About

The foremost objective of Vichara is to build a foundation of values appropriate to the needs and possibilities of 21st century civilization. Its contention is that an aesthetic orientation toward reality—willing an amazing world, be that beauty of things+relations of atoms+bits, excellence of different humans, or greatness of civilization itself—will lead to the most joyous and meaningful reality, as well as best facilitate the kind of governance, production and distribution needed to confront a century of intensifying global catastrophic risk.

The philosophical framework of (left or right) liberalism seeks justly distributed liberty for humans, who are conceived of as atomized individuals, in order for them to pursue their utility functions. This is an innately nihilistic basis for civilization, rejecting as it does any value beyond pleasant and unpleasant qualia experienced by humans, and it thus sets the stage for the politics and culture of today, which increasingly proceed from and foster weakness, shallowness and short-sightedness.

As against this, Vichara introduces a novel articulation and integration of ideas such as vitality, beauty, purpose, nobility, etc. Along with developing this philosophical picture, Vichara also examines matters of governance, technology, culture and geopolitics for how they align or misalign with such a philosophical alternative planetary civilization can be based on.

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