How it’s possible

When I was little (under 12), and I was in a rush to get somewhere, I would just look at my watch while I walked. I would stare at it. Counting every second. Feeling every moment fade away while I continued to not be at my destination. Until suddenly I was there.

Of course this is not “time travel”. And yet it sort of is in its own unique way. It’s all about the perception of time while moving in space. Before you blaze through that last sentence, let me break it down because it’s the key: perception while moving

— Said everyone, always

One of the perks of being 31 in an era where everything happens faster and faster each year is that I get to be a bitter old man long before my ancestors had to. I’m not gonna turn this into self-promotion and tell you my story of why exactly I have grown up so fast.

Every year, at some point, I start hearing people say “___ sucks”. The positive among the bunch will joke and say that they will just go to sleep now and next year will be better. Well, there’s even a German song about 2020 called “WTF”…

And the politics of life afterwards

Before we get started, I have to tell you two things:

I have a weird psychological relationship with death.
I have never told this story so openly to the world.

Ever since I was younger, I contemplated suicide for several reasons. Sometimes it was depression, other times it was curiosity about this “God” people talked about. More often, however, I simply wondered what it would be like to be dead; and the answer was never far away at any moment if I truly chose to seek the answer.

I don’t know if this weird relationship with death also came because…

Because he knew “everything” was a miracle that couldn’t be theorized

Before we get started, we need to be very clear about one thing: I am not saying this is the way things are, I’m saying this is the way they are made to be. Big difference, no time to explain it right now.

The reason why we don’t have time to explain right now is because we need to focus on one thing, and one thing only.

What’s that?
I know, I know! Just hear me out! I know we can’t talk about everything… or, anything, really… unless we really hyper-focus. …

Why they are fundamentally different

Over the past couple of years I’ve realized that his has become the example that I give people when I say that there is a fine but fundamental difference between some terms. I’ve gotten to a point where I can do it in Spanish (escoger vs decidir), Italian (scegliere vs decidere) or German (auswählen vs entscheiden). So what’s this fundamental difference?

Here we go


Picture this: you’re in a situation where you have to choose between this thing or that thing. Between this action or that action, or perhaps even between doing and not doing. What do you do?


Su relación con la nacionalidad y los pasaportes

Puede parecer una pregunta trivial. La mayoría de la gente simplemente nace con la ciudadanía de un país en particular (o con suerte, de varios). Pero algunas personas, probablemente académicos, verían esta pregunta como compleja ya que puede tener connotaciones legales, políticas, socio-psicológicas e históricas.

Nosotros estamos aquí para hablar sobre la ciudadanía legal y lo que implica.

… No es residencia permanente

Tal vez esta sea la distinción más fácil de establecer. Cuando alguien tiene residencia permanente en un país, eso no significa en absoluto que tengan ciudadanía legal. Quienes gozan de residencia permanente no tienen, sin embargo, todos…

Its relationship to Nationality and Passports

It might seem like a trivial question. Most people are simply born with the citizenship of a particular country (or if they are lucky, with several). But some people, likely academics, might see this as an inherently complex question because it can have legal, political, socio-psychological and historical connotations.

The focus of this article is not socio-psychological or even necessarily political.

We’re here to talk about legal citizenship and what it entails.

… Not Permanent Residence

This is perhaps the easiest distinction that can be drawn. When someone has permanent residence in a country, this does not at all mean…

Articles towards a European Citizenry

Some variation of this phrase is written into the very beginning of several founding documents. It is in the Preambles of the US Constitution, the UN Charter, and the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, thus highlighting both the international character and the very European nature of this statement. Yet at the very core of this statement lies the question of citizenship. Who is “we”? How are we “a people”? What makes someone a citizen?

The Most Important Right of All

Without sounding controversial or hierarchical, there is arguably one right that matters above all others. …

The Peaceful Kind of Weapons

Somewhere along the line, humanity seems to have forgotten that “the pen is mightier than the sword”.

Maybe it was with the invention of the bow and arrow some 1700 years ago, which allowed us to take down our enemies from a distance. Or maybe it was with the invention of pistons and machine guns, and their usage in WWI which allowed us not only to kill from a distance but also to kill without even aiming properly.

But arguably, it was the invention of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs) that played a role in ending WWII.

In 2020, we…

How to overcome binary reasoning, and “good vs evil”

As I stated from the outset, the core purpose of these essays is to propose a new philosophy founded on will. However, every article after the first one seemed to be focused on black vs white and the concept of grey/grayness. The reason for that is because this whole conception of “will” relies on the fact that to overcome binary thinking, we need a willful/conscious effort to decide/create a middle path rather than accept a given set of binary choices (which are most easily represented as black-vs-white).

When I first introduced grey, some would argue that it was hypocritical.

æ | Ed Alvarado

🌎 Citizen 📝 Citizenship, Diplomacy, & International Relations/Law 🤓Philosophy, Logic and Psychology 🟣@VoltEuropa

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