Personal Log: Ben Versteegt

The entire government of Philosophers Inc has reacted with shock and dismay to the recent chain of violent events in the US. "Shocking. Absolutely shocking," described the secretary of Foreign Affairs the violence in the US this afternoon in a press conference. "We can only hope that all parties involved will sit down and talk instead of solving the situations with violence."

His words have fallen on deaf ears, however, as the army of Ariddia is preparing to invade the US to free their imprisoned citizens and rescue the rightful leader of the US, which has recently changed government. The tension throughout the entire region begins to rise to a point where escalation seems inevitable. In the aforementioned press conference, the president of our wise nation urged his fellow leaders to stay calm and solve the situation rationally. His appeal was mostly directed at B.Ush, the new self-proclaimed leader of Utter Stupidity, asking him why war seemed like such a good idea to him.

Other nations have not remained unstirred by recent events either. It is reported that Backwardistan's Relur Emerpus also is displeased about the way the Ariddian reported described his country. When the US was displayed by an Ariddian newspaper in a negative way (rightly so, according to this reporter), this was cause for the US to go to war. "We ask the rest of the international community not to get involved in this conflict," said the secretary of Foreign Affairs later on in the press conference. He expressed the hope that the Relur Emerpus would be so wise as to "hold his horses", to prevent this already delicate situation from increasing in complexity.

When asked whether or not he felt that the Ariddian newspaper article had been right about Utter Stupidity, the president replied that he couldn't share his feelings about the matter. He did say, however, that he felt that "some nations would do well to adopt Philosphers Inc's or, for that matter, Ariddia's philosophy on politics."

The president has offered to arrange peace talks between Ariddia and Utter Stupidity. The most gifted diplomats and political philosophers are standing by to travel to Ariddia and the US and view the matter philosophically, should the president's offer be accepted. Meanwhile, the military has been placed on medium alert.

"The outcome of these events may prove to affect the balance of power in the region," warned political analyst Ramp. "This situation will have long-lasting consequences if all parties involved are not extremely careful in their actions." She spoke of "region-wide trouble" if Ariddia would invade the US, but at the same time said she saw the need for a "more rightful and just government" in the US. "Perhaps a US government based on Ariddian values will strengthen instead of weaken regional stability."

I wanted to complain about Tiscali in this log entry, but Rob already beat me to it. Oh well. Suffice to say that Tiscali is not delivering any mails to me... so if I'm not replying to anything, you know why. The missing posts and mails will probably be delivered to me in the next couple of days.

Now for some happier news (for me anyway): my paper has been approved; the evaluation went well and ten studypoints are on their way to me. Woohoo! The title, if you want to know, was "Human Intelligence in Machines: Turing, French and Chatterbots" (translated title; the paper is in Dutch).

I also finished "Star Trek: The Lost Years", although I may have reported this in a previous blog... It was a nice book, if a little slow at first. I wanted to start reading "Imzadi" right after that book, but I got caught up in another book I was reading: "The Devil and God" ("Le Diable et le Bon Dieu") by Jean-Paul Sartre. I finished it yesterday. It's a play about good and evil, and in the end, the main character in the play realises that the only way for him to truly love people, is to lead them into battle, kill and punish them, and do evil. Man is thrown back into his own existence; people have an incredible fear of nothingness, of death. This is what it means to be thrown back at yourself: in death, you are nothing. In death, no one can follow. The finite existence of man implies that man is alone. God is merely an illusion to comfort the people, so says the main character. There is only the earthly life and if one dies, there is nothing anymore. The main character realises that everyone is alone and everyone suffers. To at least ease the pain of that suffering a bit, Goetz (the main character) decides to take charge over the troops and fight against the enemy. This is the only way for him to love the people he commands: to lead them into war. This paradox is fascinating, but also very depressing; which is something of a characteristic of Sartre's philosophy.

Another book I'm reading and have almost finished, is New Frontier 5: Martyr. It's a very exciting and also fun book, as are all books in the NF series. I'm looking forward to finally finishing this book (I had to stop reading it three times already in the last year due to lack of time) and to focus my attention on only one book again: "Imzadi". I hear it's great.

Back to FF: the Odyssey mission is slowly getting started. I've posted yesterday, and I want to post today as well, but I'm not going to say that, since every time I said in a blog that I wanted to post, I suddenly didn't have the time for it anymore. So, I'm not saying I'm going to post. Just so you know.

That's it for now, I guess. See you in a next blog.

Regs,
Ben.