culture nor where I have reduced everything to culture in spite of my challenges to do so. Instead he claims that I who accuses of Dr. Amarasekera of copying the woolly and nebulous idea of Jathika Chinthanaya have also copied from westerners and goes on to write on Knowledge, Reality and Nirvana. I will reply to his second reply on “Knowledge, Reality and Nirvana” later in this series and I will show that my “explanation” of Nirvana does not depend on a “bahubootha concept” but is in the tradition of Theravada and “Milinda Prashnaya” where rebirth is explained in terms of “na ca so na ca anno” meaning neither you nor somebody else. Prof. Amaratunga who does not seem to have any idea of “catuskoti” or four fold logic or “athmadava” would probably say neither you nor anybody else is also “bahubootha” as “pavena parandel” of western sciences and technologies have difficulties in overcoming the constraints introduced by Aristotelian logic. He may even claim that he does not believe in rebirth following his mentor. In the meantime I must say that in “Mage Lokaya” I have stated that knowledge can be created in many ways assimilating or absorbing from other cultures being one of them. In the case of “Jathika Chinthanaya” we are concerned with something original in the national culture and what I wanted was to emphasise that even there Dr. Amarasekera who talks of imitators (“anukarakayos”) has himself become an imitator without absorbing a foreign idea to our culture.

I have already responded to his “Marx was not a Marxist”, all encompassing mega narrative or great narrative and Nalin de Silva is still a Marist. However much he wants he cannot show that I have reduced everything to culture nor that I have said knowledge is determined by culture. In a vain attempt to do so in his second reply he has the impudence to say the following. “Regarding the relationship between knowledge and culture it could be seen that human beings at the earliest times created knowledge before they created a culture. They used their inherent enquiring mind to find out about the surrounding world and solve their problems. Knowledge was acquired by this manner. They used this knowledge to develop their culture which in turn helped them to gain further knowledge. This basic relationship may be operational at present too. For instance the knowledge that betel chewing (with tobacco) could cause mouth cancer, which incidentally was discovered with the help of dentists, could result in the decline of this habit in Sri Lanka. Similarly the knowledge that is being gathered regarding the protective nature of certain foods could result in changes in food habits in the West as well as the East. These could be considered as cultural changes brought about by knowledge and proved to be beneficial to human beings as shown by the improvement of their health.” It is clear that he does not have a clue as to what culture is. Anyway thank God for creating the dentists who have discovered that betel chewing with tobacco could cause mouth cancer. Culture is what ever man had created leaving out what is called nature. Whatever is not nature is culture. Thus knowledge also belongs to culture. Not only chewing of beetle but the knowledge of chewing beetle is also culture. Western science belongs to the western culture. What we are interested is in how knowledge is created and we say that it is created relative the culture and the “indriya” including the mind as well. Prof. Amaratunga is interested in knowing what came first culture or knowledge in a typical western fashion of finding the first cause. The answer is easy in our culture. Whether it was the fist man or the woman on the earth as the western way of thinking he or should have had a “samsaric” experience and he or she would have created the so called first knowledge on the earth relative to his or her mind and that first knowledge would have become his or her culture as well. I will explain this in detail later.

Professor Nalin de Silva