Involution Labs

Category: Thinking Out Loud

  • What Do the World Cup and Eurovision Have in Common?

    They are both global storytelling festivals.

    The competition is the stage; the real drama is the people watching it.

    The World Cup and Eurovision create temporary maps of affection and resentment. For a few weeks, people rediscover who they feel close to, who they instinctively oppose, and which old stories are still alive.

    The arguments around Eurovision can be more revealing than the winning song. They show what a country cares about, what irritates it, and how it sees its place in the wider world. The fascinating part is watching a country say, in effect: “This is how we want the world to see us this year.”

    The World Cup does something similar on a global scale.

    When people talk about Eurovision, they often talk about the songs. When people talk about the World Cup, they talk about the football. What fascinates me is what happens before either competition begins.

    Long before a ball is kicked or a song is sung, countries start telling stories about themselves.

    Every Eurovision act is, in some way, a national introduction. Some countries present themselves as modern and sophisticated. Others embrace humour, eccentricity, tradition, rebellion or nostalgia. The songs matter, but so does the message behind them.

    The same thing happens at the World Cup.

    This year, Norway told a story.

    Before the tournament had even properly begun, the Norwegian team posed dressed as Vikings. Some people immediately saw colonisers and raiders. Yet that is not how much of the world sees the Vikings. For many people, the Vikings represent curiosity, courage and the willingness to leave the familiar behind.

    The people who sailed west from Scandinavia were not living in a land of endless abundance. They survived in a harsh climate with short growing seasons. They looked beyond the horizon and wondered what else was out there.

    That image still resonates today.

    Norway took that story and turned it into a simple act: rowing.

    Suddenly people everywhere were rowing for Norway. They dropped to the floor in offices, schools, gyms and living rooms. Nursing home residents turned their exercises into rowing sessions. People who had never met a Norwegian in their lives found themselves taking part in a small national ritual.

    The rowing was not really about football.

    It was a story about a small country setting out into the unknown and inviting others to come along for the journey.

    The image was simple and irresistible: a small nation climbing into the boat together and rowing out to take on the world.

    Norway was rowing for gold.

    I don’t even watch the matches, but it was almost impossible to miss. My social media feeds filled with Erling Haaland videos. There were clips of his goals, his interviews, his larger-than-life presence and his peculiar sense of humour. I even found myself watching videos of his sister affectionately mimicking him. Her impressions were funny precisely because they were so warm. She seemed to know exactly which details made him recognisably himself.

    That’s how these tournaments escape the boundaries of sport. The players become characters, their families become part of the narrative, and the supporters create rituals that travel far beyond the stadium.

    You don’t need to watch ninety minutes of football to become aware that something is happening.

    The same thing happened at Eurovision.

    Bulgaria did not simply send a song. It sent an idea.

    Before Eurovision, Bangaranga was a catchy pop song. On stage it became something else. The choreography, movement and visual storytelling brought the song fully to life. I found myself completely hypnotised by it.

    The word itself is unusual, but DARA used it to express something universal: finding your inner strength, letting go of fear and having the courage to be yourself. The performance transformed that message into something you could feel rather than merely hear.

    Bulgaria went on to win Eurovision for the first time, but by then the story had already connected with people.

    That is what these competitions are really about.

    Countries do not simply send football teams and songs. They send stories about themselves.

    This year, Norway’s story was rowing towards the horizon. Bulgaria’s story was finding the courage to become yourself.

    One invited people to pick up an oar. The other invited people to let go of fear.

    The competition gave them a stage. The stories are what people will remember.

    Years from now, most people will not remember every result. What they will remember are the stories.

    This year, Norway’s story got people rowing.

    A small country told a story about itself, and the world decided it liked the story.

  • Eurovision is Not a Battlefield

    Eurovision is not a battlefield. There are no soldiers on that stage, only artists. It was created as a space where countries could meet through music rather than conflict, where political tensions were held back rather than performed.

    “Music unites us” is a comforting slogan, but unity becomes more complicated when participation itself is questioned. If shared spaces only remain open to those we approve of, what kind of unity is being protected?

    Debates over boycotts reveal something larger than disagreement about particular countries. They raise questions about culture, morality, and belonging. When does participation become endorsement? When does exclusion become principle? And who decides?

    People who choose not to boycott may be seen as indifferent, complicit, or disloyal. Others may see participation as a way of keeping dialogue possible. The disagreement is not only about politics. It is also about what cultural spaces are for.

