David's World

December 19, 2004

blogito ergo sum.

Why do people blog? Why bother telling thousands of people (yes, you!) out there about my life?

First of all, there are probably not thousands of people who read this. It's an illusion to think that our lives are actually interesting. Reality TV has worn off. It's an even more common illusion to think that we all have something to tell. The sad answer is, we have very little to say to the world. That's why nobody switches on his TV at prime time to see - me. Blogging gives me and all the others the illusion to have an impact on the world.

So, are we all unimportant? In a sense, yes. There's a nice story in Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker triology, that boils down to an explanation of the electric chair of the future: The Total Perspective Vortex. To kill a man, show him how small he his compared to the universe. The pope doesn't matter. Usama doesn't matter. Edison didn't make a difference to the universe. Earth will be destroyed sooner or later, so why care?

Maybe I'll answer this another time. For now it may suffice to say that a butterfly in the amazonas can create a tornado in the US Great Plains. Why not be a butterfly?

I for my part will leave notes and ideas here, notoriously replying to rhetorical questions with the wrong answer, as another way to tell myself: David, you're alive!