MANKIND IN THE BALANCE

REINVENTING SOCIETY

2011-07-22T05:10:00.000-07:00

Can we reconcile diverging demands to create new harmony between economics and our quality of life?

In His agony the God who features in the Judea-Christian Bible might say to us: “I told you so!” In defiance of His warnings humanity has lavishly eaten the forbidden fruit of knowledge and ravaged the Garden of Eden beyond recovery. He might contend that our materialist selfishness has made us submit ourselves collectively to enslavement by the Devil, foregoing every reasonable concern for the longer term livelihood of our habitat in favor of insanely egoistic pleasures. Why, even in respect of our fellow human beings, our family, friends and our broader community we have become grossly indifferent. We have isolated ourselves from one another as we pursue our monotonous jobs, tagging along among the anonymous masses, each of us making huge claims, as individuals, on the available resources for energy, food, clean water and so on, without effectively securing their recycling to cater for the future. This is not merely a slap in the face of God, any god, but of the very essence of nature. How do we think we can carry on?

We all have our own appreciation of the conundrums of our time and of the prevailing societal, political and economic realities. Much depends on our personal circumstances and outlook, and this today seems to be a more prominent distinction among the people in our societies than – for instance – ideology or religious belief, both of which have lost their power to bring people together and inspire them to share and contribute in larger communities. For however we look at it, it is difficult to deny the increased segmentation – some call it atomization – of our societies and the loss of traditional bonds of mutual care and support, material and otherwise, which have largely become the object of collective provisions and services which rather categorize than personalize us in our particular needs. Local societies of private citizens responsible for schools, health care and cultural institutions all have been displaced by large scale institutions, largely operating within regulated public systems which allow for little if any spontaneous civic engagement.

Today however these systems (and institutions) have become subject to severe financial cutbacks, due to large scale cuts in public spending, forcing to reduce and standardize their service levels, allowing for even less personal discretion. At the time when new demands are made to citizens to take their own (financial) responsibilities, they seem least equipped to do so, both economically and in terms of their social context. We may have our various networks, but generally they serve as platforms for communication and information sharing rather than as communities of true mutual commitment.

My assumption is that our world faces a long term period of budget austerity and economic sluggishness if not worse. We can not rely on industrial and commercial innovation to spirit us in another wave of high growth any time soon. But even if this were otherwise, we still need to address the societal framework, including our interaction with the public systems, in which public responsibility, civic participation and the proper management of our collective interests are more closely aligned. The objective being to safeguard their access and promote sufficient public and private contributions, monetary and otherwise, in executing their functions. Such initiatives could counterbalance the current costly emphasis on individualism and re-introduce an element of sharing among a greater group of people with common interests.

One has to be realistic about the actual possibilities of such countervailing development. We have come a long way from the illusion that society can be engineered, that is, unless it creates substantive benefits for a significant segment of the population. Yet sustained scarcity - in all dimensions – can be seen as a viable trigger for citizens to actively pursue options to share and contribute as a means to maintain a reasonable quality of life for all.

It is evident nonetheless that the kind of leadership and inspiration required to effectively curb the current predominance of laissez-faire policies that emphasize individual self-reliance is glaringly absent and has been absent for a long time ever since market orientation and privatization became the prime focus of public policies, both left and right wing. One can not suppose that people take care of themselves unless there is a working context in which they seek cooperation and shared responsibility and shared benefit. To articulate such perspective is the greatest challenge to anyone who takes the human society serious and who does not want to surrender to a world driven by mere self-interest.

Admittedly the above is still rather more conceptual than substantial and it would require further elaboration, both in respect of the suggested route to take and in its underlying analysis. But an effort has to be made. The key point here is to help people to make proper use of their individual responsibility and not take it away from them. There should be an advantage for them, on the long rung, to share – and care – in a greater community of people rather than claiming every possible good individually. Such options have already developed, for instance in the area of private mobility, such as automobile sharing arrangements, and they can be extended into many other areas.

Also I believe that the above will only be fruitful if similar steps are taken at the level of macro-economics, the working of our labor markets, and taxation. We should seriously question the prospect of full employment under present conditions given that industry and commerce are doing everything in their power to maximize their return on investment with the least possible people. The paradox is that every new efficiency in the markets, based on the exploitation of the fruits of knowledge, will move us one other step away from meaningful human participation and this will eventually destruct the very societal fabric on which most public systems and provisions are currently based. We should rather reward employment and fully focus our tax systems on the use of resources and on business profits.

Having said this, it is clear that such thorough re-thinking of the basic assumptions of our world is not done overnight. But if we claim to live in true democracies it is upon us to make sure that more than just one value system or policy framework is available to choose from. As it stands at present, we are going one way – and this is not necessarily the best way.

AWAITING THE FURTHER PROCESS OF HISTORY

2011-07-04T07:44:00.000-07:00

For most of its existence humanity was destined to be content with the status quo. This was either because early humans, like their predecessors, lacked the drive or the immediate pressure for ongoing invention and advancement or because the prevailing leadership kept their people largely ignorant of their potential for such advancement. Advancement as we know it is a recent phenomenon, however much it seems to be innately tied with the essence of our humanity. We simply can not imagine a status quo.

But indeed, our ongoing advancement equally stems from need: population pressures, environmental pressures and many other – related – issues which can only be resolved when humanity presses forward in its technology and in its institutional framework for peace and prosperity of our world’s population. There is no choice but to go ahead, the alternative being the certain collapse of our civilization.

But the current leadership of our world seems to experience great difficulty in articulating such road ahead. If anything their constituency is urging them to go backwards and none of the competing political forces offer a credible alternative that can rally voters away from their conservative populist preferences. Besides, almost all energy is spent in at least preserving the attainments of our recent past, as we currently experience in the European Union and as similarly is the experience of the people of America. Wealth, wealth creation, international security, a solid future for our children, all of this has become rather more uncertain than it has been throughout the greater part of our post-WW II universe. Concepts required to draw us out of mere debt management, budget control and public service restraints are greatly lacking on all sides.

Clearly, the status quo is not an option. We live in a world which by every measure is unsustainable. We can not dream of some nostalgic paradise. It is no longer there. We may redefine our needs, our ideas of society and well-being – and I am convinced that we should – but the only road ahead is one that is paved with substantive, progressive ambitions at unprecedented scale.

We will not see such ambitions surface any time soon. It will require a new momentum, most likely arising from a sense of imminent disaster, but hopefully some imminent opportunity too, the nature of which is anybody’s best guess at present.

The present state of stagnation is a reminder of the fact that history has no preset course. It is up to each generation to rise to the challenge and visualize an attainable, mobilizing future. True history is made by those who have the stamina and the persuasive power take us to new and promising frontiers. We have almost forgotten what it looks like and our younger generations haven’t had experience of it. But they too will know when they see it or at least, when they see the need for it.

As expressed at various occasions in this blog, humanity still has a long way ahead. The confines of our planet will largely define the parameters by which it will have to secure the habitat and livelihood of many billions of people over the longer term. I am convinced that we haven’t yet reached our ultimate potential in our means to achieve this, neither in technological terms nor in terms of politics and societal thinking. But it equally seems to me that we have reached the point of exhaustion of the thinking that has brought us to the point where we are today. This includes our ability to effectively respond to the great disparities in the conditions and prospects of the people populating our world. The true project of humanity is to address these disparities to the longer term benefit of all: their access to resources, their sustainable development and livelihood and their quest for a meaningful life however we may define it.

Our current global political and institutional framework may not necessarily suffice It is either too fragmented or it lacks the power and the means to mobilize the nations of our world towards a long term common goal. Old history still stands in the way but so do vested national and ideological interests.

It took some two decades before the true scope of the twentieth century became manifest, both in its drawbacks and in its vast array of possibilities. Much of the groundwork had been done in the preceding decades. The historic process centered around competing ideologies, out of which - as we see it – free market liberalism emerged victorious. National democracies have become the main residences of the people’s sovereignty. The greatest challenge for the present century is both to retain this foundation of government and at the same time strengthen the role of global institutions governing our critical resources. We should hope that it won’t require similar cataclysms as in the last century to finally get there.

MUSTERING THE POWER OF OUR SUSTAINABILITY

2011-04-16T12:53:00.000-07:00

Who will dig up Liberty, and when?

Almost every civilization thus far in human history crumbled. It either went down into total oblivion or it disintegrated into a state of barbarism out of which new advancement arose. But humanity does not perish. The genes of the ancient are still among us. It is an interesting topic aside: where did the genes of the Sumerians or of the senators of Rome migrate? Most of us can barely trace our forbears beyond some hundred or two hundred years, let alone thousands of years. Nonetheless, the legacy of antiquity is all around us. The rise and fall of civilizations do not preclude the transfer and continuity of their achievements. Each new civilization or cultural tradition sooner or later absorbed traditions and inventions of a previous one. The ascent of Western Europe is a strong case in point. This is not merely because Rome retained its position as a center of authority and spiritual development but also because of the Renaissance, when the remains, in letters and thought, of antiquity were again dug up to inspire the birth of new culture, science and political thinking. It was a re-birth with profound consequences for the further advancement of our civilization, reaching well beyond the confines of our continent. If a Roman senator of antiquity would visit Washington D.C. today he would recognize many of its elements, its architecture, the tradition of its monuments and probably the atmosphere and proceedings on Capitol Hill too. In other words: he would start to wonder whether in fact Rome had fallen at all (see my previous posting: Much will change, much remains the same).

If ancient Egypt survived, we might have seen the same thing over and over

The Rome that we know of antiquity perished by manifold forces both from the inside and the outside; the weight of its bureaucracy, the decadence of its elite, exhaustion of its innovative power, the devolution of its authority and the massive demographic pressure forcing its way through the eastern borders. In our present-day ears these factors ring a familiar bell. All of them have their contemporary parallel. We may already feel severely disturbed by the pressures coming out of the Arabic world and its impact on our civilization, but if we seriously ponder such concerns then we should be concerned in at least similar measure by many other - inside - factors too, similar to those which plagued Rome in its final stage, such as our consumerism and the decadence it projects, our hedonist popular culture, the mounting disparity between the wealthy and the poor, our stagnating technology – that is: where today it matters most; the exhaustion of our key resources, the diminishing power of persuasion of our leaders and so on. One could paint a very bleak picture of our current state of civilization and of the prospects of its survival and predict that nothing less than that the fate of Rome awaits us.

Still, all of the factors mentioned played a role one way or the other at previous stages of our history too, and they didn’t bring us the irreversible apocalypse of preceding civilizations. More than any other our western civilization has demonstrated the capability of renewal and re-birth from within, and like no other it has come to cultivate this capacity as is manifest in its present-day popular culture, which by and large celebrates the power of youth. We can make a long list of weaknesses but we would do great injustice to ourselves if we didn’t count our blessings too. Similarly, we wouldn’t have arrived at our current (st-)age of global information and communication without our innate commercial and intellectual acumen (and freedom), elements severely lacking in any civilization that has preceded us. However much we may feel stagnation today, our innovative potential is everything but exhausted. Our modern western world is a mere hundred years old. Why would it perish any day soon, sooner – by comparison – than all other previous civilizations?

Is the nuclear age over, or is it just beginning?

The answer is: there is no need for any imminent oblivion, if only we seriously face the challenges. They are unprecedented too. That is the key. We know that in fifty to hundred years time no drop of oil will be left, but as yet no substantive alternative (i.e. an alternative that is safe and without severe negative side-effects) is in sight that will allow the undisturbed continuation of our present way of life. What power will drive us, what material will replace our plastic and all other vital derivates of fossil carbohydrates? Unless we find a way to re-cycle every atom that goes through our hands, a principle which has kept nature going for many hundreds of millions of years, the prospect of our continuity is very gloomy indeed, almost inconceivable. The newly rising resistance against nuclear energy and the actual uncertainties that surround this potentially infinite power source are indicative of the long road still ahead either to solve these uncertainties or to find a viable alternative. In my own mind energy is the outstanding factor affecting the outlook of our western world, but there are quite a few other, in part associated, factors which need to be addressed at the same time, demography most certainly heading the list.

Until the Middle Ages much of what happened in the story of human civilization could be seen as ongoing variations of just a few unchanging themes. Progress in almost every dimension – human well being, the organization of social and political institutions, the evolution of public governance, technology – was very slow indeed. Today we live at the pinnacle of exponential progress; it has changed the globe beyond recognition. Our future progress will be measured first of all in terms of the sustainability of where we are today. Every inventiveness, every youthful vigor, and every bit of true civilization will be needed to achieve this.

But then, I am reminded of one the main messages of the much acclaimed television series of the late nineteen sixties, the monumental BBC documentary of Sir Kenneth Clark “Civilisation”: the one decisive element, he told us, of a lasting civilization is its confidence. Ability isn’t good enough. We have to shed any doubt that we can get there.

MUCH WILL CHANGE, MUCH REMAINS THE SAME

2011-03-24T04:01:00.000-07:00

La plus ça change, la plus c’est la même chose

One event in history that stands out as an instant of great change is the fall of Rome. The sack of the great city in the mid 400s not only marks the oblivion of the imperial and military order which had commanded the European people’s for more than four centuries, it also crushed its entire civilization, or so we are led to believe. But when not long ago I visited Rome for the first time, I was struck by the specter of continuity. By the looks of it there was much that had not changed. In particular, I felt, the historic elements of the city which are an expression of power and authority – the remnants of imperial Rome but also the monuments of Christianity – all seemed to suggest to me that the process of change had been rather transitional and that the epoch which brought us the Dark Ages is just as fascinating for what had been destroyed as for what was preserved.

It all cumulates in the Rome’s predominant monument of history, the Vatican, a complex that was built to intimidate and to assert the supremacy of the Roman pope, much like his imperial predecessors. Christianity may have been inspired by piety and humility, but its appearance in the city of Rome (and, as many will argue, in some thousand years of its existence) rather underscores an unchanging desire to rule and indeed of every effort, throughout the past sixteen hundred years, to match and preserve what was seemingly lost by the hands of barbarism.

Paris, La Bastille, 1789

There have, of course, been subsequent instances of change – or revolution – in our history, such as the Reformation, the Enlightenment and the period of revolution that followed. The two world wars of the twentieth century similarly define major dividing lines, in manifold dimensions. But as with the history of Rome it can be said for all these instances that continuity was as much an interest of the generations which carried them as the enforcement of change. And thus, in a broader perspective, we can look our history as one in which both elements play a role, every time and again. And this must be true for our time too.

Having said this, change has been the fascination par excellence of our present generations. It is our first and foremost addiction. We want to see change every new season. The fashion of our clothes, the design of our commodities, the technology that drives our appliances; our architecture; all of it must be constantly on the move. And if this is particularly true for our material environment, the same holds for other, more abstract aspects of our world. When in our public arena someone calls “change!”, we rally to it en masse, without so much as a blink, as if change itself is more important than the actual purpose it is supposed to serve.

Nonetheless, even the most ardent champion of change must at one point or other concede to things that will not move. Vested interests and vested practices are often tenacious in their defense and so is this anonymous monster called ‘reality’. As a result, real change remains elusive, almost illusory, and it can only be perceived once considerable had passed – by hindsight. Moreover, in our present day, progressiveness and the urge to change the world for the better have taken a back seat (as has happened many more times in the past) in favor of reinvigorated conservative sentiments, even to the point where going back in time is being presented as a legitimate way to go ahead. We see this sentiment both in Europe and America, in the strengthening of rightist populism, much as a response to the perceived undermining of our societies and its traditional cultural assumptions by foreign elements.

But setting this aside, change is ongoing and seemingly irreversible both inside and outside our political arenas. We are just at the beginning of the information and communication revolution that has ravaged our traditional societal and civic fabric beyond recognition. Economic pressures in addition drive public service and commercial organizations to spew out obsolete management and supporting staff in ever increasing acceleration. At global level economic and political power is shifting into new patterns, adding to the discontent of many people in our world in respect of their future up to and including the most basic conditions of their lives. In my own country, the Netherlands, there is a growing uneasiness about the greater divide between rich and poor and about the diminishing opportunities, both true and perceived, of a significant segment of society to aspire a level of wealth - and welfare – similar to what has been enjoyed by the great majority of the people in previous decades.

Futurist imagery in present-day computergames

In this blog I have already alluded to the disappearance of “future” as a source of inspiration (and aspiration) in our collective mindset at several instances (see, most recently: A future that can energize). If anything our prevailing desire is for the present (and perhaps even the past) to remain where it is, with minor adjustments only. But this is a fallacy. We better be prepared, both in our own mind and in the choices we actually make. Change is a roaring monster which we should tame (or keep checked) in the service of our advancement and not the other way around. It requires that we articulate the terms of such advancement, based on the realities that we face. Adverse change will occur when we deny these realities, as we seem to be doing today. If we pursue along this course, we may find ourselves in a similar situation as the Romans did, many centuries ago. If we want to preserve and foster our continuity, we should embrace change in order to achieve it.

THINKING OF EUROPE – WHAT EUROPE? – PART II

2011-03-03T12:31:00.000-08:00

Europe in a world of shifting powers

This is the second part of an essay on the present and future outlook of Europe. For the first part, see:
Thinking of Europe - Part 1

Institution building and the sentiments of history

Throughout modern history the process of nation building and of establishing the fundamental principles and rituals of a people’s governance has been a profoundly historic one. Constitutions were wrought from the claws of one or the other agonizing struggle – from the suppression by tyranny, a foreign usurper or severe civil conflict.- and invariably the transition is recorded as a moment of renewal: the promise of a better future, often coinciding with new liberties and (increased) democracy. Without exception these momentous transitions in a people’s history continue to be celebrated; their remembrance is transferred to the next generations, mementos are erected.

In more recent history similar milestones have been reached at the international level, such as the conclusion of wide reaching treaties and the fall of the Berlin Wall, a defining moment with world wide implications. The establishment of the European Community and its subsequent enhancement both in scope and membership can be seen as similar major accomplishments after nearly two centuries of continental strife and destructive competition between its - then – major powers.

Europe in the present public’s mind

Today, this European pre-history seems all but forgotten. In the eyes of many Europe has become synonymous with a distant and burdensome reality. Public sentiments are firmly fixed at the national level, regardless the gradual erosion of the member states’ autonomy. This prevailing sentiment, even in countries which have been ardent supporters of a strong Europe, stands in sharp contrast with the ongoing unification process. New rules of European governance and member state compliance are being drawn up with major implications at the heart of national budgetary prerogatives. It happens not so much in the wake of one or the other great historic drama or long term European inspiration but rather more as an expediency for the short term fiscal and monetary survival of the members of the Euro zone. It may steer those member states towards greater unity, but it may equally stir new disparity between the European nations.

I believe the project of Europe is on a dangerous path if the governments of the member states merely treat this transition as a technical issue. They should pro-actively mobilize broad public support for the likely further enhancement of Europe’s political clout in national fiscal and budgetary policies. Failing this, it will only add new frustrations to what is already a widespread skepticism of the union’s faceless intrusion in domestic interests.

Yet, all of this can still be seen as concerns to overcome immediate challenges only, leaving the greater question of Europe’s future unaffected – or at least undecided. It remains a question with many faces. The issue of Turkey’s potential EU membership, on which Member States have in principle agreed, epitomizes the manifold dilemma’s – some would call it crises – that linger in the union’s undercurrents. As a country on the brink between the Christian and the Islamic – Arab – world the sentiments against Turkey’s membership have become more articulate, such as those of Germany and France. They most of all reflect the growing uneasiness in European countries with their internal demographic reality of a sizeable Islamic population. Thus, more than ever before, the question of extended EU membership hits the union – and the individual Member States – in the heart of their own sense of European identity.

Our history is moving towards new paths

It is a foregone conclusion, I would think, that the EU will not become the super power that once was considered its destiny, at least not in the foreseeable future. No single, shared interest nor any major issue would rally the current EU members to speak and act in one voice and with sufficiently credible muscle. In fact the whole idea of Europe as a super power rather stems from an era in which it served as a logic – to assert itself against two major super powers, the Soviet Union and the USA. Today these powers have not only lost their pre-eminent position in the emerging multi-polar world, the countervailing pressure towards devolution and regionalization seems stronger than ever at the same time.

Lastly, the history of nation states and their alliances may not yet be at an end but it faces increased competition with the rise of the modern day commercial super powers and the history of their impact in our modern world. It is just as easy, and perhaps more pertinent, to describe the past few decades in terms of Microsoft’s ascent in the lives of almost everyone on our globe (or that of Apple, Samsung, Google and the like) as it is to write about the cumbersome efforts of the various nations to maintain a reasonable level of peace and security. In this respect too, the future of our political conglomerates has many faces, more particularly so as and when we move away from the current oil-driven power equilibrium.

Conclusion

In summary, no single future path for Europe can at present be defined as credible or likely. It may as well become a matter of merely historic interest as it may still emerge as a priority on our agenda. Shifting powers in our world, between major regions as well as between public and private (commercial) interests make a plausible prediction about the position of Europe in the next forthcoming decades a hazardous undertaking. At the same time, EU Member States have arrived at a perilous cross road if they persist in strengthening the political role of the EU whilst simultaneously ignoring to mobilize broad public support in doing so.

THINKING OF EUROPE - WHAT EUROPE?

2011-01-20T03:38:00.001-08:00

Signing the Treaty of Rome - 1957

Part I of an essay of the history and future of Europe from our present day perspective

Looking back: a century of pain and progress

In the decade before the First World War the European continent experienced great commonality across the national and imperial boarders, stretching from the North Sea well into the heart of Russia. Much of this was the result of manifold investments in the second half of the nineteenth century, most notably in rail transport but also new modes of communication such as the telegraph and the telephone. New markets were opened and the emerging new urban classes shouldered a gradual expansion of the economies of most European countries.

Railroads were the first to unite Europe (1900)

The increasing sense of European commonality was furthermore stimulated in the arts, in the world of science and invention, but also in the world of ideas. The emancipation of the working classes and efforts to improve the conditions of labor and their general living conditions became the first and foremost themes to create genuine internationalism among a broad segment of the European societies.

A rather more anachronistic and at the same time contradictory element were the close connections between the monarchs of the time and the shared culture of their entourage, which expressed itself both in the area of diplomacy and in the general habits of the European ruling elite. But it was contradictory indeed, because out of their very interaction arose the cataclysm that subsequently took many decades if not the entire twentieth century to overcome.

The outcome of the Second World War and the subsequent East-West division of Europe meant a prolonged social, cultural and political divergence among the people of Europe. But even in Western Europe the old sense of commonality did not return. The old mobile elite had vanished from the scene and the project of reconstruction and development was a national effort first of all for each country.

However, it was self-evident, after the Second World War, that the countries of (Western) Europe should strive to reach lasting settlements to safeguard the continent from any renewed armed Armageddon and that preferably they embark on a broader project of unity. From its start the European Community was embedded in the determination of the member states “…to lay the foundations of an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe”. Its main – primary – objective was to facilitate the development of their markets. Despite periodic setbacks this project has been hailed by many inside and outside Europe as an unequivocal success. It created a system of shared rules and instruments without precedent, which benefited all member countries in the broadest possible terms. It became a work in permanent progress, with successive new ambitions not limited to merely economic interests but increasingly covering the wide public domain of social, environmental and judicial affairs.

But perhaps the most significant development for - what became - the European Union has been the gradual enlargement of its membership, in particular when after the fall of the Berlin Wall the lost countries of Eastern Europe could finally rejoin the sphere of European commonality which had been held away from them for almost a century. The perspective of an enlarged common market of over 400 million consumers justified considerable effort – and monetary investment - to help these countries adjust and align with the prevailing regime of steep competitive regulations to which the western European countries had grown accustomed in the course of the preceding decades.

In parallel to the political processes new cultural commonalities emerged but they were not distinctly ‘European’ (continental) and rather more western, much of it being introduced out of the English speaking world, America in particular. A new universe of popular culture supported by rapidly proliferating mass media opened up and this in turn – at least to some extent – helped create a sense of shared interests, especially among the younger generations, throughout the western world.

Governments and their constituents: diverging perspectives

All of the above is the correct historic tale, one could say, but it is not necessarily the story of the European people themselves. For it is equally valid to say that the project of Europe has been – and has remained to this day – a project of the national governments - obviously supported by the business communities – and not a grass roots process. European citizenship is a concept only, however much our national passports allow us to freely move across the continent. For most Europeans, the unity of their countries is a bureaucracy, a powerless and distant parliament and a faceless center of regulations and directives which are rather more perceived as a disastrous overkill than as a genuine benefit.

Yet, in the face of today’s financial and economic adversity it is difficult to determine, however we ‘feel’ about the European Union, whether in fact this adversity has part been caused by a European project that has gone too far (for instance, by pushing the euro as a common currency before every participating country was truly ready) or, on the contrary, whether indeed the project has to be completed (it has not gone far enough) at even greater speed in order to safeguard its benefits for the member countries.

We have to remind ourselves of the fact that throughout the decades, no single destination for the European Union has been formulated – with people on many sides along the way arguing for a strong federal union or, alternatively, for a confederate union which leaves the center of political gravity in the national parliaments. Today, we may ask whether history hasn’t in fact overtaken these various arguments. On the one hand, the course towards stronger central influence seems almost irreversible or inevitable. On the other hand, despite greater unity, the member countries, including those who participate in the common currency, still show great divergence in terms of their political and societal priorities and preferences. The conditions set to save the solidity of our economies (and of the euro in particular) have ignited fierce protest in a number of European countries, reflecting a broader sense of estrangement among a significant segment of the population.

But perhaps the real estrangement is not so much with the institution or governance of the European Union (its new constitution being considered by some as “squalid”) but rather more with each other, between the people of the member countries. It seems as though more than half a century has done little if anything to bolster the broader sense of commonality between the citizens of Europe. We may enjoy a holiday in Italy or Spain but how much closer have we come to appreciate each other’s culture, aspirations and dreams of the future? Across Europe, people have retreated to a verbal trench war to keep everything as it is and they have thrown away the idea of Europe as a shining beacon.

Secondly, many European countries are grappling with the situation at hand, in all dimensions: economically, socially and politically. Across the continent we have become more inward looking, less cosmopolitan and less inclined to fulfill our great historic projects.

Trying to grasp the full picture

Then, there are those who argue that Europe’s crisis is even more profound, reaching to the heart of our civilization and its very continuity. They see our present crisis as symptomatic for a series of structural issues about which people have good reason to be concerned. Their anxieties, they contend, even including outright xenophobia, are only too understandable, however much people might be misguided both by the nature of the issues and the realistic solutions.

It is slightly disconcerting that such comments in particular stem from outside analysts, for instance out of America. Few European commentators come to the same inventory of problems, perhaps in part because they verge on treading the boundaries of political correctness and might be seen as too pessimistic.

