There have been many discussions between me and my various Jain relatives/acquaintances regarding equating Poker and जुआ. Even after giving various arguments I have never been able to convince them. The. various counter arguments provided are:
- Poker is science and requires a lot of work. Involves science and statistics (point out various articles). Mention that a “good” poker player is more sure of things than a naive investor in stock markets.
- Even in business, people lose money. Why is that not Jua?
- Poker involves control of emotion etc.
- When I mention that it is also about the भाव where it involves rush of adrenaline and anxiety, the urge of playing until winning or losing everything – they counter argue that because this involves Science, they are always in control of emotions. They always have a upper limit of the money they’ll lose which they never breach.
- Regarding adrenaline and emotions, they say how’s it different from other sports where those players also experience anxiety, nervousness, adrenaline rush etc.
Can someone throw more light on it? I still consider Poker as Jua and will never play it, but also want to get more information on what exactly classify as ‘Jua’. By that, I mean, what is the internal state of the Jeev which classifies as Jua.