Twitteretter

I have just taken a look at the Collins dictionary. I was interested in the word gig, defined as a life performance by someone such as a musician or a comedian, synonyms show, performance. The reason for this foray into the dictionary, which I rarely engage in, was the many references I find lately to the gig economy, basically to those without the protections afforded by normal employment, to the self employed, which have become one of the worst affected groups by the lockdown. Plumbers, handymen, drivers for hire and the like. I get the simile to gig performers, who suffer with the same uncertainty and insecurity, but gig is a specific term implying performance of a public nature. I guess politicians prefer to use that somewhat positive connotation than the unsecured or working not employed, which would be more accurate and descriptive. Wait… Politicians… Accurate… Descriptive… I see the problem. I guess insecurity is not great, but thinking you are gigging does make it sound cooler ...

We have a problem. The Independent reveals today that top supermarkets in the UK throw away enough food to put together 190 million meals per year. This does not even account for what we, the consumers, dispose of. At the same time, 100,000 children go hungry every day and 280,000 homeless people roam the streets, again, hungry. Get your calculator out. The food discarded by the supermarkets, sent to landfill and to, as it decomposes, generate greenhouse gases, would be enough to give each of these people one and a half meals per day, all year round. We could, pretty much for free, eradicate hunger, an embarrassment to a country with the resources of the UK. The fact that we don’t, that there seems to be no willingness, by government, supermarkets or even the public, is despicable and infuriating. We, the public, can fix this, by pressurising the supermarkets to develop a system that efficiently transfers that unwanted food to those who want it. Logistics, after all, are their strength...

When it comes to living life, one of the choices to be made is whether to just live it, day to day, slowly advancing towards death without a narrative, or whether to search for meaning, to try to make your life count for something, to make a difference (whatever you may find your meaning in). Searching for meaning may make life more fulfilling, at least when you find it. The searchers like to think so. But, also, searching makes life undoubtedly harder. It is not enough to just live, the searchers demand more, expect more from their existence. As a consequence, what would for others be a perfectly fine day, for the searcher is a day wasted, if it does not contribute to the existential narrative. The temptation of nihilism is always there, the void, its tempting mindless rest, which the searcher, at times of exhaustion, envies of others. But, alas, once you choose meaning, giving into the void would be admitting defeat, calling it quits, which the searcher, invariably, refuses to do Len...

In terms of morality, it is not difficult to talk a good game, to take the moral high ground when decisions are theoretical. But, as they become real, and as the stakes get high, we soon find talk is cheap and not many who talk the talk will walk the walk. We are seeing a startling example of this with coronavirus vaccination. I was offered to vaccinate, well before my turn is due, a couple of days ago, in that grey area of unclaimed vaccines. The temptation to yield, to give in, to lower the bar and walk from the moral high ground to the valley of convenience was certainly there. The decision, should I have taken it, not that hard to justify to myself. Surely my importance to economic activity and my efforts to develop solutions to coronavirus itself making me deserving of early vaccination, a win for society should I take the chance offered. A duty, almost, to jump the queue. But also false, a theft of a vaccine from someone who needs it more than me. My turn will come, in due course...

I had a business meeting today which mainly revolved around Star Wars, featuring my not very good Darth Vader impression and some espresso machine jokes. This may seem unusual, or even incredible, to you, especially if you are not involved in business or if you are, but have not properly understood it. Business, you see, is part of life, for those involved in it. It does not exist to serve money, an inert object which needs no servicing, but rather to serve people, its participants. If you understand this, and many don’t, you then also understand it must be fun and not taken overly seriously. A willing, cooperating, organised group of highly prepared, motivated humans, can achieve a lot. The real trick is to achieve it whilst, at the same time, enjoying it, contributing to creating a virtuous circle around willingness, cooperation and motivation, a self-feeding success. This obvious fact is often missed by those in business who, lacking the perspective of distance, miss its real purpos...

Reading Thomas More’s ‘Utopia’, his imagining of an ideal society in the XVI century, one is also reminded, by contrast, of the conditions in his home country, England, at the time. One specific passage explains that theft, however small, was punished by death. This is certainly Draconian. We are living through a period where getting vaccinated against coronavirus, at least for those who have not surrendered their brains to mindless conspiracies, is a primary aspiration. And UK pharmacies are offering some vaccines outside of the government priority lists, under the counter, if you like. All you have to do, if offered, is lie about your circumstance, invent some vulnerable household member whose life is at risk while you don’t vaccinate. The problem is, in so doing, you are stealing the vaccine from those who do need it, putting them further down the list and, by doing so, putting their life at risk. It may look like a victimless crime, but although it is a crime, victimless it is not ...

Vaccination is not about individual protection, but group protection. What this really means is that a vaccine with 95% protection will be ineffective if only 60% of people use it, whilst a vaccine with 65% protection will be effective if 95% of people use it. It is not about doting an individual with a shining, Arthurian armour, but about impairing the ability of the virus to spread in a population, so that its famous R number dwindles, and the virus does with it. This poses a significant problem for our highly individualistic societies. It seems, in fact, that many people are incapable of thinking in these terms. They only care, can think of or understand individual protection. The concept of group protection, maybe the concept of group or collective all in all, is beyond them, as if their ability for collectivism, precisely the ability that made humans who we are, has completely deserted them at a fundamental level. The virus, of course, hunts in groups, we must defend as a herd Len...