2 / 2026 • Issue 7
Civilization and Science
| From the Chief Editor We have come a long way from dwelling in caves to celebrating ourselves as masters of the universe, but how much of our progress is truly civilizational, and how much depends solely on physical science and technology? Given how we proceed now, will we continue to benefit from science, or will it destroy us? |
| AI and the Global South: Colonialization or Emancipation? Sudhir Tiku The Global South is no longer a passive recipient of global power dynamics; it is an increasingly influential force actively shaping the 21st century. Its growing importance is multifaceted, driven by both demographic and economic shifts. |
| Tantra and the Hard Problem of Consciousness Justin M Hewitson This essay engages with the debate over the hard problem of consciousness formulated by David Chalmers: why does sentience arise in matter? It interrogates Western physicalism via idealist arguments to challenge the philosophical incoherence of strict empiricism. |
| Transhumanism – Promise or Peril? Aaron Frank The power to rewrite the genetic code of a human life is no longer speculative. For the first time, science confirmed that human beings are born with deliberately altered DNA and can pass those genetic changes to future generations. |
| The River Within Us: Rediscovering Our Sacred Bond with Rivers Shermon Cruz As the backbones of civilization, rivers did not just sustain life—they created history. Along their banks, civilisations blossomed into the societies we know today. Rivers are not only the authors of human history, but the intrinsic essence of life and the cosmos |
| River Valley Civilizations Shrii Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar Human civilization is created in, and moves along, river valleys. Like a river, human civilization also has three stages – hill stage, plain stage and delta stage. From the hill stage, it moves to the plain stage and from the plain stage to the delta stage. A civilization starts in the hill stage, develops in the plain stage, and matures in the delta stage. |
| Civilization, Science and Spiritual Progress Shrii Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar The subtle sense of refinement that we encounter in the various expressions of life is called civilization. It is also the expression of life’s physical aspects. How does the development of civilization take place? Civilization has an intimate relationship with science. They progress together. |
| P.R. Sarkar on Indology: Lost and Forgotten Cultural History of Ra’r’h and North East India Ac. Shambhushivánanda Avt. Evidence of an ancient “lost river civilization” was uncovered off the west coast of India in 2001. Local archaeologists claim the find could push back the currently accepted dates of the emergence of the world’s first cities. |
| The Discipline of Love Richard Hames Without the deliberate cultivation of love as method – in law, economics, technology and security, not just in families and faiths – we are unlikely to become a species that deserves to survive. This is not a call for everyone to be nicer. It’s a structural question: what happens when we treat love as an underlying constraint rather than a decorative sentiment? |
| Music and Agency: The Philosophical Voice of Tagore, Sarkar and Spivak Sumaya Machado Lima This article investigates the potential for philosophical agency in Bengali music, framing social constraint through Bourdieu’s Habitus and Symbolic Power. Using a hermeneutic approach, the study compares Tagore’s “Ekla Chalo Re” with Sarkar’s “E gán thámibe ná”. Results show Tagore emphasizes individual courage, while Sarkar’s music infuses a collective mandate, linking action to Neo-Humanism and PROUT. |
| The Orthodox Homeopath Who Shakes Up His Field, an interview with Erik Van Woensel Anthony Carlyle An interview with Erik Van Woensel, a homeopath who demands rigorous scientific accountability, standardisation, and long-term diagnostic tracking of homeopathy. He introduced more than 150 detailed, long-term case studies, citing systematic analyses, quantitative follow-ups, and transparent prognostic breakdowns to establish strict clinical standards. |