Categories for World

Today, Tuesday 30 May, i worked in the fruit garden. The temperature had dropped, but it still felt warm and a bit moist. We worked on making a strawberry bed around the cherry trees. I wasn’t much help. But i did do some odd jobs. Getting all the grass cuttings on the compost heap. Getting everybody water. And talking!

I got into a conversation with Daniël about Mars. Me, i don’t buy into it. I know there is a project, but i think it is ludicrous. There is no oxygen on Mars. There is no way to come back to earth. I think it is insane. Daniël thinks different about it. Then the name Elon Musk dropped. I said i didn’t like his reason to set up his project to go to Mars. He seems to have given up on earth and wants to colonize Mars. As a plan B. Because he has given up on earth. Daniël didn’t know anything about that. Than i said i would look things up about this. I do know i have read this. I would make a post about it. So here it goes!

He is the founder, CEO, and CTO of SpaceX; co-founder, CEO, and product architect of Tesla Inc.; co-chairman of OpenAI; founder and CEO of Neuralink. He was previously co-founder and chairman of SolarCity; co-founder of Zip2; and founder of X.com, which merged with Confinity and took the name PayPal. As of May 2017, he has an estimated net worth of $15.2 billion, making him the 80th-wealthiest person in the world. In December 2016, Musk was ranked 21st on Forbes list of The World’s Most Powerful People.

Musk has stated that the goals of SolarCity, Tesla, and SpaceX revolve around his vision to change the world and humanity. His goals include reducing global warming through sustainable energy production and consumption, and reducing the “risk of human extinction” by “making life multiplanetary” by establishing a human colony on Mars.

In addition to his primary business pursuits, he has also envisioned a high-speed transportation system known as the Hyperloop, and has proposed a VTOL supersonic jet aircraft with electric fan propulsion, known as the Musk electric jet.

I do appreciate Musk, i do admit. He is an intelligent man who works hard and thinks hard. It is his desire to establish a human colony on Mars which cast doubt.

… reducing the “risk of human extinction” by “making life multiplanetary” by establishing a human colony on Mars.

Or as it also says on his wikipedia page:

An asteroid or a super volcano could destroy us, and we face risks the dinosaurs never saw: an engineered virus, inadvertent creation of a micro black hole, catastrophic global warming or some as-yet-unknown technology could spell the end of us. Humankind evolved over millions of years, but in the last sixty years atomic weaponry created the potential to extinguish ourselves. Sooner or later, we must expand life beyond this green and blue ball—or go extinct.

We must expand life beyond this green and blue ball – or go extinct.

The absence of any noticeable life may be an argument in favour of us being in a simulation…. Like when you’re playing an adventure game, and you can see the stars in the background, but you can’t ever get there. If it’s not a simulation, then maybe we’re in a lab and there’s some advanced alien civilization that’s just watching how we develop, out of curiosity, like mould in a petri dish…. If you look at our current technology level, something strange has to happen to civilizations, and I mean strange in a bad way. … And it could be that there are a whole lot of dead, one-planet civilizations.

With this i completely disagree. I do think our earth is a miracle place. A treasure in the universe. With the billions of other galaxies in this universe, it does seem likely there is life on other planets. But the structure of this universe, expanding right now, means the distance between planets with life possibilities can be beyond our traveling capacity. Thousands of light-years away from each other. I do think it is our planet is rare, at this distance from its moderate sun, with its large companion by its side, the moon, which protects this earth from asteroids, makes a high- and low-tide possible with the daily movement so important for life on this earth.

I’m not saying terraforming Mars is a hopeless case.

Terraforming Mars would entail three major interlaced changes: building up the magnetosphere, building up the atmosphere, and raising the temperature.

I would never send humans to Mars though. Of course, there are always people willing to go. Excited by the adventure, willing to make a final move to the edge of their imagination. But it is a death trap, right now. Maybe someday somewhere way back in the past, there was a situation on Mars in which bacteria could grow and start changing the atmosphere. But it didn’t happen. We’ve seen The Martian, we can imagine living in a dessert type environment and going out with protection clothing only and working on a vegetable garden inside, sure. But Mars is not a dessert as we know it. Mars has only 0.145% oxygen in its environment. If we want to terraform Mars, we need to prepare it with robots and ammonia and hydrocarbons and whatever technical help we can find. It will take hundred of years, i think. And it seems to me a project in which this whole world, all the countries on it, needs to work together. And really, we do have other pressing issues right now. Right here on this planet we call earth. Home.