Nevertheless, it is difficult to ignore these assessments, in particular where they concern the prevailing demographic trends. Examples are Bruce Thornton’s book “Decline and Fall – Europe’s slow motion suicide” (2008) and Mark Steyn’s “Ämerica Alone – The end of the world as we know it” (2006). Both books were published before the world wide financial crisis hit us and when in Europe the general consensus still was highly upbeat. They nonetheless paint a grim picture that today – more than at any time before – rings many bells of truth.

Apart from demographics (and their longer term economic, social and financial consequences), they see most Europeans as being politically too complacent, too much addicted to a high cost welfare system, inapt in dealing with immigration and integration issues and, perhaps most important, rapidly losing steam in terms of spiritual vitality. In particular they express their severe concern over Europe’s religious indifference, a point of view that may perhaps be most debatable but pertinent nevertheless.

For indeed, without shared underlying values that embrace the entire population, including immigrants and their descendants, Europe’s heritage and its historic potential are bound to obliterate. It is a choice to make, however we define religion or any other source of spiritual inspiration in this context.

Formulating new perspectives

These and similar analyses are reflected too throughout this blog. My main objective has thus far been not merely to underscore the nature and extent of our present day challenges. Most certainly it includes, however modestly, the attempt to formulate new perspectives and ideas which may inspire our younger generations in particular when defining their own themes and ambitions for the world as it will gradually be transferred to them. Still, gaining a good understanding of the past (“how did we get here?”) remains a critical point for any young person who wishes to make a contribution to his or her future world.

We live in a transition period. The old world is coming to an end, the new world is already in the making. Our focus should be on the latter, not on the former. We shouldn’t ignore history and its arguments, but more persuasive are the arguments derived from our perception of the world ahead. And this may well require a new concept for a lasting union among the peoples of Europe and stronger efforts to retrieve and safeguard our commonalities across national borders, wherever we live on this diverse and fascinating continent.

Further links on this topic:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4n5VvWX6D-s
Bruce Thornton (Europe’s slow motion suicide)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQELHJx8Vf0&feature=related
Mark Steyn (America Alone)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bAQTvRXZy-4
Neal Ascherson (British journalist)
http://www.freeworldacademy.com/globalleader/agendacont.htm
Europe civilization is committing suicide
http://www.economist.com/node/16539326
Can anything perk up Europe? (Economist 2010)

THE GUIDING MINDS OF HUMAN KIND

2011-01-04T08:26:00.000-08:00

Consciously and subconsciously all of us harbor the notion that between heaven and earth powers are at work which guide our lives on a predetermined path. We do not necessarily believe that this is true, and most of us will dismiss such notions as outright imaginary or primitive. But however rational we may be, it is very difficult to entirely disregard the feeling that eyes and minds beyond our reach somehow influence the opportunities that we have or the direction that we take.

Beyond our individual fate we also harbor certain notions about the time and circumstances in which we live. We may think that certain events are inevitable, for instance, as some people strongly “pre-sensed” the end of the world near the turn of the Millennium. Such convictions can also be more realistic and to some extent they may constitute a self-fulfilling prophecy. One example in history is the overriding belief among many people in Europe at the turn of the nineteenth century that war was a certainty in their time. It almost seemed as if the collective minds of the continent were driven into it by an invisible hand. Even today one might ask what caused the war that broke out in the late summer of 1914. A house of cards came tumbling down. Nobody in his or her right mind would have wanted the Great War as it actually unfolded, yet masses of people hailed its advent as if to celebrate their satisfaction that the prophecy had come true.

By the same token, in times of prosperity and general progress, we can think that it will last forever. Economic recessions invariably take us by surprise. Time and again the “boom and bust” of our economies are accompanied by unreasonable optimism and unreasonable pessimism respectively. In a longer term perspective, i.e. the perspective of an entire generation, the broad conditions of our youth frame the sense of the probable and the improbable in our own minds. The social and cultural context in which we grow up (including the absence or presence of religion) furthermore shape our view of the immediate and longer term future, including our subconscious sense of fate – of what may happen or of what is “bound to happen”. As illustrated above the general mood of a generation can have a direct or indirect impact on events that actually occur (even though thy may not be truly inevitable or necessary).

I am alluding to this interplay between the rational and the irrational as in our current time as many certainties of the past decades have increasingly come into question: our continued progress, the shared values and general coherence of our societies and indeed the very foundations of peace and security which have been self-evident in our world for an unprecedented long period. In a way, this outlook – at least superficially – very much resembles the situation described above, some hundred years ago. Many elements differ, for sure. Classic imperial conflicts have been replaced by manifold global tensions. The struggle to maintain - or achieve – social and economic equilibrium for an ever increasing world population is one in which nations and political regions face substantive stumbling blocks such as scarcity of resources and ecological deterioration. At the same time historical adversities and violent animosities especially directed at the western world constitute serious impediments for our traditional mechanisms of international consultation to reach long term consensus on major issues.

We most certainly have not reached a boiling point of global proportions to merit popular fatalism or another collective urge towards an armed resolution of prevailing conflicts. If anything, the past century has demonstrated the devastating outcome of such resolution – on would say – in highly convincing terms. However, as indicated above, it is not merely our rational deliberation or our memory of history which will determine the fate of our world in the foreseeable future, nor, for that matter, our personal fate. If anything, in our current time we witness another surge of popular sentiments which only two or three decades ago the great majority of the people in the western world would have considered perfectly unjustified if not insidious. This, unfortunately, includes racial, ethnic and cultural sentiments that most of us would have thought were left behind decisively some five decades ago.

Nothing in our world is predetermined. Yet our anxieties, our sense of the inevitable and the certainties we harbor have their own role to play, even if this would imply a course of action against all better wisdom. From our present point in time it is perhaps even more difficult than ever (at least considering the past three to four decades) to make a reasonable assessment of key factors of our world in ten, let alone twenty years time. Most of the postings in this blog address these factors. Indeed, they are manifold, complex and far reaching, affecting every dimension of our livelihood.

Our world has grown much beyond the mass hysteria – guided by monopolized mass propaganda – that led the people in the western world to the gates of hell just half a century ago. Most of us living today can not imagine the horror and devastation to which previous generations have been subjected. We should nonetheless realize that even in our own time people live in desperate circumstances. The shifting global power balance creates new influences and antagonisms which in turn can ignite irrational sentiments and new fatalism.

I, for one, do not believe that there is a guiding hand beyond our own – and those of our leaders - to steer clear from disaster. However, in countering populist anxieties rational policies or resolutions will prove sufficient only if they respond to the people’s inner convictions and beliefs at the same time. Nothing in the future is predetermined, but without satisfying at least some sense of destiny, human kind will progress – or otherwise – in a spiritual desert.

TRUTH AND THE PURSUIT OF MEANING

2010-12-15T03:42:00.000-08:00

A new Bible should start with the origin of life and the evolution of species

The Bible has been a one-off historic accomplishment without precedent and most likely without any legendary literature of similar magnitude ever to follow. One could argue that only the Koran comes close but then, the Koran was largely drawn from Biblical resources.

Of course we could think of new religions in the distant future which feed on legends of their own making. They would however have to compete with the kind of factual records of history that Biblical writers lacked from the time of Abraham well unto the early years of Christianity. The absence of a mature historic tradition established the Bible’s immediate credibility as a historic document and as a source of religious inspiration.

In the mean time history and archeology have either corroborated Biblical claims of truth, sometimes only contextual, or they have added substantive question marks to them.

Especially the Roman Catholic tradition has been very keen, throughout the centuries, to defend both the factual truth of the Biblical accounts and its own authority in their interpretation. Even in hindsight we can still ask why. What interest did Rome have in its vehement assertion that Earth stood at the center of the Universe rather than being a mere planet circling an accidental sun in a vast galaxy? The answer has been obvious, for acknowledging this would principally undermine God’s unique position in the process of Creation. The same is true for accepting the facts of Earth’s geological history and the origin of life.

However, even though this position may seem evident, we might also argue that knowledge about the position and the origins of the Earth, including the origin of life, could have been around at the time that the Bible was written and still, God could be placed at the center of it. But this is only true if, at least in its contemporary use, the Bible is most of all seen as a metaphorical source of truth rather than a source of real facts. Even so, many Christian believers remain keen to know the ‘reliability’ of the Bible as if only factual accuracy can persuade them to appreciate the Bible’s underlying messages. The ongoing debate in certain circles, especially in the United States, between “creationists” and “evolutionists” reflects an extreme example of an unnecessary antagonism.

At the same time, and perhaps only to underscore the last observation, our geological and biological knowledge has been vastly extended over the centuries, but this hasn’t as yet solved every mystery. The spectacle of our Universe and the detailed view we have of its evolution still leave many questions unanswered. Moreover, the processes which led to the advent to complex living organisms have been unraveled only to a point. There remains an instant of ‘creation’ of which science might never fully uncover its actual nature.

Given above, I see no basic contradiction between accepting the fruits of discovery and science on the one hand and nourishing a belief system that embraces the concept of divine creation on the other – of one so wishes. It follows too that – in my view - ongoing efforts to disprove one with arguments of the other are futile if not outright ridiculous.

Should everything therefore remain where it is? First of all, there is no reason for any religion to adopt history or science as its foundation. Truth is a very broad concept if only it isn‘t used in absolutist terms. But, secondly, I believe that any religion could draw many salient points at the heart of human morality from them and add a broader sense of purpose or meaning to them. Neither can be provided by science or by any ‘knowledge’, not even at a distance.

People have a choice to embrace (or not) a religious impulse in their lives to provide these underlying answers. The ‘reliability’ of biblical stories or similar books nor the debate about the factual history of our planet will ever satisfy them in this respect. I am tempted to say, on the contrary. Facts are arbitrary and never absolute. It is what we make of them that counts.

But even this may not suffice to broaden our perspective in addressing prevailing conflicting claims of religious versus secular antagonists. They may well never be resolved as long as their arguments fly cross-purpose from one side to the other. There may well be as many good arguments to re-design the concept of religion as those relating to the scope and implications of science.

One can not expect that such a process would readily arise out of the established traditions on either side, even less so given the present-day persistence by which certain religious leaders and scientists profess their certainties.

But we could also say that it is a people’s choice. We could make it a collective project, to write a new book of human inspiration, the assembled wisdom of all humanity. I, for one, would take the logic and the beauty of evolution – such as the fundamental urge to live that we share with all other living things, plants and animals – as its basic premise.

The more I think of it, the more I believe this is a good idea.

A FUTURE THAT CAN ENERGIZE

2010-11-28T03:32:00.000-08:00

Let’s make good use of the world wide talents

In November 2010 New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman commented on a recent poll among Americans by Rasmussen Reports, showing that 47% of the respondents think that “the best days are in the past”.(*) Friedman noted that just before President Obama was inaugurated, 48 percent said our best days were still ahead and 35 percent said they had come and gone. “This is a disturbing trend”, he observed. I can only concur. It is most likely that this trend is not limited to American citizens only.

Tomorrow is humanity’s unborn child that most of us today would rather abort than nourish to its healthy arrival. We fear the future, collectively. We see all the challenges that we seem incapable to overcome. Our main reflex is to defend what we have and to give way to reactionary impulses whenever change threatens us. US President Obama’s campaign yell “Yes we can!” has been smothered not merely by the vocal forces of domestic Republican conservatism. He faces a much more profound and widespread spiritual paralysis. Across the globe, progress-as-once-we-knew-it has come to a grinding halt amidst an ever rising pile of unpaid bills and unresolved conflicts. We have amassed manifold agendas that (largely because of this) have become overburdened with demands to which we can not effectively respond: the need for clean and sustainable energy, the need to address major climate issues (I dare not speak of “climate change”), world population, international peace and security – just to give a shortlist. (*)

Along the way we drain the resources required to groom and inspire the next generation – our schools and universities – beyond repair. We allow the distribution of wealth and power to grow more and more distorted. At the same time we – willingly – submit ourselves to mass serfdom in the hands of ever larger corporate interests with ever diminishing accountability. We do it willingly, because we do not want to control the very source of their power, our own insatiable material greed. If I were a God fearing Christian, I would say that we can now see what God desperately wanted to help avoid when he warned Adam and Eve against eating from the tree of knowledge.

Utilizing every source of knowledge

But we can not wish to go back to paradise. There is no future there. Only knowledge will help us forward. More knowledge, applied in greater – collective - wisdom. If we wish to fight the ignorance that allegedly threatens us from outside, cloaked – as we see it – in vicious terrorism, then indeed wisdom our best weapon, not bullets. We should recognize that today’s terrorism is an expression of a widespread outrage, even among reasonable people, against the ongoing usurpation by ‘western civilization’ of almost every corner of the Earth, its resources, its culture, its mindset – and its sense of deprivation. If we look at the balance of happiness in our present world, western civilization has done as much to enhance it as to destroy it.

Indeed it is a sobering and irrevocable reality: ever since European ships set out to explore the globe, more paradises have perished than have ever been regained afterwards. In the process the regions – nations, people – of our world have grown too interdependent to simply let go- we have no choice but to redefine our sense of a sustainable future together and eradicate existing antagonisms by offering real perspective.

Making life sustainable for all

Most of all there is the need for a perspective, not merely “solutions” or “change”. To overcome present challenges we will need to look beyond them, in substantive terms. If anything, history has proven that policies merely aiming at problem solving are insufficient to mobilize the critical mass of the electorate to support them. Facing the challenges is a condition but not an inspiring, energizing motive under any circumstance. We should have confidence in our ability to utilize every inventiveness, indeed: every possibility which the tree of knowledge offers us, to help our world become a better place for many – not merely for the happy few.

Lastly, however much we have already burdened the lives of our descendants to unprecedented scale, the future still is free. If we withdraw from it, out of fear or out of sheer reluctance to reset our priorities, we will indeed have made it powerless. US President Obama, not any other world leader can effectively rise to that challenge unless the opportunities are offered, ready at hand, with competent people to make it work. I only need to recall the conditions under which President Kennedy was confident enough to announce his “Man on Moon”, a project that inspired many people for more than a decade. It had countless spin-offs in a wide range of industries.

We do not require a “Man on Mars” to match this far reaching ambition. We better focus on our own planet, even though at this point I would hesitate to pin point its nature and scope. Moreover, it seems to me that the process of getting to such project – a wide ranging global ambition in substantive terms – is at least of similar importance as its actual parameters.

Developing clean, unlimited energy

The world has the means – the technology and the talent, indeed: our collective wisdom – to make this a viable proposition We can connect every mind and every inspiration to it. If designing a inspirational future is what the world wide web has been made for, then we truly have proven that our information age makes sense for many generations to come.

----
(*) See:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/28/opinion/28friedman.html?src=me&ref=homepage

2010-11-19T09:20:00.001-08:00

REDEFINING PROGRESS

2010-10-03T11:37:00.000-07:00

What is the next stage of human advancement?

The political trend across Europe is strong push toward a predominance of the center-right. Although their majorities are generally marginal, the left is invariably weak and divided. In the public debate left-wing policies and preferences have become subject of widespread scorn. It mirrors a similar trend in the United States where right wing conservatives are far more articulate and vehement than those who belong to the moderate left or democratic electorate.

America's right-wing assertion of the nature of the present administration

The underling development however seems more complex than a mere shift to the right. We experience an evolution in many different dimensions – and in many directions. It challenges our opinions and values about the elements that constitute right vs. left-wing or conservatism versus progressiveness as these qualifications have guided our view of our political society over the past decades. At the same time our own values shift. What was considered right-wing thirty years ago can now be a perfectly legitimate opinion of ‘the left’, but the reverse is equally true.

First of all, to describe the political spectrum along one – left-right – axis has always been a gross simplification of the actual dividing lines among the electorate and the political parties, especially in Europe. They can have different views about social and moral issues and economic freedom, about governance (more or less autocratic), about religious issues, personal freedoms etc. in many different compositions. There are dividing lines too along specific issues, such as environment and security, or, especially at this point, minority issues and the attitude towards the Arab-Muslim population. In addition the sentiments of the electorate depend on their current economic and social situation. This may have been the case throughout recent history, but in times of economic adversity it is one of the defining factors that has new pertinence.

In search of new horizons

Uncertainty, economic stagnation and – as I have indicated many times in this blog – an apparent exhaustion of inspirational ideas and concepts stir the electorate on an as yet ill defined path. The conservative or right-wing populace is fighting in defense of its vested interests, or so it seems, whilst the people who traditionally belong to the progressive (leftist) part of the electorate are grappling for an answer with an equally conservative attitude.

The implication of his stand-off situation is that nothing moves at all. Belt-tightening and more stringent legal provisions in respect of civilians and (financial) markets dominate the political agenda. Every idea of social or economic reform, let alone of seriously addressing more wide ranging issues such as energy and environment have been effectively pushed out of view.

The clashes are not any longer about ideas but about the priority of interests to be served. This is a far cry from the notion that there is a future to be conquered in which we enhance the conditions of our societies beyond the horizon of vested positions and obsolete ideologies. Lamentations about this – largely among a dwindling class of intellectuals – are more outspoken in the US than in Europe, where societal issues are most prominent in headlines and columns. But this may be just a marginal difference. On both sides of the Atlantic the public debate has vulgarized and the exercise of progressive idealism has become a highly suspect pastime of an increasingly unhappy few.

This is not because no one cares to listen or their ideas are overruled by the noisy conservative populace, it is rather that at this point it appears to be extremely difficult to effectively formulate substantive, countervailing progressive concepts. In fact, what constitutes “progress” is fundamentally in question. Although in Europe this seems to be a concern for the left most of all, this is a shared issue for left and right, as “progress” is not necessarily a monopoly of the left only. For most of the 20th Century the engine of progress was firmly in the hands of enlightened industrialists, and this included a fair amount of social improvements. Post-war social welfare programs as they proliferated in (then: Western) Europe would have been unthinkable without the solid foundation that was laid in this period.

Perhaps this is what we should remind ourselves of in our own time. The societal fabric is weakening because our economies are halting in their very roots. The engine of welfare generation requires all our attention. The other side of the coin is that our present-day industrialists have a major social responsibility next to their commercial responsibilities. I have touched upon this in an earlier posting (See August 2010: Power and responsibility in our future world). Secondly, as I have indicated in this blog at many occasions, we should reassess the traditional distinctions between our own roles as consumers and as responsible citizens. To a large extent this must come naturally, as in our own private lives we do not readily distinguish between the commercial and the political where it concerns the progress we make ourselves. For instance, the benefits of the Internet are as much a result of private initiative as of public infrastructure.

Nonetheless, however we look at it, some major – and very pressing – public issues remain which do demand a concerted effort of both commercial and public institutions. Left nor right can escape them, and resolving these issues in my view will largely determine true progress in the future decades.

There are many choices to be made of which some – but not all – indeed will depend on our priorities in political terms. “Progress” nor progressiveness point at one single defined track. We better clarify the various options – and their divergence – next to the narrow options, the choices – we might say – that we do not have. Decisions that we simply have to take in order for our world not to disintegrate in a longer term stagnation. Effective leadership seems to be more crucial at this stage than political denomination.

The UK's new young leadership at the left

In Europe, examples of such forward looking leadership are not absent, but they are a minority, for instance in the UK where young and buoyant individuals, all in their forties, have taken the center stage from left to right. But elsewhere in Europe, the situation seems more hesitant, for instance in my own country, The Netherlands, where many people mistake noisy (and largely resentful) populism with truthful guidance. We will get beyond this, I have no doubt. In the mean time there is ample room, and ample need, for parties in at all ends of the spectrum to readdress their own sense of the future and of the partnerships they require to get there, whether in the political arena or in the private – and most likely: in both.

IN DEFENSE OF DEMOCRACY

2010-09-24T14:36:00.000-07:00

Across Europe the increasing influence of right-wing extremism challenges the ideal of a civic democracy based on decency and a sense of compromise. It raises the question whether our democracies can survive when the populace votes by stamping its feet in response to ad hoc anxieties or raw self-interest and social exclusion. At the root of this development is the mounting uneasiness with the presence of – what people see as – an alien Muslim culture. This sentiment is further exacerbated by the severe economic troubles that have hit the entire western world. The current circumstances are an eerie reminder of the situation in the late 1920s and early 1930s when democracies were swept away by militant right-wing dictatorships attacking our civilization at its very roots. Of course, the comparison is flawed by many accounts, if only because no such militancy has surfaced in our present day nor are the economic prospects as depressing as in that particular period. But even if in terms of severity our present world is a paradise of wealth and peace compared with the conditions of the 1930s, we should not turn our eyes away from certain current trends which of themselves can not be described in diminishing terms.

New cultural elements cause widespread uneasiness and enstrangement

First of all there are above societal trends, which I would categorize as follows:

social values have become diffuse as have the societal codes of behavior; there is a marked rudeness and impoliteness in the public debate and a popular culture which heralds hedonistic vulgarism;
old left-wing solidarity has been rather rudely shifted aside in favor of uninhibited materialist egoism;
equality and non-discrimination have to be defended against mounting stigmatization and outright discrimination of minorities such as Muslims, Roma

Each of them undermines the integrity of our societies which constitute the foundation of our public institutions and of the written and unwritten rules by which they have thus far been able to serve the common good.

Secondly, I see parallel a trend which in my view is largely a consequence of the above. The past decade has shown increasingly erratic voter behavior, with the public exerting pressure on parties to offer immediate satisfaction rather than sound long term views and nourishing leadership based on populism. This development coincides with a gradual shift in generations. The ideals of the past four decades have worn out but few substantial concepts or visions as yet have replaced them. Ironically the emphasis among younger generation appear to be more conservative than that of the previous generations, thus reinforcing the shift to the right in the broader social-economic spectrum.

Rightwing populist Geert Wilders of the Netherlands

Admittedly, all of the above is a matter of perception too. I am part of the aging Baby-boom generation and thus it is only natural that my observations include an element of regret (not necessarily discontent) about the general drift of our societies and the diminishing relevance of the civic values by which I have grown up. Yet I also believe it is more than just that; more than a mere difference in taste or personal preferences.

Evolution of culture is one thing, but it is very difficult to ignore the potential harmful consequences of societal disintegration and of a lack of responsibility for the longer term. Major challenges lay ahead but they have somehow disappeared from the agenda, in part because of short term financial pressures but also, I believe, because they offer little appeal for politicians to gain – or sustain - their popular support. Issues such energy, climate change, maintaining the fabric of world peace and security, including the fabric of the European Union itself, have almost, so it seems, become suspect. Anyone who raises it with any degree of seriousness as simply cast aside. It is not a conscious process, but it is distinct phenomenon: our real concerns being driven away inadvertently by our short term hypes and anxieties.

Wrung from history: Europe's institution for peace and security

In the end, this will undermine the credibility of our democracies too, and it is in its ultimate defense that I raise this topic. In their extremes the above trends, if unchecked, could well lead to an increased call for authoritarian rule, both as a result of sustained discontent and of even greater challenges being posed on our societies. They may either come from within or outside – or both. Natural disasters, armed conflict at larger scale, mass insurgence against new shortages and so on. Under those circumstances the constitution of our democracies will come under new, additional pressure. It is not difficult to paint a scenario in which all of these different existing and possible future developments arrive at a boiling point in which our democracies crumble largely because we have forgotten how to run them properly.

Civic responsibility and the orderly conduct of our public interests are a concern to us all, whatever preferences we have or whatever choices we make. Political parties should be responsive to the public’s needs but should also be able to project substantive leadership beyond short term pressures. All of it seems obvious and almost needless to say.

Yet so many things that may have been obvious are not any longer. Civic education can not be taken for granted. Democracy requires tolerance and responsibility at all levels, and this includes the voter. Whether or not historic precedents are relevant in all respects, we can at least derive serious lessons from them and steer clear from unnecessary disaster.

THE COSTLY DECADE AFTER 9/11

2010-09-16T05:53:00.000-07:00

In the aftermath of the 9/11 commemorations people in America and elsewhere in the world may forget the sequence of events that followed and which in hindsight could be viewed as a disaster at least of similar magnitude. I was reminded of this when some young friends asked me to watch Michael Moore’s documentary Fahrenheit 911. It has been a while since I last saw it. “Will we get opinions only, or facts?” they asked beforehand. As far as I knew it largely offered facts, images, but obviously construed in such a way to see the events from a specific angle. And this is what I told them.

My young friends are adolescents now, but at the time they still were kids. So this was the first opportunity for them to observe and evaluate for themselves the successive actions of the Bush Administration after September 2001, ultimately leading up to the military intervention in Iraq. They ware truly horrified. Of course, in this documentary Michael Moore leads us to see the pre- and post-9/11 events as one huge conspiracy in which President George W. Bush served as nothing more than as a dumb witted pawn in the hand of corporate interests out to get as much profit our of Middle East oil as they could get their hands on. The dramatic onslaught of 9/11, in their eyes, served as a blessing, not as a tragedy. The Republican-Corporate elite concocted the case for democracy and freedom in the Middle-East to the benefit of their own pocket books and in the process sacrificed the lives of many more American people – young men in particular – than the number of people who lost their lives in the initial terrorist attack. And even though this is a very subjective, highly cynical interpretation, it is very difficult to escape the notion that the American people were misled in believing that in toppling the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein, something effective was done to avert a substantive and immediate threat to their own security. It was by no means a response to an actual, immediate threat of terror but rather a pre-emptive action to safeguard America’s economic interests.

The great sacrifice after 9/11

I have been highly critical of the Bush Administration throughout its tenure and even though I would not readily concede to conspiracy theories or to US presidents serving their own interests only I can not help but see the entire history of the years between 2000 and 2005 as a tragic mishap for which taxpayers and citizens world wide are paying a colossal price. What strikes me most of all is how we tend to forget this and blame the current economic slump and lack of new progress on the present-day administration.

Massive military spending, hundreds of billions of dollars, went into a war that as been questionable from the onset and it has drained the American – and world - economy to such extent that it wasn’t able to sufficiently counter the burst of the financial bubble that ensued in parallel. We got stuck, in America and elsewhere, and much of it is to blame on the expensive illusions that have been kept alive, indeed by very self-centered interests – not merely of politicians and corporations - throughout the past decade.

The president is who is largely blamed for the consequences of the past

It will take the western economies at least another decade to recapture sufficient financial strength and inspiration to get on with the job of making the world a better place. The implication is that a great many urgent innovations in energy, ecology and market efficiency will take much longer to materialize and that they will only come about if governments accept sustained austere budget policies for a considerable period. All of this will keep people across the world – including people in areas of conflict – on a tight string and this may again trigger new outbreaks of violence.

When will new stability and growth return?

Seen from this angle, I much regret that I can not tell my young friends that any time soon the outlook of our world will substantially improve. Many uncertainties remain and thus they too will pay part of the bill of the wasteful previous years. At the same time it is important that they grasp the historic context in which they make their own decisions, from every possible viewpoint. The conundrums of their world are not an act of God but the result of willful actions of people, both for better and for worse. They too can dream of their own contributions and learn from the judgments of people in the past.

