The first people of Sri Lanka – A speculative construction of the past

Fossil remains are our principal guide. Stone artifacts and organic and inorganic remains directly associated with fossil finds may help in ‘dating’ the unearthed complexes and provide clues as to the ‘level of advancement’ of the putative human types that the fossils represent. The sad truth is that no significant fossil finds that shed light on the early evolution of man have ever been found in Sri Lanka. Despite the local ballyhoo about a ‘Balangoda Man’ (A fictitious posit of an over-enthusiastic Museum Zoologist) it can be stated with fair confidence that Sri Lanka was never a theatre of Primate Evolution.

l by R. Chandrasoma

(04 July, 2012, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) In speaking of the first people or indigenes of Sri Lanka, two things must be remembered that set close limits to our hypothesizing. The first is that historical records and archeological findings of the ordinary kind are valueless in working out the ‘late anthropogenesis’ of our species. Fossil remains are our principal guide. Stone artifacts and organic and inorganic remains directly associated with fossil finds may help in ‘dating’ the unearthed complexes and provide clues as to the ‘level of advancement’ of the putative human types that the fossils represent. The sad truth is that no significant fossil finds that shed light on the early evolution of man have ever been found in Sri Lanka. Despite the local ballyhoo about a ‘Balangoda Man’ (A fictitious posit of an over-enthusiastic Museum Zoologist) it can be stated with fair confidence that Sri Lanka was never a theatre of Primate Evolution. As a continental outpost of limited size it ‘received’ early human types from centres of anthropogenesis in Eurasia and the Far East. From Africa – widely regarded as the ‘cradle’ of the human race – there is no evidence for the direct transfer of human genes to Sri Lanka

Let us fill in the details. Who were the first humans to cross our shores? It is pretty obvious that any definition cannot be couched in terms that are cultural, linguistic or ethnographic. Our mainstay must be a characterization of the physical features of the earliest remains discovered. Skulls and other osseous remains – well dated and expertly characterized - must be our primary guide. Unfortunately, this is exactly the kind of evidence that is sadly lacking in the pre-historic studies relating to our island. We need physical anthropologists and comparative anatomists to lead the investigations into the pre-history of man in that intriguing island known as Sri Lanka. In this connection, the recent discovery of bony remains estimated to be about 11K years is of high significance for the unraveling of local pre-history - even if its significance as a global marker of human evolution cannot be very great. Accurate dating – easily done these days given the high sophistication of chronometric assessment (carbon dating, thermofluorescence etc.) - and an expert review of the osseous organization constitute the necessary groundwork for more speculative forays in this field. Most important is the task of ‘placement’ – has it archaic features that foreshadow the Australoid complex seen in the genuine Veddhas? (the ‘Ardhivedhis’ currently ‘exhibited’ are largely dark Caucasoids of the mainstream Southern population of Sri Lanka.) Suppose we see marked prognathism, low cranial capacity, high and flat cheek-bones, beetling brow-ridges, broad nasal bones etc. These characteristics – readily identified - will show if that archaic ‘person’ was a direct predecessor of the ancient Veddhas of Sri Lanka. This find will then provide strong conformation that an ancient Australoid stock from East Asia were the earliest people of Sri Lanka. The Andaman Islanders are Australoids – hinting strongly that Sri Lanka was first colonized by sea-farers from the East – not migrants from India. Indeed, Australoid stocks are found in Southern India - indicating a general migration of people from the East at a time when sea-levels were low and ‘Island-Hopping’ was possible.

It is conceivable - indeed, very likely – that another ancient stock of East Asian origin entered Sri Lanka at about the same time as the Veddha-Australoid group. They are the Negrito or pigmy-like people found widely dispersed in in South-East Asia. These ancient East-Asians must not be confused with the foetalized Negro stocks found in Africa. The reference to the Nittavo or Dwarf Forest People in some ancient chronicles of the island suggest that this sub-species of humans lived alongside the Australoid Veddhas in ancient Sri Lanka. The identification of the recently-discovered remains as Veddha or Negrito would not be a blow to conventional wisdom except that a very early colonization of so ‘remote ‘ a region as Sri Lanka would be a great surprise to the "Out of Africa’ theorists. More dramatic would be the finding that the supposedly 12K fossil had ‘Dark Caucasoid’ or Indo-Semitic features. Here we must remind readers that long before the so-called "Aryan invasion’ of the Sub-Continent, civilized or semi-civilized people had spread over India and, doubtless, intruded into Sri Lanka. Who were these people? There is confusion here because science mixes with legend and dreams. A well-established view is that Dravidic civilization commenced when Elamite stocks from the famed Babylonian region reached peninsular India by sea. These Elamo-Dravidians were also termed ‘dark Caucasoids’ or Indo-Semitic people. (The word Elam has no connection with ‘Eelam’ of the Tamil separatists.) The Elamites were a major force in ancient Mesopotamia and are credited with the pioneer use of a written script – an invention that passed on to the Elamo-Dravidians of India. The current population of Peninsular India is a mix of the Indo-Semitic or Elamo-Dravidian intrusive stocks with the early Australoid and Negrito indigenes.

