Cogs can think.

And it’s been like this all week. I hug global warming!

Princess Maxima, Prince Heir Willem-Alexander, Queen Beatrix

How unnervingly moving is this.

It was Koninginnedag today in The Netherlands. An Afghan refugee, who fled to our country in 2001, walked 50km from Heerenveen to Franeker last night. Franeker is one of the cities the Royal Family visited today. It was his goal to extend a personal letter to the Queen in which he thanked her for the support The Netherlands has given, and is giving, to the Afghan people.

Noble.

He got to shake the Queen’s hands, but she didn’t take the letter. He got to shake the Prince Heir’s hand, but he didn’t take the letter (these people have to shake 4395398589307593 hands, no surprise there).

He was sad.

And then, at the last minute, Princess Laurentien passed by. She shook his hand, he explained his intentions, and Princess Laurentien took his letter, and assured him she’d give it to the Queen.

God I love this place.

I need to make a mark fast. I need to get really rich, really quick. I discovered a grey hair. Now, I’m already balding badly, but the grey hair did it.

Soon, I’ll be 30 and married. I’ll have 2.3 kids, a Korean SUV, and a dreadful 9-to-5. In other words, I’ll be dead.

FIONA!

One key feature for most users was a sense of community. Even though blogging is an inherently one-to-many activity, most readers felt a personal connection to the author. This could foster the feeling that the reader belonged to the community even in the absence of participation, and led those who did participate via comments to agonize over their content.

Hi, I’m Thom Arvid Holwerda, born on 1 December 1984. I have two brothers I never talk about, because their (in)actions severely damaged the connection I had with them - most likely beyond repair. And I don’t even care. My mother suffered from breast cancer a few years ago, which taught me a serious lesson about mortality. I have a lot of friends whom I appreciate and love dearly. I vehemently oppose the death penalty, legalised guns, and intolerance. The principle of unconditional equality is one of the two most important values - together with unconditional loyalty to the people I care about.

I am superawesome, incredibly smart, incomprehensibly funny, and NOT AT ALL ARROGANT.

Now, CONNECT GODDAMNIT.

It seems I have seriously changed my preference in women. And then I mean the looks department, as the character department is still the same.

I used to be a total long dark hair person, and eyes didn’t really matter to me. However, these days, I’m totally into lighter hair colours, preferably natural blonde, with bright, blue eyes. Blue eyes are enchanting. Green eyes are okay too - my Fiona has them, and one of my ex-girlfriends had them too. Green eyes are mysterious. My eyes are darkblueishgrey, by the way.

My last, err, object of affection had brown eyes. Maybe that was why it went so horribly, horribly wrong.

I SURE FCUKING HOPE SO.

There’s one moral issue I’ve been struggling with for a long time now.

You see, for everything in this country, you’ll need a permit, a license. Want to drive a car or a motorcycle? Better invest thousands of Euros in driving lessons and a license. Want to externally alter your house in any way (even if you own it)? You need to get a permit from the local government. Want to go fishing? Get a fishing permit.

Want children? Go fcuk someone and pop out a kid nine months later. No permit needed, no license, no lessons. You need not pass any tests of competence.

Which is peculiar, to say the least. Raising children isn’t an easy task, and requires strength of will, determination, and the ability to completely put your personal needs aside for the benefit of your child. You need to be able to make yourself irrelevant, as the well-being of your child is much more important than your own. Not everyone has the ability to do this. Not everyone has the ability to love someone else unconditionally.

My parents have. That’s why I turned out so loving, caring, and all-round SUPERDUPER AWESOME.

However, a lot of people don’t. This year’s ’spring break’ (to put it new worldishly) lasts two weeks instead of just one. This is causing problems for many parents, as their jobs may not allow them to take two weeks off instead of just one. Complaints aplenty.

Well, tough luck. In order to fix this, you might have to organise spring break differently this time. Instead of both parents taking one week off at the same time so you can go on vacation, you’ll have to be a bit more inventive and, for instance, have mommy take the first week off, and daddy the second week. It’s not as if the vacation dates for this school year weren’t already known for god knows how long.

When you have kids, you’ll have to make concessions. You can’t and both have full-time jobs, and go out every weekend, and go on vacation whenever you wish, and have children. It just doesn’t work that way. You effectively gave all that up the moment you both decided to have a go at it without the pill.

This is not all the parents’ fault, of course. Especially when it comes to single-parent families, or simply poorer families, our government is not doing enough to help these people in their times of need. Welfare checks are way too low, and financial child support is near nothing. Which is interesting, seeing the Christian parties have a strong say in parliament and the government.

So, what’s the moral issue? Well, should we allow just anyone to have children, uncontrollably, without any checks as to whether or not people are actually ready or capable of being good and responsible parents? Should child molesters be allowed to have children? What about murderers? The mentally ill? The mentally handicapped? Are those people capable of raising children? Should they have the right to have children?

What about this one? Should a daughter and her father be allowed to have children? Their first one died, their second one is still alive. They pleaded guilty immediately, explaining their relationship is completely consensual. The judge took the consensual nature into account, and released the parents with a 500 AUD fine.