POWER AND RESPONSIBILITY IN OUR FUTURE WORLD

2010-08-21T15:33:00.000-07:00

Whom should we look at to clean up the mess?

This blog is an ongoing exploration of the factors affecting our longer term future, not merely in terms of economy, politics or private wealth but in its fundamental parameters. It is often said but I will repeat here that this exercise is not about predicting the future but, in essence, about getting to grips with the present. Secondly, if we want to have an understanding of where we are today we can not go without some basic knowledge of how we got here, in short: of our history and of the key events that have shaped it. To some extent the exploration of our history is just as speculative as that of the future. One can have many different, viable perceptions of it. And invariably they evolve over time. Thus however we go about it, it is an ongoing effort indeed, every time and again.

The history of the past century can be described in terms of shifting powers. From the early to the late 1900s a momentous transition has taken place from ancient nation based autocracies to power structures on a global scale, in part supported by national democracies, in part by private enterprise. The 20th century saw citizens become mass consumers at the same time and it is a matter of debate whether their influence – on average – on the direction of their future, their immediate environment and the general conditions affecting their welfare has increased or, to the contrary, whether they have in fact have been reduced to mere statistics in a global system of mass slavery. I have elaborated this viewpoint in an one of my previous postings (See Archive: March 2010 Unleash your shackles; slaves ought to be free).

The source of all current power

At another level the global shift towards internationalism has brought us a new tension between the private and the public sphere of interests. The resolution of this tension in my view is the major challenge for the next forthcoming decades. Again I should refer to an earlier posting (See Archive December 2008: The society of owners vs. the public society) in which I addressed this topic much against the background of our present-day financial problems and the need for ensure that the financial (and industrial) world become less driven by mere short-term profit rather than longer term sustainability.

But there is a more profound issue at stake and perhaps we should call this a crisis too: the crisis of responsibility. The underlying reality is not dissimilar from the one that caused massive peril a hundred years ago, when power was exercised by those who didn’t care to take true responsibility for the world on which they imposed it. And perhaps this is a theme running through the longer stretch of history when time and again power rather than need -the needs of the people, for instance – determined its actual course. This is as much true for the instances at which such power eventually was overthrown. The struggle against irrational power can be seen as one of the major spoils in the story of humanity. And even though we may not perceive our current challenges in the same light, much of what happened in the past can still happen to us today, or tomorrow. Do we ever anticipate a new war on European soil? And whether we answer in the affirmative or otherwise, why?

We are facing irrational power that stems from our own guts, our own desires, our own hypes and fads. We are fed the goodies we want in exchange of our non-interference with corporate power. Not as a mere consumer, that is. Which is what most of us are. The challenge is not power – its distribution or concentration – in the first place: it is what we want ourselves.

If the previous history was about the role and responsibilities of labor versus capital, it is the consumer versus capital now. The consumer who is a citizen of the world and of his country as well.

Do we continue to consume at the expense of our planet’s very existence as the harbor of humanity? Much of my blog content revolves around this theme. We may be increasing our knowledge about infinity, but our need is to accept its opposite as well. When nothing is left, nothing is left.

Who has the true power – and the responsibility – to effectively help to curb this trend of global depletion? Can we truly sustain many more billions of people on this planet. Or should more drastic measures to control birth rates be taken? From a humanitarian point of view this seems self-evident, but from the point of view of logic it is not. Accellerated death rates, war and devastation would be more logic and more effective. It is the other conundrum that constitutes our humanity. Will we control it?

In this light too the question of power and responsibility in our world becomes paramount. We have many international institutions but they have neither. Multinational corporations have far greater impact, in both dimensions, but they lack the essence: full accountability. We have only recently had the first instance of great corporate accountability of BP in the aftermath of the Mexican Gulf oil spill.

Perhaps a serious attempt should be made to critically assess the current world situation of power and its corollaries. It underscores the need to come to new terms between the private and the public interest, the latter meaning: us all, together or similarly. Fresh air, clean water, security, education, etcetera. All of this against our true private – individual - needs.

And as already indicated: it all starts with (and within) ourselves.

ALL OF NATURE

2010-08-18T07:23:00.001-07:00

Unattainable: the paradise of legend

This summer one of our last surviving American uncles visited my family in The Netherlands in a short European trip. He is ninety years of age and was born in 1919, the year of the Treaty of Versailles. The treaty was discredited by many at the time and thereafter for its shortsightedness and its focus on retribution and revenge rather than on the true needs of the future.

Versailles 1919: not the wisdom of these men could make the world a better place

As a teenager I had a correspondence friendship with my uncle for a time. Invariably he and I exchanged our views and experiences of the main events in the 1960s. And very much in the same spirit we spent a late afternoon, upon his visit to my place, discussing the events and challenges of our present time. In many respects, I observed, our present time very much resembles the fin de siècle – the period preceding the Great War. Our world leadership may not be as misguided as the ruling class in those days, especially in Europe, but so far it has failed to set the path to effectively face our present-day world wide challenges. “They are unprecedented!” my uncle exclaimed. “We are taking a massive responsibility for many future generations – in terms of our natural environment, resources, our (nuclear) waste, overpopulation and so on – but we have no true solution for any of these.”

My uncle has visited The Netherlands in various successive stages of his life; as a teenager in the 1930s, as an American Army officer immediately after the liberation in 1945 and at regular visits in the years thereafter. For most of this period my grandparents’ residence in Amsterdam served as his prime landing place. My uncle’s mother and my grandmother were sisters, born and bred in New England. “Your grandparents were true mentors to me,” my uncle said. “Now my dog is my mentor, “ he added with a smile.

Old age has gradually slowed him down physically but his mental abilities are undiminished. The dog is symbolic for the essence of his belief, not in any God or in biblical tales but in “All of Nature”.

It seems a sobering perspective in the last stage of long life. Humanity is facing great peril, more massive and inescapable than at any time in history. We may wish to reach the closing years of our life in a spirit of optimism and confidence in human kind. Yet I didn’t observe any particular disappointment or sorrow in my uncle’s expression. It rather came to me as the personal evaluation of a realist who is well aware that at one point in our lives it is truth that counts, not merely our hopes and wishes, and that we have to let go in a spirit of restful abandonment.

Judgment day for Planet Earth

Is it true, then, that God can offer us no better prospect than the mere forces of our primal instincts? In my own life too, I have little need to answer this question. God is the product of our very own human fallibility. It can not transcend it, however much we might pray for it. Even reptiles are capable of better wisdom. Thus, if I had a dog, like my uncle, I would sit down and look him in the eyes as deep as I can.

WILL PRESIDENT OBAMA BE AMERICA’S NEXT JIMMY CARTER?

2010-07-31T16:13:00.000-07:00

One defining issue: the Middle-East (President Obama and Palestine Autority President Abbas)

President Obama is making every effort to help America get out of the present-day economic slump and to contribute to the broader stability of our world. Thus far much criticism accompanies his administration. It is not my competence to judge his performance nor is this my intention in addressing above question. However, it occurred to me that Obama’s presidency and the reputation it has gained to date have much in common with the days of Jimmy Carter.

I was reminded of this when just recently the newspaper reported Washington’s demand to President Abbas of the Palestine authority that he should visibly move towards new talks with Israel. If not, the item stated, the US would be less than forthcoming in continuing its current relations with the Palestine authority. It is the kind of diplomacy that most people who are familiar with the history of US Middle-East policies will find all too familiar. What must be said, has to be said.

President Jimmy Carter achieved some notable results during his presidency, especially between Egypt and Israel, but otherwise got hopelessly stuck in the broader process in the Middle-East after the gross misjudgment in his time of the revolutionary events in Iran and of the forcefulness of Muslim retaliation after decades of dictatorial, US sponsored, rule of that country. It caught him by the tail and this – directly and indirectly – added to his reputation as an ineffective president.

But my point is not the similarity of the pressures which Obama has to face in comparison with those that faced Carter. They are numerous nonetheless, both in terms of international politics and economy. One could say that Obama faces them in even more forceful terms and that, like Carter, he has to do so against much political “Washington adversity.”

I am rather looking at the potential – further – similarities ahead. As time progresses, the pressure is mounting towards Obama’s campaign for a second term. It will be by virtue of a second term that his presidency can rise in stature and remembrance. No doubt many stalemates by which his administration is being pestered today will only be resolved in the event of Obama’s re-election.

Jimmy Carter stumbled over much bad luck, whatever his good intentions or efforts. One of them was the advent of an impressive, ultimately successful competitor by the name of Ronald Reagan. A caliber of similar weight will be needed to topple Obama, I am quite sure. There is no indication as yet whether the Republicans will bring out such a caliber – it is too early days – but it is a serious possibility nonetheless.

Obama’s predecessor Jimmy Carter gained his ultimate stature most of all through his post-presidential initiatives, up to the present day. His presidency may linger in the shadows of history but the person does not. He his highly regarded for his stance in humanitarian affairs and for his role in international dispute settlement. This is by no means irrelevant, for any individual.

Jimmy Carter, a highly effective former US President

Thus, however his presidency may work out, Obama – in principle – will still have an entire life after it. It would not surprise me if his greatest contribution to America’s welfare and to the stability of our world will only be made in his post-presidential years, reaching both beyond Carter’s and Bill Clinton’s, whose status may well have dwindled under pressure of merely being the husband of Obama’s Secretary of State.

Having said this, I would see Obama’s strategy for becoming a respected and influential ex-President being of no less importance than every strategy he designs to win a second term.

THE 21ST CENTURY AS YET REMAINS UNDEFINED

2010-07-21T13:21:00.001-07:00

A defining moment in history - 1789

In every age there is a turning point
A new way of seeing the coherence of the world
(Jacob Bronovski, 1973, in “The Ascent of Man”)

When in the history of mankind have there be true instances of a fundamental paradigm shift reaching across society? One such instance immediately comes to mind. In many ways it is the one on which our world today is largely based. It didn’t take place in one sweep but in stages, near the end of the 18th century, and in three dimensions: industrial, social and political. It is interesting to note that it also had three distinct yet related trigger centers: the new United States, Britain and France. And even though in Europe, after the Napoleonic wars, a severe restoration was enforced of the old order, the revolutionary processes still constituted a road on which there was no return.

Yet however much we can identify these different stages in their various aspects, it is difficult to assign one single turning point in a history that took at least a number of decades to unfold. Along the way there was – and is at any time – continuity too, in people’s minds, their habits and in their broader culture.

A new challenge: catering for an aging population

But perhaps we should look at the evolution of our human societies from a more distant perspective. Over past two thousand years there may have been just two or three substantive shifts which constituted a profound redefinition of our world and of our existence and outlook in life, including the key arrangements of our political and social institutions. The advent of Christianity and its broad embrace in mind and spirit of the people’s of Europe most certainly was one of them. It was the single defining factor in our history for some thousand years. By the same token one could say that Christianity’s loss of its social and political predominance was the next main watershed. And perhaps there have been no other. Science, free thought, liberation on all fronts, the institution of democracy in our western world – all have been its consequence. The people of our age are still the offspring of this broad history. We have made no fundamental turn in any of these dimensions over the past two hundred years. History, with all its upheavals in the mean time, progressed along the precepts of the Enlightenment.

How will our young people move?

Today we live in anticipation of a new defining moment. It is key theme of this blog. Our world is challenged at its root assumptions. It has been debated that – our – history will soon end. But can we really expect – or even desire - a turn any time soon? If anything, most of our energies, whether effective or not, are driven towards continuity rather than to revolution and our younger generations do not appear to be motivated otherwise in any respect. We still herald the main accomplishments of our forebears in material and in spiritual terms. If anything the way to overcome the threat of global scarcity – in energy, raw materials, fresh water – is to counter this through accelerated advancement and throw all our trust in our capability to mobilize our technologies and political institutions to that end. This is what we firmly believe or at least desperately wish to believe.

Not the future, hopefully

In the mean time we are faced too with a militant and determined countervailing force – largely coming out of the Middle East – which many in our world view as nothing less than an attempt to throw us back into a new age of religious absolutism and deliberate global attrition. Again, historic antagonisms stare us in the face and it is far from certain that we can overcome this by the same force of reason and enlightenment that guided our history over the past centuries. But we also need to provide a satisfactory answer to the downsides of a rational world which leaves many people living in a spiritual void and encaged by extreme consumerism. We herald individualism and human liberties but they have not made us happier as human beings in our larger communities.

Thus, both from within and from outside, the ingredients of a substantive upheaval in our prevailing conventions seem abundant. But we can not say that we are truly standing at any historic doorstep. At no time this can be foreseen with any degree of certainty. History is written by hindsight. For that matter the next decades could well be an ongoing muddle, one way and the other, without a substantial breakthrough in any dimension.

Yet, breakthroughs are in great need. Clean, infinite energy; political resolutions, food for all… it can hardly be just a shortlist. If our younger generations do not wish for a revolution, then at least let them groom the leadership with a vision that can make this century the most memorable of all – preferably in the most positive light.

UNSPEAKABLE FUTURES

2010-06-01T11:58:00.000-07:00

It is difficult to escape the notion that our in our present time we experience a new threshold of history. Much can go wrong, much can still go well. And many interests worldwide are at stake. Today’s financial muddle is just a symptom of a more profound and substantive historic agony. It extends beyond mere economic stagnation or ‘climate’. Our world – our planet – is on the verge of a burst. We have arrived at a stage where every inspiration, every ideology, every invention and – most specifically – every resource has reached its near exhaustion. In baffling speed we have broken down the traditional fabric of our communities to the point where either we secure the continuity of our advanced, high tech and interdependent global society or we fall back to the greatest disarray that humanity has ever experienced. In both scenarios we pay a considerable price.

Continuity implies great adjustment. This includes a sizeable investment in new technologies to sustain the level of material comfort to which we have become accustomed – and in which most people living today were born. Previous generations lived through adversities – both in material and in humanitarian terms – which we consider unthinkable. All we – should – know is that there is nothing romantic about a world falling into collapse, with everything that is bound to follow.

But a future of sustained welfare and ongoing advancement is far from certain. We truly have come the end of a history that is crying for another rebirth. Before we know it our world of privilege – particularly our Western World.- will find itself in the same position that some hundred years ago the elite of kings, emperors and their entourage found themselves in: abundant, ignorant of the true needs of their people, consuming wealth they did not really earn. At a global scale, we are now that elite, potentially oblivious of the needs of the rest of our world, its huge population, its dying wildlife and its barren fields. Are we going to defend our privileges at all cost, our access to the last remaining oil wells, the last gallons of fresh water, our last kilos of beef and tons of steel to just continue as we are?

I am not in the habit of being a doomsayer. It is merely a contemplation of possible futures that occupies me. My understanding of history – at every stage – in the past thousands of years is that it very much derives its character from discontinuity, manifold perils – not limited to the perils of war and conflict – which caused humanity to readjust, not necessarily for the better at every instant. It can be a gradual, creeping process that suddenly hits, or it is an unexpected great disaster. The Roman Empire took decades if not a hundred years to finally collapse, both from within and outside. The old European world of Kings and Emperors required one irreversible shot to trigger its demise, however much it was a world at its end anyway.

Hotspots of our present world

One could also look for examples in history where progress was achieved beyond prevailing paradigms without any cataclysm. Can societies arise above stagnation by the force of their own energies? Some civilizations did manage to do so, at least to some extent, but never without great sacrifices amongst themselves, such as the Chinese. But we can also think of the Renaissance of Europe, in the 14th and 15th centuries. Battlefields and disease did accompany it, but it was a substantive transition.

Paradigm shifts are called for, in many fields, whether or not technology will help us to overcome the emerging material scarcity. We should ask the question whether indeed we can allow the pressure to mount, populations to grow, resources to remain exploited in the way we do now. We actually know that we can not.

Among the futures that we face are those which we better do our utmost to escape. We are world filled talent and youth to achieve this. At the same time we tend to waste it and we allow our consumer habits to rule our interests as human beings living on a lonely but highly precious planet. We accommodate sizeable migrations, there seems very little choice, but we fail to invest sufficiently in blending newcomers into the rhythm of our societies.

Vulgarization, alienation and complacency may threaten us more – from within - than any present day conflict or natural crisis may do from outside. To sustain what we have and what we are is not enough. Stagnation means disintegration. Strong, forward looking ambitions should guide our world to a new horizon. It will demand every leadership and inventiveness available.

My sincere wish is that such leadership will also take us away from the antagonisms that plague our present world and articulate new, inspiring missions for humanity. Traditionally we look at the Western World – the US or Europe – to mobilize the critical mass to this end. But this another great question mark. It is not because such leadership may be absent, but because we have become too self-interested to understand its necessity.

The world in 2050 will be vastly different from the world we know. By reasonable reckoning I will not live to see it. I am nonetheless as much concerned about that world as anyone belonging to our younger generations. We have to be. Most of the decisions – and hopefully: breakthroughs – of the next couple of years will determine the parameters for the longer term. We either strike out the potential for disaster, or we will have to embrace it.

WHY NOT TAKE THE DEEP DIVE TO PROTECT LIFE ON OUR PLANET NOW?

2010-04-20T14:38:00.000-07:00

A new age of invention

Looking beyond the current crisis

Our world is bogged down by a financial crisis at a time when forward looking investments are most needed. We need to move towards a clean global economy as rapidly as we can. The sooner we reach it, the least disaster we risk and the better quality of life we achieve.

My question would be whether the crisis should not be a trigger instead to make us take such a move with even more pressure. Investments in sustainable wealth will make us prosper beyond imagination – if we succeed. This is a certainty.

I just read the announcement of a new car made in China: it is a car powered by electricity. The article suggests that China may be pushing harder – harder than we do – towards a green economy. Most likely, if this were the case, the country will be stronger in our world because of it.

Life preservation is wealth. This should be our economic axiom. We should create richness for every natural habitat we preserve and for every new habitat we create. If need be, we pay for clean air. Let’s make clean air an element on the DOW Jones Index, but in reverse. The lower its share value, the cleaner we have become.

The 21st century should become known for its ability to advance on the merits of the 20th but also for cleaning up its downsides. We should pass a clean, sustainable world to the 22nd.

This, in my view, is the kind of inspiration too that can in fact drag us out of the current financial problems and the stagnation this has caused. Financial institutions, industry and commerce have a large role to play in reducing waste, increasing product relevance, in enhancing the entire habitat of life, and in making it a joy for all humanity on this planet.

What's in the bag?

But is an effort too which can not succeed without our own contribution. Humanity has gone haywire in its use of the markets. We are being led by many needless, wasteful things. Just look at what goes out, week after week, with the garbage collector. We can be more pro-active, as a consumer, in dictating the market and not allow us to be simply exploited by it. In a sense, as I have indicated in my previous blog, consumers should at least in part be producer too.

There is lots of talk about innovation and new invention. There should be. It is best achieved if we are imaginative in our needs too. How do we really want to run our lives. What are the thins – materially and otherwise – I really need and what should they be like? What can make my life most “nature friendly”? What, today, is the state of the art?

I do believe that if we let our imagination go wild over saving life on our planet, new economic growth will follow to the benefit of many

UNLEASH YOUR SHACKLES, SLAVES OUGHT TO BE FREE

2010-03-30T06:53:00.000-07:00

In a truly democratic economy, we can take production in our own hands

I have been meaning to say this for a long time. It is one of my main intellectual preoccupations. Something I can not solve in my own mind, or just by myself.

As I see it, our present day consumer society is nothing different, but much more pleasant to live in, than the ancient society of Roman slaves. The instrument of our submission is our seduction by manifold commercials and attractive contracts of labor. The key force behind our slavery is our very existence as a consumer.

Can we have it otherwise? I think we can.

For instance, I believe we do not need to stand passive when bankers and CEO’s of big companies cash in monetary benefits far beyond their actual added value. It is outrageous that we allow people to be paid huge sums for exercising powers that they should not have in the first place.

Secondly, on the other side of the fence, I think we are able to say no in all clarity to the massive waste that is produced at high cost every day in terms of useless products, superfluous advertisement, unnecessary packaging, meaningless diversity and senseless illusions, which we are expected to buy and to pay for.

Thirdly, it is my firm conviction that we have allowed our public interest and the interests of our markets to take a much too divergent course. We should re-assess what in our own minds, as citizens and as private individuals, is the true distinction between things which are relevant for us all and things in which we wish to retain our private choice.

But when I follow through my thoughts about these issues, I can almost not avoid – at least in my own mind – to end up in the construction of an utopia that would dwarf communism in most of its further implications.

What was so bad about communism? Essentially it was the arrogance of ‘state’. The gruesome inefficiency of centrally planned demand and supply; Its degeneration into murderous absolutism and its inability to rise effectively above collective poverty and mediocre industrial performance. The Trabant, the only car of fame built in the former East Germany, is the icon of the chronic lack of incentives to constantly improve as it persisted throughout the former East Block world.

Nothing of that we should wish for as an alternative to our present state of consumer slavery. Nobody would vouch for it, obviously. We rather cherish the illusion of our happiness than undermine it by the force of a terrorizing war against superfluity.

Secondly the weakness of my utopia is its assumption that humanity is basically ‘good’: economic, loving, social, cultivating the spiritual rather than the material, and so on. My utopia in other words is too naive to be realistic – as a rule of thumb - from the start.

So here you see my problem. Unless there is no such thing as scarcity (which is a fundamental underlying reality in every ‘model’). we can never be really free. But does this mean we should continue to accept corporate imperialism as it gradually undermines our sovereignty as citizens? Perhaps we should now recognize – at least – that ‘markets’ in our time are not the places of real choice as they used to be. And it follows that as consumers the only way to really counter this, is to become producers ourselves, each of us individually, if we were to restore true market freedom. Our technology in fact could help us along this way. It allows us to tell companies, just by pushing ‘enter’ on our laptop, to produce only as we order, in all dimensions, and give instructions for design as well. If we want to stand tall in the face of corporate power, then let us take the power of supply out of their hands.

The reality is, we can. We only need to put our minds to it. We are able to unleash our own shackles and share every bonus among each other.

In a world in which consumers are the producers at the same time, corporations are – nothing more and – nothing less than arbiters of resources, technology and distribution as we direct them according to our true needs. This seems to me a workable market. It would also mean that consumers push suppliers to be as mean and lean – and only as powerful – as we need them to be to supply us with the necessary goods in the most efficient, sustainable way.

But have I neutralized all my possible objections to the utopia that I have described above? It all boils down of course, however we look at, to our own behavior, the rigid application of our own sense of economy – of our needs and of the means in which we wish to satisfy them – and to our understanding of the bigger picture of the markets in which we wish to be active. This will take time, I have no doubt. But in fact we are already actively testing this in many different corners, however primitively as yet, such as news, clothes, books, photo albums etcetera.

The next implication is a political one. It requires governments to rethink markets and their own role in them just as much. We are on a long road, but I am convinced that in ten years time we will find ourselves much further on this road than most of us would now think feasible.

But perhaps, if we realize that this is about our freedom in all dimensions in the first place, we might feel we have many more incentives ready at hand to make all of this happen soonest.

CAN HUMANITY STILL IMPROVE ITS WAYS?

2010-03-26T09:56:00.000-07:00

Homo egoisticus – 4.000.000 B.D.

Many, many years from now, those who will be our descendants might look back at us the way we look at the Neanderthals. They will recognize our advancements and capabilities but they will also see the flaws which after many eons the successors of human kind will have overcome.

Is this a likely scenario? We will never know, of course. But we can speculate.

In essence human kind as it is today is capable of almost everything that it wasn’t made for. This is the beauty and it is our potential tragedy.

It is first of all a recognition of everything that Darwin told us. The clockmaker who brought us to life, was blind and he will always be. Mutations which some 200.000 years ago enabled us to become more skilled hunters, also led us to send a man to the Moon. It is accidental. No intelligent being with a sound mind would ever have concocted the modern human being and let it loose on the planet Earth on purpose to do its work, unbalanced and unfinished as we are.

For instance, why would an intelligent designer think of a life form which is actually a regression from the norm that prevails in the rest of the animal kingdom, which is the natural inclination to preserve life’s balance? Every animal – every predatory animal especially – knows this by instinct. So why not the humans?

Why do humans not have an absolute resistance – and I mean: absolute – against killing off its own kind? One could say, of course: but this is the prerogative of the dominant animal in every other species too. Lions kill the offspring of competitors. Baboons do it too. If you want to have strong genes, needed to maintain the versatility of the species, well, in fact humans are much too kind. So here perhaps is a point in favor too, and not necessarily against ‘us’.

Third: why would an intelligent designer create so much variety, even within a narrow band of genes, in terms of intellect, quality and level of talents, reason, emotion, etcetera? The first answer could be: it isn’t a failure of design, it is a failure of behavior. Humans have cancelled the mechanism of selection on those qualities themselves! They go for stupid things like looks and form. Stupid men prefer stupid blondes. But then, this is the very failure of our design, or it is the handicap that proves the fact that actually there was no designer at all.

I am going for the latter, as people may well understand from my earlier postings in this blog. It is out of pure curiosity, out of my private speculative interest in the future of mankind that I raise this issue. The first issue, of course, is whether in actual fact man is such an imperfect animal in the first place, and whether my alleged weaknesses are not, by further analysis, the inevitable corollaries of our uniqueness – or to put in another way: our very perfection.

We should not get ourselves blindfolded by our own humanity in judging who we are. This is the conundrum. The very qualities which the blind watchmaker, accidentally, ignited in us – indeed: our humanity, our intelligence, our intellect, our variety and so on - in the end both help us to survive and they challenge us, constantly, in our very sustainability. We are destructive and we are kind. One is very necessary to foster the other. Our intellect, which provides us with new ideas, inventions, solutions etcetera, is at the same time our greatest threat. But of course. How can it be otherwise?

We can't just do away with the money wolves, or should we?

Still, the question remains: can we improve? Can we consciously foster the benefits of our qualities and downplay our weaknesses, not just in an individual, but at larger scale, for a longer period, to benefit us all? The dilemma may be whether we can enhance humanity’s beauty – in its widest sense – and relinquish our selfishness at the same time.

Selfless love to the extreme

I am coming back to my first thesis: we are capable of things for which we haven’t been ‘made’. This in fact is a potential of which we haven’t yet seen the absolute limits. We can not say today: this is as far humanity gets; over to some other species. We will never say it.

Is it possible that one day she will walk the Earth?

We can’t look into a million years future. So many things along the way can happen, out of ourselves or just by nature, including out of space. But we do have the capability to critically asses our potential as a species. This is what makes us unique anyway. So why not look at ourselves more critically, in the context that we can reasonably foresee. We can do this in an ambitious way. We can make a treaty to save our planet, as I have been promoting in this blog. But we can also create an agreement, among all human beings, about ourselves. Why wait for another Mozes to lay down some new commandments if we are intelligent enough to make them for ourselves and agree to nourish our strengths and reduce the impact of our imperfection?

