Tor Rønnow

6 Star Finisher 7 Continents Finisher 75 Marathon countries Author of best-seller running book Mountain hiker Off-piste alpine skier Chess player

Life according to Science

So, Science tells us the truth ? Ok. Here comes the short version of ‘Life’.

At some point in time, Carbon, Nitrogen and Hydrogen begins to cluster together in the thermodynamically favored structures called Nucleotides… and due to a subtle twist in the cosmic radiance, L-amino acids are formed primarilly (not D-amino acids). In combination and again by chance, life evolves around these very structures, the Nucelotides and the Proteins. Ok, throw in a few Carbohydrates and other stuff as well… all in all, we have the one-celled life organisms.

Even here, what happens ? WAR ! In order to survive, the organisms begin a chemical warfare first by simple chemical compounds. Later, the cells begin to differentiate (eg. welcome to the mitochondrians) and later again the organisms begin to develop specialized organs (welcome, penis 😉 ). All this to protect the survival of the initial microorganisms. Yes, taken to it’s ultimate argument…. and to cut a few steps in the story of evolution … the scientifical ‘fact’ is that we humans live only to carry futher the content of our microbiologocal flora in our intestines ! Think about that the next time you sit on the toilet. And forget about your career, sport interests and other ‘human interests and feelings’… according to science, they are not of interest or any meaning at all ! At least not in the quest of evolution.

So… do you really want to face and interprete your life according to Science only ?

I don’t ! 

Heavy Metal

Take a good look at this picture 😉

Medals from the World Major Marathons

So – what is it ?

It is my finisher medals collected at the five World Major Marathons, the five greatest and most prestigeous marathon races in the World, i.e. the London, Berlin, New York, Boston and Chicago marathons.

I have had the pleasure to travel with the Danish ‘Marathon Travel’ to these races and with great expericences and friendships in the bag as well.

I can only recommend you to take on the challenge of collecting these heavy, hard earned pieces of metal ! You will meet the very moments of peak experience and personal fulfillment at these Majors !

You find, as always, pictures from these races in my list ‘MY MARATHONS’ in the menu at right (or use the links in the text above). 

31 marathons in 2007 !

Time to account for 2007: 31 completed marathons in the book and one DNF. Two months (Feb and Aug) with just one run.

31 marathons ! That is just insane !  Some of the biggest experiences were collected in the big city marathons like Barcelona, Rome, Boston, Vienna and Chicago… but for sure, many of the small races are close to the heart as well, cf. my previous post on the best marathons of 2007.

Another great goal was also reached, namely the completion of the ‘World Major Marathons’ … for me, done by Boston and Chicago in 2007 (Berlin, London and New York already done).

So…. time to be happy… best wishes for 2008 !

Happy Tor at Socialmarathon 31-DEC-2007

The best marathons in 2007

Just like last year, I give my you my take on the best marathons in 2007, i.e. amongst the ones I have participated in myself. Incredibly, it looks like that I will reach 31 marathons completed in 2007 alone (still have two to do during the Christmas holiday !) making it 66 in toto for me ultimo 2007.

I have divided the marathons into four groups. I have left ‘my own’ run GARMIN Rudersdal marathon out of my evaluation, of course I find that marathon to be a very, very special one – for a number of both subjective and objective reasons, but nevertheless I’ll not rank it here amongst the other races.

As always, you find links to the races via ‘My marathons’ in the menu.

Overall
1. Vienna (Austria)
2. Rome (Italy)
3. Barcelona (Spain)
4. Storebaelt Nature (Denmark)
5. Banemarathon (Denmark)

Big-city marathons
1. Vienna (Austria)
2. Rome (Italy)
3. Barcelona (Spain)
4. Boston (USA)
5. Chicago (USA)

Nature
1. Storebaelt Nature (Denmark)
    (well, and GARMIN Rudersdal ! ;))
2. Vänersborg (Sweden)
3. Magdeburg (Germany)
4. Natursti (Denmark)
5. Öland (Sweden)

 Small races
1. Storebaelt Nature (Denmark)
2. Banemarathon (Denmark)
3. Vänersborg (Sweden)
4. Sydkystmarathon (Denmark)
5. Zürich New Year Midnight marathon (Switerzerland)
    (DNF for me, but a great experience !)
 

These are lists based on my personal experiences, of course. To mentain memory of the best races ‘ever’, I better have a category of the ‘all-time best’ marathons as well. Here, the big marathons do live up to their famous names !

Best ever
1. New York (USA)
2. Hamburg (Germany)
3. Vienna (Austria)
4. Rome (Italy)
5. Berlin (Germany)

Programmed Philosophy

Being a programmer is fun ! Many things are based on logic, on knowledge of a certain scoped knowledge-material… and then the task is to be creative and find solutions to stated, explicit requirements. Pretty easy, basically, at least after the many hours of studying and learning are over.

Being a Philosopher stinks 😉 You may think and write stuff your whole life… and you may never find out if it was worth a damned penny at all. So why – WHY – at all care to think or contemplate about anything ‘deep’ during your lifetime ? No, no, no… go for the money, fame and sex … and enjoy the ride all the way to the graveyard, right ? Perhaps.

Well…maybe not. Maybe we have in our nature as Human Beings to become philosophical about life and the meaning of it at some point in our lives. So… good news.. for your lazy guys out there, I have created a small piece of vb.net programming that will spare your some efforts. Go on, give it a read and a tought.

Dim GodExists As Boolean
Dim ScienceIsTrue As Boolean
Dim PhilosophicalHeadline As String
Dim Conclusion as String

If GodExists = True and ScienceIsTrue = True Then
 PhilosophicalHeadline = “God exists ! All questions or metaphysical considerations are irrelevant if God exists. Period !”
 Conclusion = “God Exists and let’s Mankind play around with Science. However, God may or may not determine (at any point in Time) to ‘make new decisions’, ultimately underpinning the true permanent consequences of the Natural Laws as we know them.”

Elseif GodExists = True and ScienceIsTrue = False Then
 PhilosophicalHeadline = “God exists ! All questions or metaphysical considerations are irrelevant if God exists. Period !”
 Conclusion = “God Exists and Mankind has fooled itself in the persuit of Science. We know truly Nothing at all (even though we think we do).”

Elseif GodExists = False and ScienceIsTrue = False Then
 PhilosophicalHeadline = “God (or the equivalent) does not exist. Only matter counts in the Universe. However, Science is also not what we think…”
 Conclusion = “God does not exist and Science is a fallacy too. We think we know stuff, but we don’t… and we have no afterlife or heaven to rest in. We are really F***ed !”

Elseif GodExists = False and ScienceIsTrue = True Then
 PhilosophicalHeadline = “God (or the equivalent) does not exist. Only matter counts in the Universe. Science is giving us the correct perception of the Universe.”
 Conclusion = “God does not exist, but Science accounts for the matter and Natural Laws of the Universe, the Biology, the Chemistry and so forth.”
End If


Surely, in the Europe the last conslusion seems to be the most popular. However, I think that all philosophical discussions begin with the question ‘Does God exist ?”. 90 % of the Earth’s population believe he does. What do you think ?