ON YouTube Elon Musk, the Dan Dare of the 21st century, is posting fantasies almost daily about bringing “humanity” to Mars in pods!
As humans are getting into a retro-20th century geo-conflict over Nato expansionism and the Ukraine, Tesla’s co-founder is literally firing off on tangents. On YouTube we also see clips about Musk “threatening” China, Biden, Russia and even other billionaires, implying that he is going to surpass them all! Megalomania creeps in. It seems that extending “humanity” on earth somehow eludes the billionaire.
Reading between the fiction behind his plans for Mars, where one million people will be encapsulated in pods on an inhospitable planet, one wonders why?
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On Earth there are people still living in unhealthy environments, with little food, clean water and no escape. His “vision” is utterly self-serving and idiotic to say the least. Is no-one calling him out on this, or are sections of society so mesmerised by the hype that they incapable of rational critique? When it is even considered to alter the atmosphere by detonating nuclear bombs on Mars, Elon Musk is truly crazy! His narcissism has taken over!
The worst aspect of Musk is his self-appointed role as terrestrial, secular prophet of doom forecasts when he postulates about doom in about 12 years.
His down-to-earth technology has a future, but let us not be taken in by the hype surrounding interplanetary humans living in pods in the cosmos on Mars. When Dan Dare-fantasies and Star Trek fiction collide and Elon Musk takes the floor to fantasise on his interplanetary musings, then humanity is truly lost. Andrew Carnegie, a man of his time with his faults, gave his fortune away.
If one has not already done so, google Elon Musk and peruse the clips on YouTube surrounding Mars, stand back and reflect, look at the assumptions behind the claims, and then simply smile! It is going to come tumbling down.
John Edgar
Kilmaurs
I FOUND the letter from Maggie Chetty in Friday’s National incredible, the lack of under-standing of the geopolitical situation sublime.
Russia is controlled by an unreconstructed NKVD colonel who has already seized part of the Ukraine and is busily fomenting trouble in other areas of that country. Putin has massed 100,000 troops near the borders of Ukraine, a country which is no threat at all to Russia.
Ms Chetty seems to wish no international response to this piratical behaviour. I very much doubt that Biden wants anything to do with war, and not even our idiot Prime Minister wants war, but international misbehaviour does have to be checked. A sovereign European state is under threat of invasion.
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Ms Chetty goes on to mention China, failing to note the Uyghur and Hong Kong situation and the very grave situation in the China Sea. Taiwan is of course under various levels of threat all the time.
When dealing with both China and Russia, we are not dealing with normal administrations and this has to be factored in in any response. Writing hands and bleating about peace – as the Dutch, Danes and Norwegians found – can be a costly mistake.
R Mill Irving
Gifford, East Lothian
IT seems strange that Russia is concerned about having a Nato presence adjacent to its border. The Soviet Union, as heidbummer in the Warsaw Pact, had troops adjacent to West Germany until the wall came down and had Pact countries, eg Hungary, adjacent to neutral countries such as Austria. The present Russian state and its allies has borders against the Baltic countries. Russia has Kaliningrad, a large naval presence, next to Poland and Lithuania.
It seems that posturing a huge military deployment would look like Mr Putin has domestic concerns.
M Ross
Aviemore
ONE month into my recovery from a stroke, I would like to extend most sincere thanks to Wee Ginger Dug and his dad. I was lucky enough to meet Wee Ginger Dug on several occasions and know that his delightful photo, which we now get to see regularly in The National, is a true depiction of his good and most unusual looks, and also captures the special presence he had.
He commanded respect and affection in equal measure whether he was wandering about amongst Yes supporters at rallies after marches (never going too far from his dad in the statutory gazebo!) or strolling around the foyer of the Queen’s Hall in Edinburgh, as if he owned it!
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Paul has given me hope at a time when it has been hard to find, and has shown, through his courage, and honesty about his own journey post-strike, what is possible.
I wish him continued strength and health, not least as his acerbic descriptions of our current “leaders” at Westminster, and other Tories floating about on both sides of the Border, are a true tonic, and always make me smile as they are so unsparingly accurate!
Jenny Pearson
Edinburgh
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