A question of very great interest is the timing of these events. When did the first invasion of India by Indo-Semitic stocks occur? This may have been around 2000 BC and well after the arrival of the Australoids and Negritos in India. That these crucial events were spread out in time is a basic fact we must keep in mind. When did the first Indo-Semitic (or Elamo-Dravidian) stocks reach Sri Lanka? Well before the Vijayan invasion of course but how many thousand years before the dawn of recorded history? It is here that the recently discovered fossil can be critically important. Suppose the fossilized skull shows features that are ‘advanced’ and suggestive of an Indo-Semitic connection - then the consequences can be dramatic. That ‘advanced’ humans lived in Sri Lanka at so early an age is a big blow to conventional concepts in Pre-History – although the European Theatre saw the enaction of great transformative events at about the same time. In many ways our Island is strangely unique and we must be prepared for historical revisions of a surprising kind. It is said that one swallow does not make a summer. This recently-found fossil may turn out to be the remains of an unexciting denizen of recent age.

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Will rising energy costs throttle socio-economic development?

Such a dark cloud is the steady and menacing increase in the cost of energy. Need we add that we are in the hopeless position of being an impoverished buyer in a market ruled by others? Indeed, the whole world is now threatened as the fossil fuels that keep the civilized societies going will peter out in the lifetime of many who are now living.This issue of energy-management in the context of a global decline in the availability of affordable energy must rank as the greatest challenge to the future prosperity of Sri Lanka – indeed, to our very survival as a civilized community.

l by R. Chandrasoma

(February 22, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) It is not unfair to say that the political vision of most wielders of power at both the national and regional level is designedly myopic. The rationale is that to secure electoral support short-term payback is greatly preferred as against distant benefits. Actions that result in benefactions in the distant future have little political worth even when they are of life-saving value to future generations. 

Thus the clearing of urban slums or the battle against the dengue mosquito are weighty issues for politicians. A faulty marking-scheme is a huge conundrum even if it is insignificant in the larger context of educational advancement in our country. In contrast, a distant dark cloud –however ominous – is viewed with much complacency as it is a feature of the human spirit to hope for the best.

Dark Cloud

Such a dark cloud is the steady and menacing increase in the cost of energy. Need we add that we are in the hopeless position of being an impoverished buyer in a market ruled by others? Indeed, the whole world is now threatened as the fossil fuels that keep the civilized societies going will peter out in the lifetime of many who are now living.

This issue of energy-management in the context of a global decline in the availability of affordable energy must rank as the greatest challenge to the future prosperity of Sri Lanka – indeed, to our very survival as a civilized community.

What can we do to prevent a likely collapse of our economy if conditions turn out to be as dire as predicted? Alas, solutions are easy to envisage if we can travel backward in time but are near impossible given the state of affairs as they currently are. Our road-system can be taken as an illustrative example. – it is a system designed for vehicular traffic – not for pedestrians or bicycles. Indeed, no pedestrian is safe on our principal highways and bicycles are now practically extinct except as toys for children. This disaster – the profligate and artificial use of imported energy for tasks best done using human power - should have been foreseen decades ago. An adult can easily walk two miles a day and a cyclist can cover five miles with ease – provided the roads are made for them – not fot the belching behemoths that now dominate our roads at an enormous energy-cost. It is a shame that roads are now made that treat pedestrians as stray dogs.

Modernity

Let us look at the motor-car that is now the emblem of modernity. The notion of private motorized transport as an inalienable right is proving to be a global ecological disaster. Our planet simply cannot sustain the millions of motorcars that throng the world’s roads.

