Mutual respect for other’s opinions

If I would have been a U.S. citizen, I would have voted for Obama now that Ron Paul was no more candidate. Although back then I didn’t know enough about Ron Paul to have voted for him instead of Obama.

That doesn’t mean I must somehow dislike McCain, although at the end of the race I didn’t like how he campaigned. He has regained much of my respect after his concession speech. I really hope both Democrats and Republicans will listen to what he told you guys in that speech.

A lot of what Europeans think is wrong in America is exactly the kind of black and white thinking that must be overcome and that McCain & Obama have seemingly tried to address in both their speeches. Although we have our share of black & white thinkers too, sure.

Wrong & right, evil & good, right or wrong: none of these concepts really exist. They are just models. I convinced myself that of all candidates, Obama understands this most. He will listen to you, especially when you disagree, he said.

It’s in disagreement that we humans learn most from each other. It’s in cooperation and mutual respect that we make most progression.

The only rational conclusion a rationalist like me can make is that there’s no black and white. There are many shades of gray and on top of that there are many eyes who all have shades of different opinions. War, is something that turns eyes into black and white.

I conclude that the moral of respect for other opinions is still a successful meme: we saw McCain shush his audience when they were being disrespectful for the outcome of the election, we saw him giving a brave and gentleman concession speech. I repeat that I consider this meme to be the most important one humanity ever got convinced of. And for this reason, McCain has regained my respect.

Today, I’m happy that I visited the Boston Summit this year. I was in America when there was hope, now I can visit it again when there will be change.

Right?

I can see! And so can you.

I can see Great Britain, France, The Netherlands, Luxembourg and Germany from a lot of parts of my country.

Although I’m not sure about Great Britain, the distance between Koksijde and Ramsgate is a full 51.49 miles whereas the distance between Dezhnevo and Bering Strait is only a small 52.07 miles. But apparently are the eyes of certain people in Alaska better than mine. Must have something to do with training your eyes while shooting moose? I never tried but can you see Dover from Calais? It’s only 25 miles!

I was told that the human eye can see on average 10 kilometers. Greatly depending on weather conditions (and of course the size of the object). That’s 6.2137 miles by the way.

I congratulate the people in the United States of America who have voted today. Remember that your new vice president wont have such great eyes! Let’s hope that the Russians wont attack now that they know the people in The White House don’t have great eyes!