News from the battlefront: "However beautiful the strategy,..."

"However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results."

These wonderful words were spoken by Winston Churchill many years ago. Although it refered more directly to tactical decisions taken during the Second World War, they have taken a more personal meaning when it comes to my own rhetorical battlefields.

Recently, I have found myself besieged by a barrage of ignorance at the hand of conspiracy theorists from all fronts. Alien abductees, Moon Landing Hoax advocates, creationists and Intelligent Design proponents have all leapt from their trenches and attempted to breach the No Man's Land of skepticism that separates us. And, for the most part, I have been successful in machine-gunning them down to their knees thanks to my trusty Thompson of Bullshit Detection +2.

Unfortunately one particular conspiracy theorist has utilized what I call the Divide and Conquer routine in which he has gone beyond artillery bombardment and indulged in the use of a rather anachronistic orbital weapon's platform, outgunning me severely as I attempted to respect the rules of engagement. A myriad of his Katyusha rockets were fired in the shortest amount of time and, being alone on my side of the trench, I found myself spending an inordinate amount of time writing lengthy replies to each point. But no sooner had I loaded my trusty mortar with a reply, that ten other fallacious rockets were fired at me. I was outgunned and outnumbered.

I do not really feel bad about waving the White Flag of Surrender, for his parting words to me indicated that he felt that he was the last soldier on his side of the field and that no other crusader would follow in his muddied footsteps. This made me think about Winston Churchill's fateful words. Is my diplomacy what attracts these marauders? Is it my friendly demeanour or the fact that I play by the rules? Should I adopt a more ferociously martial predisposition to my opponent? My method is elegant, my uniform is spotless and many of my fellow comrades have complimented me upon this, but do my few war trophies truly vindicate my strategy? Isn't it time that I sullied the uniform, grabbed the nearest bayonet and blitzkrieged right back at them?

That is something that I will have to consider in the future.

Over and out.

~Nils

A brief introduction

Greetings and well met,

I suppose that it was inevitable that I would migrate to a somewhat more serious blog community. The blame rests entirely upon my friend Amber's shoulders, to whom I owe both the invitation and the motivation to start this new journal-cum-weblog.

My name is Nils, a name that was given to me in memory of my adoptive grandfather. I am of Anglo-Norwegian descent and currently live in the United Kingdom. I will always consider myself a citizen of the World and I shun all forms of nationalism because I do consider myself beyond such weak and intangible notions. I am above all human; national and social apartheids mean very little to me.

I am a skeptically-minded person. I really do operate along the principle of the scientific method and the default stance of skepticism. This is mostly due to my academic upbringing in linguistics, archaeology and history. This is not to say that I am a negative person, rather the contrary: I consider myself to be desperately optimistic. It is important to differentiate open-mindedness with gullibility.

My purpose in utilizing this new format in lieu of my current MySpace blog is to ensure that I possess a somewhat more permanent online presence that is currently not guaranteed by the present form and instability of MySpace, its internal politics and its itinerant immaturity.

I am a keen student of theology, comparative religious studies, logic, practical archaeology, science, technology, antiquity and medieval history. My personal academic expertise is the study of Scandinavian medieval history, as well as arctic archaeology and Scandinavian languages. I am also a fervent humanist and a vociferous advocate of secularism in our societies. These are some of the many subjects that I will pursue in this new blog format, although I will also post some of my personal photography, interesting news items, and various other random thoughts (music, personal thoughts, social events, etc.

Peace be with you,

~Nils