It is a most lamentable folly of our country that motor-car buying is actually encouraged by the state and its citizens delight in acquiring vehicles that enhance social prestige while caring nought for the total cost in environmental terms. A motor-car with a 1000-cc (one litre) internal combustion engine is more than sufficient to transport five adults in ease and comfort if manufacturers set their will on it. Today, only the cheapest cars have such engines – fuel efficiency is seen as the effort to make very large engines for private transport less thirsty on fuel. Thus SUVs and and sleek high-powered limousines are in greatest demand while a ‘Nano’ is seen as a kind of donkey for the lower classes aspiring to be true motorists. This folly must end – the state must rule that no private car with an engine capacity over 1000 cc can run on Sri Lankan roads.

Boors and ruffians

This revolution is just the beginning – civilized public transport must be the chief means of long distance travel with special roads for their exclusive use. The boors and ruffians who now run buses must be replaced by a ‘hospitality service’ with the kind of manners and courteous ways seen in our best hotels. The need for the planet-destroying private motor vehicle will be greatly reduced if public transport reaches this level of comfort and civility.

Let us look at that other great area of energy wastage – dangerously excessive use of electric power in our households. Must TV sets have larger and larger screens?

Must refrigerators be cupboard-sized? Is Air-Conditioning a must for survival in tropical board-rooms and offices? Must sound be belted out at very high volume to be enjoyed? Is our kitchen forlorn without microvave ovens and food-processors? These are all part of a plot by the capitalist market to make the rich richer while the planet suffers a slow death.

On the lighting of homes, much the same can be said. It is a great shame that we are compelled to use energy resources purchased in distant and alien lands at killing prices to supply household current for so basic a thing as illumination. Surely, every household in Sri Lanka can generate 100 watts of solar power – sufficient to work six CFL bulbs at no cost to the householder.

This move will revolutionize the use of electric power in the home. It will also be a symbolic blow in the great battle ahead to free ourselves from the thralldom imposed by the international energy mafia. More can be said on these lines – for example, boiling water to make it germ-free is hugely expensive in energy terms. Efficient filtration must replace boiling given the dollars we have to pay to foreigners for the luxury of killing off germs by boiling. Surely, our science is sufficiently advanced to achieve this necessary end by other means.

There is no need to add to this list. Mankind lived mostly in darkness after the sun set until about 200 years ago. Lamps first appeared when ‘mineral oil’ seeped out of the ground in North America. We are not making the ridiculous suggestion that we must go back to the age of dark nights and wood-fires but merely pointing out that a major shift in life-styles and behavioral adaptations are needed given that the world will run out of fossil fuels – the mainstay of the global energy budget– decades before the close of the century that we have just entered. We live in an age of highly sophisticated science and it seems bizarre that we are defeated by the new twist in the ancient problem of resourc e exhaustion by our notoriously destructive species.

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Why India will falter while China forges ahead ?

 | by R. Chandrasoma

(January 04, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Many factors shape the historic evolution of nations and their peoples. It is commonly thought that wise political direction is the key ingredient in the mix of interventions needed to achieve stability and standing in a competitive world. There is no doubt that this is a necessary condition for benign and successful governance but it is not sufficient. The degree of empowerment of the underprivileged, the rules of social interaction and the ‘religious’ attitude to life’s tribulations all play a significant role as ‘parameters’ in shaping the historic transformation of human societies.

The approach to human poverty in these two countries reveals starkly the philosophical disparity and its far-reaching and unfortunate consequence. The Indian poor are among the most wretched in the world despite the fact that India is an economic giant capable of producing all the fancy things prized in the West.

India and China present case studies in the determinative role played by these ‘extra-political factors’ in social evolution. These factors – the underlying sentiments that inform the beliefs, customs, or practices of a group or society - differ greatly between peoples and nations. India and China share significant commonalities – they have, both, embraced the capitalist model of management that has achieved such great success in the West. This approach embraces notions of work-efficiency and egalitarianism that are also copyings from the West. They are united in the belief that science and technology are of pivotal importance in the great task of relieving the pains and ills of the human condition. All this conceded, there exists a great separation between the two Asian giants that we cannot ignore if we are to be realistic in our assessment of their global role in the decades ahead.