TOTAL FALL-OUT, OR NEW PROGRESS

2010-02-25T11:51:00.000-08:00

The conundrum of a huge horse shit problem

Early 2001 I was in the mood to say to a young history student: “We will experience another Middle Ages!” I knew it was an exaggeration to utter such a prophecy but I did foresee turmoil and confusion before, not much later, it actually hit us. Things were going ways they couldn’t last, I felt. And bang! 9/11 happened and there was a subsequent burst of the economic bubble. It is not a delusion coming out of wisdom by hindsight.

Every since, the world has been too optimistic about the immediate future. A bubble had burst, the world adjusted to a point – but by far not enough, Afghanistan and Iraq were overrun by the Western world, many tens of billions of dollars are drained from the world economy and after a few years the bubble sizzles again, big time… and things as yet are getting worse. Still, we are led to believe that our leaders are on the right track.

The crisis that we experience now is going to be a long one, I am convinced of that; long and still more painful, not less, both for the stagnation in our economy and for reasons of world politics.

But does this all amount to such disintegration or disfigurement of our world that real times of darkness and strife lay ahead, a world – a western world in particular – going out of control? Anyone contemplating such prospect would find it both highly unlikely and plausible at the same time. On the one hand we are too sophisticated – in all dimensions – to let this happen. Whatever forces of disintegration may challenge us, our societies have too many vested interests to uphold their intricate structure, their governance (at all levels) and infrastructure, the organization of our markets and services and so on. But all of this at the same time is our great vulnerability. If only we think of a worldwide failure of the internet (however this may happen) or of the potential fall-out as a result of secondary consequences of Global Warming. None of it may be around the corner, but we can not rule them out. Increased interdependence at ever increasing scale in terms of systems, governance, markets and supplies inevitably offers us as many opportunities as it offers the potential of great peril.

Dali's pessimistic view of our world

At the same time we have severe unresolved conflicts in our world and the responses thus far have not brought us close to a sustainable resolution by any measure. The combination of age old regional strife, a long history of Western interventions, and protracted social and economic stagnation in the Arabic world is a major complication in our present time. We tend to reduce the antagonisms which plague the Arab world, including their considerable adverse spin-offs in our world, into simple – indeed, often medieval - terms of political and religious conflict. Our interest – more than ever – is in grasping its complexity, in many more than mere political (or religious) dimensions. 1)

A future of our world as we wish to see it

The underlying failure of the Western world is to come to terms with its own role, indeed in a long-winding history going back more than a century, in the creation of these antagonisms, with the impact of its current (largely military and political) involvement and with its true interests in the longer term. I am not suggesting that all of this is negative or driven by our own interests only. Nor am I suggesting any excuse or justification, for instance, for the violence caused by countries and people in the Arab world itself. Again, there is too much complexity to put it into terms of good versus bad. We do have interests of course, which can not merely be expressed in our desire to secure peace and security in the world, let alone our projection of freedom and democracy as the best recipe to affect these. One such interest is the continued exploitation of and access to the remaining oil resources.

But if it is true, as many contend, that the present state of affairs – and the daily draining of huge resources needed at least to not make it worse – is an exercise without end, then only some thorough rethinking on all sides will ever get us out of it. Mere pacifism and idealistic benevolence are insufficient and will prove just as ineffective as a protracted projection of military might and corporate muscle. But this is only self-evident. The key first of all is understanding, not any immediate solution or intervention.

But however this may be, the political climate to really rethink our concept of sustainable solutions for the multifaceted issues between the Western and the Arab world on our side is not helped, to say the least, by the images we hold (perhaps first of all of ourselves and) of Muslims, the Islam in general and of the general character of Arabs. Deep down many of us nourish the sense of their backwardness, cruelty, lack of imagination and their obstinate refusal to align with the modern age. When we see them, in increasing numbers, walking on our own streets, occupying our space, erecting Mosques and draining our social resources, and there is an outcry: stop the Islamization! A single sentence that summarizes the mind prison that we have allowed ourselves to be locked into. But it isn’t as if the armies of Iran or Egypt stand at our front door, the reality is quite the reverse. We call it upon ourselves if our medieval prejudices lead to the disintegration we profess to counter. Without sympathy we will never succeed.

Every time I think of the seemingly insoluble issues of our time – resources, population, economy, security, all up to and including the very sustainability of life on our Planet – I am reminded of the greatest issue facing the government of New York City by the end of the 19th century: the cumulating pile of horse manure, caused by increased traffic. It wasn’t solved, eventually, by effective “horse manure drainage provisions” or traffic policies of any kind. The issue simply disappeared from the agenda by the advent of the motorcar.

The true solutions of many issues are still hidden in the Chrystal Ball

Perhaps, in hundred years time, historians will look at our issues much in the same way. We struggled to win a lost cause, but were saved by one or the other innovation, a new perspective, perhaps a common enemy, or a combination of all. We can not foretell. But I am convinced that by merely wishing to solve the issues of the Middle East and related issues, we will not succeed. Intrinsically this would offer noting, no true perspective beyond the known horizons to the people involved.

All of this seems to point at magic as the single force that can save our world. Indeed, how Medieval can one become? To a certain extent, we have no alternative, at least if we are to sustain our material prosperity. Some breakthrough in the search for new, durable energy capable of lighting and moving the masses, is obviously required. But in a time when Facebook has decided to run its servers in part on coal, this prospect should for be projected at considerable distance in the future.

In the mean time, it is better not merely wait for the magic. What counts is not when solutions are found, it is the commitment and (self-) confidence that we need to get there. Otherwise indeed the slope downwards will be one without end.

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(1) I find myself greatly inspired, for instance, by Robert Fisk, Arabist and celebrated journalist of “The Independent” and author of a number of books on the history, nature and underlying complexities of the present-day conflicts in the Middle-East. In one sentence he describes the insoluble reality of the US presence in Iraq: “America should leave Iraq, it will leave Iraq, but it can’t leave Iraq”.

WILL RELIGIOUS FERVOR EVER RISE AGAIN IN EUROPE? - PART II

2010-02-04T08:18:00.000-08:00

An exploration of the future

This is my second posting on the role of religion in our present day European societies. My first posting, under the same title, can be read when you scroll downwards.

Having attempted an overview of current trends the question remains what the developments described in the first part of this essay – both the remaining role of confessional institutions in our public life and the increased presence and articulation of Muslims in our Western world – tell us about the prospects for the future in respect of the role of religion and religious institutions in our societies.

Christianity and the secular world
Perhaps, in response to this question, a first note to make is about the nature of secularization. We tend to think of secularization as a process undermining Christianity or its legacy. But we forget that in fact it is its very product. Even in our secularized world we harbor most of the values and principles which were established in the heydays of European Christendom. (1)We have largely absorbed them as the core of our humanistic values. There is no fundamental hostility between (Christian) believers and non-believers and when it comes to it we will jointly defend the entire achievement of our civilization. Christianity and European civilization have been synonyms ever since Charlemagne. The main divergence is between the dogmatic Catholic version of Christendom and our broader, protestant and secularized (and humanist) sense of it.

However, the actual dividing lines may shift over time, whether as a result of internal forces or external. The post-war decades of political and social liberation (including sexual liberation) may be seen as an example of internal pressures shifting the main divides within our societies. Today, as indicated above, we experience external challenges to some of our fundamental postulates and this may lead us to re-assert the heritage of our values and convictions and perhaps even to re-embrace Christianity as our guiding legacy in more explicit, though still primarily secularized terms. And thus we may forge new bonds between the various segments of our society which in certain periods of our history were divided, especially on the boundaries between church and state. To be clear, I am not saying that this is what necessarily should happen. I am only stating that such a prospect is more plausible at this time than has been for a long period before.

Confusing State and Religion started here, when Jesus appeared in front of Pontius Pilatus

State and religion
At the political level in Europe, as indicated above, Christian-democrats have all but relinquished their post-war balancing role in the wider political spectrum. I take the developments in my own country, The Netherlands, as an example. In the mid-nineties social-democrats and liberals embarked upon the much welcomed experiment of a coalition and many believed they could once and for all reduce Christian-democrats to insignificance. Ironically this was called the “Purple” coalition (red mixed with blue), a color most often associated with papal Rome. But eight years later, Christian-democrats were firmly back in their seat, not so much because of an outright failure of the purple coalition, but because of new political developments, within and especially outside The Netherlands (e.g. 9/11, the killing of a popular political leader, economic stagnation). Voters associated Christian-democrats with security, order and the kind of moderation needed to ease tensions in our agitated society. Over time, further cracks emerged in the memory of “Purple” and - rightly or wrongly – people increasingly have come to discredit its achievements.

The political realities are similar in many other (most of all northern) European countries, most notably in France, Germany and even the UK. (2)It is reflected too in the strong representation of Christian-democrats (European People’s Party) in the European Parliament, where they occupy almost 40%, the largest single segment of the seats.

The Roman Senate was a profound exercise in secular rule

Although in essence the re-assertion of Christian values is fed primarily by conservative, perhaps even defensive sentiments it would be a mistake to qualify this development as merely reactionary. I may also refer to Mueller’s observation (3)at the political level (France, UK): “Especially in the face of the financial crisis, religion has been presented as a source for what Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel have called the project of moralizing capitalism.”

Re-assessing the role of religious institutions
As indicated above, in the past decades the institutions of Christianity have largely been a force of moderation and social responsibility – in politics, education and other societal institutions – and they should rightly be seen as a vital, though never exclusive, factor in maintaining the overall fabric of our societies in the foreseeable future. I tend to stress this especially in the face of massive global inequities, not simply between rich and poor, but between our materialist pursuits and the actual possibilities to sustain them over the longer run.

Let's not send him away

But even without dramatizing this gloomy reality and most certainly without advocating the role of Christian – religious – institutions to come to our moral rescue, the prevailing challenges of our societies demand an inclusive approach. Governments would do nothing wrong in re-engaging religious institutions both at national and local levels to help ease out tensions between the various segments of society and in the process re-enforce a sense of common values. (4) What is stressed here is the potential future role of religious institutions (including Islamic institutions) as a moderating force, and not as government sponsored missionary agents.

Spirituality, religion and the public’s mind
My last main point concerns the things that are going on in people’s minds. For as much as my own education was driven by “rational observation, disciplined thought and rigid analysis” (see introduction) this is not necessarily the common denominator in our societies at large. And even the staunchest atheist can harbor a superstition or “belief”, often fueled by personal experience, which takes him close to a sense of divine providence (example: surviving an accident, or having escaped a particular accident). Those who deny that they are susceptible to this at least to some degree should be met with considerable scepticism. In short: when it comes to it, we are all human. Moreover, I believe our irrationality is what feeds our spirituality, our imagination and sense of romance – all of which are vital in the further progress of our societies. A purely scientific world would be an emotional wasteland, prone to total stagnation. In our quest for the meaning of life, of our own lives, and for ‘purpose’ we know that we have to look beyond science. In fact, I would contend that this is what drives the progress of science itself, however rational and rigid its actual process must remain. (5)

We are all on our own road to inspiration and spiritual enlightenment

If anything, events in the past decade have proven that public sentiments can be still be stirred in unexpected magnitude, for instance when a disaster has occurred or when people wish to share their response to specific events, happy or otherwise (as has for instance become apparent after the tragic death of Princess Diana in 1997). The time is long past when religious institutions, by virtue of their community and social functions, held a monopoly in channeling such collective emotions. Mass media have firmly established a prime function in this respect, however much we may contend that they also serve to nourish false sentiments, creating a world of fake exaltation and solidarity. But none of these and similar phenomena of themselves point at the media as feeding grounds for the re-enforcement of anything in the neighborhood of common religious or moral values. (6) Most of all they appeal to the human needs of community and belonging rather than to his craving for collective myths.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, we should be interested in the pursuits of our younger generations who are perhaps the least impressed by epic myths and legends yet spend much time dwelling in them – in their computer games, in the movies they watch and in a popular culture which offers abundant pulp fiction and staged stardom. Their most predominant pursuit, I believe, is in communicating with one another, across varied networks or platforms, exploring their individuality and that of others. It is their key process, overriding all other processes, whether at school or at home, in which they develop their own sense of life and of the world around them. Neither religion nor its denial bears any significance for them, so it seems (7). They largely live in urban environments which so obviously are the product of the human hand, so totally devoid of any remnant of divine creation, that for them the whole question of religion indeed is here nor there. They are more immune than any previous generation to institutionalized influences or indoctrination. Over time this may well constitute an entirely new level playing field for all institutions that wish to contribute to sustained social and cultural cohesion and to any common spiritual language capable of rallying the people’s minds to causes of common interest. For that matter the twenty first century could see a total obliteration of religion the way it is still in existence today as much as its rejuvenation.

On further evaluation and conclusion
I have started this exploration with an open mind, simply asking myself whether religion, however defined, is here to stay and whether there is any reason to expect a renewed upsurge in religious sentiments in the future, affecting our public order . I have addressed this question out of curiosity, very much because I realize that the course of history can never be taken for granted. Out of ignorance rises enlightenment, facts, figures, reason and tolerance – and thus shall it ever be. This is not necessarily the only plausible future of our history. Nor do I contend that religion and ignorance are synonym in all respects, however critical one may be to this day about certain postulates of Christianity and other theologies. Nonetheless, the increased vocalization of religious fanaticism, not merely out of the Islamic world, inadvertently revives our attention to the very presence and impact of religion in our societies. Our key interests are progress and the improvement of the human condition in rational, factual terms. Our situation today seems more remote from that promise than ever before, both as a result of our own actions and as a result of onslaughts from outside. It is only natural that one seeks for countervailing forces. This may explain my positive attitude to religious institutions as a constructive factor in our societies.

As it stands, I nonetheless arrive at an ambiguous outcome. The greatest challenge is to look at this subject – as much as possible - in objective terms. For true objectivity indeed is extremely difficult. No doubt, my essay no doubt reflects the bias of those who wish issues relating to religion (and institutions inspired by it) had disappeared from our public life altogether.

Another difficulty in assessing the picture is the fact that most research on this topic and the majority of publications are the effort of religious institutions themselves. On the other side of the spectrum I find the people who take issue with religion as if the Reformation and subsequent secularization in our part of the world have not yet taken place. This is how I look at the eagerness of certain scientists, with Richard Dawkins as their main proponent, to claim their ultimate victory over religion on topics such as evolution versus creation. Why should we wish such a victory? I don’t see any point in bashing religions for their misguided concepts, if only they don’t bother us with them. But I do say this as the citizen of a country where the real plague of dogma has effectively been eradicated a long time ago. It has to be recognized that to this day in our part of the world the error of dogma and superstition does perpetuate itself, as Dawkins e.a. have amply demonstrated, especially through education, and there is all good reason to openly expose and counter this wherever it still occurs.

I also realize that all of the above is an essentially European outlook. Although we are united in what we call the Western world, the difference with the American outlook is astounding, more so than we care to admit. This runs through every vain of our existence – in the public domain, in our communities and even in the way we present ’science’. For instance, for a European it is appalling to see a serious and respected institution such as National Geographic treat biblical stories as if they actually happened, full swing, without reservation. Similarly it seems utterly strange to us when we see American public figures, including their President, frantically embrace God as a common truth for all Americans. Well, to a large extent, God is the common truth for Americans. (8)

For the European mind it can only be highly disconcerting that this American religious conservatism in fact determines the way in which on a global scale conflicts, especially the conflicts which largely evolve around religious issues, are handled. Indeed, there is more reason for Europeans to be a little more vigilant about the prevailing religious dogmatism in the US than about the remaining ignorance of Catholics in respect of the true age of our planet Earth and the origin of species.

In conclusion it is clear that the impact of religion and its further prospects in our world constitute a far more complex theme than could have been envisaged a few decades ago. Demographic developments and social and cultural change in our societies interplay with factors and events in the wider global scene. One could say that this is a historic constant and not a discontinuity. Present day conflicts in which ethnic and religious play an important role challenge our civilization in some of its most fundamental precepts. It is insufficient to respond to these challenges merely in defensive terms. The object is not to reconcile religions or religious traditions. Our main concern should be that whatever religious sentiments persist in our societies, they should be freely celebrated in a public order which safeguards each and everyone’s rights and responsibilities regardless these sentiments. It seems a platitude, but it isn’t. If it were, we would not have politicians, as for instance in The Netherlands, who take up battle against an entire religion, thinking that they have a cause to win, and we would have concentrated our efforts in the public sphere to securing responsible citizenship full stop, without entangling ourselves in the conundrum of integrating people’s minds and attitudes in dimensions where they should remain perfectly free to make their own choices.

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1) For instance: Six out of the Ten Commandments constitute general moral precepts which are fully absorbed in our civil and penal codes (the other four being of purely religious nature).

2)Jan-Werner Mueller – The Return of Religion to Europe, 2009 - Project syndicate. His article can be found: www.project-syndicate.org.

3) Jan-Werner Mueller, ibid.

4) I have avoided to use the term ‘morality’ as this is a highly loaded term. But we should not deny that it is aimed at a shared morality at least to some extent.

5) Most enlightening especially in respect of present day spirituality and – the transformation of – religion is offered in “The Future of Religion” by Graham Ward, Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 74.1 (2006) 179-186.

6) Nonetheless, with the advent of Radio in the nineteen twenties, religious and ideological institutions were the first to establish an organized broadcast function of which in The Netherlands the remnants exist to this day.

7) This is a sentence I have actually copied from an observation made by Jonathan Miller in his BBC series “A Brief history of Disbelief” (2004) when he walks around in Paris in search of traces of people long dead who played an important role in challenging Christianity’s claims to moral supremacy and truth. If I had been in Miller’s place I would rather have dubbed his series “A Brief History of the Arrival at Reality”. Interestingly, on the website dedicated to this program there is a poll on the question “Do you believe in God?”. 15% of the respondents say yes, 85% say no.

8) It is interesting for those who wish to gain a better understanding for the American outlook on religion to watch the documentary “The God who wasn’t there” (2005) – wwww.watch-movies-online.tv.

WILL RELIGIOUS FERVOR EVER RISE AGAIN IN EUROPE? - PART I

2010-02-03T12:37:00.000-08:00

A personal exploration

This essay follows the theme which I took up in my posting of March 2008:The origins and future of Christian Europe. In it I attempted to address the various issues affecting the continuity and future of our European civilization. The following exploratory essay takes this topic from a specific angle. However much we may consider ourselves to be part of a secular world, in which everyone has his own freedom of belief and worship as much or as little as one wishes, we cannot dismiss religion as a phenomenon of mere private interest. This is both because of sensitivities arising out of the ongoing social and cultural evolution of our societies but also because of the increased presence of people with a different religious background, most notably Muslims.

I have embarked upon this essay with an open mind, i.e. without any predetermined conclusion that merely required substantiation. I am not even sure whether the question raised in this essay, in the end, are the truly pertinent ones. The only point to make here is that, even though I respect each and everyone’s private inspirations of whatever attribution, I strongly cherish the secular outlook of the society in which I live, especially where it concerns the handling of our common public interests. Hence, when I raise the issue of renewed religious fervor, it is in that context that I wish to address it. Whether people become more or less religious is not of itself my immediate concern nor do I harbor any prejudices in this respect (1).

An overview of current trends

Most people of my generation have taken the ongoing secularization of our society largely for granted. This includes the rules and values that guide our public and social life and the key choices in our private life. Our understanding of history is the ultimate demise of dogma and superstition as a source of power and authority in the modern world. Indeed, our entire education was founded in the victory of rational observation, disciplined thought and rigid analysis and most of all in our freedom of expression and association. Gods nor priests had any serious role in this process.

God is not dead
In the mean time religion has all but disappeared from our public life. In part this is due to the revival of right wing religious sentiments, and secondly, largely as a result of massive immigration out of the Muslim world into European countries, we are forced to deal with many more people who are motivated by their religious dictates than have been around for considerable time. In essence the culture of Islam is felt by many as an alien reality in our society and this sentiment has as much fueled today’s social and religious antagonism as the Muslim culture or Islam may have fueled itself. Obviously the conflicts between the Arab world and the Western world have played an important role in filling people’s minds with the idea that in fact we are faced with an ongoing and age old religious strife rather than anything else.

Still, across the board, we can not say that religion itself has again become a major topic of consideration in the conduct of our public institutions. Our main response thus far has been to guard and where necessary to tighten the constitutional and legal framework both at national and European level aimed at securing the irrelevance of religious arguments in our public domain. At the same time we wish to secure everyone’s freedom of worship as a matter of our greatest privacy.

Remaining footholds of religion
Nonetheless, there are those who are not convinced that this framework is sufficiently solid and unambiguous. First of all the political spectrum of continental Europe includes a significant segment strongly associated with the various (Catholic and non-Catholic) denominations of Christianity. Although the parties concerned may be guided by religious convictions, their actions are by no means dictated by their religious institutions and authorities. They rather tend to secure their – predominantly center right - position through moderation and through a power strategy in which their ability to communicate and deal with all other segments of the political spectrum plays a key role. Any overt religious dogmatism would obviously stand in the way of this. Nonetheless, they do act as the guardians of the Christian legacy, not merely by emphasizing Christian values (which in fact are non-exclusive, as many are shared by other political parties) but also by securing all remaining constitutional arrangements in which Christianity has kept its foothold, most notably in education.

This is the second major reality. Although in most European countries the position and financial entitlements of Christian (catholic, protestant) schools are founded on the – liberal - principle of freedom of education, these entitlements nonetheless constitute a fixture in the overall fabric of schools and academic institutions. They have thus far been able to retain certain privileges, especially in respect of the selection of students and teachers. These privileges have become subject of increased scrutiny. For instance, in The Netherlands, the fact that certain Christian schools refuse to engage homosexual teachers or fire them if they ‘come out’ is severely criticized on the grounds of the principle of (and constitutional entitlement to) non-discrimination.

Just the same, one could say that such concerns are a trifle compared with the broader issue of an education system which so heavily depends on the availability and competence of confessional institutions. From a purely liberal perspective this could be seen as a self perpetuating force in favor of religious bias among a great many people in each new upcoming generation. However, I do not believe this is such a strong force nor is it one that should necessarily be viewed in critical terms. On balance, a situation in which both public and private institutions run what is essentially a public schooling system seems more beneficial to the vitality of our schools than a situation in which public institutions have a monopoly (2).

The advent of Muslims in Europe
There is a third dimension, next to politics and education, in which those who cherish the fruits of Enlightenment feel less than comfortable, especially in our present day. And it is in this dimension where it can be said that Christians and non-believers throughout Europe share the same or at least a similar embarrassment. It is the echo of a massive embarrassment, especially in view of sacrifices already made to free ourselves from the reign of prejudice and absolutism, which the Western world experienced in the first half of the twentieth century. The terror of fascism and its claims on racial and ideological supremacy are imprinted in our collective memory as a gruesome aberration of history that should never again be allowed to visit us. In its wake we have erected an extensive legal framework to secure our personal freedoms and to safeguard our citizens against every undue discrimination. But now it seems as if we are being slapped in our face because of it. The Muslim world and Muslims living in our own countries are not necessarily impressed by our freedoms and legal safeguards and in fact some feel highly insulted when we use them, as they feel, at their expense.

The case of the Danish Mohammed cartoon haunts all for the massive response it ignited in the Muslim world. Though our freedom of expression is not boundless (especially where it hits other fundamental rights and freedoms such as non-discrimination, and where it leads to inciting hatred against specific groups or persons) we prefer to interpret its scope as wide as possible. This includes our acceptance of expressions that some may find ill mannered, crude or even offensive. We rather tolerate such utterings than make them an object of the law. Still, this is a fine thread and susceptible to social and cultural changes over time (example: the – non – acceptance of sexually explicit images on TV). Also, we employ our sense of humor and sarcasm as an outlet for manifold emotions and opinions and in this respect cartoons (caricatures, comics etc.) fulfill and essential cultural role. We accept the other side of the truth without necessarily losing our respect for our side of it or for any side of that truth. This is the essence of our civilization and of our hard fought freedoms. Thus, the violent threats which ensued from the Danish Mohamed cartoon indeed are an embarrassment for us all, Christians and others, in that they constitute an attack in the heart of what we consider to be a civilized and most of all tolerant world. The worst response, however, is to shy away from it or to make public amends to it, as unfortunately has happened.

If we continue to walk away from the very safeguards against such undue compromises, we seriously risk falling back to the same distrust and authoritarian rule which terrorized our part of world in the past ages. Tragically our fear of terrorist reprisals has further tightened our sense of political correctness v.à.v. the Muslim world but it has also tightened the general belt of our freedoms. More people have come under the scrutiny of justice for their public expressions than at any time in the past decades (3).

Next blog: Part II - An exploration of the future

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1) A recent overview of the religious trends can be found in H. Knippenberg e.a., “The changing religious landscape of Europe”, University of Amsterdam (2005).

2) At the same time increasing concern is expressed in respect of the establishment of Islamic schools both in terms of their quality and in terms of their (alleged) role in propagating societal and political convictions among the younger generation that go against the grain of our fundamental human rights and freedoms.

3) Example: the prosecution of the Dutch right wing politician Geert Wilders for igniting hatred and for expressing himself in discriminatory terms after speaking in derogatory terms about the Islam and Muslims in general.

AVATAR ACTING: A FUTURE IN MOVIES AND ON THE WEB

2010-01-03T05:51:00.000-08:00

Avatar: behind the computer generated skin there are real people bringing the characters to life

We have grown accustomed to the new alliance between animation and acting. It started with Hollywood stars lending their voice to animated characters (e.g. Tom Hanks in “The Polar Express”, Jim Carrey in “Horton hears a Who”, Johnny Depp in “Corpse Bride” and many more). But is has gone a few steps further, most of all by virtue of new advanced computer technology, to a point where both acting and animation need to be redefined. The first character on the movie-screen who became famous as a result is the fictional Gollum of “The Lord of the Rings”. The character indeed is fictional and the product of computer design (called CG: computer generated), yet his performance is acted by a real person, someone who has largely remained unknown. The same principle has been applied to manifold CG characters in ‘Avatar’, James Cameron’s most recent masterpiece (*) of imagineering including its delivery in 3D.

Actor Andy Serkis, who played Gollum in Lord of the Rings

Instead of making actors invisible the way it happens in traditional animation the new technology opens an array of opportunities for actors to exploit the best of their acting talents without being limited by their own skins, bones, body shape – and looks. In fact it can make the art of acting more pure and profound – more credible in the eyes of the public, if the entire appearance of the character is credible.

The idea of allowing people to step into the skin and bones of a (computer generated) fictional character is one that can trigger many new applications or developments beyond the fantasy world of Hollywood – and beyond moviemaking.

One such application already surfaced a few years ago when Discovery Channel used it not to bring fictional characters to life but – cg models of – historic figures in its “Virtual History” documentary “The secret plot to kill Hitler” (2004).