It’s not the incestuous relationship itself that that is the problem here. I may have a deep and strong physical and mental aversion against the whole concept, but this does seem to be a consensual relationship - whether or not these people are psychologically sound and actually capable of making consensual decisions like this is a different matter altogether, and not for me to decide. The problem here, of course, is the children. Can these people be called responsible parents? These children have a high risk of serious genetic defects due to their incestuous parents, and it’d be hard to argue the parents did not know of this risk. In addition, these children will face a life of hell. Forever will they have to bear the burden of their heritage, there’s a large chance they will be outcasts, which may even lead to them developing serious psychological problems. And their own children, in the future, will still be susceptible to serious genetic defects.

Consequently, in my book, these people are not responsible parents, and therefore, should have never been allowed to have children in the first place.

The problem with this moral issue is this: who gets to decide if people are fit for parenting? Who gets to evaluate prospective parents and say, look, I’m sorry, but you are not fit for parenting? I think most of us can agree that child molesters should not have children, but what about all the border cases? Heck, I’m sure there are many who would consider the right to have children so sacred, that it cannot be taken away, not even from child molesters.

So you see my dilemma.

My previous entry got hijacked (unintentionally, I’m sure) by a religious debate - welcome to teh intertubes, I suppose.

Anyway, this link got posted. A quote:

ATHEISM IS NOT A RELIGION OR A FAITH!

Atheism, by definition, is the absence of theism. If you cannot say “I believe in a Deity/God/Supreme Being” then you are an atheist. If you are not a theist, then you are an atheist.

And thank you for the insult. Let me explain.

I am not religious, and do not ‘believe’ in a god/do not think there is a god. In fact, I don’t really give a damn either - my life is perfectly complete without guys with beards in the sky telling me what (not) to do. I don’t need a book to tell me how to behave. I’m fine with people needing the guys with beards and the books, don’t get me wrong, but I’m fine without it.

However, I do not, in any way, wish to be associated with “atheism”. People who call themselves atheists have this very, very nasty habit of feeling superior to religious people, of looking down upon them, of belittling them. “Atheists” never pass on an opportunity to profess their atheism, their moral superiority, and they more often than not try to convert religious people to atheism.

Exactly. For all intents and purposes, atheism has become a religion in and of itself, complete with feelings of moral superiority to those who are not atheists and a drive to convert others to atheism (to spread the faith). So yes, if you look at the true meaning of the word, anyone who doesn’t do the beard and book stuff, is an atheist. However, out in the real world, atheism means a whole lot more, something I do not wish to be associated with.

Of course not all atheists are like that, but many of them are, and they ruined it for everyone else. Which, coincidentally, brings atheism yet another step closer to religion.

Scientific research like this interests me beyond imagination. I find it fascinating how researchers find pieces of real-world evidence that actually support many myths and legends found in cultures all over the world. Fire raining from the sky, as in Sodom and Gomorra, is not something exclusive to the bible/torah - similar myths and legends can be found all over the world. The same thing goes for the story of Noah, and the big flood God caused to whipe the slate clean. Stories of such epic floods can be found in cultures as diverse as the Mayans, Egyptians, and our Christian/Muslim/Judaic cultures (let’s face it, those last three are more or less the same).

To me, this indicates that various global disasters are somehow engraved in mankind’s collective consciousness. It is not hard to imagine that the end of some ice age, which obviously would lead to a dramatic rise in sea level and loss of habitable land all over the world, has somehow made its way to various folk tales and myths, passed on from generation to generation, until someone decided to pen them down - like the writers of the Old Testament did.

Personally, I think cellular memory can account for more of these kinds of cases. Take the dragon, for instance. Dragons appear in cultures all over the world, in one form or another. In any case, lizard-like creatures that may or may not breath fire. Now, how can you explain that cultures that have never had any contact with one another, share the concept of the ‘dragon’?

To me, cellular memory is something that may explain this. Even though this is utterly speculative, with no roots in any proper scientific studies that I know of, I think it would be feasible that our early ancestors - small rodent mammals - who lived during the ages of the dinosaurs, somehow engraved “memories” of these gigantic creatures into their cells, over long periods of time.

Evolution took its course, eventually leading to us - a species with a very well developed brains, most likely the first ever brain capable of ‘wording’, of ‘communicating’, bits and pieces of this cellular memory, leading to the fact that the ‘dragon concept’ manifested itself all over the world.

Despite there being no scientific base for these claims, it seems reasonable to me, it makes sense to me. It can explain many startling similarities between vastly differing cultures, cultures that may not have even existed alongside one another during the same timespan.

Think about this one for a while. It’s interesting material, and I’ve always been saddened by the fact that studies into this matter are far, far beyond my capabilities.

As long as they don’t start squealing, toddlers can actually be kind of fun and cute. At work today, a customer comes in with his little son, probably about 2 years old. He was wearing this miniature version of a blue worker’s overall, with baby wellingtons on his feet, and it just looked SO DARN CUTE.

I’m so going to make my future son wear one of those overalls at all times, including the wellingtons. Even at night.

And then, when he gets older, he’ll buy a pick up truck, and he’ll shoot at birds with bb guns. And I’m going to be SO PROUD.

I never understood the world’s obsession with gold. What’s so enchanting about this metal? It’s too soft and heavy to be of any real use, and yes, it’s resistant to corrosion, but so are many other metals. I find gold’s colour ugly; it lacks depth. And gold isn’t even that rare compared to, say, platinum.

To me, silver and especially platinum are much more attractive. I love the ‘depth’ of platinum; it’s like nature captured the depth of the ocean between a plate of silver and glass. It’s exceptionally beautiful.

Repeat after me: gold is tacky, platinum is classy.