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Loyalty and Floating Molecules

Today more than ever people are mobile. Also ideas and goods and services travel rapidly from one part of the planet to another. What might have been impossible 100 years ago - very insignificant in geological time - has become amazingly simplified today. What this all leads to is the idea that one is not bound to their roots so to speak. In fact the whole notion of dwelling on the roots (no pun) seems outmoded. One does not have to be bound. To bound or not is upto the boundee. This is where I will introduce the concept of 'Loyalty'. I mean a fancy way of describing any affiliation and longer term interest is the act of being loyal. You can imagine a situation where one is loyal to their family, friends, country of birth, alma mater et al. At the same time that notion has become inherently weakened by the availability of choices and the ability to parse through reams of information to determine the most optimal situation for any person by the minute. Short term leases, breakup in matrimonial bliss, decline of marriage as an institution et al are early signs of things to come. We are in a sliding scale of long term loyalty moving to split second decision making. That is where the concept of high frequency trading came along - everyone wants to trade their information not invest anymore. Key to this is availability of good information to make rational decisions. As MJ Akbar points out in one of his blogs this loyalty was described in the days of the Raj as being a Namak Halal. Loyal to the salt of the earth. Again a fanciful and romantic way to describe unwavering commitment to one's motherland. Motherland will probably drop from the lexicon because I am not sure it will mean anything 100 years from now. I mean the only affiliation humans can really talk about is that they are from Earth. 'If' the humans hang out for another 100. I for one have no such concept to adhere to. I suppose I am loyal to my immediate family but beyond that everything is fair game. I think that is what makes capitalism work. Movement of talent or ideas or money or time to the most productive activity. Now part of my family is American by birth and us as a couple naturalized to this country. I do not necessarily agree with the definition of the latter form of being aligned to a country's flag but that is the only option available. Besides I do not even understand the notion of flags. I mean what is all this romantic mumbo jumbo about stars and wheels and emblems and crests when there are more important things to do? One cannot control what the collective poplulism would vote for and so the better informed needs to always be looking for early signs of cracks in the strata. One day you are a captialist the next a socialist. Good joke describing the difference between the two ideologies was - in the former 'Man exploits Man'. In the latter its the other way around. So bottom line - be prepared. Oddly that is also the Scout's motto.
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