[The following is the transcription of Nandini Iyer's Dialogue questions. It remains unedited at present, but will be updated shortly]

Pamela Lee:

Hello. You were talking about the value of myths and heroic tales, and I'm wondering if you have some personal choices that you would like to see continue to be part of culture, perhaps global culture, or do you think we need the creation of new myths, or both?

Nandini Iyer:

I think every society and every culture has the myths that are most appropriate to transmitting its own values. And to me the interesting thing is that the values that are transmitted by very different seeming myths in different cultures - the values themselves are remarkably alike, just as in religion I think the place where they come together the most, and are most alike (even in the institutionalised religions) are their ethics. Something like a golden rule for (omission) for literally exists in only slightly different forms in every one of the major religions, (omission) Christian and Confucian. So I think I have myths which are favourites of mine - maybe Greek myths - it may be the myth of Prometheus, or it may be some myths in the Hindu culture, from the Mahabarata Mahayana, or it may be some of the native American Indian myths appeal to me and so on. Or the Meso-American myths, but what I'm saying that all of the generations, every culture shows a certain wisdom in choosing the way in which it is going to construct it's myths as a means of passing on the values and the most important, the richest of the discoveries of that tradition. So they will vary in outward from. I'm sure that if you're aware of the work of Milchia Ryardi [check this] the great mythologist, and scholar of comparative religions, but at also another level of Joesph Campbell and his first book "The Hero of a Thousand Faces", where he shows that the myth of heroism, if you look at the myths of different cultures, the heroes have different faces, but in the end, the lesson that is being taught and the values that are being conveyed in all these multiple different myths, these values are the same. And I think that's where myths come into their own. But I think it is true that, for instance, it has been said by sociologists and psychologists that at least that this was one time where America fell behind, perhaps, because it was not a traditional society that was old enough to have generated myths. And yet you know, it's not true -American children are brought on the myth of Bouldevere [?] spreading the news, or Washington cutting down the cherry tree, or Paul Bunyon. Or more recently of course we are told that there is the myth of the American cowboy, who rode strong and straight in the saddle, and saw that justice was done, killed the bad guys, and then rode off all by himself into the sunset. And the important thing about these myths was that he was tall and strong. And this is a myth because if we compare it to what we are told by historians, the average height of the American cowboy in the nineteenth century was five foot seven, which is not particularly tall by American standards. But the myth serves the purpose and it was a myth because it did not correspond with literal reality. But certain elements were taken from the reality and fused with other elements to pass along a set of values. So I think there are types of myths and each society has the wisdom to generate its own myths.

Ari Santoso:

Hi. I do believe in what you say about education. It's the key to change the (omission) system and (omission) and culture. And I also believe that education, from basic education, from the people around us, closest to us, which is family - it's a very basic and essential means of sharing the family ethic or the family system, what we are going to do next in religion. And also the educational system, and also the government. Actually the three of them are one together - there is no one particular family responsibility. The three of them are very essential. Because the basic one, which is family, that shows the real means in the real world, and the education system, which increases their knowledge, and the government, which is in our daily life, where we can apply what we have learnt so far, what we have got from our families and also society, to do in the most (omission) area which is government. And I think that basic education in the family will not succeed if the government will not do the same. If we in the family we forced to have mass failure system which is so alien that government do the wrong thing [?] Children are the hope for the future. This a family would deny thing to students - they just show more failures. (omission) So, that's my point - the three of them are important together.

Nandini Iyer:

Thank you, Ari. Of course I might add that we may teach them as family at whatever level, but if the people who are teaching don't [do it] themselves - if there's a huge gap between what they are teaching and the way they live their own lives, it's not going to have much effect. We have to also provide them with some examples, as I said, of at least an effort to live up to those principles.

Kenichiro Baba:

In the Christian tradition is there is only one. Do you think there is only one religion and does it have to be only one?

Nandini Iyer:

No. I don't believe there is only religion in the sense of expressions of the religious spirit. I do believe there is one truth but every religion is trying to express that truth. But the moment it gets expressed in words, I think it invariably loses some of its life. And so, as I said, different religions are, as long as they don't exclude each other, and say "I'm the only one! You're all wrong!" If they recognise and respect each other as different paths and people, and people on different paths trying to strive for the same goal. As long as we admit that they are all going to lead, if properly walked on, to the same goal, then I think there can be many many religions. And I think, in fact, we cannot have only one religion. That would be imposing a uniformity on human beings which simply does not exist, so you would have to force them to have one religion, which in that case, it's not a true religion at all.

James Harvelik:

My question is I guess more of a comment question. I believe that religion and science will come together one day. It's just a matter of evolution. But at some point in time, evolution must serve, must happen through, I think of it just like on an individual level, as a sort radical revolutionary action. For this to happen, there must be some sort of information that comes directly from above, or from some of medium, and is then brought to the people to in order to create some sort of base. So that all the religions, they keep their traditions and see themselves as beautiful just the way they are, but there must some sort of base that is agreed upon, some base truth that must be agreed upon, between the religions. So my question is "what sort of force would this have to be, what sort of medium would this have to be, that to bring people to this level where...

Nandini Iyer:

Do you mean, what should we all believe in that would bring us all together?