    Eurovision has long carried contradictions. Countries compete while claiming unity. Histories of conflict sit beside performances of celebration. Identity is expressed, judged, rewarded, and sometimes rejected.

    Perhaps the question is not whether Eurovision is political. It almost always has been.

    Perhaps the harder question is whether culture should remain one of the few places where countries continue to meet despite disagreement.

    Because once shared spaces disappear, it becomes less obvious where people meet those they disagree with, misunderstand, or would not choose to spend time with at all.

  • What Story Does Eurovision Tell About Europe?

    Eurovision is often described as a song contest, but people rarely speak about it as if that is all it is. Many claim not to care. They laugh at it, criticise it, dismiss it as political, strange, over-produced, or irrelevant, and then they watch anyway. Sometimes openly. Sometimes from another room while insisting they are only watching because someone else put it on. Often while already knowing who should win and who should not.

    This says something.

    Perhaps Eurovision continues because it is not really about music, or not only about music. Every year, countries step onto a stage and perform a version of themselves. Not always who they are, but sometimes who they hope to be. Sometimes who they think Europe expects them to be. Sometimes who they once were, or who they refuse to stop being.

    For a few minutes, a song becomes something larger. It becomes identity.

    Some countries arrive with confidence. Others seem to ask for recognition. Some bring humour, folklore, absurdity, pain, rebellion, nostalgia, or longing. The performance ends, but the story does not. Votes are given, votes are withheld, patterns are noticed, and people argue. Beneath all of this sits a larger question:

    What is Europe?

    The word is used easily. European values. European identity. European culture. Yet no clear definition exists. Europe contains histories that do not fully agree with each other: empires and occupations, wars and reconciliations, languages and loyalties, countries that remember the same events differently.

    There is no single Europe. Eurovision complicates the idea further. Countries outside geographical Europe participate, while others sit at its edges—connected through history, politics, migration, or culture. Europe begins to look less like a place with clear borders and more like an ongoing negotiation about belonging. Who is included, who feels included, and who remains outside changes over time.

    There are many Europes. Nordic Europe. Balkan Europe. Post-Soviet Europe. Rural Europe. Urban Europe. The Europe of migration, memory, and inherited stories. The Europe imagined from outside, and the Europe people carry with them long after leaving.

    And still, once a year, countries gather and vote.

    Not because agreement exists, but perhaps because disagreement does.

    Eurovision survives, perhaps, because it allows contradiction. Countries insist: this is who we are. The contest quietly replies: you are also part of something larger. Neither statement disappears.

    This year’s winner sang:

    Welcome to the riot.

    And then came a made-up word:

    Bangaranga.

    Meaningless, perhaps. Or perhaps not.

    People create new words when existing ones no longer feel large enough. Maybe Bangaranga means: become yourself. Remember yourself. Resist disappearing into everyone else. But do not become so individual that connection is lost.

    Maybe this is true for countries too.

    No one country is Europe. All contribute to it. None define it.

    Perhaps Europe is not an identity at all. Perhaps it is an unfinished conversation—a place where histories meet without fully merging, where blame survives, memory survives, difference survives.

    And despite everything, people continue showing up.

    Singing.

    Voting.

    Wanting to be understood.

    Because beneath performance, competition, and politics, there may be something simpler: the desire for recognition.

    To say:

    See us.
    Remember us.
    Understand us.

    And perhaps Europe itself is asking for the same thing.

  • The Courage to Think

    Thinking is often treated as something automatic. We assume we’re already doing it because we have opinions, reactions, beliefs, and conclusions, but real thinking requires something more demanding. It requires openness.

    To think isn’t just to process information; it’s to allow ourselves to be changed by what we encounter. That isn’t easy. It means letting go of certainty, questioning what feels familiar, and staying with ideas that don’t immediately make sense. That takes courage.

    Inspiration is often treated as something external, something that arrives when the conditions are right. But it’s closely tied to thinking itself. It emerges when we stay open, when we’re willing to engage without needing immediate answers or clear outcomes.

    When I was growing up, characters like Pippi Longstocking, created by Astrid Lindgren, suggested that it was possible to move through the world differently, without needing to fit neatly into expectations or social norms. That kind of influence doesn’t just inspire behaviour; it changes how you think about what’s possible. In a different way, Tove Jansson, the creator of the Moomin books, encouraged a deeper kind of reflection, a willingness to examine and question rather than accept things as they are.

    Thinking doesn’t happen in isolation. It’s shaped by what we read, what we experience, who we encounter, and also by the language we move through every day. Language does more than communicate ideas; it shapes how we understand them. The words available to us influence what we can describe, question, and even notice.