Hitler’s CG model in Discovery’s “Virtual History” documentary

By all accounts we have come to a stage where our own senses can not any longer – readily - distinguish real from unreal. Whatever or whoever moves on the screen by virtue of computer image regeneration technology – indeed, this is not just another ‘animation’ technology (**) - is as real to the public’s eye as any other character who is moving in his own skin.

The possibility of stepping into the skin and bones of a fictional – CG – character is a gadget that has found its way to some extent in the industry that largely moves parallel to moviemaking: the (computer) gaming industry. Character design, environment and game flexibility (the decisions a player can make in ‘acting’ the plot of the game) have become increasingly sophisticated and ‘real’. Especially with the advent of Wii games (by which the movements of the player’s hands, arms and body are transposed to the events on the screen) the dividing line between virtual and real has shifted by a further step.

I expect that the next generation of computer games will more fully embrace this incorporation of the individual player and the character(s) of the games and their environment. Wii technology and the experiences of Hollywood CG moviemaking will be combined in advanced homebound gadgets allowing our youth to (almost literally) step into another world and ‘be’ somebody else in whatever perilous journey or challenge they choose.

It doesn’t take much imagination to consider similar developments in other ‘virtual’ domains, especially the domain in which many millions of people across the world by now are spending much of their real-life time, the internet. We are still in the infancy of the internet as an increasingly ‘real’ meeting place – the fourth dimension in which people can move, play and ‘act’ through self-created images (profiles, nicknames etc.) and travel to places everywhere in the world without actually moving an inch from their seat.

We connect and talk in manifold “chat rooms”, we can already connect in self-created worlds through applications such as Second Life and SIMS 3, young people already play games with friends who – through the internet – appear in the disguise of a character on their own screen etcetera. The technology is there, the first applications are there. It only needs time to further develop into more realistic but also more adventurous online experiences.

People meeting in a multiplayer online game

There is a difference of course between joining an online gaming community and choose (or create) a fictional character who performs all kinds of fantastic feats in one-on-one fights or entire battles, and connecting with other people on the internet driven by one’s own identity and real-life objectives.

In both domains – online gaming and online communication – I foresee further shifts between the real and the virtual potentially moving to a point where the distinction no longer makes any sense. In fact I believe it would be realistic even today to embrace the virtual world as a ‘real dimension’ and to take ourselves seriously when we move into it, whether our objective is to communicate or to play. In a sense, what may hold us back from fully enjoying the fruits of our present day technologies is not the advancement (or limitations) of the technology itself but the adjustment of our own habits and (social) standards in this fourth dimension of our lives.

To underscore this point I need to go back to Avatar (and similar movies). Although many characters of the movie are computer generated, all characters require the same serious actor’s performance. The experience of the main character in the movie, whose mind and ‘body control senses’ are transported to an alien body and brains (created in a laboratory), is the actual personal experience of the actor as well: it has been just as real (or ‘unreal’) for the actor to imagine himself as for his character to fly giant reptiles, to move through a strange jungle of exotic plants and trees with other aliens, and to kill ferocious beasts. It takes a good actor to make this a fully credible experience.

Similarly, I believe, it takes a serious and skilled communicator to make the internet a credible medium for communication. In contrast, many people prefer to use the internet as a hideout, disguising themselves under a veil of anonymity and using the various platforms for communication to unload their discontent or to express themselves in (often vicious) terms which they wouldn’t dare to use in ‘real life’. Indeed, the key for the internet to fully become a serious medium is the maturity of our own behavior.

But having said this, I could foresee a development in which internet users create their own ‘avatar’ – a figure, a character but not necessarily fictional - by which they move, play and communicate on the internet in such realistic terms, perhaps even in 3D, that we have can serious meetings with people across the world almost as if we are sitting around the same table. And it wouldn’t surprise me if ultimately our mobility and physical congestion issues on the road will largely be solved by new and credible ways to move – and act – on the avenues of the world wide web. In this perspective “working out of home” will – or at least: can – become a way of moving from one place to the other in a much more extensive way than by merely sending and receiving e-mails or by talking via msn and similar media.

Hence, if we take the internet serious and act-for-real our present day technologies bear the promise of a wonderful future in which our human imagination and creativity have boundless opportunities to become productive in almost all dimensions of our lives.

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(*) It is a masterpiece most of all for its technical superiority and for the wonderful scenes it depicts. The story of Avatar is rather cliché. Many movies have used the same theme: a foreign power wishes to exploit new lands and threatens to destroy the indigenous population. Some individuals of the foreign power befriend the local people and decide to help them. Pfff... what's new. In fact the story is very similar to one of the first movies ever made, about man's journey to the moon (approx. 1902), and it almost literally follows the script of Disney's Atlantis, to mention another one.

(**) In an interview producer/director James Cameron calls it "captured performance".

NOT THE END, NOT A BEGINNING

2009-12-30T05:31:00.000-08:00

Signature image of the 2000s: our world collapsing at the strike of terrorism
(part of a collage titled "Modern History" by Josh Poehlein)

The first ten years 2000 - 2009: a personal review

The first ten years of the 20th century today are known as the fin de siècle: the end period of an entire era. In 1905 US President Theodore Roosevelt had called the old European world of Kings and Emperors “a bygone civilization”. He was right of course, but it would still take another ten years for this old world to finally collapse and thus for history to ultimately appreciate the significance of those first ten years of the century. The same applies to the ten years that have passed in this new century. What will be their significance? As yet, we can not say.

The other signature image: a world connected by the internet

The Great War of 1914 – 1918 and its aftermath triggered an immense turning point in Western Civilization. It was the birth time of our current modern world of democracy, technology and of the supremacy of popular culture. In its initial phase the outcome was far from certain as new absolutist claims to the human society were made both by the fascist regimes in Western Europe and subsequently by communism in Eastern Europe. Their massive impact was twofold: both – highly – destructive and highly stimulating. The Second World War and the Cold War have greatly accelerated the modernization of our world in the second half of the century in every field: technology, culture, markets, governance.

Largely as a result of ongoing adversity and conflict, both old and new, it has taken the entire century to develop concepts and institutions capable of exercising shared – regional and world wide – responsibilities in the interest of lasting peace and security. This is still an ongoing process, for instance in Europe - with some countries still waiting in the wings to become EU Member State – and at international level: with the UN and NATO remaining subject of ongoing scrutiny in terms of their effectiveness and longer term viability.

Still, setting aside the institutional struggles, globalization is one of the most prominent forces affecting our lives today, not merely in the Western world. And it does so in almost all dimensions: economically, politically, in our popular culture, our social and professional networks, our language and so on. What started in the early 1900s with telephone, radio, gramophone and the automobile has continued by virtue of an unprecedented and unstoppable surge in human inventiveness, creating mass mobility on the road, airlifting the masses in planes, taking people to the Moon, and offering us a means to communicate through mobile phones and the internet in a way that was almost unimaginable even some twenty years ago.

Will the hybride car secure our longer term mobility?

From my own perspective as a Dutchman I would say that being Dutch and being a citizen of The Netherlands is of much less significance in my life than it must have been for the people of my country hundred years ago. In this context, although there is no “end of history”, as has been suggested no too long ago, I would certainly speak of an end of the history of individual nations, in Europe in particular, but also outside. No country is on its own any longer, not even the United States, or Russia. What will count is our world’s history – and our world’s future. We have become much more aware of our existence as one single humanity on a fragile and very lonely Planet Earth and of the challenges we face collectively to keep this planet afloat as a habitable place for the human masses.

We nonetheless continue to wrestle with our sense of identity, the impact of our nationality and national character both in the face of an increasingly global culture but also of increased diversity – and adversity – in our own immediate backyards. Large scale immigration throughout Europe especially from the Arab Muslim world had created manifold tensions, not in the least because of the world wide assertion out of the same world against the very foundations of our Western civilization. It is impossible at this point to predict the ultimate significance of this conflict for our – future – history.

Diversity and - the need for - mutual adjustment

All we can say now, I believe, is that out of all these various challenges – planetary issues, and cultural (and religious) conflicts – will somehow emerge the watershed event that will divide our era from the next.

In the mean time the ebb and flow of our economies, the successive periods of high growth and recession, leave us largely unaffected in the greater scheme of things. The current generations in the Western world have enjoyed an unprecedented long period of peace and prosperity. In our own minds we live in an everlasting world of material comfort and consumer happiness, however much we may have to adjust in certain aspects.

Consumerism depicted as modern day mass slavery

But in our private lives our liberation from ancient social and cultural conventions continues. We have come a long way from the fixtures of a society of families and segmented, regulated networks to our present day much more loosely connected world, in which national or cultural background, social status, past and future are rather fluid and amenable to who we are to whom at any given point in time.

The networks where we meet

We create or joint our own personal contexts, networks and intimate circles largely beyond our traditional social confines or at least we have many more means to do so. The world that we leave to the younger generations will turn out to be quite a different one from the world they will eventually make of it.

EARTH'S STANCE IN THE UNIVERSE

2009-12-24T07:43:00.000-08:00

Do we say ‘hello’ to intelligent life elsewhere in our Milky Way?

Ever since the sounds of our planet became radio waves our world has made itself noticeable beyond the frontiers of our atmosphere. We might speculate whether Earth in fact had already been spotted long before as a viable and interesting place in the Universe by some distant alien intelligence and whether, regardless of our own efforts, we are already object of its close scrutiny. But however this may be, we have grown increasingly noisy for any technologically advanced world in outer space if any such world exists within the reach of the signals that we have sent out thus far.

Most likely, the rest of the intelligent Universe is just as ignorant of our existence as we are of theirs. Indeed, none of this to this day surpasses the borders of speculation and we can not even say whether we will ever know better. We would have to reach beyond many thousands of light years by whatever means and even that may not be enough.

Far out in Space - who's there and how many?

Besides speculation there is calculation. By virtue of the so-called Drake equation scientists have calculated that in our own Galaxy there could be a few hundred, perhaps even a few thousand habitable planets harboring advanced intelligent life. The equation and more specifically all the assumptions that go into it have been subject of intense debate and this will go on without end up to the moment when hard evidence reaches our telescopes (*).

We do know that the process which we call life is a highly resilient process on our own planet and the more we know about its origins the more we tend to think that it is bound to arise whenever and wherever the right conditions are present. But again, this still remains mere speculation, most of all because we have just one sample – our DNA based life – to justify it.

Still, let’s look ahead. I am assuming that indeed one day there will be credible evidence of intelligent life on another planet, and I am assuming that the evidence originates from some stellar system within our own Milky Way. How do we – how does the planet Earth – respond to this?

Scientists have already stated that perhaps our planet should not be so keen as we currently seem to be, to propagate its existence – and its marvels – too far beyond our own solar system. Why should we wish to become noticeable in the first place? And what should we actually wish to do with another planet somewhere many hundreds of light years away from us?

No doubt we would wish to obtain as much information about it as we possibly can. It would help us in our understanding of our own place in the Universe and of life’s processes (or comparable processes) etcetera. It would be a science bonanza for eons to come and so on. But otherwise?

Should we wish to get in touch with other ‘intelligent planets’ at any time in our future? Those who consider our science fiction of interstellar – and even intergalactic – travel and combat as a true projection of the future would have no hesitation to say yes – and prepare for any friendly or hostile interaction that may ensue.

Hi there?

But I am not sure whether our science fiction should necessarily come true by any measure. Rather, I feel, we should aim for the contrary. As a planet we have no foreseeable interest in investing huge material and human resources in any interstellar conflict or love affair since both scenarios would only end up making us more vulnerable to outside factors than we already are by virtue of the Universe’s known perils. But there may be a need to actively invest in avoiding that scenario other than by remaining passive or invisible. Do we expect other intelligent planets to have a peaceful attitude towards their intelligent neighbors or don’t we. We have no foundation for any answer to this question whatsoever.

It leads me to a viable – perhaps the only viable – option as and when it becomes opportune to initiate any policy. It is the option in which the planet Earth sets the example – perhaps mounting to “Galactic Law” – of peace and non-interference between all intelligent planets, and this could possibly include some kind of protocol for communication as a means to secure this ‘law’.

We can not say at this point whether all of this will become relevant any time in the future: in hundred years time, thousands of years, longer? We have no clue. It might as well lurk around the corner.

Unlikely prospect: combat in Space

We should hope, however, that whenever a planetary policy in respect of other intelligent planets becomes a relevant issue, we have effectively solved the painful issues to which we are still hostage on our own mother Earth. It is difficult to think of any leading role in interstellar peacekeeping as long as lasting peace on our own planet is still a far away dream. What example do we set in the first place?

Just the same, the context in which interstellar matters become relevant for Earth’s humanity may well be entirely different from the one assumed here. The moment may still be many eons away, for instance when Earth is finally suffocating to the point of collapse and the remaining inhabitants do their utmost to find refuge elsewhere in our Galaxy. What peace can you keep under such circumstances?

If my own estimate of the number of habitable, or intelligent, planets in our Milky Way turns out to be correct – somewhere between a hundred and four hundred planets – then we are still many tens of thousands years away from the point when this subject becomes a point of interest at all. This is a time scale in which speculation from our current viewpoint turns into nothing better than a fairy tale. But what a wonderful fairy tale to keep pondering about.

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(*) Using the Drake equation and based on my own assumptions the number of communicating intelligent planets within our Milky Way would be some 100 – 400 out of 200 billion. You can try it on your own: http://www.activemind.com/Mysterious/Topics/SETI/drake_equation.html

ADJUSTING OURSELVES TO THE COMMON GOOD

2009-12-18T07:08:00.000-08:00

Siqueiros - The March of Humanity

A global perspective to help secure life on Earth – and a continued well being of humanity

Humanity has taken the interest in the survival of individual humans a great distance. Both our collective morality and our individual drive for survival (reaching to individual supremacy) surpass any precedent in the wider world of animals and plants in which group logic has largely retained its predominance. At the same time this evolution towards individualism brings us to the brink of utter disaster. The individual claims to a decent life of potentially more than 10 billion people in our near future are devastating for our planet and everything that needs space and resources to survive on it. Something’s got to give.

An overcrowded world - will we manage?

I have always looked at our world and the potential for ongoing improvement of our lives from a distinctly liberal perspective. Although I am not a proponent of Ayn Rand, I do believe that egotism to a large extent is the fountainhead of progress (*) and that our morality and social behavior can largely be based on rationality and facts rather than on myths and mere belief. Secondly, without individuals out to move our frontiers, we would still be dwelling in conditions not dissimilar from those of the apes. But it is the social fabric of humanity which ultimately decides its sustainability. We have to be individualists and highly social animals at the same time.

For me this has always been a debate about the right kind of liberalism, not about the choice between liberalism and socialism – the individual versus the collective. It is always both, but in what mix, in what context and by which mechanisms?

They deserve to be nourished

I believe the issue of individualism versus our social responsibility remains a pertinent one in the face of the choice ahead which affect the very fundaments of our world if not our civilization. One could also say that it is about the same concept that was articulated long ago by Adam Smith: that our individual interests are best served if we focus our energies on serving the group to which we belong, our community or society or whatever other interest group largely determines the conditions of our life. Still, this doesn’t preclude fundamental dilemma’s even to the point where we have to make sacrifices beyond our current imagination in order for our group or community to survive.

How far will we be prepared to go ourselves, to truly sacrifice for the common good? I believe this will largely depend on our trust in its consequences. Focused leadership will be the key to any fundamental adjustment. And this is exactly what is being tested in our present day, not simply the leadership itself but our preparedness to follow it. On both sides we have grown substantially weak in the past decades.

Secondly, in our age of information and communication, there is a greater need than ever to well inform the public about the true nature and extent of the challenges we face. This includes the questions as much as the answers. We are currently debating CO2 emissions but the actual scope of the international debate is to establish a common global framework that will lead us to effectively manage (and control) the basic conditions of our planet. Shared knowledge and shared resources to achieve this across the traditional boundaries of nations and (corporate) institutions are essential prerequisites.

An image of the past - hopefully soon

Still, this leaves many questions in respect of our individual lives unanswered. Most of us are probably willing to adjust, to reduce waste where possible, limit senseless consumption, to buy more economic cars or economize on our mobility in general etcetera. But it is unlikely that this will suffice in the end. Any next step will have to be one in which new opportunities and new limitations go hand in hand.

But perhaps it is not the material adjustment that will be our greatest challenge. The pain we feel should as much be a moral one: collectively we should take more care for all. Much of our lifestyle and the daily priorities we make will hang in the balance. This is a longer term process, no doubt, but one in which all factors come to play: leadership, technology and new opportunity, corporate governance, our social institutions, education etcetera

Again, we are far from the end of our time. In many ways, it is just beginning.

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(*) “The Fountainhead” written by the famous novelist Ayn Rand in the late 1930’s drives the ego to its self-destructive extreme, yet the key message still remains.

WHO WANTS TO KILL HIS BABY GRANDFATHER?

2009-12-15T15:07:00.000-08:00

No going back in time

One of my very favorite movies is “The Twelve Monkeys” (1995). The story is that in 1996 two thirds of all humanity perish from a virus and the rest of humanity goes underground. By 2030 they have developed a time machine which allows people to be sent back and investigate the origin and the nature of the virus. The key figure is a man in 2030 who is sent back to 1996 only to actually ignite the events that lead to the killer virus in the first place. It is wonderful fiction and anyone who will watch the movie ends up in a turmoil of paradoxes and challenges to his or her sense of logic. What is ‘past’ and what is ‘present’?

The world in 2030

The whole idea of time travel – i.e. traveling to “the past” or to “the future” is as nonsensical as is – for instance – the idea that we could un-birth ourselves or revert our lives to the stage of our youth. I am not saying that rejuvenation is out of the question nor am I saying that one day we could not travel so fast that in relative terms we will experience a “time difference” compared with those who we have left behind. Certainly not. But actually going out and visit Napoleon Bonaparte in 1810 or George Bush IV in 2130 from where we are today is a fairy tale unworthy of scientific thought.

Still, people who profess to be a scientist get serious attention when they babble about the subject and they are all over the place in documentaries saying that time is a river and we only need power and speed to master it. Well, a huge amount of power, admittedly – the power that explodes an entire star. But even so, it remains – great - fiction.

This is the kind of serious stuff presented to make time travel credible

Time is an experience only known to humans (as much as we know): that each event is preceded by another and so on, and that this succession of events can be measured in terms of the clicks of a clock: in seconds, minutes, years, eons. We have a sense of the past (and the future) and in our minds we are capable of reliving it almost as if we can take it from a shelve and touch it. But the reality that once determined “the past” can not be touched nor can it be visited. Where to go? Left or right, up or down? The past is nowhere and the future is nowhere. We might just as well say that the past and the future are everywhere and still we have nowhere to go.

So what about traveling to nowhere – or everywhere? What machine and what concept of physics and astronomy could ever help us making any move that could resemble this idea of “time travel”? The best time machine we have so far constructed is the archive, the documents we keep, the records we hold, the pictures we take – and the movies we make. Our mind can travel into them and indeed in this sense our possibilities for time travel are boundless.

But actually moving in a sphere called ‘time’ and go to places and moments long gone is hypothetical at best. We can advance our own movements and we can slow them down, possibly. We could freeze ourselves, at least in theory, and reawaken at some time ten, hundred or even thousands of years in the future if we like ( I wouldn’t ) but none of this constitutes ‘time travel’.

And however seemingly credible some scientists have pictured the rivers or warps in space and time through which they lay their claims on the possibility of traveling time, none of them have solved in convincing terms the evident paradox that accompanies any such idea.

If time travel were possible, people of the future would have descended on Berlin in 1933 and sniff the life out of Adolf Hitler. But they didn't.

Essentially an event – any event – can not at the same instant be both past and future. Any intelligent being would say: but of course not! Still, this is the fundamental requirement for any journey through time, back and forth. The present, that is: every instant we call “now” is a unique event. We can link the present to the past and to any conceivable future, but in reality no chain exists. Whatever happens, passes into oblivion the moment it has occurred.
Human beings can reflect (‘look back’) and anticipate but we can not physically escape this reality.

But the most fundamental paradox that we can not solve, of course, is the reversal of cause and effect. Many examples have been given and they are generally referred to as the grandfather paradox: what if you go back in time and kill your grandfather before he had the opportunity to sire your own father? By the same token we can not think of giving our young father a watch that subsequently we inherit … to pass on to our young father. How do we solve the actual origin of the watch? It can only be solved if the past constitutes multiple young fathers, one of whom has actually bought the watch. Alternatively the young father ends up with two watches and so on.

But all of this is water under the bridge. And if anyone would still wish to argue that perhaps you can’t travel into the future - because yes, the future does not “exist’ - but one can still go to the past, all of the above still applies. How could anyone go to the past and thus come from the future if actually from any given moment “in time”, there is no future to come from in the first place? Even so, we would have to think in terms of multiple dimensions – infinite universes – to solve all the riddles and this is indeed one of the solutions that our so-called scientists offer. Their prophecies take the world upside down – and science upside down: there is no thread of evidence or any phenomenon that could only be explained by the existence of such multiplicity but it comes in handy because we need it to “prove” the possibility of time travel.

Image of past, present and future

The famous physicist Stephen Hawkins once raised the question why we haven’t been flooded by visitors from the future and why there is no viable record of any such visit throughout the history of human civilization. Many people still hesitate to answer that question in unambiguous terms. This is because we do not wish to irrevocably relinquish our belief in the concept, not because we have any evidence to support it.

The idea of time travel indeed is like religion. We need it. We need it to project and nourish our hopes, even our hopes for a better past. We do not want to acknowledge that at any point in our own ‘time’ we are confined by here and now, from one moment to the other. The present is inescapable and we can’t skip any of it however fast or however slow we re going, wherever in the Universe.

I believe that is a good thing.

LET’S ASSUME THERE WILL BE NO KILLER-ASTEROID

2009-12-08T12:49:00.000-08:00

Copenhagen and the prospect of global agreement on the future of our Planet

If negotiators reach an accord at the climate talks in Copenhagen it will entail profound shifts in energy production, dislocations in how and where people live, sweeping changes in agriculture and forestry and the creation of complex new markets in global warming pollution credits. This will cost trillions of dollars over the next few decades. It is a significant sum but a relatively small fraction of the world’s total economic output. In energy infrastructure alone, the transformational ambitions that delegates to the United Nations climate change conference are expected to set in the coming days will cost more than $10 trillion in additional investment from 2010 to 2030, according to a new estimate from the International Energy Agency.

IHT, December 8 2009

Mankind is prone to think in terms of great disasters. We have an age old fascination with the End of Time, the Apocalypse or Armageddon. It is as if we have the firm conviction that something of the kind is inevitable and we rally to any seemingly credible speculation that it is bound to happen soon, such as the “2012” speculation.

I don’t believe that killer asteroids, massive volcano eruptions or any other similar epic disaster will visit our planet in the foreseeable future. On the other hand, the best way to face such eventualities, particularly when they are triggered by humanity’s exponential exploitation of the planet’s resources, is to be prepared

We still have a chance to allow something to envelope our planet, not the debris of an Asteroid, not the tsunami of a climate disaster, not mass starvation on many of our continents, but something far more appealing. We can still opt for a world full of life, love and human well-being if we so wish. We have the opportunity – and many would say: the responsibility - to opt for a future in which we can effectively cope with sizeable global challenges – including climate, clean water and secure land - and at the same time mobilize our energy to build for a better future in all other dimensions.

Similarly I believe the world is too much focusing on all kinds of measures to be taken, especially those associated with reducing the CO2 emissions. There is very little discussion among the nations now participating in the Copenhagen process about the world that we actually want to live in. It is highly doubtful that the people of our world, especially those who already live in adverse conditions, will be motivated by the mere wish to avoid disaster. It will only add fuel to their existing fatalism.

Do we want our planet to look like this?

We need to get a clearer picture of quality of life we want to achieve. We are too much on the defensive and to little on the offensive in our international efforts to contain climatic and related developments as they now seem to present themselves.

At the same we have to recognize that there is still too much adversity among the peoples of the planet and vast resources are wasted to contain the hotspots, the vicious conflicts directly and indirectly affecting the lives and livelihood of too many people on our planet.

Or like this?

Realistically we can’t expect countries such as the United States or the UK simply move their massive military budgets to ‘quality of life’ budgets any time soon, including C02 containment, but I do not see why these and other countries could not express their longer term intention to do so.

Future creation, that is: offering substantive perspectives to the peoples of conflict ridden countries, must be preferred to mere problem solving, just as much as a credible and appealing vision of our future planet could assist in current and future “Copenhagen processes”.

Indeed, the scope of Copenhagen is not simply CO2 or climate control. It is just a step, and hopefully a successful one, in a process which one day should bring all the nations of our world to a comprehensive agreement on the future of our planet; the management of its resources, the rules of industry, adjusted consumer behavior and so on. It should be the kind of world we all want to live in. That would make it so much easier to adjust and refocus our own lives and priorities.

2012 - THE SEQUEL

2009-11-25T10:04:00.000-08:00

Planet Earth, 27 days after "2012" - a highly unrealistic depiction

A movie no one will care to make

At the end of the “end of the world as we know it” movie 2012 we are led to believe that a collection of humanity could survive the meltdown and break-up our Planet’s continents and after a mere 27 days could look out to a bright sky, breathe fresh air and walk onto habitable land. Given the nature and extent of the disaster that this movie depicts, whatever its true merits, it is a highly unlikely prospect that any life except bacterial would survive it.

"2012" - Plate tectonics gone wild

But let’s assume that 2012 in fact is a plausible scenario and that just a handful of people – a few hundred thousand – from across the globe would indeed start anew – on the January 1, 0001 - in a world of which the geology has reshuffled overnight, dwarfing the Himalayas and raising Africa to new prowess.

It is a neat touch of course, that such a story indeed would begin in Africa, with the same gene pool of all races put together as the gene pool of just a few hundred humans that once, some 75.000 years ago, was the base of humanity as it evolved to our present day.

But then the real struggle of our species begins. How would this new beginning, in unknown land and unknown true circumstances, actually be? Humanity’s survivors would have to leave behind every thought of civilization as they had known it. They have no choice but to relinquish every thought of public and private institutions servicing their physical and mental human needs ranging from prefab food to daily doses of pop music and televised news, working schools and hospitals, computer services; really everything.

"2012" - an airplane finding its way out of total destruction

How in fact could humanity prepare for ‘the end’ and still have any idea at all about one or the other new beginning. The scenario of “2012” does not contain the slightest hint of post-disaster planning. One could just as well consider this movie a story about prolonged dying.

If I were one of the happy few seeing the light of day after the 2012 Global Destruction, I would not waste my time in any discussion among fellow survivors about the world’s future, the organization of society or anything of the kind. My expectation would be that such discussion would have no end and that nothing substantial at any scale would be established for a long time. I would go my own way, far far away

In short, I would have a very pessimistic view of anything positive coming out of the last remains of humanity. I would reduce myself and my perspective to the wildest possible kind of animal, highly driven by my own survival instinct and perhaps by my drive to help my own genes survive. So, let’s hope there is a fertile woman around with the same beastly mentality.