James Harvelik:

I mean there would have to be something that starts it, that initiates it, that actually does something. Of course, I believe that, speaking about it in this fashion is already the base of it, and in fact it is being realised. But there must still be some sort of physical manifestation of the entire project to bring this sort of awareness to the people. It can't happen, people won't get it automatically - governments. Like Satish said there must be something unifying in nature, that brings it then to the people.

Nandini Iyer:

Well, the idea, I think has been mentioned by several people before at this conference, by Satish and by Adam Wolpert, and by others - the recognition that in the end we are part of an indissoluble whole, we cannot separate ourselves from others. Even though we are all unique as individuals, but to separate ourselves completely - you know, no man is an island. So if you separate yourself completely, something artificial is happening. And is going to lead to some form of disaster, both for yourself and for others. So the sense of connectedness, of being one, and that what we do effects others, and what others do is bound to effect us, and therefore we have think of what exactly it is we are going to be doing. And not only are we going to effect each other, we have and will always effect nature. And we have to reap the consequences of what we sow, whether we exploit other human beings or whether we exploit nature. In the end there is some kind of justice that brings back to us the consequences of our actions - good, bad or indifferent.

Marina Lee Kunlan:

Hi. I agree with you. When I was listening to your speech I was thinking of my personal life. I was brought up in a multi-race family. And I agree with you in terms of needing a world view of religions. But the one thing that concerns me is that, at the base of all these religions, there are common human values, and ethics. But there is also a commonality of the exclusion of the female experience, and [applause] the gender experience of values and ethics of world religion.

Nandini Iyer:

Well, there are a couple of things I would like to say about that. First of all, it's interesting that the more anthropologists, archaeologists, etc. look at ancient societies, the clearer it becomes that the religion of the mother goddess came much much earlier than the religion of the male god. Why is that? It's true that in the last, at least two millennia I would say, women have been put down, and we know that's a very complicated problem, and it's not that it's inherent in religion, but often statements in religion have been taken out of context, distorted, misinterpreted, to put women down. So I think we can't put the blame on the religion. If we think about it Buddha insisted on the equality of men and women. One thing he strongly objected to in the Hinduism of his time, was that women have this very low position. If you look at Jesus, one of the things that shocked his contemporaries was the fact that he actually took women seriously - I mean he talked to them! Talked to them! (omission) just let them be in their in homes, looking after the babies and doing the cooking. But he actually talked to them and preached to them and discussed things with them - this was shocking. So we see that, and yet look what happened to Christianity later on. When you get to the middle ages, one of the hot points of debate of the scholars and bishops was "do women have souls?" I mean, everyone knew men had souls, and everyone knew animals did not have souls, but where did women stand, I mean this was a serious religious point in medieval Christianity. But you cannot trace it back to anything that Jesus said or did. So we tend to hang our prejudices on whatever is available, whether it be religion or politics.

Phil Grant:

I just wondered if you could address this question: Mahatma Gandhi entitled his autobiography, "My Experiments with Truth." And I was wondering if you, yourself had made such experiments. And if you could share with us, something that you've learned, that you would like to transmit to these young people who have assembled here to listen to you.

Nandini Iyer:

I think it is very significant that Mahatma Gandhi called his autobiography, "The Story of my Experiments with Truth." I couldn't presume to say that I have done anything like Mahatma Gandhi, but I suppose I have carried on my own, sometimes very simple, little experiments. But it is important that they call them experiments, because what I've been saying and what Mahatma Gandhi was saying is, don't take religion or any other truth as given. I mean don't just accept it, and the Buddha was very strong on this, just because someone says so. On the other hand, don't reject it out of hand either. Believe like a good scientist - look upon it as a hypothesis, and examine it, and try to experiment with it, because experiments can go toward proving or disproving a hypothesis. Now the trouble with religious, spiritual and ethical experiments, so to speak, is that the laboratory, the lab in which we have to do these experiments, is ourselves - our own lives. And we are willing to take that risk. All right, so Gandhi would have said, so you want to see if practising non-violence really does make you stronger. That's all right, but it means that you haven't really put into practice the experiments which would prove or disprove this theory. So don't knock it until you've tried it. It's not a scientific hypothesis. You have to experiment with it, you cannot reject it out of hand, and it's no use just accepting it just as a blind belief. In my own life I think that perhaps there were disadvantages, but I think I was fortunate in being raised by totally non-religious, agnostic parents. We had no religious beliefs imposed on us, no religious ceremonies, prayers, observances. In a sense I think there was something missing, but on the other hand, at least I didn't grow up with too many prejudices against other religions, and to me this exclusiveness that religions have is a sign of insecurity. I mean, we can understand children saying "my daddy is bigger and stronger and better than your daddy," but to start saying "my God is bigger and better and stronger than your God," is pathetic. It's putting it very simplistically but when grown up adults just say "my God is better than your God." Or truer, or more real, is just total childish insecurity.

I also wanted to remind everyone of what Mrs Pankhurst[?] , the British suffragist said, when one of her followers came to her with a problem, she said "well pray to God, she will help you." [applause]

Sally McLaren: Thank you very much Professor Iyer.

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