    When language becomes simplified, shortened, or reduced to immediate reactions, thinking can become narrower too. Quick responses replace reflection. Nuance disappears behind slogans, captions, and certainty. Even digital forms of communication—text language, constant scrolling, emojis, and rapid exchanges—change the rhythm of thought itself. They’re expressive, efficient, and useful in many ways, but they also encourage speed over depth. And deep thinking rarely happens quickly.

    There’s a tendency to avoid discomfort by simplifying things, by turning challenges into easy explanations. Phrases like “everything happens for a reason” don’t open thinking. They close it. They offer resolution without understanding.

    Challenges aren’t interruptions to thinking; they’re what make it possible. To think well, we have to be willing to learn, unlearn, and relearn. That means meeting new situations without assuming we already understand them and allowing doubt, uncertainty, and contradiction to exist without rushing to resolve them.

    In that sense, thinking isn’t just an intellectual activity. It’s a way of being. And it begins with something simple but difficult: being open enough to change.

    Excerpt from Thinking Out Loud: Notes on Being Human

  • Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants: Rethinking Age and Technology

    I wrote this piece six years ago, but reading it now, the core questions about digital inclusion and ageing still feel unresolved.

    Ageing in a Digital Society: Bridging the Digital Generational Divide

    Who is the first person you think of when you hear the term digital native?
    Most people imagine a young person who grew up in the digital age, someone for whom technology is a natural part of everyday life. Rarely do we picture an older adult who grew up in a world shaped by analogue media rather than digital information networks.

    Older adults are often described as digital immigrants, but is a simple age comparison enough to tell us anything meaningful about their relationship with technology? Not really. Age offers only a superficial explanation and often leads to the assumption that older adults resist technological change.

    The reality is more complex. Experience with technology and how it is used tell us far more about the digital divide than age alone. Older people are not necessarily resisting change. They are navigating a rapidly evolving technological landscape and making sense of it in their own way. Digital natives should invite digital immigrants into this world rather than assuming they will learn everything by themselves. Helping older adults participate in digital life benefits everyone.

    Surveys about technology use frequently group everyone over the age of 55 into a single category. This approach overlooks the diversity within older populations and reduces complex experiences to a single number.

    Finland and Ireland

    Ireland is often described as a young country in demographic terms, with around 13.4% of the population aged 65 and over. Finland, by contrast, is one of the oldest populations in Europe, with the fastest-growing age group being those aged 85 and over.

    Interestingly, Finland is also a leading country in the implementation of digital technologies in public services. Ireland, despite its younger population, has historically been less digitally integrated in many areas of public life.

    This suggests that digital inclusion is not simply about age, but about how societies approach technology. When older adults are treated as outsiders to technological change, they are more likely to be excluded from the systems being built around them. Too often, support takes the form of doing things for people rather than with them, which can reduce independence.

    Older adults who cannot use digital technologies may feel alienated from the society they helped build.

    In Finland, around 80% of senior citizens use the internet daily, while in Ireland the figure has been significantly lower. As more social and administrative activities move online, people who rarely use the internet risk becoming increasingly excluded from everyday life.

    Digitalisation and the Ageing Process

    Digitalisation has the potential to make ageing easier, not harder. Online services can simplify tasks such as banking, communication, healthcare access, and everyday administration. Yet older adults are often treated as an afterthought in the design of these systems.

    Older adults have different expectations and needs, but they still want to live independently and participate fully in society. Many are willing to learn new technologies, yet the devices and interfaces they encounter are rarely designed with their experiences in mind.

    Younger users often type quickly using both hands on small touchscreens. For older adults, small text, sensitive touchscreens, and complex menus can make even simple tasks frustrating. Constantly correcting errors or navigating unclear interfaces can quickly discourage use.

    Digitalisation has transformed almost every aspect of modern life, yet the ageing process is rarely considered during technology development. In the tech industry, people sometimes joke that you are considered “old” at forty. It is not surprising that the needs of older adults are often overlooked in design.

    Understanding the Digital World

    For many older adults, learning to use technology is not just about operating a device. They want to understand the broader changes happening around them.

    Keeping up with every development can be difficult, but building a basic understanding helps people feel more confident. What older adults often want is clear explanation without condescension.

    No one enjoys being treated as though they are back in school.

    Older adults want to accomplish tasks independently. They want to understand concepts such as the difference between computer memory and cloud storage in straightforward language. Technology should simplify life, not make it more confusing.

