I walk the streets of Western thought. They have been well-trodden since Roman times, connecting centers of power and establishing a unique logic of knowledge exchange. They connect points, their nodes are central, the path itself is tedious, arduous. A culture of monuments developed on these streets, leading to accumulations of knowledge and power. Division of labor led to specialization and progress. A society emerges in which the individual is understood as a social being, whose social reality is governed by rules...
Sometimes I react strangely. Someone does something unexpected, an uncertainty within me is awakened. How do I process that and how do I react to it, and what does "react" even mean here? So it's about expectation, a being in the world that anticipates. The future is considered predictable and is also seen as such. If I do this or that, someone might react in one way or another. But sometimes it happens that the other person's reaction is different. I...
Game – Misstep
In the West, I used to think that playing games had to do with "games" in the sense of playing video games and that video games had rules. Playing a game means entering a space that is limited by rules, and within these parameters, the player can develop strategies to act according to the rules with the goal of winning. There is the broader theory of games, which has been applied to sociology and other fields, and there are computer simulations that test hypotheses based on...
Standing on the loading bed of a small truck, I've been driving around Auroville these past few days, collecting various items for the Potters Market. These small trucks are the big brothers of tuk-tuks. Sometimes you see six or seven dozen people standing on them when a big festival is coming up. It's a popular mode of transport for people in the villages when they travel long distances together to be close to the gods. It's surprising how safe it is...
On a boulevard in Paris, a café and bad music, sun and many people. So many people want to be seen. They present themselves as busy, sexy, cool, knowledgeable, adventurous, athletic, educated, cultured, or indifferent. Many want others to notice them. They see this as who they want to be. Perhaps they live their lives in a certain way, happy and content, or externally influenced and bored, outcast or privileged. That's the beauty of Paris and other big cities, that people...
Life is so complex, and there are so many different ways to live. There is no right or wrong way to live. Life is a gift. But what do you say about the negative energies, destruction and aggression, greed and envy? All of that is part of it. There is only acceptance. But acceptance doesn't mean approving of everything, nor does it mean tolerating everything. If a community decides to establish rules and penalize the violation of those rules, then…
I live in a hypercomplex society. I notice this in political and social issues, which nobody can truly grasp in their complexity anymore. We can hold onto principles, for example, justice, equality, freedom, consideration, sustainability, etc. But when it comes to concrete actions, it gets difficult. Should I take one side or the other in a conflict, or is there a third way? Which of my own actions should I change, and how radical should I be…