Essentially, as we stand today, our humanity is helpless in such a world unless we accept the guidance of our very basic instincts. I believe that any intelligent and realistic human being would arrive at the same conclusion. Whatever remains of humanity is bound to dissolve in wilderness. There may be a tight circle of people still hanging on to the idea that something beautiful can or should come out of it. They will either perpetuate some religion or create a new one offering seeming security but at high cost, especially by being highly restrictive in most of the liberties that we have come to consider self-evident. At least some of them may attempt to create Utopia and probably, through this, help their way to a rather rapid self-destruction.

Who would wish to fantasize about this apparent ugliness and construct a sequel to 2012 out of it? If anyone would do it, it would attract an entirely different and probably much smaller audience of rather more philosophic people than of those who crave for immediate, consumable sensation.

Our species can sustain a substantial level of sophistication both in material and cultural or spiritual sense only if some very basic conditions (basic in our own mind) are met, such as the provision of food, energy, shelter, building materials etc. all of which would become highly uncertain in any “post 2012” world. What animals would still be around to provide us with meat? What trees, grasses and plants would grow to sustain the livelihood of any remaining populations of humans and animals alike?

Humanity, January 0001

Of course, on the long run, all options are open. But by all accounts it took the “post Dinosaur” world, as it emerged out of the great Meteorite impact 65 million years ago, at least many thousands if not hundreds of thousands of years to recuperate and create a new equilibrium of plant and animal life, widely different from the one that was blown away. There is no way humanity can plan for any development over such long time spans and thus, any survival scenario would as much be a jump into darkness as being killed in the disaster itself.

All of this leads me to conclude that there is no plausible way into a sequel to 2012 unless a large part of this movie is re-written altogether.

THE DUTY OF OUR OWN OPINION

2009-11-15T09:29:00.000-08:00

Freedom of expression in civil society

In our present time of crowded masses and sophisticated government we tend to be especially concerned about the room for maneuver we have as an individual, about the protection of our privacy and most of all about the freedom to express ourselves the way we wish. These are particularly the concerns of the western human mind. People for instance from Asia or the Middle East would not quite put it this way, but in our world we would (*).

Obviously there are differences between people in our own world. We are not equally expressive nor are we equally individualistic or assertive about ourselves. We harbor many divergent interests. This is just as much part and parcel of our freedom. Nobody can force us to become fanatic about sports or about music or history. We are happy to make our own choices in this respect.

At the same time our freedoms are not just for us to take or to protect at will. They are not just optional; at times it matters how we make use of them and this in particular applies to the freedom which today is subject of much dispute, our freedom of expression. What is the essence of this freedom and where do we draw the line, if all, between our freedom and other people’s personal integrity? My personal view is that the law should never intervene in anything we say (in public), however atrocious our words may be, simply because time and again the public is taken hostage by certain groups or individuals with sensitivities, especially religious sensitivities, which should not concern the law in the first place.

Much less debated is the fact that our freedom of expression – in Dutch we say: the freedom to express our opinion - is a fundamental prerequisite too of the rights – and duties – we have as citizens of our country. For without this freedom democracy is impossible. Most of our public institutions would then turn into dictatorships. But having said that, it is equally clear that our democracies would fail not simply if we cannot express our opinions, but also if – first of all – we do not form our opinions.

Thus, it seems to me, our freedom of expression equals the responsibility we have to indeed express ourselves, each of us individually, when it is our civic call to do so. Not so long ago – in many countries – this was mandatory: our failure to turn up at national or local elections was punishable by law. I do not believe (m)any of us would wish to return to this situation. Yet, by abandoning the obligation to vote, we also have thrown away our societal expectation that people participate in elections and allow our democracies to function fully.

Most certainly the educated among us should be expected to have and express an opinion of their own and effect it. I believe this is paramount in any society or any country – that wishes to sustain – or attain - a reasonable level of sophistication, both in its government and in its infrastructure and public services. No dictatorship, whether left or right, will ever be able to achieve this.

Therefore we should encourage our schools and universities, which are the breading place of civilization, to feed their students’ drive to have their own views and articulate them as clearly as possible. We should encourage them to develop their students’ questioning mind as opposed to their ability to merely produce answers according to the whims of their teachers.

Indeed, every sound opinion stems from sound questions. And perhaps this is most fundamental to everything related to the topic of this essay and most ignored. Our questions and our self-assertion in raising them are our key weapon against any dogma, any absolutist belief, any bag of nonsense which others may wish to enforce upon us. Sadly so many people, young people especially, are confronted with this in our world. There may be a good case therefore to supplement the inventory of our human rights expressis verbis with the right to question, unconditionally, without reservation, every story that is presented to us by anybody.

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(*) Just by coincidence I published this blog almost to the minute at the time when US President Obama paid a visit to China. He gave a speech to Chinese students in which he emphasized exactly my point but also went beyond it: freedom of expression should - in his view - be seen as a universal human right. I can not agree more. Yet I believe we have to recognize that - for instance - students in China will interpret this in a different manner than students in the US.

ARE WE HEADED FOR INFINITY UNTIL THE VERY END?

2009-10-05T16:48:00.000-07:00

The End of History revisited

Some twenty years ago Francis Fukuyama published his claim that the victory of liberal democracy over communism and similar totalitarian ideologies marked the end of history. Most of all his book marked the end of a particular phase in history – the dominance of East (communism) versus West (liberal capitalism) and forty years of fierce technological and military competition, bringing us – on balance – accelerated advancement in all fields. In the twenty years that have since passed many new developments emerged on the world scene: the new thrust of our information and communication age, globalization and its adversities, especially on the axis between the Arab and Western countries and so on. As a result, the idea of a finite history has lost much of its credibility. Major challenges lie ahead if we wish to avoid massive political but also natural disasters – the possibility of one feeding the possibility of the other.

Thus, however we define ‘history’, the human story is very likely to continue without any prospect of an end but the very end itself. We could say this almost by definition, assuming we retain our ability to record and store our life’s accounts until such final moment one day in a probably very distant future (*).

With this prospect in mind I am not necessarily looking at the course of history as we generally know it: the rise and fall of civilizations, the tales of peoples, nations and great ideologies, the faits et gestes of kings, emperors and presidents or of war, conquest and expansion. In these classical dimensions many histories have already passed or “ended”. We no longer live in a world dictated by the whims of absolute monarchs or by grave mass superstition and religious ceremony such as the world of the Pharaohs or the Aztecs. I am rather more looking at the story of humanity in a broader sense, its general advancement in many different fields, such as science, arts and culture at many different levels and in many different expressions.

However, it is obvious that we cannot dissociate one from the other. The advancement of our space technology and everything derived from it would have been unthinkable without the pressure of the Cold War – the competition between the US and the Soviet Union – in this critical period. We could expand this observation to most other fields no doubt. The broader social, political and economic drama of humanity is an essential inspiration for the arts, for scientific developments and so on.

Thus, if it were true that “history” would end – as Fukuyama once contended – all other endeavors of humanity would come to a grinding halt. There would be no more inspiration for advancement or innovation – or the retention of certain beliefs and practices - in any field. We would return to an existence of no more interest than for instance the existence of the Neanderthal or the baboons. Human kind being the way it is, I believe this is a highly unlikely prospect, however our existence may be disrupted by unforeseen disasters or – alternatively – however new species may still evolve out of mankind (intelligent beings evolving from other species, though theoretically plausible, being a very, very remote prospect). There is much history still ahead of us in yet unthinkable dimensions and of a scope beyond our current imagination. We believe we can foresee everything, but it is obvious we can not. We may speculate about certain aspects – technology, biology, space travel and so on – but there is no way that our future can be foretold in a remotely credible way. Why, if we look back at our own lives, how much of it was foreseeable when we were young? Very little, I would say. I have had many visions even in my early youth of the future, let’s say: the year 2000. But the actual turn of the Millennium was vastly different, in dimensions which could not remotely be foreseen back in the sixties or even in the seventies. In the mean time our own life’s story is ongoing until the very end.

The metaphor of our individual lives is a pertinent one. In our own mind we live forever, until the reality of our mortality – finally - overtakes us. And many of us invest as much in the present as in our (personal) legacy. We want to be remembered and, if possible, leave a lasting footprint for the world after us. We do not readily accept that, one day sooner or later, there will no longer be a single trace of our existence. This, I believe, is true for mankind as a whole. So let’s think of humanity as a story unfolding in infinite space and time, indeed until the very end – one day sooner or – hugely - later.

All of this for me is a starting point, not a final argument, in considering this challenging phenomenon called “the (distant) future”, the scope and potential of humanity’s story. It liberates my mind from today’s prevailing paradigms. I am not particularly interested in liberalism or capitalism per se. I am interested in every dimension on which humanity can put its mind and skills. If mass air transportation was inconceivable up to the early days of the twentieth century, how much that is inconceivable today can still be achieved in the future? We can not draw any definitive line, perhaps even including the speed of light.

13,5 Billion years in a nutshell: a mere prelude to what is to come: infinite darkness

Some ninety percent of our Universe – today called “dark matter” – is still little understood. We are crawling towards some understanding of it, but much is still to be uncovered. We are touching quantum mechanics but haven’t yet reached the revolution it will no doubt trigger once we’re there (wherever and whatever “there” is). Solving the issues of climate, ecological balance, future energy sources, mass population and so on can be seen as major challenges for this century but over time they will just seem mere steps in between from the primitive technologies and institutions of the industrial revolution to the advancements of future human civilizations if not the entire future global community. This will hold true even if along the way the process of advancement is disrupted either my major natural disasters or by war and conflict. The actual scenario is irrelevant (we can speculate as much as we want, but we will essentially remain ignorant). Of course, disruptions may matter if they get us close to total extinction and a total loss of knowledge, perhaps even of history itself.

The future therefore is vastly more interesting – in every dimension – than was pictured in Fukuyama’s book picturing something close to the end of it or close to some kind of equilibrium freezing our ideas and concepts of a truthfully happy human society. For indeed, the pursuit of happiness, even in our own lives, is a journey without end. Also, I believe that our contemporary Science Fiction is producing tales of a highly repetitive nature, without much advancement and without enhancing its scope beyond – essentially very boring - battles between entire galaxies.

A neverending dream: human flight

Finally, I would say it is equally interesting – and pertinent – to dwell in the past as it is to travel through space and time and visualize the various potential futures – generally but especially in particular fields or dimensions. Will religion disappear or will it recapture its hold on the known world? If so, how would this be, or what could trigger it? At what time, if any, will nation states disappear behind the curtain or will they reassert – re-group – themselves? How will our private and collective mobility evolve, including our mobility beyond the confines of the planet Earth.

How long will the House of Orange reign in The Netherlands?

On average Earth’s (animal) species have a lifetime of some four million years. Humanity – homo sapiens – has just started, covering a mere two hundred thousand years, or – if we want to include its predecessor homo erectus – not more than a million and a half. Hence, we are not even finished with the groundwork. All of our past history is a succession of primitive experiments (each with their own greatness of course). We live in the prologue of human history, not in its epilogue.

I hope this essay serves as an inspiration especially for young people. Nothing is finished. Much remains to be done. Humanity requires our greatest ambitions without restriction here and now or any time in the future.

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(*) I wouldn't be surprised if at some point in the future, mankind will make sure that - whatever the fate of planet Earth and its inhabitants - the memory of their existence will not be lost in the Universe. In fact, we already sent a probe - Voyager I, launched in 1977 - with exactly this purpose, and no doubt many will follow.

EDUCATION: SHARING THE INTEREST(S) OF OUR STUDENTS

2009-08-10T04:25:00.000-07:00

Let our students assert themselves

All my life I have been involved in education but I have also spent ample time in the real world to make my own assessment of the actual connections between one and the other.

I have seen much improvement over the decades. Let’s first make that observation. The old academic ivory towers are items of the past. Schools, colleges and universities have become much more – generally - responsive to the needs of society and our information and communication capabilities have revolutionized many learning processes. However, we continue to largely project our own interpretation of the world on our children, which we do in the disguise of knowledge transfer. We fail to systematically engage them into the real world. We do not sufficiently get our students to develop their own views of it as a basis for their ventures in the future and or help them to lay a proper foundation for their own career.

Many senseless, irrelevant programs are offered in our colleges and universities. We tend to overemphasize knowledge and invest much less in the actual development of the students’ capabilities. It may seem a paradoxical statement, but many fashionable curricula which allegedly connect knowledge with its (real life) application, offer yesterday’s solutions at best and do not actually challenge the capabilities of students to identify relevant issues themselves and mobilize the required expertise. In fact, the expertise which the students end up with is very thin or shallow; they know very little about almost everything.

Secondly we have steered the notion of competence driven education into much too narrow alleys. Whilst the concept offers useful parameters to design a curriculum at the appropriate level and to help create its focus, the actual investment in our students should be much broader. It is vital we get away from too much standardization and allow more room in our program to cater for the students’ individual qualities .

I believe most of all that the current generation of students has a great challenge to face. Not simply to make sense of the myriad of options, this bombardment of opportunities, almost in every aspect of their lives: education, culture, consumer markets, entertainment etc. Not simply this, but also to take command of their own path, their own education and development, based primarily on their own needs and interests.

More substantially this is what the current younger generation should take on board:

- to be responsible for themselves and for the development their own capacities/capabilities

- to assert themselves in the face of everything that is presented to them, in education, culture, politics, markets etc

- to create their own themes and signature irrespective of the commands of the curriculum, and shape their own identity accordingly

- to be highly cooperative among each other (most of what students can learn, they can learn from their fellow students)

- to pro-actively make their own inquiries – and develop their own approaches – (in)to the outside world

- and finally, to make sure that what schools teach them is indeed what they should learn

The current board of the Dutch National Student Association ISO

More than ever schools and universities are the extended arm both of their students’ parents and of society at large. We should provide for an education system which takes the interests, talents and perspectives of the students as the starting point. Curricula should guide this process but not rigidly determine, let alone confine it. Obviously, for most true professions such as the medical, legal and engineering professions entry qualifications should prevail, but students should be allowed to choose their own path to getting there, at least more than is the case at present.

I am a strong proponent of an approach to education that treats the process of knowledge transfer as a supporting process. The key process is not teaching, but is the actual learning of the students themselves, in all their variety and different learning styles and learning capabilities. Educators, not simply teachers, should be there to guide and coach the students, independent from those responsible for the education program.

Secondly education is to cater for the future and not to enforce the past on our younger generation. Every educational environment should be particularly inviting on that score: in the way it draws its students to the real world and not simply to the books and theories at school.

My third and last point is that we have treated students mistakenly as "clients", almost as objects. The reality is that they are the main producer themselves of "our output". We should view ourselves as their partners, most certainly not as their adversaries or as adults who always know better. We don't.

Why isn’t this evident already. Why do we so strongly adhere to telling rather than showing? We should push our students to experience the world themselves and liberate them from school buildings with too many teachers around them who have no clue of the real world, let alone of the competences required to properly survive and thrive in it.

HERCULES, SUPERMAN AND JESUS CHRIST

2009-07-11T08:41:00.000-07:00

Our human craving for the supernatural

When watching the animated Disney version of the Greek story of Hercules (Greek: Heracles), which contains many digressions from the original myth, one would almost believe that the creators of Superman did nothing but copy Hercules in a modern age version. A baby from outer space (or the mountain Olympus), taken up by foster parents, growing into a human of extreme power and ability, saving the world in which he lives.

They are both just stories to begin with. We might even be similarly inclined to believe the story of Superman as the Greeks did in respect of their Gods and superheroes. For them they were nothing less than the key characters of their national religion. Superman in our time has not come that far. However much he is our modern day myth of a son of the stars and his powers are derived from our own yellow sun, the Christian superhero, Jesus Christ, Son of God, is still a stronger myth, stronger than any myth attempted or created ever since the first century AD.

In all three stories there is a child who is raised by foster parents of our own Earthly world. Even Maria could to some extent be considered s foster mother, for her child was conceived for a destiny far beyond the grasp of mortal parents. All three enjoyed a childhood of humble proportions. Nothing in their earthly surroundings, whether the simple nomadic existence of Maria and Joseph or the rural life of Martha and Jonathan Kent. It seems to me that indeed the creators of Superman, Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster, knew their classics when almost eighty years ago they concocted the myth of Kal-El, son of Krypton, who became the greatest superhero ever imagined on the planet Earth.

Of course, Superman was never conceived as a claim to our fundamental beliefs. Still, he is an important icon of our Americanized world. American concepts and myths pervade our western world ever since Woodrow Wilson first dictated his (ill fated) Pax Americana in the closing days of a world dominated by European imperial concepts and myths. The story of Superman is part and parcel of this – essentially twentieth century – reality. It will be difficult to conceive the total oblivion of this story, even though – no doubt – Superman will ‘die’ many more episodes to come (it happened twice so far, by my recollection).

And we do want to believe to some extent. At least we want to believe in this ultimate fantasy of the supernatural, the superhuman, whether sired by divinity or by living beings on distant stars. Hercules, Jesus Christ, Superman and many other similar myths or stories have served humanity for most of its existence to satisfy this universal need. Both our experiences and our hopes are infested with the notion that our world, including our personal existence, is influenced if not governed by agents outside our normal powers of observation. Some believe in an actual, existing God, others cannot escape a sense of fate or pre-determination, and I believe in guardian angels.

Most of all, ever since I first came eye to eye with him at the age of eleven, I believe in Superman. Obviously there is nothing in me that believes he ever really existed, but the comics that have come out of Schuster’s and Siegel’s first inspiration all serve as a reminder of our human limitations, our weakness and even our potential for malice. And aren’t these the universal themes of all myths and legends, isn’t this in fact the key message of almost all religions? You don’t have to believe in anything and still accept these ‘truths’ as a beacon in your life.

But otherwise, Hercules, Superman and Jesus Christ simply offer us the kind of fairy tales that of necessity accompany our earthly path, wonderful fiction which is the essence of our humanity.

JACKSON IS THE MOZART OF OUR TIME

2009-06-28T14:22:00.000-07:00

In the recent days many comparisons have been made between the deceased Michael Jackson and other icons of our time, most notably Elvis Presley.

One other comparison has been drawn, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Michael Jackson too was a child prodigy who was pushed onto the stage by an ambitious father. Like Mozart Michael Jackson was crowned a King of his art and public performance. They both inspired an entire culture, for many decades, whether in classical music or pop.

So indeed, Michael Jackson will stand on a high pedestal, almost in the way he had already depicted this in the pictures of his album “History”.

To some extent Michael Jackson isn’t history yet, nor for that matter can we call Mozart ‘history’. Most likely Michael’s voice will be heard for ages to come in the same way as the sounds and tunes of Mozart’s sonatas and concertos.

And what about the culture itself? Our popular music already has passed Michael Jackson’s heydays. Yet his legacy continues to resound in many new albums of a wide range of artists, his dance routines re-emerge time and again in video clips, and Michael’s own music will of course continue to be played for quite some years to come.

Still our popular culture may be up for some sizeable innovation, the way Michael Jackson single handedly ignited the innovation of the late seventies, right after Elvis Presley’s death. It will be interesting to see what it takes to be star with revolutionary potential in our time. We can not sit and wait. We just have to recognize it when it arrives.

A GLOBAL TREATY TO SAVE OUR PLANET

2009-06-05T12:04:00.000-07:00

God does not mingle with the odds

God does not temper with destiny, this is my conviction. Whether or not he plays dice.

Or should we say: life is one big game of dice. The only thing a God can do is show us the consequences of our own actions. But it is the human society that determines those consequences. Nothing actually is “an act of God”.

And because there is no God who actually sets enforceable rules, we have created the institution of law to rule us. Law is a fundamentally human logic. A necessary or inevitable effort towards logic, if we want to maintain the equilibrium of hour human societies. And perhaps by virtue of that its mother is the logic of God, or Nature.

I had a conversation, recently, with a colleague. I don’t remember how we got there, but he said: “Natural law was a great philosophy before Darwin. We never again looked at natural law after Darwin, did we?” I mumbled in agreement and immediately started to reflect on it.

Although I do not believe in legally relevant natural law, I do believe that there is much that law can learn from nature.

For instance: that we may fight crime better by bringing home the consequences rather than by mere punishment or retribution.

Or: that we must have some tolerance, however difficult emotionally, for accidents to happen, unless we want a rigidly policed and tightly secured society. Such society can only be sustained on the basis of human enslavement not human freedom.

That we must emphasize our individual duty to find the niche in which we can survive and sustain ourselves. One could indeed say, this is our natural duty as it is our natural opportunity. To go and find our own, individual niche and work towards our own sustainability in the first place.

The essence of human evolution is the ability and drive to quickly adapt to new niches, new circumstances, and yes, entirely new environments from very warm to very cold. We have reached the stage – as a species – at which we are a serious force with an impact of unknown consequences on the environment itself. To a large extent we have created, and engineered our entire human existence, and our potential peril.

We have been on the road of submitting nature to the human wishes and now we have reached the point of reversal. Shouldn’t our responsibility in respect of nature of itself not be the key principle of natural law to be imposed on all humans living now and in the future?

And if this is not self-evident, then perhaps we should ourselves articulate our responsibilities regarding nature in a global treaty of all humanity, strictly reinforceable, by force if necessary.

Let’s newly address the question of ‘natural law’: not simply as a source of guiding (or inspiring) principles for the human society, but as the prime expression of humanity’s responsibility in respect of its true mother Nature. And whoever wants to believe in God will most likely wholeheartedly agree. Even the Pope in Rome should be in total agreement. Nearly fifty years ago an American President spirited the Western world to the Moon. Perhaps in our time we need an American President who inspires us to reach a global agreement regarding our own planet Earth.

HOW HISTORY WAS INTRODUCED IN MY YOUTH

2009-01-27T12:24:00.000-08:00

And how it inspires me to help pass it on to future generations

I still have the record of my first lessons of history at school when I was nine years old. It is something we would today call a notebook. Most of it was written exactly according to the instructions of our teacher. But some things were not. One could say that they contained my first personal interpretation of history, by way of my illustrations.

Charlemagme at his court in the early 800's (TKA 1961)

These drawings are a reflection too of that time. The man with the firm stride closely resembles a popular comic figure, Captain Haddock of Tintin, whom I was frantically copying in all my drawings and scribbles. Of course, history obtains its meaning very much because we can project ourselves into it. Experience it.

Captain Haddock (Herge)

I have to say that the largest share of my history lessons did not come from school, but from my father, and from many other people, family and friends, teachers, with whom I shared the years of my youth.

At school our teacher picked this notion up by starting her lessons right there, with the experience of family: young people, old people, stories from the past, long ago, a chain – a chain of people and a chain of ‘time, endlessly going back in the past.

The first page of my notebook, the first lessons, dealt with this concept of time, and the timeline you can divide in parts, in dates. All of it was quite clear for me from the onset.

The first page of my history notebook, fourth grade (age 9)

I believe that in order to understand this space of time in the past’ and people long gone, the idea of a finite life, and thus the notion of death, must be clear by that time too, in any child of nine years old. I certainly understood it because I had no difficulty to grasp the implication of old aunts and uncles, even a grandfather, already having ‘died’.

The notebook is not simply a annotation of dates. It contains many references to the way of life of the people, their circumstances, their technologies and livelihood, next to the significant facts of history and the kings, queens, presidents and Popes involved in them.

The professions, the crafts and the arts also were given their proper attention, even in ‘experience’ terms. One example is the letter ‘P’ that I designed for the cover of an imaginary Medieval book, dedicated to a person named Philip.

Why not? It is a good way to experience the dedication of a 10th Century Monk who is working on his masterpiece. That monk would have loved the availability of Photoshop or 3D design, or even mass produced tubes of paint. But in his time they didn’t have any of it.

Viking ship

But I believe it was the key lesson of my father that stirred my passion for history indefinitely. He was always very quick to relate events of our time to examples in the past. And once that happens, you get interested to hear the whole story, and not just the fragments. It comes naturally if you have the basic curiosity of a child.

It has to be fed, this curiosity. It is the curiosity that does not develop just on its own steam. I believe that our current youngest generation is one which shows a good deal of curiosity, and I believe it is critical that we help them answer it in the right way.

For me, the lessons of history have most of all been part of an expedition of my own. I was given ample opportunity to actively absorb it, in our travels, in movies, in books, in family history. It continues to be such expedition to this day. Every day when I travel to certain periods or aspects of history, I largely see facts which I already ‘know’, but I see them in different lights and contexts. And this includes the events of which I had been witness myself, such as the revolution of the sixties.

The active exercise of history is a highly useful effort especially on behalf of our present and future. Not by way of prediction, but by way of projection and interpretation. Every day we absorb these lessons.

My perceptions of Charlemagne and the Vikings, and many other figures of the past have since evolved, of course. Most of all I have many more questions about Charlemagne than ‘knowledge’. And it is unlikely that today I would paint a Viking ship so colorful. But otherwise, the picture is very constant too. The order of history as I grasp it today is founded on these very basic lessons, back almost fifty years ago.

NO MAN ON MARS IN THE COMING DECADE

2009-01-23T13:37:00.000-08:00

Our planet is grounded to solve the issues at home first of all

One of the missing topics in President Obama’s inaugural address was Space and America’s future endeavors beyond the confines of our planet. I have no doubt that he considered the subject for the speech, but consciously decided not to include it. For he must have realized that back in the sixties, a period from which he draws many of his inspirations, America’s ambition to put a man on the Moon spawned many different technological – and inspirational - initiatives which multiplied the single benefit of mastering the art of Space travel. Kennedy’s early decision to make this ambition a hallmark of his Presidency, taken at substantial risk, helped build a strong focus across the entire western world on superior achievements in a broad area of technology which otherwise would not have been realized. And in part it shaped our cultural focus. Next to the emergence of pop culture and popular rebellion, “2001 - A Space Odyssey” epitomizes the character of this memorable decade, which sadly had to do without Kennedy to actually see it unroll.

Most certainly we live in a time when great ambitions are needed. In general terms Obama has captured this need in magnificent terms in many different dimensions. One can therefore assume that his decision not to include a renewed or strengthened mission outer space is an immediate function of his understanding of America’s – and the world’s – first priorities. My interpretation of his approach is reinforced when I go through the newly published agenda of Obama’s administration (http://www.whitehouse.gov/). There is no reference of any prominence of a specific plan regarding further US Space programs.

Nonetheless there is one paragraph which refers to the Administration’s stated interest regarding Space:

Ensure Freedom of Space: The Obama-Biden Administration will restore American leadership on space issues, seeking a worldwide ban on weapons that interfere with military and commercial satellites. They will thoroughly assess possible threats to U.S. space assets and the best options, military and diplomatic, for countering them, establishing contingency plans to ensure that U.S. forces can maintain or duplicate access to information from space assets and accelerating programs to harden U.S. satellites against attack.

