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Gentleman, Eavesdropper and Protagonist.



So, what is culture he pondered for a while, while the truck before him was idling? Is it the ideas that are advocated by few men of intellect that drives the civilization forward? he conjectured as the man behind the steering wheel pulled the gear levers and the truck took to the roadway. If not for the wheels, the gears, throttle, the sophisticated suspension, the immaculate joints, the crank shafts with zero tolerance, all of them would merely charge the truck into the state of ‘idling’, but could never put it into motion. But is it that simple, he struggled with skepticism; wheels are just as much an integral part in the complex machinery of the truck as any other part. Isn't that so?

Besides, wheels can only take the truck as far as the engine permits, and there are a whole lot of other parameters that preclude the wheels from assuming a central authority. ‘So, is the civilization too’, he blushed pleasingly as if he chanced upon a critical theory and continued with the new found spirit ‘ all the men and women in a civilization represent the interiors of the truck while the intellectuals represent the wheels. Intellectuals can guide the civilization smoothly through ruff and unsafe roads by forming devices that could help cushion the effects of a bumpy timeline just as the air in the rubber tyres cushions the truck on a bumpy road’. He was so pleased with the analogy that served his inquisition that he began a small talk with the gentleman sitting beside him. While they waited for the bus, another truck stopped by before them. The gentleman waved at the driver in the truck before asking our protagonist a tricky question. ‘What about the driver’ the gentleman waved his arms wide open as if he made a very clever point. To this our protagonist seemed oddly bemused; he made few vain attempts of comparison, that the driver represented the ruler (to which the gentleman retaliated with fine examples of civilization without clear and distinguished rulers), that the driver represented an apparition not wholly accompanying in the journey through the timeline of civilization’s progress but merely accrued to, as an existence (to which the gentleman demanded our protagonist to substantiate reasons for the necessity of such an apparition, while the civilization already had intellectuals as the truck had wheels)

By now, our protagonist was stirring his mind’s pot violently with the inquisitive spoon to pull out the grape of explanation. He convulsively shook his mind’s pot and finally came up with an explanation. ‘ The driver represents the prime idea, an idea that defines the period of that time. Just as one driver switches his place with another after a while, the prime idea also shifts to make way for another, not necessarily a better one, merely another’. To this the gentleman appropriately ridiculed ‘if not for a better idea, why then would an idea make way for another at all in the first place’. Our protagonist pleased with the gentleman’s inquiry responded ‘only after a period of time in a driver’s career can the judgment be made, similarly for the truck of civilization, the idea or driver after replacing an incumbent one gains approval or censure from the men and women of the civilization after a period of time’ the protagonist continued ‘but, the switch in prime ideas does happen, for the accumulation of knowledge and the segregation of other localized ideas gains momentum over a period of time and the situation becomes volatile at a point in time, when the immediate realization for the switch in the driver or the idea occurs’.

The gentleman and the protagonist got into a bus and on the way, an eavesdropper commented ‘there is a glitch though, in your theory you mentioned the superiority of an idea over many other localized ideas which drives the civilization’ both men nodded their heads and the eavesdropper with the affirmative gesticulations presented before him proceeded ‘you also emphasized on the knowledge that these men and women of the civilization gather, disseminate, relish and take pride in’. Presently the eavesdropper paused for a while as if crying for an affirmation from the listeners. The gentleman nodded slightly with apprehension not knowing where the train of comment from the eavesdropper was leading to. ‘so, how is it that a knowledgeable populace with islands of ideas embraced wholly by the islanders give up their prized ideas, and proffer allegiance to a central or prime idea as you put it?’. The protagonist and the gentlemen were awestruck by the eavesdropper’s terrifying method which appeared for a while so menacing as to shake the foundations of the establishment built laboriously.

The protagonist however was a clever man, so he explained ‘this inquiry admirably adds another dimension to support the establishment rather than destroy it’. To this the eavesdropper looked nonchalant. The protagonist took no respite in hurling his intuitive aids at the dispense of the establishment for its safety. He blithely went on ‘the knowledgeable populace with their islands of thought march towards a society of civil unrest, each clinging to their elegant ideas fervently, and this situation immediately invalidates any individual island’s predominance. Furthermore, the men of intellect dynamically rebuild the philosophy of the central or the prime idea in as much as the situation demands, just as the wheels of the truck transfer information to the driver in a feedback loop so he can readjust his driving philosophy as the tract demands of him’.

The gentleman hitherto in muse, now added virtue to this establishment ‘so, as the road we are on changes, driver immediately accommodates or compensates his driving methodology to suit that road. As the civilization progresses, the ideas dynamically change, but instead of a violent jerk (as from the bad driving skill of the driver), the men of intellect streamline the feedback process in such a way as to aid for a smooth transition between ideas, and this my friend is the mechanism behind the working of a civilization.

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