This thought of ourselves living in a simulation, in a sort of matrix, can lead to thoughts it doesn’t matter what we do. If we are watched by others, if we live our lives in this make believe world, it doesn’t matter what we do. But we don’t. This is the magic of our lives, on this planet, in this universe. It rolls on with time continuously. We make up stories of the past. Some are truish. Others are false. We make up gods, we make up stories about lands and families and money. But we all live now, in this world. We do not live in the past. Or in the future. Now. The most special time there is. The time so difficult to grasp, so hard to be in. Now. And we can let our lives be ruled by past stories, or we can move on and try something new. We have complete freedom in the way we set out our life. Which is so hard to see, so difficult to feel. Now.

We are subject to risk, everywhere on this planet, anytime in this world. An asteroid could hit our planet. Ride through the cover of the moon and hit us hard and make life extremely difficult. Of course. It has happened before. Millions of years ago. But we can not make a life with this risk in our hearts. We simply need to make the best of our lives as it is right now. Start to build a better world. A greener world. A world in which all the people born on it can make a life for themselves. For some it will be more difficult than for others, but that is the chance of being born here on this planet. Your life here is a chance to build something, to work on something worthwhile, to love people around you, to have a family, to maybe have children. To make the future a better place to be. To make this world cleaner. To make this world a better place for our children and all the children after that.

I believe this is the essence of our life.

All the people trying to make us move in the way they want to, all the people making money over our backs, all the people making us work so hard and earn so little, all the people hiding behind the curtains and not being visible.

All these people i don’t believe.

I work in the garden. Three days a week now. I love it.

It is a small thing to do. I’m a small person on this planet.

This website, with its five posts a week, is a place in which i can channel my thoughts, make them grow. A place in which i can think. With all the liberty i can feel in me. Right now.

I’m not saying i have all the answers. I’m saying i want to talk with you. About many things. About supercouples. About making walks. About working in a garden. About music. About food. About your personal life. About movies, books and television. About terraforming Mars. About our planetary system. About the universe.

There are many things you will know better than me. And some things i know better than you.

I’m afraid Elon Musk had to step aside for a bit. This post may be about him, about some of his thoughts. I’d love to talk with him about them. Even though i will be really nervous if this would ever happen.

In the end though, this post is about me. Why i maintain this website. I have so many thoughts in my mind. They do keep me awake at night. And yes, some of them are about me, about wishes i have for myself, dreams i would love to come true. Others are about this world, about our lives, about my sadness, about my friends. About this stupid and miracle world we live in. The world we destroy because we can.

Stop!

How Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt defined the 21st-century fame machine

The Dutch party D66 is advocate of a law which will enable elderly to end their life when they believe their life is completed. The elderly are people of 75 years or older. This is different from the euthanasia law, which is build on a medical perspective.

In March 2017 in the Dutch program Nieuwsuur Alexander Pechtold was interviewed for almost an hour. There were also some people invited to ask a question. Martin Kock was one of those people. He has a death wish, but is still 18 years younger than 75. He wants to know why he can not make his own decision.

I saw this episode later on. For a couple of days this topic was trending in the news shows on Dutch television. I didn’t follow it at the time, but it did stick in my mind. Parts of me were puzzled by the question. It is also a strange topic for me. I don’t have any desire to make an end of my life. I enjoy it with all intensity.

I found another clip on youtube where Martin Kock talks to the camera and explains more about his wish.

Later on in the program De Wereld Draait Door there was a discussion between Pechtold and Segers, the list puller of the Christen Union.

The past few months this topic stayed with me. At one point i talked with my mother about it. Did she know anyone around her who felt her life was complete. No. This doesn’t mean all, of course. Most people will not talk about this. So you will not know it if someone does feel this desire.

