Speedy Dialogue- Zita

THE SPEEDY VIRTUAL INTERVIEW SERIES

Introducing a New series: Speedy Dialogues

Episode 1, January 2019

Speedy with Zita Perera Subasinghe,

On Time, Global warming and Generational Responsibility

I hope readers will warm towards my latest idea. I hope to discuss various topics with friends who volunteer and the topics are wide open. Please do come up with suggestions. The inaugural one is with my close friend Zita.

Speedy: Good morning Zita. Another year passes and here we are in 2019 just as we were getting used to 2018! I love Andy Rooney’s quote on the subject - “I've learned that life is like a roll of toilet paper. The closer it gets to the end, the faster it goes.”

Zita: Hey, that is good! Speedy (you know, I am still not sure whether to call you Speedy or Mahendra!),the end of an year and the imminent dawn of a New Year always makes us pensive and thoughtful but also forward looking and hopeful. We think of visiting friends and relatives, going to and giving parties. But at the back of our minds that nagging feeling- ok we’ll make merry, sing songs and live it up but there’s disquiet too. We see and hear photos of bad news of a tsunami, there’s starvation and poverty and sickness and death. Even when we see this unexpected good weather we have the uncomfortable knowledge that it is Global Warming, Climate change, depletion of resources, suffering of animals and the collection of non-degradable plastic and other substances.  These spell out bad news for the planet and the life in it of the present and the future generations of man and animals.

Speedy: Speedy, Mahendra, Mahen, Gonsal: all OK by me!

Throughout history, there are ups and downs, reasons to be joyous and reasons to be sad. That is life. We are of course much more aware of issues such as Global warming.

Zita: Quite true. There was a time when we were younger and we heard this message on global warming full of foreboding, we discarded it ‘Oh stop moaning’ and went on with whatever we were doing. But now we have children of our own, grandchildren and nephews and nieces. We see little ones taking their first, faltering steps and our hearts fill with love and hope for their future. Then suddenly, like a thunderbolt we see in our mind’s eye and in news everywhere words and pictures of climate change and possible extinction of birds; so there won’t be pictures of robins on greeting cards. There will be too many vehicles and road blocks. There’ll be the depletions of fuels. Robots will do all our work but there’ll be the slow and sure death of planet Earth!

Speedy:  Global warming is fact but the change in attitude you refer to as we get older, don’t you think this is natural? I mean to be aware that there is a new generation and that we have a responsibility to ensure a safe future for them. After all, we only have this one planet.

Zita: Absolutely agree and we must all contribute in any way we can. I am saying, let’s start now, one person at a time, let’s stop using plastic bags, reuse an ‘up cycle’ those in use, reduce waste, recycle with care, reduce use of fossil fuels, stop making this world a dreary waste land and let’s do this one person at a time, let’ spread the message to at least one person each, every day and it will be a billion people getting it in no time. Let’s give people hope not despair, love not hate, compassion and not selfishness. Let’s share what we have with others and let’s each of us alleviate poverty in one person, so there’ll be billions of people helped along their way.

Speedy:  What a beautiful goodwill message from you for the New Year 2019!

Zita: Yes! Yes! Happy New World to all to look forward to!

Speedy:  Zita, this prompts me to start a discussion with you on how we look at time. These are my thoughts and I would welcome your own.  The years, the months, the weeks, the days, the hours and the seconds are all humanity's way of making sense of the world. All there is, is time and space and matter. There is no real change from the 31st of December to the 1st of January compared to change from 30^th to 31^st of December, as the universe does not work like that. The concept of “time” and “event occurrence” is needed to organise our lives. What ultimately matters however is how we utilise the time we have till it ultimately and inevitably runs out for each and every one of us, periodically. The world, and us the Beings in it, will always face challenges and also be presented with opportunities. Let us make the best of these for us, and always think of the welfare of future generations as we have a duty which we cannot abrogate

Zita: You are so right about 'time'. I have read that time is an illusion and of course there was more but that line stuck with me.

Speedy:  Time gives us “time” to fill our brains with memories that matter. So long as we look at the past to re-live pleasant experiences and not dwell on bad ones, we will be happy

Zita: I am sure you are right. You told me about the lovely period you've spent with your sons over Xmas you'll take that happiness with you and it will last a very long time. I do like you taking the time to spend with them. I know 'time' itself is not what matters but what you talked, sang, cooked, and the meals you enjoyed and visits you made with them that matter. The experience is saved in a corner of our brains as 'happy memories' to be recalled at will. Time is not like that, once gone it's gone.

Speedy:  Very true. The worst thing is to look back and have regrets. You just cannot press the rewind button and change what is to follow (only in sci-fi movies!). I don’t know who said it, but it is probably true that “regret” is the saddest word in the English language.

Zita: I think that quote is attributed to American author Tonya Hurley, bestselling author of the book series ghostgirl, and is so true.

Speedy:  There are so many intriguing things about time we can discuss. Does anything about time come to your mind at this moment in time?