The peoples of India – the common and the elite alike - are troubled by notions of the ephemerality of the world of mundane things and the providential nature of the unfolding of history. This Hindu-Buddhist cultural heritage blunts the drive to improve social conditions and sanctifies societal divisions as part of a higher scheme of things that must remain inviolate. Only the Gods can successfully intervene to set things right. Thus prayer is seen to be better than work. The wretchedness of the poor is viewed with stoic indifference and gross inequalities in society are accepted as irremedial structural features that must be patiently endured. The salutary notion that ‘Work is Worship’ is unknown in India. It is true that reformers and saints have striven valiantly to remedy matters but the social lethargy of India is such that these failings will remain a structural feature of Indian society for a very long time to come.

In contrast to what we have called the Hindu-Buddhist heritage of ‘denial’ there is the Confucian philosophy of work, public order and discipline as the key upholders of social health and stability. The dynamic core of this Confucian world-view is that society is fragile and that hard work, public discipline and commitment by all is a necessary foundation for the well-being of mankind. This enlightened approach has made the lowest in society participants in the unending struggle to keep alive and do well. It is undeniable, then, that this necessarily co-operative attitude to life and living is socially more robust than the static fatalism of traditional Indian societies.

The approach to human poverty in these two countries reveals starkly the philosophical disparity and its far-reaching and unfortunate consequence. The Indian poor are among the most wretched in the world despite the fact that India is an economic giant capable of producing all the fancy things prized in the West. Indeed, a very small fraction of Indian society enjoys the comforts and luxuries that pass as hallmarks of affluence in the West. Sadly, the poor of India – mostly workers belonging to the socially disadvantaged castes and peasants - present a very sorry picture indeed. They are not only starved and emaciated – they have the forlorn look of humans forsaken by society. The closest to them are the poor of Africa – but these Africans do not suffer the indignity of being despised by an elite of their own kind that parade their wealth and separateness.

China was – until very recently – a poor country. But the kind of depravity seen in rural India was never a feature of rural China. The peasants were adequately clothed and shod even if life was generally harsh and unforgiving. Their bearing was one of sturdy independence that bespeaks confidence - in contrast to the defeatism and apathy of the rural poor in India. The belief that honest work could mitigate if not defeat the ravages of fortune is a Confucian heritage while the defeatism of the Indian peasant is part of the spiritual baggage bequeathed to him by the dominant faiths of his country.

Poverty, corruption and indiscipline are the ‘three Horsemen of the Apocalypse’ so far as India is concerned. We have spoken of the deforming poverty of India. Corruption rides close behind. It may surprise most to learn that the malignant corruption that is so widespread in India has the same causal roots as poverty – they are both unhealthy weeds in the garden of Indian religion. Corruption is minimal when there is a strongly-developed sense of social obligation - remorse for those who lose when fortune favours the well-born and the lucky. If the poor and the weak are seen as an ill-begotten load carried by society, the prick of conscience is hardly felt by those win in life’s struggles. That practically all the political parties in India and their stalwarts are corrupt is a fact paraded by the Indians themselves. They do not refer to its ideological facilitator – the ancient religious paradigms that see the general lot of mankind as irremediably wretched.

Let us look at the last of the three failures referred to above – indiscipline. It is not individual moral failure that is implied. The social indiscipline that we fault is rooted in the lack of respect for the laws and practices that ensure healthy collective living and good citizenship. A deeply religious man (or woman) can be a poor citizen if his first care is to secure goals which are personal (and spiritual) while his otherworldliness makes him indifferent to the public good. One’s own garden can be clean and beautiful while waste and dereliction surrounds it. This metaphor sums up the state of Indian society – the existence of deep religiosity alongside a callous indifference to the iniquities all around that deform society at large. It is only in countries like India that hundreds die in a stampede to worship God.

The ideas expressed above will be misconstrued if they are seen as a blanket indictment of the Indian way of living. We in Sri Lanka are bound by the same ideological fetters that drag down our great neighbour - albeit in a less virulent form. In our country – just as in India – poverty, corruption and indiscipline ride high and mar the healthy cohesiveness that is the wellspring of social success. The withering political rancour that exists in our country is an example of social maladjustment stemming from the lack of a developed social conscience. This, in turn, hangs on religio-ethical inheritance from the past – the absence of what we have called the ‘Confusian ethos’ in our approach to life and living. The good news is that we are moving out of frames of understanding that commanded loyalty in the past. Our social evolution is headed the right way.

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