An article in the Groene, Extra Bingo Is Geen Oplossing (1 June 2016 ). Decay, loneliness, loss. The ingredients of a completed life. A 2011 research of the VU University Medical Center Amsterdam showed that a hundred thousand elderly people in the Netherlands have a death wish or a diminished will to live.

What is a completed life? It seems to me a life full of accomplished wishes, full of life, work, friends. A moment in life where you look back upon it and feel happy with the work you have done. It can be big things or small things. It can be having had a family and enjoying your grand children or great grand children.

This is not the completed life which is meant here. Existential loneliness, is the term here. A feeling of uselessness, loneliness, a burden upon society, a burden upon your family, if you have any. Death seems the only way out. Death is more pleasing than the vision of being dependent on lowly payed young people leaving you sitting in your own shit for hours, if not days. Live is unlivable.

A major problem hinted at in this article and Voltooid leven vraagt ander antwoord dan dood is that older people feel themselves standing outside society. Not being included in, not being able to use your skills to help other people makes you feel unworthy. The distance between yourself and the working society grows with each year.

The articles i found today are very helpful and gives a lot more depth and background to my thinking.

Last Sunday i had a talk with Daniël about this very same subject. I was still a bit concerned about the question being asked. As if you need permission from the government to make an end to your life. I think there is a limit to the influence of government on the people. In the end, the life you lead is your own responsibility. Making an end to it is your own responsibility too. There are many ways to make an end to your life. Stop eating and drinking for one thing. To ask for a pill to make an end to your life is convenient, yes. But i don’t think politics goes into that area.

After reading the articles linked here, i am finding out there are many more issues involved here.

I am not able to give an answer here and now. I am seriously thinking about this. Weighing all the answers of other people, without getting to a definite yes or no. Balancing.

So i will leave this post here.

To be continued.

The Action shop, a shop only 50 meters away from my house, i don’t visit that much. Only last week, some people i walked by and smiled to said to me it was good i lived so close to it. I shrugged.

I had this post as a draft for a couple of weeks. And yes, i didn’t use it. I just remembered. So i will delete that draft and keep this one in place.

I did buy two bedsheets in the past year. The ones i had were torn. I tried fixing them, but it all got loose once more. So i bought new ones. I did do a search for the cheapest ones i could find. The ones in the HEMA were 10 euros. The ones in the Action were 6,95. So yeah. Action.

A few months ago there was a television program on Dutch television about discount shops. That was what woke me up. I never thought people would buy so many things in there. But yes, they do. Whole houses filled up with things bought there.

Jinek interview with Roland Duong about discount shops (Dutch)

Earlier I bought plastic containers in the Action. Like a year and a half ago, not sure. But that is it. I did go into the shop once before, but i left a bit flabbergasted with nothing. So many things, all very cheap.

So today i went in specifically to make photos. I did worry a bit beforehand. There could be guards there, that could try to prevent me from taking the photos. Not that i will do anything with them. But that didn’t happen. Some people saw me taking the photos, but nobody said anything.

I was actually taking in everything that was there. I liked the paint brushes, the paint, the papers, the insect hotels, the coloured feltpens, the metal boxes, the plastic containers, the glass containers, the toothbrush sets for electrical brushes, the hair colourings, the candles, the gardening gloves, the underwear, some of the the food, like the bio nut paste. More than i had imagined.

Ooh, the name. Action. Another bolt in my piece about language. Remember!

Anyway, here are the photos. Enjoy!

Next week, Wednesday 15 March, the Dutch elections will be held. In this election all 150 members of the House of Representatives, the Tweede Kamer, are chosen.

No single party has ever managed to win a majority of the votes, good for 76 seats in the house. The Dutch government has been a coalition of several parties for more than a century.

I grew up in a left wing labour family. We had a Vara tv magazine, we listened to the Saturday radio show In de Rooie Haan. We watched the VPRO on Sundays and had the newspaper Het Vrije Volk, the Free People – which no longer exists. The first party i ever voted for was the Communistic Party. I was eighteen years old.

