So what is the ultimate problem? The ultimate problem is we do not want to suffer. That's all. We want comfortable, peaceful life. This is the ultimate problem. Is it not? Just think over. That is . . . in Sanskrit language it is called ātyantika-duḥkha-nivṛttiḥ. Ātyantika-duḥkha-nivṛttiḥ, to solve the problems of miseries.
We don't want any kind of misery. We don't want to suffer. We want very peaceful and joyful life. That is . . . but that is not being possible within this material world. That is the problem. The living entity is, by nature, he wants joyful life . . . Ānandamayo 'bhyāsāt (Vedānta-sūtra 1.1.12). Abhyāsāt. Abhyāsāt means by natural tendency he wants joyful life. But . . . there is a song, Bengali song. A poet writes, sukhera lāgiyā ei ghara bandhila anale puriya gelā: "I constructed my home to live very peacefully and comfortably. All of a sudden, there was set fire, and everything vanquished." Just like in America you have got experience that Mr. Kennedy, he became president after long struggle. He had very nice wife, children, honor, prestige, everything. And somebody was saying, telling me yesterday, that people took him as very happy man. Within a second, all finished. He was driving, he was in procession, people were honoring him, and within a second—finished.
So everyone is trying to be very happy, comfortable, but it is being finished within a second. Is it not a fact? Huh? Is there any disagreement on this point? That is the problem. Everyone is trying to solve this problem in his own way. They are manufacturing different ways only, but the problem is not solved. The problem is there.
Here (there) in America, whenever I meet some gentleman in the street and he understands that I am coming from India, he says: "Oh, India is very poverty-stricken." You see? So . . . as if there is no problem in America. There is one problem: food scarcity. But I tell him that "You have got also many problems. You are not problem-free."
So there is . . . suppose you have got some pain here. Sometimes we think that, "If pain would have been here, then it would have been nice. Here it is very painful." So pain, here or there, it is pain. You see? So either you have got problem of food grains or problem of hippies, but the problem is there. A different feature only.
Therefore one should be very much careful to know how to solve the problem. Actually, we are trying. We are trying to advance in education, in scientific knowledge. In so many things we are trying. The material nature is offering problems after problems. That is the nature's business. You solve one problem, and she'll present another problem. First of all, one . . . somebody thought, "If there is aeroplane, then it will be very nice to travel in the space."
But now the problem is that by aeroplane, if there is enmity, another country can face my country without any fight. So another problem. (laughs) Now they have to go underground. I was reading in the World Almanac that next hundred years people will live underground.