Zita: Yes. Do you remember the `matrix' films? There was a lot in those on 'time, space, existence' and it was almost that we are pre-programmed to act as we do and that time itself and space itself is an illusion and we are programmed to think we are very hampered with our capabilities because of pre programming

Speedy:  Pre-programming is interesting. Those who believe in Astrology must accept this indirectly. I personally find it very difficult to subscribe to the view, that we are born progress through a series of life events, and then die, and that all these events are pre-determined or planned. Some may like to use the term fate or “the awesome force of destiny” as ND puts it!

Zita: I have no problem with ‘pre-programming’. Anyway, it is a hyphenated word inferring a predetermination of our fate. I don’t think anyone can prove it but from our own exposure in growing up, including our religion, our parents’ influence and our education will instil into our minds these various beliefs and ‘dogmas’ but no one can prove or disprove it. Rationalists can only query how one can prove it. It cannot be ‘proved’

Speedy:  I do agree with you that cultural factors matter a lot in developing our belief systems. For example, the single most dominant factor that determines a person is what he/she was born into, and that has been confirmed over and over again.

Zita: I am not at all surprised by that. The “struggle” between belief (faith) and analytical thinking is common to us all.

Speedy: Indeed Zita. Although as I said, I have difficulty with the concept of a pre-determined destiny, I do accept that we are not in full control of our “destiny” all the time. From the moment of conception, we are prone to tendencies. For example, we are genetically conditioned, and that is a given. After births, environmental influences matter. For example, the son of a couple, one of whom is a drug addict and the other a prostitute, living in a deprived inner city area has very little chance of succeeding in life. When he makes a “free choice”, he is already conditioned by factors beyond his control which affects his “free choice”. A boy growing up in a loving family environment may make a different choice given the same situation.

Zita: I suppose it is a mixed bag, with some “pre-determined” influence and some entirely within our control. 

Speedy:  A nice way of putting it! Moving on, although I don’t really want to enter into areas of religious controversy, it is inescapable that one’s view of “time” is coloured by one’s religious background. Buddhists and Hindus believe in a cycle of births and deaths, Christians and Muslims also believe that death is not the end and “the next instalment will follow”

Zita: Yes. Without going into ‘Faith’ particularly if one is a non-believer in religion, then what I can say is that from the dawn of time (hey that word again!) humans have wanted this life to go on, in some form, so concepts of re-birth, a spiritual world after death, another life etc have given hope to individuals. No one has come back to tell us ‘it is so or not’. So, can you blame man for thinking in this way?

Speedy:  The history of Mankind (or Humankind in these days of PC!), is replete with Man’s curiosity about life and death. As you rightly point out, there has always been a fascination about what happens after death.

Then there is the scientific view that there is “space-time” and not time or space alone.

Zita:  One has to admit that there are different forms of time. What you and I are now talking about is ‘time’ experienced by a human being on a day to day basis when he sets about living from sun up to sun down. He would meet his friend in 1 hour, or he will eat his lunch in two hours’ time. He will catch his return train in two hours 30 minutes. He needs to have a number for ‘time’ so he has devised seconds minutes and hours and later days and months so as to conduct his life in this world with ease. So, the clock and the calendar were devised. (They say the calendar as we have it now started with 1 A.D. now let’s leave that as I don’t want to bring religion as such into this discussion.)

Speedy:  That fits in with my proposition that a more mundane reflection on “time” is that time has meaning only through events that fill it. The sensation of time passing is also very subjective and what feels like “a long time” or a “short time” is so subjective.

Zita: You are quite right. Speedy!

Speedy:  One thing is clear. We all have only a relatively tiny amount of time to spend on this Planet. If you are born, you will die. We are an infinitesimally small part of the Universe. Let us not get big-headed and let us spend this time as fruitfully as we can, with our families, friends, associates and members of the Community of Human beings in Peace and Harmony. Divisions based on age, sex, ethnicity, religion, wealth, political views and “how clever you are” have no place. Let us tolerate variations in belief as we are learning all the time and very little is proven. If The “Truth” is proven, there won’t be room for other “Truths”.  Let us spend the moment we have (Live in the present), which is “now” as wisely as we can.

That is my final message Zita and how would you like to state yours?

 Zita: I want to say, Hear! Hear! To that Speedy! How wise you are! That is what really matters! I.e. how we spend this ‘time’. How productive we are, how happy we are, how fruitful and how resourceful. You have already said the same thing. And so, let us end this very ‘timely’ and fruitful discussion saying ‘it does not matter what ‘time’ means but it is how we spend this undefinable ‘time’ that matters. Let us do good to ourselves and our neighbour. Let us be happy, helpful, fruitful, and successful and let us educate ourselves in things we do not yet know.

Speedy:  Once again Zita, my much valued friend and “batch mate”, thank you for taking part in this inaugural “Speedy Dialogue”. I hope to do several more with my colleagues.