I never was terribly interested in politics. For convenience, i settled for the Dutch Labour party, the PvdA. I did vote most of the time. I might have skipped a few. I don’t remember.

The past two years i have changed, my life has changed. My thoughts about many things, like politics, have sharpened. These last weeks before the elections the debates and discussions on television are on almost every night. I don’t watch them all. The one thing that stuck was a question somebody in the audience asked Pechtold (D66) about his death wish. He was only in his late 50s.

We are all born free in this world with our own responsibility for our lives. The government has nothing to do with how somebody would like to end his or her own life. I’m really baffled by the question, as if the man was waiting for approval for his going away. The answer uses the word dignity. Death is simply the end of your life. I’d love it to be dignified for everybody, but i do see that it is not the case. To me, this drives the responsibility of our government too far. You can simply slit your wrists and be done with it. Not that i wish anyone to do this. But if you want to go, simply go.

I’m also thinking about the importance of money and economics. The way the future is projected. Plans of the parties are calculated through with an horizon of 60 years. So many things can happen in that time. It is impossible to know everything, or rather anything about these events. But it still goes through. Most parties parade the apparently good results.

Once i have a little money myself, i will donate some to the Peace garden. I will try to find people who are working on school gardens. I think every school, for children aged between 4 and 12 years old, should have a school garden system. With gardeners working with the children.

These are my personal dreams. If ever i get the money of course!

As for our country, my vote goes to the Partij van de Dieren. I like their thinking about economics. We do need to find a way to change the buying habits of so many people, buying all this nonsense junk in the shops. We do need to take care of our planet. It is a magical place with so many animals and plants sharing this world with us. We need to take care of all of it. Not kill and pollute.

Plan B (English) – Plan B (Dutch).

I am still thinking about who i am going to vote for. Marianne Thieme is the main front person of the Partij van de Dieren. But i am also following Ewald Engelen on Facebook and Twitter, he is on number ten of the list. So my vote might go to him. Still thinking!

I am following my own dreams, my own thoughts, my own ideals. I’m happy i found a good party to place my votes with.

I do hope you will find a good place too.

Yesterday i watched the VPRO Tegenlicht documentary about the truth of the financial system. The main person being interviewed is Joris Luyendijk. Luyendijk is a journalist whose book “Dit kan niet waar zijn” (Swimming with sharks – the English title), about the financial world, was a huge success in the Netherlands.

So today i watched some more. I collected most of the clips i had seen in this post. Most of these clips are about the financial crisis and its aftermath in 2008 – a wikipedia article i still need to read carefully. Truthfully, i was hardly aware of this crisis when it happened. I was working at the time, i had a monthly paycheck. I read the newspaper, i watched television talking shows. But it was very distant, it felt like it hardly had an impact on my world here in Rotterdam.

I do feel different now. More open. More aware of things going on. I also know i need to learn so many things. There is no way i can have an informed opinion about the specifics of things going on. The world is extremely complex. It has always been this way, but with globalization and the news and facebook and twitter and whatever new technique all stories move in dazzlingly fast ways all around.

Well, i do enjoy watching these videos. I have no idea how you, dear reader, will like these. Truthfully, i only watch around one in two or three clips in a blog post. Still, i do hope you will like some of these. Enjoy!

Most of the clips are in Dutch.

This morning i went to the Coffee Company on the Meent and bought myself a medium latte with an extra shot of espresso and a piece of cheesecake. The cake is divided up into twelve pieces. Twelve! I would have divided it into eight pieces. Man, these companies really want to make a lot of money. I did say something to the girl helping me, but of course she can’t do anything about it. She only works there.

I sat inside drinking my coffee, watching out onto the Meent. I started to read the paper, the NRC Next. I used to have a subscription to the NRC, but stopped a couple of years back. The primairy reason is the lack of money, but hmm, i’m not sure now. Reading this news, every single day, all these parts of the world stacked next to each other, all these headlines, all these articles. Not every day is the same, not all the news is equally important, but in the paper they all seem to glide into each other.

But, it is still my favourite newspaper in the Netherlands. So when i go out and treat myself to coffee, i do read it. Not every article, but still. Today, i made some photos of the paper. Yes!