The priority

This paragraph can be found under the heading of Defense. Space is (or remains) primarily positioned in the domain of the Military, which is where it was established in the fifties and sixties as well. No wonder the paragraph largely reads as a defensive stance: the restoration and safeguarding of freedom in Space.

No reference to this is made in the sphere of economy or technology, where apparently the Space program (apart from the ongoing availability of satellites) offers no special incentive or opportunity, according to those who crafted Obama’s policy principles.

During his Presidential campaign. Obama’s team did have a close look at NASA’s current plans for the future. Some reported that he was specifically interested in these plans. It is an other indication that the absence of ‘Mars’ in his inaugural speech was far from a haphazard omission. Economic gloom, climate change, health care and education all rank higher than any farfetched dream without immediate benefit to America’s taxpayers.

At one time in Nov 2008, one of Obama’s top aides clarified his position:

“Obama believes we should continue developing the next generation of space vehicles, and complete the international space station. While Obama would delay plans to return to moon and push on to Mars, Obama would continue unmanned missions, and use NASA to monitor the forces and effects of climate change, support scientific research, and maintain surveillance to strengthen national security. Obama also believes we need to keep weapons out of space.” (Source: http://www.spacepolitics.com/).

Again the motives seem largely defensive - or protective- rather than offensive or entrepreneurial. Clearly this is not the hallmark enterprise of the forthcoming decade, as new energy and climate control most certainly will be.

The world we live in

Still, if Kennedy’s outreach to the Moon back in 1961 was largely inspired by pressing competition (i.c. from the Soviet Union, who had surpassed the US by getting the first man ever into an orbit around Earth), today’s competition can not be entirely overlooked. The Russians have in the mean time become collaborators, not competitors. No indication exists that Space is anywhere near Moscow’s current issues. But the Chinese have stepped up their development of Space programs and may well become a serious player in this field. Although the chances of China surpassing the US in scale or advancement of their Space efforts are very slim indeed,

Any Space plan that is presented as a mere end in itself (like, most likely, a man on Mars) will be met by Obama’s administration with great reservation. Competition, real progress, measurable economic benefit etc. must be the key considerations if a continued substantial Space effort is to survive in the forthcoming period. We should be surprised if at one point such effort will rise in stature after all, for instance if some ingenious system of solar panels is to be sent into orbit to “harness the energy of the Sun” (one prominent feature of Obama’s inaugural speech).

But perhaps, at best, we will have a good few new men on the Moon by 2020.

Arts and qualities of the left hand

2009-01-21T13:27:00.000-08:00

President Obama in his youth

I never realized the enormous chance of left-handed people to become President of the United States, especially in the past fifty years:

Truman, Ford, Reagan, Bush sr., Clinton – and now Obama.
(source: http://www.anythingleft-handed.co.uk/presidents.html)

But of course, you better be born an American, and I am not. I am a left-handed Dutchman.

I share the sense of specialty with all other left-handed people in our world, and I believe much of what people say about it, sometimes a little mythical perhaps, must have been true for all our history.

On the internet I googled the following text:

(There is) ”… this theory, right-handers solve problems using analysis, or the process of breaking the problem into its pieces and examining each piece in turn, hoping to thereby understand the problem;

In this theory, left-handers solve problems using synthesis, or the process of connecting the dots to understand the big picture, hoping to thereby understand the problem.”

Source: http://www.helium.com/items/763455-why-a-left-handed-obama-will-beat-a-right-handed-clinton.“Why a left-handed Obama will beat a right-handed Clinton”. It was about Hillary Clinton, not her husband, the former left-handed President. But the power of synthesis and filling gaps in our understanding of our world, all of this has become more evident as and when we came to see and hear more of the new American President. McCain 's competition in this respect made no difference, for he is left-handed too. (*)

I share a little history of left-handedness among my forebears and (distant) cousins. We all combine this, without exception, with the gift of creativity. Like our left-handed great-grandmother, many of us are avid amateur artists, dreamers and writers.

In the end it is about bridging and crossing the existing rifts between the people of our world. Much synthesis and dots connecting is required.

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(*) And interesting question nonetheless is whether left-handed politicans will be more inclined to the left, on average, or to the right.

INTERNET IS OUR GLOBAL COLLECTIVE SKETCHBOOK OF IDEAS

2009-01-20T10:57:00.000-08:00

But it is in need of some codification

We scribble megatons of bytes on the Internet, every day. We post our messages, our blogs, our comments or votes on polls. We share them in smaller and wider circles. Much of it is of little consequence, it is dust passing with the wind, but at times, there is a sparkle, something unique and innovating. And the Internet can help us to pursue it.

At a larger scale, consumer marketing will become a highly democratic process in which all of us share ideas about projects, products, movies – etcetera. Increasingly, producers and consumers are communicating with each other through the internet, even though most of us are not aware of it, or recognize who actually is the producer and who is the consumer.

There are games which trigger their consumer’s creativity, the products of which are subsequently shared with all other online participants of that game. It is obvious that the next generation of games will be a reflection too of the input of the ‘consumers’. Indeed, they are rather more participants of games with global reach.

We have a new American President who, more than any of his predecessors understands the role of internet in achieving unity among all humanity. And perhaps it is inevitable that we do this with ‘fighting games’. So be it. But these games advance too, as for instance a computer game called “Infamous” not yet on the market. But this games promises to put violence on the backseat of a car driven by rationality, and sensitivity. If you use too much violence, you make everybody your enemy. Do you want that?

The worldwideweb: a joy for our souls

Blogging, chatting, Facebook, MySpace, Messenger, all of them have become our regular tools to find our way through the internet, show a little bit of our interests and talents, and share them with any likeminded individual in the world. Many other features of the internet support or accompany this development.

You can voice your opinion on regular polls. You can share your hobbies and further interest. Internet and the world wide web are the bloodline, the arteries and veins almost of our entire social and professional life.

There is however good reason to enhance our sense of values and respect, especially on the Internet, and to avoid such highly unfortunate incident as recently occurred in Thailand. A British national had published a book through the Internet, a novel, which was taken as highly inflammatory against the Thai monarchy. He was arrested and taken in custody, and received a six year sentence. “A Nightmare, this can’t be happening”, is his desperation. Just 10 copies sold of – what likely was – a non-best selling novel.

Imprisoned for insulting the Thai kind in an internet book

I treat everyone respectfully, although I would say that the Thai government response to this case was - and is - highly disproportionate by any reasonable (global) standard.

Shared standards for our chat behavior, aimed at making our exchanges more sensible and fruitful

Perhaps, given the importance of truthfulness and ‘effective communication’ on the Internet, for those who take it seriously, something like a ‘Global Code of Conduct for the Internet’ would not be such s bad idea, even though there will continue to be the inevitable abuse etc.

But otherwise, indeed, if I may speak for myself, I publish all my sketches, my notes and thoughts. and little drawings, if I like. For me, the Internet is my little place in the Milky Way.

A PRESIDENT OF PROMISE

2009-01-13T13:04:00.000-08:00

It is almost incredible to realize, but the fact remains that the United States supported and pursued a hard-fought victory over German oppression and racial hatred as it emerged in the NAZI period, whilst at the same time accepting rigid racist practices and policies in their own large backyard as a solid fixture of American society. It continued to sustain such practices well into the sixties, even as it became apparent, through international treaties and emerging common standards in our world regarding discrimination of any kind, that America stood quite alone in this throughout the western world. In 1954, some years before Martin Luther King effectively entered the stage, the US Supreme Court took a landslide decision regarding racist (segregationist) regulations regarding schooling. This decision marked a period in which many such decisions were taken in the battle of the Supreme Court against statutory schemes and state court decisions that served as "an endorsement of the doctrine of White Supremacy” (Source: Legal History Blog – http://legalhistoryblog.blogspot.com/). Yet it took many years more for the US to really come to grips with the concept of equal civil (and human) rights for all, regardless color.

By the same token no one at the time, not even in the sixties, would have predicted the advent of a ‘black’ American president in the early 21st Century. And most certainly no one could have predicted the strong association which this upcoming President has already generated among many, both inside and outside the US, with hope, change and a truly better world.

I have been watching a historic video clip tonight, dating from 1966 when Martin Luther King marched his followers through Chicago. The words he speaks are a prime source of history and to some degree they can still serve a a guiding light for the future. In that march, Dr King was stoned by an angry crowd of ‘whites’. “I’ve been hit so many times, I am immune to it,” Dr King dryly responds. Earlier on, in a speech, he conceded to his tiredness of marching, all that endless marching. It sounded like a desperation. Why does it take the American society so long to come to the realization that all men are equal, wherever they come from.

Civil rights demonstratrion, US, in the sixties

Today we continue to struggle with substantive echo’s of pure racism. We have denounced it, but the sentiments across the racial, ethnic and cultural dividing lines have not disappeared. The new American President no doubt will be a major contribution on the further path of equal recognition, but how far will this be?

Dr Martin Luther King

In King’s last speech he spoke of ‘having been on the mountain top’. “I’ve seen the promised land.” It was a daring promise, an expression of personal courage and an admonition to all to act in similar courage. Next to his eternally beautiful 'I have a dream' speech, his ‘Mountaintop speech’ can stand out as one of exceptional force and truthfulness (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0FiCxZKuv8&feature=related).

“I may not get there with you,” he said. And we know he was so right. But perhaps the next few years will indeed see the American people but also the rest of the world make a few next steps towards that promise. We all need greater understanding, in each of our countries, and greater tolerance, if we want this planet to be a happy place in the eternity of the universe surrounding us.

THE SOCIETY OF OWNERS VS THE PUBLIC SOCIETY

2008-12-08T10:32:00.000-08:00

Consumers face their other responsibility: as a voter [1]

My current job is to support, coach and teach a new generation of students to become legal professionals in the arena of International and European law. Our program is new, and thus we have ongoing discussions among the members of our faculty on the development and scope of the various elements of our curriculum. One area is Corporate Law. We concluded last year, with our first group of students, that we came only half way convincing our students that business and commerce is worth studying, both from the legal point of view and its wider context, from the view of the general public interest.

It is not uncommon for law students to harbor a distinct preference for matters of public interest, such constitutional law and human rights and for the causes that can be associated with it. Especially our students coming from countries with a recent background of conflict and war tend to be highly motivated in these areas. Rules that govern the conduct of private citizens or their (business) associations seem popular only with those who look out for a commercial career themselves, either as a corporate lawyer or simply as an entrepreneur.

But even for those students with a predominantly “public” outlook, there is a good reason to develop a keen interest in the rules of business and commerce. First of all: most of the rules that govern commercial processes have the public interest at their heart. We all benefit from effective commercial or corporate legislation and its compliance, both from the view of private predictability (pacta sunt servanda) and from the point of view of (public) accountability.

Secondly, we live in a time when many call for a fundamental reassessment of the rules of private enterprises, for instance of financial institutions and capital markets. This happens after a significant period which saw considerable public property move to the private sector and in which the rules of the market enjoyed a great popularity even as the – alleged - mechanism for improved service and cost reduction in areas traditionally belonging to the public domain.

Thirdly, corporations grow into ever larger conglomerates, assuming (or strengthening) a global market control surpassing the scale of control in the hands of any currently existing (international) public institution.

Royal Dutch Shell: more powerful in the world than many single nations

“While the amount of mergers continue to climb, statistics indicate that the average size of the smaller American law firm have decreased, reflecting an overall lean in the industry towards the megafirm.” [2]

The need for new rules regarding financial institutions today is perhaps most strongly felt in the US, following the collapse of major banks. But even the recent election of a new US President can not overnight swap away the greatly increased influence and actual power of large, multinational financial and other commercial corporations. But they will, by virtue of this irreversible development of increased scale and economic influence, increasingly become subject of public scrutiny at the same time. Or at least: this is what we should wish to happen.

It is therefore paramount that legal professionals, professionals especially of International and European law!, should fundamentally understand the principles and mechanics of corporate law and essential elements of private law (such as torts, contracts, litigation), at the same time. This will be in the interest of the scope and effectiveness of corporate law as much as those of public international law. The rules governing the owner (mostly: the owner of capital) should be well balanced against the interests of society, i.e. the public interest.

But what is the definition of “public interest”? When do we wish to be regarded as free consumers and when should we stress our responsibilities as a citizen? As experience tells us, this definition is in evolution all the time. We have to establish and reestablish our sense of public interest every time and again. We live in such a time; a time of some profound redefinitions. This most certainly is one of them: the redefinition of capitalist’s duties and privileges versus the interest of the lager society’s well-being.

An other important principle that drives the conduct of private business is the principle of freedom. In the western world we have clearly chosen for free enterprise and the primacy of consumer autonomy (of which the idea of a free market economy is a necessary corollary). Despite all regulations of both corporate responsibility and product composition, our economies are largely based on real-time consumer preferences. At the same time we allow for a wide range of mechanisms aimed at influencing consumer behavior.

A cynical view would picture this state of affairs as nothing less than a situation comparable with mass slavery. Consumers have no real choice, we are all driven by greater powers to empty our pockets largely to satisfy theirs. Indeed, we can stage our world as an epic drama not of capitalists and consumers but of vicious predators versus the enslaved masses. Enslaved not by force but by seduction. Consumerism is slavery in the disguise of sweets, candies and endless entertainment with no other purpose than to satisfy the selfish desires of the ignorant.

Lawyers indeed can look at private enterprise, public responsibility and consumer behavior with a great deal of cynicism. Much of our current legislation stems from this – kind of – basic lack of trust (in humanity), however may – politically – be professed otherwise. Legislators are humans too, one must remember.

Nevertheless, at crucial points in history legislation came about that was founded in trust, and that projected a new perspective of hope and improvement, for instance at the level of constitutions or acts of independence (“We the People….”), or at the level of national legislation, such as increased voter’s rights and civil rights. We say: yes of course! But this is not always self-evident. Quite a few treaties, and quite a few national laws had been subject of severe strife before they came about. The soul of any law is the struggle it took to get there; history, debates, memo’s and parliamentary questions.

Equally, when we look at corporate law and market regulation from a positive view: that it should all be there to benefit consumers and to benefit the entrepreneurs who service all those various markets, and not simply to restrict them, or curtail commercial innovation, etcetera. And at times, businesses are crucial as partners in times of change and ongoing – and uncertain – innovation. And this is where the private and the public meet again, at many intervals, for instance in our present time.

Above I mentioned the relatively limited influence of a US President even in the face of major economic crises. But one should say that the influence of this office potentially is very great, as the historic example of F.D. Roosevelt convincingly demonstrates, and not just his. Perhaps I can refer you to a speech of President-Elect Obama, which he held back in February this year [3], standing in a GM Car plant and explaining his view on the desired economic policies. At that time, the financial crisis had not yet surfaced. Yet he was making his point right in the hall of one of the big automobile corporations, General Motors, the same corporation that right now begs for public = taxpayer’s money.

We should as much be critical of the public ideologies as of the market ideologies which govern the rules, but also the debates. And we should be very interested in the development of both, exactly in this forthcoming period of shifting paradigms in almost all spheres.

All of the above is to encourage a sense of curiosity among our students in the corporate side of (international) public life, not in contrast but rather to strengthen their emerging competences in overall international law.

Owners do have entitlements, and so have consumers, but there is our responsibility as a voter too. We all must have some common sense of the forces that drive us to more or less cooperation in the modern world, whether they stem from greed or the desire for power, superstition or whatever kind of idealism. Corporate law is one such territory where careful balances have been stricken. It serves freedom and competition, but it secures their broader responsibilities (or potential liabilities) too.

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[1] ) This essay was originally written as an introduction to the scope and relevance of (International) Corporate Law in the curriculum of the International Bachelor of Law program at The Hague University.

[2] ) (The Illinois Business Law Journal, Nov 13 2007, “Megafirm Merger Mania”:
http://iblsjournal.typepad.com/illinois_business_law_soc/2007/11/megafirm-merger.html).

[3] ) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3R9g5iQcZE&feature=related

It is up to each new generation to articulate its own vision of life

2008-11-25T10:09:00.000-08:00

Three generations between 1800 and 1900

History is the ongoing story of successive generations. Yet we are used to perceive it as a gradually unraveling tale in which generations are just a coincidence, an arbitrary addition to all the other pieces of a chess board. But we are not simply the bystanders in a play. We create the various acts of the play ourselves, each one at a time. The generations make their own choices and they make their own mistakes.

What constitutes a generation? The transition between generations often happens only gradually and sometimes two or more generations belong together for having lived out the same convictions and the same themes of their time or epoch. The true divides between generations or periods can only be established afterwards. For instance, I have come to perceive the generations of my parents and grandparents much in the same light, even though there have been substantive transitions within their time. But both carried the last period of nationalist strife and imperial conflict on the soil of Europe, with two World Wars and a simultaneous acceleration in the industrial and technological development of the western world.

When my own generation came of age a distinct rift slashed the connection with the generation of my parents. The nineteen sixties led our world to an entirely new outlook, a transition process which took well over twenty years, up until the end of the eighties. We entered the childhood years of global communication and information and thus of a new period of renewal and change of which we yet have to see the end.

I am part of the so called (Baby) Boom generation, born after 1940. I strongly identify with this generation. I hope I have contributed to the records of my generation in my own very modest way, for I do wish that the character and the dreams of our generation carry through into eternity. Our generation above all is connected with the future. We had visions of the year 2000, a paradise of mechanization and luxury. A world of blue skies and private jets flying through the cities, of Rock Music and holograms, and of a horizon of high rise apartment buildings and industrial food production. When on Jan 1st 2000 (or 2001, which was the proper first day of the Millennium) we woke up, there were still cows grazing in the fields, gassy cars driving around, in ever longer queues, we still had classical music and normal Television, even though everything had been expanded and modernized along the way. Back in the sixties we couldn’t dream of an Information Age, but in 2001 it had solidly arrived.

Two generations: the 1920s and the 1950s

It is my experience that when time moves on, our perspective of the past evolves with it. I find this an utterly fascinating phenomenon. One can sense that the days we can still remember change in color, in relative importance or in their actual meaning, as I can see with more clarity about the transitional period between the sixties and the early nineties. It took those decades to finally shrug off the last remnants of the convictions and adversities which had shaped the larger part of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

But most likely any contemporary assessment of our recent past will be superseded by another. Decades that loom large in our own memory will shrink to mere seconds in future accounts of our time. Some Presidents will be forgotten and some will become legendary. Innovations which today do not seem significant will in future time seem huge and decisive, whereas other developments will fade away in blurry tales.

We do have the advantage, of course, that our time is a period of immense record keeping at ever larger scale. Hardly any incident, small or great, can escape future researchers: our time will offer its records on a golden plate, however flexible the context in which they may be presented to generations after us.

I would very much like to write the history of humanity strictly from the viewpoint of successive generations, the collective of all individuals in each distinct period . I am not the only one thinking in those terms. This I conclude from a brief search on the Internet. One website [1] describes the past six hundred years – the period between 1400 and 2000 – as a succession of some 24 distinct generations, be it from a predominantly American viewpoint, each with its own characteristics. For instance, the generation which faced the Depression and World War II is called the Missionary Generation (F.D. Roosevelt e.a.), and their period is labeled as “The Third Great Awakening”.

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The Silent Generation (Artist, born 1925-1942) grew up as the suffocated children of war and depression. They came of age just too late to be war heroes and just too early to be youthful free spirits. Instead, this early-marrying Lonely Crowd became the risk-averse technicians and professionals—as well as the sensitive rock ‘n rollers and civil-rights advocates—of a post-crisis era in which conformity seemed to be a sure ticket to success. Midlife was an anxious “passage” for a generation torn between stolid elders and passionate juniors. Their surge to power coincided with fragmenting families, cultural diversity, institutional complexity, and prolific litigation. They are entering elderhood with unprecedented affluence, a “hip” style, and a reputation for indecision. (AMERICAN: Colin Powell, Walter Mondale, Woody Allen, Martin Luther King, Jr., Sandra Day O’Connor, Elvis Presley; FOREIGN: Anne Frank, Mikhail Gorbachev)
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I would limit the number of generations to two or three per century, allowing for a broad definition of successive periods, and covering an average of forty to fifty years per generation. We may have to distinguish “early” and “late” varieties of certain generations but they should have largely lived in a continuum of style, advancement, cultural preferences, political paradigms etc. Based on this I have made my own identification of generations between 1800 and 2000. But this is just a first broad brush attempt.

A view of five generations 1800 – 2000 (years of birth):

1790 – 1840 – The Generation of the Restoration (Politicians and Literary figures)

1840 – 1880 – The Generation of Romance and the Bourgeoisie (Victorians)

1880 – 1935 – The Generation of Mass Wars and Invention (Entrepreneurs and Generals)

1935 – 1980 – The Generation of the Popular Revolution (Rock Bands and Managers)

1980 – 2020 – The Generation of Information and Communication (Global Culture)

Every generation is transitory to some extent. In our personal lives we may have developed a clear sense of ‘generation identity’ yet at the same time we are caught in between. We grew up as children of the older generation and we aim to be connected with the generation of our children (and if possible, of our grandchildren). In my framework we can experience at least two distinct periods or generations in one single lifetime.

As a rule, history is described as a tale of wars, leadership policies and great events. The underlying developments and shifts in society do not always get the attention of historians that they deserve.

But history is not simply about the dreams and victories of Kings and Popes, of Emperors and great movements. It must also be about the dreams and convictions of the people. Why not consider history from the perspective of the ordinary man: a good civilian with a keen eye for the things that happen in this world, who intelligently observes the ongoing flow of human passion, the pleasures of the masses and the great thoughts of literature, and who may somehow participate in them or even be part of their creation.

Three generations between the 1960s and 2005

What dreams and convictions were passed on from one generation to the other, what dreams persisted even longer? For instance, the dreams of Jesus Christ or the idea of one Europe as it once was cherished by Charlemagne. And what dreams never got another chance? It is interesting to note that each generation has its thoughts about the end of time, some Apocalypse or Doomsday. But then, we all have our vision of Utopia, or Paradise too. Where has humanity come after we segregated from the kingdom of the animals?

When I try to distinguish my generation (born in the 1950s) from the generation of my parents (born in the 1920s), one single theme stands out: their loyalty to the order of their parents versus our desire to dismantle it. Historic events (i.e. WW II versus the emergence of popular culture) have had a significant influence in shaping these characteristics. It didn’t come with our blood, it came with opportunity and the right economic, demographic [2] and cultural context .

Thus, every generation faces the challenge of achieving its authenticity in the eyes of history. No generation would wish to be cast aside as mere transitory. Each generation faces its struggle of independence of the parents’ generation, each generation creates its own convictions, passions, and fashions. And this applies to the individual too, even though we do not all go to the very limits. Nevertheless we have the freedom to re-invent everything however it suits us.

But even if we accept the idea of a history of humanity as a tale of successive generations we can not, nor should we wish to escape their interaction with the larger historic events. It is impossible to understand the scope and impact of the popular revolution(s) in the nineteen sixties without reflecting on the Cold War, the war in Vietnam, or on any other major issue of the time. Obviously not. We are not talking about separate histories but about another viewpoint from which to relate to largely the same facts. Still it remains an open question to what extent the various elements of ‘history’ truly interact and how they relate in terms of cause and effect. What was the true impact of John F. Kennedy’s assassination from the perspective of the ‘people’s history’? It may become more important to understand these interactions as we have moved well into the age of the masses, of an ever growing world population with many interconnections.

If it was still possible at the time of my parents’ and grandparents’ generation to see ‘history’ as a largely regional affair – for instance: European history, or American history – and to define their progression from a defined social viewpoint (the distinct social segments to which the members of their generation belonged), this will become increasingly difficult for the subsequent generations. Traditional segmentations and class distinctions are rapidly being replaced by dynamic networks both at regional level and beyond. Our virtual reality is becoming a prime reality in which we fulfill many different functions – and satisfy many different objectives or desires. It is probably realistic to say that at this stage it is impossible to assess the ultimate implications of this development, especially the implications for ‘history’, from whatever perspective without some global perspective guiding it.

It has been a fashion for some time to flirt with the idea of ‘the end of history’, following Fukuyama’s famous publication of the late 1980s. The concept has been much debated, often without sufficient consideration to one of Fukuyama’s key points. His thesis on the course, and driving factors, of ‘history’ included the requirement of ‘thymos’, the desire for recognition that pushes certain individuals to project ambitions beyond well trodden paths. Already, some two decades after the self-proclaimed victory of free market capitalism and liberal democracy over any remaining totalitarian system, it is clear to us that History has not stopped there. Foundations for new historic themes are being laid right before our eyes. They are new themes compared with the issues of power and people’s influence of the Twentieth and Nineteenth centuries, such as Climate control, world population, international security, global political and economic institutions and so on. As yet we can not determine how or what ‘history’ will come out of this. It requires the hindsight of people living some hundred or more years from now.

New generations will continue to inhabit our planet either in tranquil succession or with massive bangs. Their future stories, much as the stories of past generations, will be the ongoing tale of humanity, indeed, like Fukuyama said, until de very last man.

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[1] ) Generations in history - http://www.fourthturning.com/my_html/body_generations_in_history.html

[2] ) Some time in the early eighties I attended a business course at which we had a professor of demographics as a guest lecturer. In a persuasive presentation he pictured the course of history entirely as a function of demographics, for instance contrasting a more restrictive elderly society with a young and boundless society, societies which are conducive to a stable democracy and societies which are prone to absolutism or authoritarian rule.

Obama is the reminder of a President we never had

2008-11-07T17:19:00.000-08:00

Some men see things and ask why?
I see things and ask, why not?
(Robert Kennedy, 1968)

This is the major significance of Barack Obama. He is the Robert Kennedy who didn’t get the chance. Yes we can! is exactly the recommendation that Robert Kennedy left us, before he was shot to death. Indeed, why not? More than any other Presidential candidate, Robert Kennedy practiced the oratory and operated out of a heart similar to Obama’s.

Kennedy’s assassination followed the assassination of Martin Luther King, which was some half year before. And the death of both of them could be seen as their ultimate, personal sacrifice to help end a war which very few people could still consider justified. The war in Vietnam.

There is an almost bizarre similarity between both the circumstances and the public atmosphere of 1968 and those of 2008. But this time it is a Democrat who won, not another Republican – however little comparison can be made between McCain and Nixon.

Nevertheless. Nixon almost single-handedly crushed the hope of an entire generation. He protracted the War (eager for an honorable withdrawal and nothing less) and he corrupted the entire office of the US President.

This most certainly is not the expectation we have of President-Elect Barack Obama. It is highly important for our world that any further comparison with 1968 and the subsequent years fails from this point.

