The first good thing to do is to prevent bad things from happening, and to recover well from the ones that could not be prevented.
As the first goal will probably never be finished, we can at the same time work on realizing good things.
Good things are the pleasant parts of life, which makes it impossible to define what good things are. The pleasant kind of emotions aren't caused by equal situations for everyone, and it can even change for one person from time to time.
Beauty
I wonder about if beauty can be described by one or a couple of numbers. The number Phi (not Pi), called the "golden ratio", would be the prime candidate: 1.618 (approximately). This ratio number can be found in nature very often.
When composing a drawing, music, a building, or even text or an event, it's always playing around with options until "it feels good". Especially when being completely free of realistic drag (what others want, little budget, and such).
The repetition of patterns is one thing appearing frequently in beautiful things. Symmetry; a repetition with a twist. There are a lot of simple ratios that we consider to be "harmonious" in music as well as in colors and distances. 1, 1/2, 1/3, 1/4, and such.
Could somebody's character be described by a set of ratio numbers?
On the other hand, if for example a piece of music is totally made from repeating harmonics, that would be boring, not beautiful. For something to be alive and interesting, it needs to be a bit off-perfect. Imagine everybody having the exact same Phi face, that would be terrible!
But than again, if a face is too far off the ratios we like, we don't like that and call it ugly. If the ratios are even further away, we don't even recognize it as something.
What I consider to be good things
It's not right to dictate to others what is good and what isn't. Although the like and dislike of many people show -on avarage- a lot of similaritie, it's very personal and dynamic, so it would be wrong to make a fixed definition of what is good and what is bad. What do you at this moment think is: fun, beautiful, interesting, important, cool, relaxing, exciting?
Here's some things I at this moment think are good things:
Experimenting
Doing unusual things to see if it goes anywhere interesting is a good thing, if you like evolution. Most experiments won't go anywhere, but to know what doesn't work is valuable information also. Repeating the ordinary will probably not get you to an exiting new whatever, but experimenting probably will. Experiments can and probably will bring troubles also. New situations can hurt easily because of being unknown. New things that work can be good as well as bad. So, experimenting is important, but should be done with caution.
Playing around
Making music, dancing, writing, gaming, sporting. Being creative & hanging around. It's nothing special, but it can be fun and keep you in shape. In contrast to having a terrible job or/and watching that crap on TV all the time.
Architecture
The buildings we live in, the streets we walk through, where the children play and learn, where we do or jobs. Our surroundings are a part of our live. If the architecture of not just the buildings we live in, but of most of our surroundings is pleasant to be in, then that's a good thing. How an organization is organized could also be seen as a kind of architecture. Now, most of the places build aren't build with beauty in mind, but with short term financial profit for some.
The place I had to recover from my accident.. I lived there for 2 long expensive and terrible years. Most of the people there were all right, but I'm sure that if I had no accident, but would have to stay there for just a week anyhow, that my healthy condition would go down hill fast because that health care building/institution is just such an unhealthy design. It was probably build with the goal to spend no more than the little budget there was, to make the best possible with that budget. Is should have been a place where I would like to visit sometimes, to see the place where I recovered so well in just a few monds. (That would have saved a lot of money also).
And I know this place was relatively good..
Sometimes the ugliness isn't caused by a lack of budget. To me it seems that many "architects" simply copy the ugliness that surrounds us in large quantities.
Building is so much easier than it used to be, so I really don't understand why they build so many boring boxes, even within a small budget.
Health care
I can tell you it can be terrible to have serious body malfunction. It would be great if we could repair vitualy everything that can be broken in our body. I'm a chicken, very afraid of what doctors do, because of the loss of control and the pain off course, but also because they are human (who are far from perfect), the technologies used, the chances of infections and other complications, the whole atmosphere of the building and the institution.
So, a great lot can be improved here, that would be a good thing.
Sharing knowledge
Each time we learn something, we can share that with who ever is interested. Especially now with the internet we can achieve amazing progress in very little time. But instead, because of the money thing, the war thing, and such, we "protect" new and even old & common ideas by patterns and the law with the thread of punishment, to prevent others from using it. This is a terrible drag on progress. It would be great if the reasons for this protective behavior would be gone.
Cleaning up the Earth
Or "getting the earth in balance". There are already too much people, or should I say that the way we live is polluting our beautiful little Earth. . We should slowly bring down the amount of people, or start living more ecological, or better: both. There is enough space on Earth for more people, but only at the cost of space, which is usually occupied by nature. I like great spaces with no people. We people are biological and thus part of nature. We did and do rape the other parts of nature, we even shit in our neighbors garden. We should clean up our mess, bring down our numbers, and help nature to restore. We have the power to make this a very green planet.
Developing new technologies
Technology has a dirty and sometimes drangeres image. It's true that our machines are poluting our world, and war is turning into a machine war, but it doesn't have to be like that. Technology can help you to do what you want. What people want can be the source of trouble. If you want to do green stuff and live in peace, technology can help with that too.
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- Exploring the universe
- Grow our own food; small scale biological farming
- Advanced education
- Creating life
- Building impressive architecture, just to show of we can.
- Upgrade the way we live
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Giesbert Nijhuis
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