Sahu is writing about how ideas get degenerated over a period of time. Actually he is not talking about how they get degenerated. He is saying that they get degenerated.

This echoed with something that I had experienced a couple of months back. I had gone to Sikkim some time back. Close to Darjeeling, there is a Japanese temple. In that temple, there is a ‘stupa’ which symbolises peace and harmony. Actually, it symbolises nothing as such as it is just like a tower shaped structure. The writing there says that it symbolises peace and harmony.

Seemingly, there was some man in Japan who felt there was too much of pain and sufferinng in the world. And he wanted to spread a message of peace and harmony in the world. For that, he founded an organization and raised a lot of funds and eventually built a couple of these structures across the world.

That’s what his intention was.

But let me tell you what I saw there. Myself and Vaishali walked to the structure. We were reading the writing on the wall. And a ‘tourist’ group walked in. All but one stood on the stairs leading to the Buddha statue. The one who was left took the camera can composed a shot. One of the guy from the group shouted, “It’s ok if the top of tower does not come in the photograph”. The photograph was shot. They walked out.

That’s what is happening eventually.

The message of peace and harmony is written on the wall. People come, read, shoot photograph and go back. But does it spread peace? And harmony? No.

What about the people maintaining the place? What are they doing to ensure that the structure continues to convey the message for which it was built? Nothing.

An ideology emerges from one person. And it spreads over to others. Everybody who joins the ideology brings in his/her own contribution. It may spoil the ideology or it may improve it or it may leave it mostly unchanged. But there is a change (even if it is a tiny bit).

In fact, beyond a point, it becomes impossible to say what that ideology means.

At this juncture, I’ll point to my post on ecosystem of ideas where I said:

Ideas are like living beings. An idea takes birth amid and out of other ideas, it evolves with some contemporary, some old and some new ideas. And eventually is superseded by newer ideas.

Some ideas degenerate but some do evolve.