OPPORTUNITY, MR PRESIDENT-ELECT

2008-11-04T22:52:00.000-08:00

My warm congratulations to Barack Obama on a watershed victory

“The choice in this election isn't between tax cuts and no tax cuts. It's about whether you believe we should only reward wealth or we should also reward the work and the workers who give it," he said. "John McCain calls this socialistic. I call it opportunity."

(Sen Barack Obama, just a few days before Nov 4th 2008, election day)

Nov 4 2008 has turned out to become a day of great hope and anticipation. Ever since I spotted Barack Obama in the summer of 2007, I have set my hopes on his election, as did so many other people once he caught their eyes and their imagination.

But I never dared to hope too strongly. The sense of pain after John Kerry lost the elections in 2004 was far to great to ever wish to experience it again. Yet, over the past few months, Obama’s chances of winning the presidency became ever more serious. And still I did not dare to project his ultimate victory. Only tonight the floodgate of hope and anticipation finally burst open.

Barack Obama represents opportunity as it only rarely has reached the office of the US President. Obviously there is no way we can say that he will seeze all the opportunities ahead, as on his way he will have to successfully tackle many issues – severe stumblingblocks -, largely the legacy of his Republican predecessor George W. Bush. In doing so, the main thrust of his initial months as the US President should not be to further enstrange the public from this recent past, but to offer reconciliation.

Still, however this may be, Mr Obama will be the first US President in many years to inspire a great many people around the world who will take his election as a wake up call to ignite new imagination into our world in all dimensions.

I have often made the comparison between the atmosphere – and opportunities – of our present time with those of the early sixties, when I was still a young boy with an emerging awareness of the greater world around me. It was in 1963 when I first visited the United States, 11 years of age, and ever since I have been fascinated by the vibrations of entrepreneurship and imagination all around me coming out of the American soil. Mr Obama will need all these vibrations when he faces the tremendous challenges ahead, none of which need to be clarified at this point.

George W. Bush enjoyed a silver spoon upbringing and his presidency started off with a healthy America delivered on his White House doorstep. Barack Obama made this journey to Washington all by himself and he will pick up an America in financial and moral disarray, both domestically and in the world outside. It is in the interest of all Americans to cast partisan divisions aside ans start amend these huge deficiencies. Not one Barack Obama can ever complete that task. It will have to be thousands of people, from both sides of the political spectrum, to restore America’s greatness, in a new perspective and abundant with new opportunity.

HISTORY IS MADE BY AMBITION

2008-11-01T15:34:00.000-07:00

Tuesday November 4 2008 will be a decisive day for history. It will be proven by a record turnout of American voters.

On one side, there is an experienced aged Senator with limited imagination and out to return some respect to (and) for the established powers. He seems a reassuring prospect for many, especially for those who see nothing in change and rather stick up a good defense to keep what they have.

On the other side a man who is already the epitome of change, by virtue of his candidacy, and who professes ‘change we can believe in”. He is an inspiration to many, whatever the critics say about his rhetoric versus his actual accomplishments.

History is made by people who see a road well in advance of others. Who can see the opportunities, and the threats, in their proper context, and in their proportions. And perhaps it is even better to say that such people can look beyond mere opportunity and see its potential too.

A famous example is the historic ignition of man’s quest for the Moon. “Within this decade we will send a man to the Moon…” (John F. Kennedy, 1961). It happened, most certainly in part because of the explicit presidential thrust behind it.

We do live in a time when every presidential thrust in quite a few ambitious directions will be highly appreciated. This need not be just the American president. Nor was it just any single American president in history who pursued and completed the job. An important aspect of the presidential responsibility is to seek and retain the proper allies, inside and outside. So did every great American president, at least if we take the rank of greatness from a recent expert panel who assessed all 43 presidents on their historic ‘turf’.

And if history - which is always by hindsight – is determined by the greatness of human ambition, so must be our future. Many sizeable challenges lay ahead affecting the sustainability of our human existence on this entire planet. We can not remain in the squabbles of the past, as many of today’s conflicts and struggles still largely are. We don't actually have to go to Mars, and perhaps we should not go, at least not until some pertinent issues on Earth have effectively been resolved, such as Climate change, resources, habitat etcetera.

Many US Presidents have given good examples. Even the unlikely ones. Harry Truman is considered one of the better presidents. He achieved this against all initial odds. He succeeded a giant, in a highly complex period. Both McCain and Obama at least have the possibility to rise to the challenge, perhaps in both cases against the initial odds.

What the world should hope for is that all Americans will be able to stand behind the one who wins, and that the will be able to do so for his full term.

TRUTH AND THE DELIVERY OF JUSTICE

2008-10-28T13:13:00.000-07:00

A tribute to all victims of crimes without cause

My students know that I am a vivid watcher of movies and that at many occasions I derive stuff for my lectures out of them. Invariably a good story is the mother of many good thoughts.

A few nights ago I was with some young friends, and we watched a movie called Spun. The people in this movie, men and women in their late twenties, all were wasting their lives. They moved pointlessly, largely to secure (or ‘score’) a sufficient quantity of drugs to trade and drugs to use. They could have been hippies in the early seventies or junkies in any other period, up to today, coming from nowhere and having no prospect whatsoever of a stable, sensible occupation, let alone of any escape from their marginal existence. The movie was highly reminiscent of another intoxicated movie called Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, in which the two main characters pass through the story soaked with marihuana and cocaine. They are the kind of movies that make you stoned without taking a single milligram of the stuff yourself. You swallow the misery on the screen as if it is your own depressing existence.

A scenefrom Spun

A life without prospect is not simply a subject of fiction. We can see people in our own world who have nowhere to go and live in chronic desperation. There are those who vegetate in utter loneliness even when they share their nightmares with other unfortunate individuals, like the young people in Spun. They have no idea what to do, they have no sense of their larger environment, or rather their sense has become increasingly distorted through their chronic disenchantment with life. Deep down many harbor a strong grudge against the world outside, or against particular elements of that world: parents or older people, school, politicians, authority, against everything ‘normal’. Most of their actions are on impulse, both positive and negative – especially negative to others – when grudge becomes anger and anger turns into hate. I remember walking in the center of Amsterdam one night with a few friends. In front of us was a small group of young men of apparent Moroccan background. In passing I said: “Good evening gentlemen”. Immediately one of the young men, a boy really, turned around, facing me with a vicious, angry expression and waving his fists in a threatening way. He yelled:: “Whaddaya want!?” I gently explained that I wished him a pleasant evening. Again he waved his fists at me. We then took a few steps aside and passed this group in some haste, continuing to enjoy what I can call my Amsterdam too. How does anger and hatred make people deaf for any sign of goodwill? What did I represent in the eyes of these young men?

If a world of anger and suspicion starts to become violent, the context is created in which people become capable of horrendous acts, such as brutal theft and other physical violence, murder even.

It is highly unfortunate that such senseless desperation only recently struck an innocent young Dutch women working on the Caribbean island of Bonaire. She met her end not because of some passionate rage. Her killer simply wanted her possessions, her bag and whatever was in it, and when she tried to defend herself he smothered her, out of fear. From the way I understand it, he had no intention to kill her, it just happened as he didn’t know how to stop and how to silence her otherwise for the outrage he had already committed.

And a few days ago one of the students came to me in great anxiety telling me that the morning before she was robbed of her laptop and her cell phone – in her own home. It turned out, as was corroborated by a witness who lives on the other side of the street, that two young men of Moroccan origin had entered her room through the window (she lives on the ground floor, street side), quickly snatched the two items from her desk and disappeared the way they had come. It all happened in an instance, just as she was taking a shower. The window had been slightly open, but the shutters were down. They had cut their way through it. In the end, she said to me, the theft was one thing (her parents had already offered their help to replace them); what had shocked her was the brutal intrusion of her privacy. Although I didn’t ask this in so many words, I am quite sure that she realized the danger that she would have faced had she caught the two burglars when they were still in her room. I guess she was lucky in a way, for it could easily have turned much more violent.

In the movie Spun one of the main characters has fun with a girl and she is playfully chained on a bed, when suddenly he is called away. As he doesn’t want to lose her, he simply leaves her as she is, naked, chained and mouth taped, and he takes off. The girl has no clue what to make of it and she grows increasingly fearful the longer he stays away, even fearing for her life, for this is the kind of situation in which many women have ultimately faced the vicious grin of a killer. We are led to believe that the young man, stoned as he may be, has no ill intent and that he will return, either to continue his bedroom session or to free the girl from her chains and let her go. At one point he does return and offers his apologies, yet keeps her chained while trying to comfort her. She manages to cry out and curse him for being such an asshole – after which she realizes that she has a better chance if she would go along with him and let him cuddle her. Again he is called out, and again he tapes her mouth and eyes and leaves her chained on the bed. Now she becomes really desperate. It takes a while before the situation is resolved. The movie keeps you in suspense about the girl’s ultimate predicament. She finally manages to escape. In the end it is another girl who unexpectedly becomes the oblivious victim of a suicide bomb explosion.

Many tragedies originate from some passion becoming the obsession of a devilish phantom inside, who smothers every remaining reason and compassion and who unleashes some brutal force that sees no other way than to silence adversity forever. It is ultimate moment of broken trust, when innocent play turns into horror or when an innocent student sees her privacy ripped away by senseless boys. We all feel raped to some extent. It can happen to you too, and to me, at any time.

Our first response to such incidents – and outright tragedies – is that, surely, the culprits must be caught and they should not escape their punishment. If anything, our sense of justice must be satisfied. In our civilization we do not take an eye for an eye, but any outrage against the order of society must be repaid in kind, one way or the other. And there is increasing concern about the aggression and disorder caused by certain elements in our society, such as those young men – many of them just children. Increasingly in our society there is a general resentment against people of particular backgrounds, like the Moroccan boys, or indeed, against young people from our own Caribbean islands. We rather wish they were not here, that we could somehow send them back to where they came from or where their parents came from. Most of them are actually born of our own soil.

In the end, the delivery of justice nor the initial assessment of the truth – of what really happened at the spot – can be limited to a mere reflection of the crime itself. We have to establish truth and justice in its wider context. We have to accept that the most effective response may not necessarily be punishment and retribution. We should recognize that in a wider context we see the mirror of a far greater failure than the single failure of young individuals (or their parents) to grow up as responsible people or to align with the general order of society. It is always our failure too.

We live in a time of excessive wealth and of excessive materialism. Most of it is fascinating too, of course, but much of the opportunities we create, both in terms of education and care and in terms of jobs and income, is simply unreachable for quite a few young people, particularly those who are caught in the middle of geographic and cultural transition. Their days are filled with pictures of a far away Dreamland, the birthplace of their souls, their island in the Sun or the arid mountains of Morocco, and with the reality of a world which in their own mind is hostile, uninviting, confusing and essentially inaccessible. The waving fists of the young man in Amsterdam were the expression of a boy who saw me as the symbol of everything that was denied to him.

I am not suggesting that we should harbor a sense of guilt because of this. I do not feel personally responsible for the lack of prospect in the lives of just anyone, or for the perceived hostility of my world. The only thing I suggest is that in order to free our society of aggression and hatred, we should always aim to address the situation at its very roots. And this inevitably includes aspects for which we do hold responsibility, whether individually or at the level of our political system. At least we have the opportunity – and the responsibility – not to ignore but to properly address the wider context – the wider ‘truth’ – of any incident that passes our way, for instance when we are a lawyer directly dealing with such cases and even when we are a prosecutor. This applies to local theft and murder as much as to the greater outrages of our time such as genocide and terrorism.

We should also recognize that at the other end of the scale there are those who take, or rather: grab, what they can get their hands on, far in excess of what they deserve, or far in excess of any reasonable distribution of affluence within society at large. The current ‘global financial crisis’ is the immediate outcome of the cumulated greed of people whose lives already are incomparably comfortable. You don’t need to be a communist or some other leftist idealist to take exception to irresponsible speculation or to the sky high bonuses of men (indeed, men only) who have the power to intimidate their environment into paying them. And you do not have to abandon the principles of a free market economy to be critical of the enormous spoil it creates in its wake or the gross imbalances it allows in the attribution of its benefits. Markets, as people, are imperfect, however close we get to full competition based on the fullest information both in the hands of customers and of competitors. Our greatest imperfections as human beings are our greatest weaknesses, our tendency to succumb to temptation, our greed, selfishness and so on. It takes hugely great minds to effectively control these innate weaknesses.

For me, when it comes to it, trust is first of all the assumption that all of us accept the basic rules of our society – the basic rule of law. This does not necessarily mean that we have to follow each and every rule at any given time (for instance: that we stop at every red light even if there is no other traffic in sight). There are too many rules for that matter. Nor does it mean that we are capable at all times to live up to our commitments. And I am even prepared to take a ‘yes’ for a ‘no’ if circumstances so dictate. Each of us will experience this daily struggle between the promises we make and our actual possibilities to honor them. I don’t mean this kind of trust, however important it may be to us.

What I mean is the basic trust that every other person essentially cares, that those whom we associate with do no willfully inflict us any harm. For instance, it is the kind of trust that was willfully broken between one of our own students and a man whom he thought was his friend, someone he had known from his earliest youth. As a result, this student now faces the serious possibility of being stripped of his freedom and of being convicted for something he emphatically has not done. It is at such moments that any of us would take the greatest trouble to help avoid such predicament, as in this particular case we at least have been able to help secure the best possible judicial attention, at the highest possible level, up to and including the European Court of Justice. Well, if that is not a profound satisfaction of the rule of law!

I am writing this essentially as a tribute to anybody who falls victim to somebody else’s misery, to somebody else’s misguided and perhaps even rotten life. But of course I am writing this too as an inspiration to all those who aspire to respond to such cases, whether in the delivery of justice or in the amendment of the wider, underlying societal injustice. Our contribution can take many forms.

And perhaps we should not simply dwell on the nature and causes of human disenchantment and of lives wasted alongside the spoils of our modern world, and allow ourselves to be inspired by some vision of beauty and happiness, not just for the happy few but for all. For we should never stop to contemplate such utopia, however unreachable it may seem. Each of us can make just this tiny contribution that, who knows, one day will prove to be the proverbial butterfly creating a hurricane. So what should inspire us?

This personal essay basically started as a recommendation to watch certain movies. And as I was contemplating this question about some contrasting inspiration, I asked myself: if Spun and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas are the kind of movies that project the darkest possible outlook of our existence, when our fantasies essentially become self-destructive, what then are the movies which do exactly the opposite and project the ultimate positive, creative fantasy?

Legend of Spyro: Dawn of the Dragon

I realized that these movies in fact arrive in abundance. And they are not just movies. Imagine a life in utmost positive fantasy, the ultimate frontier of creativity where you can ‘imagineer’ any possible world. It is the world of the creators of animated movies and computer games which saturate millions of laptops and Playstations across the globe in an ongoing flow, one after the other. Imagine what life that must be, to get up every day and let your mind travel the widest universe of your imagination, and actually do something profitable with it. Similarly, I highly enjoy watching animated movies and I do occasionally play with Playstation (I have a good young friend who has lured me into it). Just as an example, you can watch any of the recent animations, such as Ratatouille, Wall-E, Horton, Bee-movie and so on and truly relish in their colorful expression of joy or even happiness, whatever the story, as they all have a pleasant ending.

This joyful feast of animation doesn’t preclude more serious messages. In fact I believe that many animations are made by people who make fun in a highly creative way but who cherish more serious thoughts too (moreover, isn’t enjoying good fun an essential prerequisite of the ability to be serious?). Again let me illustrate this with an example out of one of the movies, Horton and the Who’s. The happy and gentle elephant Horton faces gross injustice in his effort to bring the world of the Who’s - which is an invisible world of tiny little people on a spec – to safety. Horton is met with disbelief and distrust, especially of one dominant female kangaroo, who refuses to accept that such tiny world could even exist and who sees Horton’s dedication to ‘people on a spec’ as nothing less than a threat to the order of her community, which she wishes to preserve at all cost. I am reminded of the happy ballads, songs of love mostly, of four long haired English boys, calling themselves The Beatles, who created an outrage among the parents of my generation, over forty years ago. It is hard to imagine, that these lovable songs actually unsettled the entire established order of my time. Even the many young people of the sixties who ended up in hefty scuffles with the police, in actual fact started their actions of protest and resistance out of sheer playfulness, not out of malice. Provocation was the game of my youth, not aggression. In the end The Beatles won, and so did Horton the elephant.

Anyway, the point here is that there is no limit to our imagination, if only we dare to mobilize it. Anyone can be inspired by the examples in history, such as Walt Disney and The Beatles, and by the examples in our present time. There is no limit to the imagination of a better world, in which human beings can truly enjoy their lives. And there is no actual need to succumb to the dictates of consumerism, to material greed an affluence, or to lose our hope and self-respect out of mere material adversity. The greatest wealth we can experience is the wealth that comes out of our own hands, however hard fought.

We do know however that people who do succumb to it and who can not envision their lives other than by comparison with the fortunes of others, are ultimately capable of great atrocities. Rather than merely threatening with punishment whoever transgresses the basic rules of civilization we should seek to offer the perspective of happiness and use our creative potential to such perspective as much as we can, even if at the same time we need to establish our response to the damage that has already been inflicted. Similarly, when we face the challenges of cultural and ethnic diversity, we should not emphasize the differences and the problems, we should emphasize everything that is pleasant and joyful about a world in which we can celebrate our differences, and make integration a thoroughly inviting party for all.

Such are the thoughts and musings that can arise out of fiction. Whoever would think of Johnny Depp or Jim Carrey (Horton’s voice) to be the agents of mindful excursions to the psychological and judicial dilemma’s of our time? Basically I think the answer is that moviemakers, animators and game creators all share the same profound interest, each in their own special way, that sustains a successful lawyer, legislator or judge. We may have to accept fate and misfortune, but we do not need to accept willful malice, neglect or indifference, at any level, in any cause, anywhere on our planet.

As a conclusion I wish to share one observation perhaps with great emphasis. Whatever miseries, misfortunes or outright trauma’s we may have to overcome in our lives, we still have the choice to make these our strengths and not our fatal weaknesses. I have seen many beautiful young people come out of a life of abuse and neglect. It is absolutely possible to offer so many more young people the same perspective of beauty.

True justice helps to serve the truth. Every unfortunate incident must be assessed against its wider context, its true causes and circumstances. In the end, we should not be satisfied simply by the actual response – through punishment or retribution – to any given incident, but by the degree to which we have been able to help avoid such incident recurring in the future. All of us are able to create our own stories which can become the parents of yet another generation of good thoughts.

INTERNET CONNECTS ALL THE PEOPLE IN THE WORLD

2008-08-10T02:03:00.000-07:00

Dreams and whispers of humanity are floating on the world wide web

Many of us do the occasional – or habitual – chatting on the Internet. Nowadays we have countless options to meet people, either people we already know (for instance: friends on msn) or people we do not yet know.

In both directions we anticipate something. We may even be very eager, especially when we have an actual and preferably immediate ‘date’ in mind. I am referring to the chat rooms on the Internet, which exist in many different categories or virtual clubs.

Although blogging and chatting are two widely different exercises, they do have a communication dimension in common. I also enjoy publishing my blogs because of the response they often generate and the meeting – or clash – of minds with people who share at least part of my interests (though not necessarily my opinions)

I have numerous interactions on the Internet, with friends, associates, students and many other people with whom I correspond, but whom I have not (yet) actually met ‘physically’. Don’t say virtual reality isn’t to some extent reality too: we share real thoughts, real pre-occupations real opinions and most of all: real feelings.

Chat rooms can be found in the most unlikely places

The habit of chatting is an utter satisfaction in my own life. I can not say it otherwise. But indeed, part of the fun of chatting is the anticipation. The idea of whom we actually wish to meet (a mate, a partner, a friend, a supporter… etc…one’s own children….) is just as much a part of the fun as actually achieving it.

I can say that approximately 80% of my life would haven been entirely different, in almost all dimensions of my life, had I not started chatting ten years ago. Personally, professionally, my social network…very much everything.

Most of all I feel utterly connected with the countless people whom I met in the course of these ten years, wherever on this Planet. For each and every aspect of my life I have a living connection with another human being, people of many different nationalities, most of all young people, but not exclusively.

And if this is true for me, at the age of fifty six, then this must be true - in whatever measure - for many hundreds of millions of other people.

We must be able to ultimately overcome the wish for any War, in any place in our world, if we continue to multiply our human connections across the Globe in generations to come.

Of course, other societal processes will have their influence too, for the better or for the worse. For it seems that Internet is powerful enough not only to spread goodness but also to disseminate discontent, discrimination, and outright malice.

Such processes may include great social and political revolutions, or they may include the smaller watersheds, for instance at the time of US Presidential elections. Most certainly communication and reaching the youth are to sides of the same coin that Senator Barack Obama has already picked up, I believe, and Senator McCain does not appear to have remotely grasped. But these are remarks at the side.

My main point is not a political one nor is it one for the short term. It is the long term potential (and its short term implications) of this process of ongoing connection.

For let us not think that it is just a process on the Internet. It serves as a trigger for all other processes, ultimately including important political processes. My professional development but also my entire professional identity are molded and energized by the Internet, not exclusively but to a substantial extent.

And I see young people and their very extensive exchanges among each other, in many different networks ( Facebook, Hyves and the like are supporting it). Images, thoughts and feelings that float around in the trillions every day on the world wide web.

If US Presidents want to the read the record of all conversations of all Americans of any given day, they would be astonished to know how much love and friendship is exchanged on the Internet as may be the incidental malice or terrorist intent.

I have nothing to hide, or should I say: everything “of me” that I have exposed on the Internet is truthful and nothing that I should be ashamed of in any way. I actually want readership. And even if this does not count in the same way for all of us, we can still consciously guard our privacy in the way we choose.

The other side of the coin remains: every politician of our time, whether US Presidential candidate, member of congress or parliament, every public official, but also artists and professionals of all trades should see this generation of communication as a glorious beginning of a new time.

THIS WILL BE THE PRESIDENCY OF BARACK OBAMA

2008-07-25T11:13:00.000-07:00

Senator Barack Obama

A courageous and youthful man, senator of Illinois, is waving at a crowd of hundreds of thousands in Berlin, not far from the Brandenburger Tor, the stage of many events in history that mark our progress from fighting Kings and Emperors to a genuine global civilization.

Berlin July 24, 2008

I believe this picture will be the key message of his presidency.: the message of unity and reconciliation. “We can not afford to be divided,” he said. And right he is, of course.

Reconciliation will no doubt be a strong theme in Obama’s (possible) presidency, bridging the many divides which hamper the preservation – and the continuity – of even some of the most primary conditions of our life on Earth. Well indeed, we are still at some distance of this shining prospect of a unified global community.

Obama with French President Sarkozy

Obama has been photographed with many important leaders of the world in Europe and the Middle East. They have allowed this even though the Democratic party still has to officially nominate him as their candidate. He has taken away every opportunity from McCain to do likewise and shake some leadership hands too. McCain knows that any such attempt would still ignite just a shadow of the attention that was given to Obama.

When he speaks he commands attention from the beginning to the end. Obama has grasped the sentences of the future to become his own in way that is reminiscent not only of a number of past presidents, but also of other leaders such as Martin Luther King. In Berlin he spoke in his capacity of American citizen, which only emphasizes his achievement, indeed as a citizen, and as a Senator, to attract such huge crowds well before he has does anything remarkable to history itself.

Well before the final presidential campaign Obama has alreadyrisen to stardom. He consistently performs at a level of high expectations. It is what makes him highly vulnerable at the same time. Everybody realizes that. But the sense of hope that he has managed to mobilize and help demonstrate, this time in front of a huge crowd in Europe, is something that, I hope, an increasing number of people in the United States will not want to relinquish just like that.

Our minds will crisscross the world in infinite variety

2008-07-03T06:38:00.000-07:00

Connecting in the new virtual world of Second Life

Joining the new age of mass connection

The telephone is a nearly extinct species in our new age of communication. It is now a residual component of a complex of functions to which we get ourselves connected. The education of us, slaves of new toys of communication, is abysmal. I-Pods and I-Phones are thrown at us like meat is thrown to the lions of the Coliseum. Those who run fast will most enjoy it.

I will absolutely buy an I-Phone, but I have not yet decided when. First, the price was prohibitive. Now there is a second version, better and much cheaper. So I decided to have a closer look at the I-Phone. Then someone said: the touch screen system is hopeless if you need to dial phone numbers.

I hesitate. It is inevitable that I take a closer look at the options, before making a move. In doing so I need to establish more precisely what needs I have, too.

I have concluded that over the past years my needs have evolved.

I need to increase my internet mobility. I do not want any third party dependence where it concerns my access to the internet, anytime and anywhere;

I also want to fully personalize – and centralize - my telephone access (by having just one telephone number);

I need a far greater mobile document retrieval or file storage facility than I have now. Each time I want to use or share a document I need to mail it to my various mail-accounts;

It makes sense to centralize my incoming and outgoing e-mail but also better organize and - partly - archive it.

But otherwise it is about communication, at least this is the case in my own life. Some 70 – 80 % of my present social life is conducted or supported by the internet (MSN, e-mail) and mobile telecommunication.

I want to be connected anytime and everywhere. It should be simple – i.e. easy to access and to handle – and it should be reliable. Also, I want to read, write and publish regardless of my location.

I believe we can all make such or similar assessment of our needs. This is particularly relevant at a time when new devices and new functions are being marketed in rapid succession. Indeed, if we do not wish to simply become docile consumers and allow our entire lives to become almost entirely directed by software programmers and telecommunication companies, then we should become pro-active users, on top of our own business and lifestyle. We should co-create the industry that serves us and not let it dominate us.

Ultimately every individual will become permanently connected. We may from time to time switch off, for instance when we sleep or when we are in a theatre or private party. Otherwise people will become a kind of internet or telecommunication device of their own, with many functions imbedded in our cloths or in just one slick rectangular device that does it all for us with a mere touch or sound of our voice (well, something like the I-Phone).

We will create our own permanent personal connection with the rest of the world and communicate, share, create and publish whatever we wish to share with others at smaller and larger scales.

I believe that this far from a prophetic view, for I do not describe anything impossible today. Most likely I am just re-iterating what is already in the instructions of existing devices, such as the I-Phone or other mobile communication facilities.

But the challenge is to turn those possibilities into their effective use. Across the board our world’s available technology far exceeds the grasp of it among the large majority of its consumers.

Our technology has become as incomprehensible for the average person as are the mechanisms of nature that sustain the cycle of life. Human technology is the third evolution of life itself [1].

If we wish to be connected as a human being, or as a business man, to the networks world wide of other human beings and business men, we should do so with a great clarity of mind as to what it is that we take out of it and perhaps most of all: what we want to put into it. We should create the proper identity (or even: identities) to maximize the benefits of being connected.

I am always there, from wherever you are, unless I am asleep.

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[1] ) The first evolution is of all physical nature and its laws. The second is the mechanism of life as we know it on Earth (Carbohydrate based self-replicating process).