Morning Walk [partially recorded] – May 31, 1976, Honolulu

Why do you fight? Instead of worshiping, why do you fight?

Prabhupada: ...the authorities they...?

Sukadeva: What do they say?

Prabhupada: Yes.

Sukadeva: It says that... [break] ...possibility of an object staying in motion unless there is a person to move it. So therefore the conclusion is that these planets cannot stay in motion unless there is a supreme mover.

Prabhupada: So he accepts God. [break]

Sukadeva: ...the fact that there's no need to worship God, the fact that there's a need to worship man, because man is actually the center of the universe instead of God as the center of the universe.

Prabhupada: Why do you fight? Why do you fight? Instead of worshiping, why do you fight?

Sukadeva: Simply that it's human nature.

Prabhupada: [laughs] Worship God by fighting?

Hari-sauri: Then it becomes a question of who's the best man.

Prabhupada: God. But you don't fight with Him. But these rascals say worship man, but why does he fight with man? Another... [break]

Pusta Krsna: Actually there was a boy sitting like that, and a shark came and bit off his leg while he was sitting there. [break]

Sukadeva: ...they still think that...

Prabhupada: Worship.

Sukadeva: They still think that man can decide his own future. He can decide how the universe was made. That's the basic philosophy now, that man is actually the center of the universe. He can decide and make anything that he wants. Initially there's no sense in worshiping God.

Pusta Krsna: There's another philosophy, though, called ecology, which is even more popular.

Prabhupada: Cology?

Pusta Krsna: Ecology. They say that man is part of the universe, and that we should take care of the environment because ultimately man will kill himself if he doesn't handle the environment properly.

Devotee: Air and water, things like this

Prabhupada: What is the meaning?

Pusta Krsna: The meaning is that people have exploited the atmosphere and the earth so badly in the last two hundred years especially, that, practically speaking, man is on the verge of self-destruction.

Hari-sauri: They're getting scared because they've put so much pollution in the atmosphere, into the water, into the earth, that now they're... Everything's... It's reacting against them now.

Pusta Krsna: In other words, they're seeing that they've become a problem.

Hari-sauri: I was telling you about that blob of garbage that was left out in the..., that's headed towards the harbor in New York. For the last fifty years they've dumped all the garbage in the sea, and now it's collected together, and it's coming back into the shore. They think that in about fifteen years' time, if it travels at its present rate, it will be blocking the entire New York Harbor. So ecology means they have to try to find out ways and means of avoiding things like that. [break]

Pusta Krsna: ...useless waste products. They've discovered new ways in science how to use things which can be used and used again and again. For example, newspapers, instead of throwing them away, they can recycle it and make new newspapers.

Gopavrndapala: They also say they were going to recycle their own urine even.

Prabhupada: Huh?

Gopavrndapala: They also say they will even recycle their own urine and stool and use it over and over.

Prabhupada: How?

Gopavrndapala: Like in the spaceship. When they go to the moon they recycle their own urine and drink it over again. [laughing]

Pusta Krsna: Actually, Srila Prabhupada, the most popular philosophy is that [indistinct] ecology. [break]

Prabhupada: Madman. [laughing]

Pusta Krsna: Man has created so many problems in the environment, so they don't think that the problem is man's way of doing things, or its heart. They simply consider if we can make some adjustments in the environment, then everything will go on very nicely.

Prabhupada: They will try to make adjustments with material nature, but everything will be failure. [break] ...hy esa guna-mayi mama maya [Bg 7.14]. They'll never be able to adjust it. Punah punas carvita-carvananam [SB 7.5.30], chewing the chewed. That's all.

[break] ...first of all adjustment to lie down in the skyscraper, and now they are coming to the ground. Why they have come to the ground? Punah punas carvita. Sometimes on the ground, sometimes the sky.

[break] Reject and accept. They reject the stool and urine and then accept it. They do like that. [laughing]

[break] Paper [indistinct], it is rejected. It cannot be utilized. But in India still the system is they use metal; when it is broken, you can sell it. They take half price and supply new. They use metal pots, on this understanding that "When it is broken and old, we can exchange with new half price." And this kind of bowls you have to throw away. You cannot utilize.

Gopavrndapala: So they break very easily?

Prabhupada: Hmm?

Gopavrndapala: These plates, the silverware and things that people use?

Prabhupada: No, whatever [indistinct]. Silver is not half price. Silver, little less than new one. They purchase one rupee less. Suppose 200 rupees tola, and the purchaser will take 190 tola. In India they use [indistinct]. Bell metal, copper...

Hari-sauri: Aluminum is becoming very popular though now.

Prabhupada: They don't use aluminum much. The [indistinct] is, if they have got excess money, they invest in metal-gold, silver, copper, bell metal... Immediate loan-you can mortgage the metal pots, the metal ornaments, you get money immediately. [break] ...day in a year, that is a metal purchasing ceremony. Every family will purchase, according to his means, some metal pots once in a year. Dhanatrayodasi. Means reserve some funds. So if there's some extra money-not big, big men; middle-class, poor man-they invest in metal purchase. There is a good business day, for the utensil-seller... You know Diwali? Diwali?

Pusta Krsna: Yes.

Prabhupada: Just one day before Diwali.

Pusta Krsna: Yes. [break]

Prabhupada: Dhanteras. Huge quantity of metals. Everyone will purchase. [end]