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Speaking ill of my own nation always makes my feel like a heretic. Nationalism is now what religion used to be and any criticism of one’s own people is likely to be treated as treason by one’s compatriots – albeit as insanity by all others. To paraphrase the nationalist theorist Ernest Gellner: we now worship ourselves as we formerly worshiped God.

When Poland entered European Union more than three years ago, I was overly enthusiastic. Deep in my heart I was hoping that the demagoguery of the Eurosceptics would become at least partly true and Poland would lose some of its ultra-nationalist fervor. I hoped that the EU’s twelve stars will cast some light on my country and finally place us on a glorious path of enlightenment. I believed that our xenophobia, homophobia and Antisemitism would evaporate along with our “almost fanatical devotion to the Pope”, as Michael Palin of Monty Python once put it. (more…)

In a recent interview with IDG NOW magazine, Ian Pearson, British Telecom’s so-called “futurologist”, claimed that within 10 years scientists will be able to create computers that are only intelligent, but also conscious like us. The grim visions of terminator-like wars for energy and resources, combined with the heat of the Fijian night, kept me awake ’till the early morning hours. I only fell asleep, when it struck me that machines may as well help us solve the problems of global warming, hunger and poverty. (more…)