Vijayendra Mohanty

Mythologist and writer Devdutt Pattanaik recently gave an interview on Akash Banerjee's YouTube channel The Deshbhakt. In it, he made several comments that I felt oversimplified and misrepresented the truth about culture, religion, and politics. So I decided to make a response to the video. I highly recommend that you watch the video before listening to my response. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit vimohlive.substack.com

This episode is about a theme that I found common to the works of Asimov, Christopher Nolan, and Jonathan Nolan. It has to do with the future affecting the past and also perhaps with dropping our reliance on the past to some degree.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit vimohlive.substack.com

This week's episode is about how many creative people in India hesitate to monetise their content by asking their followers and fans for money and why that tendency exists. It is also about how to overcome those mental blocks. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit vimohlive.substack.com

In this episode, I talk about how trolls can sometimes come disguised as fans and how they insidiously try to divert content creators from their goals.I also talk about how telling an atheist he will one day learn to believe is actually quite insulting. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit vimohlive.substack.com

This week I talk about how my favourite way of growing my Instagram account has been to periodically challenge the preconceptions of my followers. Of course, what goes without saying is that my idea of "growth" is not simply increasing my follower count or my post views.I also spend some time explaining why I am wary of the appearance of being intelligent and how that has to do with toxic strains of Indian culture. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit vimohlive.substack.com

The thing that has been on my mind for the last week has been being an Indian atheist and the complications that come with it because much of the impetus behind the modern atheism movement comes from Western atheism movement, a cultural movement which was primarily anti-Abrahamic religions. And Abrahamic religions are followed in India by persecuted minorities. This episode is mostly me talking out aloud about how to strike an internal balance. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit vimohlive.substack.com

Review this podcast on Podchaser: https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/vimoh-talks-1445220[00:00:00] Intro to the episode[00:40:00] YouTube, Instagram, and the changing online video landscape - Some thoughts about how online video emerged, what made it popular, and what has happened recently to change things in the video market.[09:22:00] Indian government "raids" media houses - I take a little solace from the fact that oppression still has to be disguised as something else. The day they just openly say we want media to shut up is still some distance away.[12:54:00] Being an "influencer" - I am finding it increasingly difficult to handle the compliments that people send my way because of the content I put up online. My privilege means I don't have to work very hard to be seen as doing something heroic even I am doing the bare minimum.[15:46:00] Masters of the Universe - I talk about the new Netflix series Masters of the Universe: Revelation and how it being female dominated has made some sad puppies really sad.[20:07:00] Ending notes and information on how you can support my work. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit vimohlive.substack.com

[00:00:00] Introduction and an announcement about the podcast.[00:04:00] A rant about how books are better than movies.[00:08:00] A note about being careful with your time on social media as a content creator.[00:12:00] Ending notes etc. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit vimohlive.substack.com

So I launched a new YouTube channel this week. It's called temporal ideas. It's where I'm going to publish video essays about science fiction series, movies, books, et cetera, and themes. The first video is up and it's about the Marvel series Loki.When I was making that video, a few ideas came to me for future content. And one of those ideas has to do with a similarity in the outlook about the future in the works of Isaac Asimov and some stuff that is also in Christopher Nolan's work, which is doubly interesting because Christopher Nolan's brother I'm forgetting his name.He's making a series based on Asimov's foundation series of books for apple TV. Which basically means that I'm not going to be able to watch it when it comes out and I'll have to figure something out. But the point is that I'm going to make a video about invisible descendants in the future sometime soon and put it up on the new channel.But before I do that, I had a couple of book recommendations because that is where primarily a lot of the material that I'm going to put in the video essays. And those books are books that if you loved the, if you like the low-key series, then you also are going to like these books because they have to do with the things that make low-key and credibly interesting, which is the idea of multiple universes, the same person having multiple versions in different universes, those persons meeting, and then chaos, ensuing and stuff.So the book that I want to recommend with respect to that aspect of Loki is called Interworld is actually it's it's a novel for teens and one of the writers is actually Neil Gaiman, the sequel to Interworld. I don't think it ever came out, but essentially it is about a boy called Joey and his ability to travel between dimensions. He can do it as easily as you and I walk across the room. He can just walk into another dimension and there are Joeys in every universe that he visits and they're all versions of him. And the interesting thing about this multiverse is that it's a series of earth spanning the universe spanning the multiverse and on this end, There is the scientific Earth and on the other end, there is the magical earth. And Joey is from the earth, which is ours, which is smack in the middle. So the influence of science and magic, both affect it but not to the extent that the other worlds on the spectrum. So as you move towards this end, you have earths, which are increasingly scientific.And as you move towards this end, you have worlds which are increasingly magical so the Joey of this world is a magical creature and the Joey of this world is a cyborg. So it's very interesting. And I'm sad that the sequel to the story never came out, but the book itself is quite entertaining and you should try it. It's called Interworld Neil Gaiman and Michael Reeves. The other book I wanted to recommend has to do with the other aspect of Loki the series, the Marvel series, where there's an agency called the TVA which oversees time and takes care of history. So that theme is also present in a book by Asimov. It's called the end of eternity. Eternity is the name of the agency that oversees time in this story. And the specific character that the book focuses on is called Andrew Harlan. And his job is he's a technician. His job is to tinker with history in order to keep it from going bad. So apparently in this world that Asimov has created mankind and earth in general ends in multiple ways over the course of the next few centuries.The job of eternity and the people who work there is to prevent that from happening. So they keep history on a largely peaceable timeline, so that things don't go out of hand and in doing so they guide the course of human civilisation so that is the other book and it's, if you liked the TVA, the idea of an agency working outside time to keep an eye on how history unfolds, then you'll like this.So again, these two books are Interworld and End of Eternity. Yeah. And I will at some point of time in the coming couple of months, make a video essay about the thing that I was speaking about, where you know where I find parallels in a theme that is quite interesting to me, which is about the future of humanity and the descendants that we all are going to eventually bring into existence and their relationship with us.Yeah, if you want to watch that one, you should subscribe to the channel. And the link I will leave in the description. It's called temporal ideas. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit vimohlive.substack.com

If there is one theme the MCU has in place of a philosophy, it is probably a commitment to free will. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit vimohlive.substack.com