31/10/2024
Hello friends, Happy Diwali to all those celebrating! Here’s a new article from me today. This article, in many ways has been inspired by my reading of scriptures and interfaith work I've been involved in. I majored in Religious Studies in the mid-80's then embarked on a career in the arts before returning to interfaith work in 2009.
Now, I am involved in data as it applies to unpacking the complexity of human identity. This work refers to Indra and his net.
In Hindu mythology, Indra was the king of the gods and ruler of the heavens, often associated with thunder, lightning, storms, and rain. For my Greek friends, yes, similar to you named it, ZEUS.
Known for his immense strength and valor, Indra wielded a powerful weapon called the Vajra, a thunderbolt symbol depicted on Greco-Buddhist coins across North, South, and Central Asia. The name Vajrapani also represents Hercules, often sculpted as Buddha’s protector. Thanks to my friend Naushaba Anjum, a coin scholar specializing in Greco-Buddhist history, I have had the fortune to hold many of these coins, including the world’s first bilingual coin—Greek on one side and Kharosthi, spoken in the Lahore region of Pakistan 2,000 years ago, on the other.
The "Net of Indra" is a symbolic concept that originated from Buddhist and Hindu philosophies, especially in Mahayana Buddhism, where it serves as a metaphor for the universe’s interdependent nature. Each knot in the net contains a jewel that reflects all other jewels, representing the universe's boundless unity and interdependence.
How serendipitous that today is Diwali, as this piece refers to Indra's net and how it helped inspire the creation of Diversity Atlas now adopted by agencies across the globe.
Ever thought some of our systems are dehumanising? Democratised datasets are essential to creating human-centred systems that recognise the complexity and interplay of human identity. Our contemporary human world is constrained within a system of…