    Designing a More Inclusive Digital Society

    Digital services must be designed so that everyone can use them. This means access to support, opportunities to develop digital skills, and systems that take diverse needs into account.

    Digital inclusion is not just about access to devices. It also involves affordability, design, training, and support.

    Older adults often express concerns about privacy and sharing personal information online. While these concerns are understandable, fear-based messaging can discourage participation. Balanced education about digital safety is more helpful than alarmist warnings.

    Access also has a financial dimension. Many older people cannot afford the devices or internet connections required to participate fully in digital life. Without careful policy design, digitalisation risks widening inequalities.

    When designing digital systems, several factors should be considered:

    • training and support that help older adults maintain independence
    • affordable access to devices and internet services
    • recognition of diversity within older populations
    • age-friendly design, including readable text and accessible interfaces
    • clear instructions written in simple language
    • intuitive software that reduces unnecessary complexity
    • transition periods that allow time to adapt

    Older adults’ physical, social, and cognitive abilities must be taken into account when designing technology and the services built around it.

    A Society for All Ages

    The global population is ageing, and technology has the potential to support people in staying connected, active, and engaged throughout their lives. Digital tools can help people remain independent, access healthcare more easily, and continue working longer if they wish.

    However, digitalisation must be implemented carefully. If systems are designed without considering older adults, technology risks reinforcing ageism and inequality rather than reducing them.

    Inclusive design benefits everyone. When digital systems are built with a wide range of users in mind, they become easier and more effective for all.

    A truly digital society should not leave anyone behind.

  • Choosing to Live for Yourself

    At some point in life, many people confront a difficult question: why am I living the life I’m living?

    For some, the answer is simple. For others, the answer is less clear. Life can become a series of expectations — from family, society, culture, or circumstance. We follow paths that others believe are right for us: school, career, marriage, stability. Often these paths work well. But sometimes they leave people feeling that their life no longer belongs to them.

    When people feel powerless or trapped in roles that do not reflect who they are, despair can follow. Sociologists have long argued that weak social ties, isolation, and lack of belonging can deepen this sense of disconnection. When a person feels they have no control over their life, they may begin to question its meaning.

    Yet this crisis can also become a turning point.

    Confronting the limits of one’s life can force a deeper question: What do I actually want? The moment someone realises that they have the right to live differently can be the first step toward reclaiming their life.

    Living authentically does not mean rejecting others or abandoning responsibility. It means recognising that a meaningful life cannot be built entirely on the expectations of others. At some point, people must decide that their life is their own.

    Not everyone will follow the same path. Parenting is not for everyone. University is not for everyone. A traditional career is not for everyone. Some people find meaning through relationships and family; others find it through creativity, independence, or solitude.

    What matters is not the specific path but the freedom to choose it.

    Learning to listen to oneself,  to understand one’s own values, limits, and desires, is an important step toward living authentically. When people begin to see themselves as worthy of care and respect, they may find new reasons to live differently and more fully.

    Life does not always unfold according to the scripts society provides. But that does not make it meaningless. Sometimes meaning appears only when we take responsibility for our own lives and begin to shape them consciously.

    Choosing to live for yourself is not selfish.

    It is the beginning of an authentic life.

  • The Oedipus Complex Revisited: Safety, Adventure and the Human Journey.

    The tension between mother and father figures is not a battle for superiority but a balance that shapes human development. Freud interpreted this tension as a sexual rivalry in the Oedipus complex. But the reality may be far more existential than sexual.

    From the beginning of life, the mother symbolises safety. She represents warmth, nourishment and protection. The maternal bond is not about desire but about survival. It is the place where life begins and where comfort is guaranteed. Yet remaining there forever would also mean never fully living. The safety of the maternal embrace can become a form of stillness, even stagnation.

    The father figure represents something different. He symbolises the call outward—the invitation to risk, explore and confront the unknown. The drive to live is not a desire to possess the mother but an impulse to leave her safety behind. It is the courage to step into the wider world.

    Seen this way, the so-called Oedipus complex is not about sexual competition with the father. It is about the human struggle between safety and adventure. Between the desire to remain protected and the need to grow.

    The mother provides the foundation. The father represents the leap into the unknown.

    To live fully is not to reject one for the other, but to integrate both forces. We need safety in order to begin life, but we need courage in order to live it.

    Human maturity emerges from holding these two energies in balance: the comfort of belonging and the courage to venture beyond it.

  • We are meaning making machines

  • Where Do Fact and Fiction Begin and End?

    Is there really a clear line between fact and fiction?

    When we think about fantasy, it is easy to assume it is entirely invented. Yet imaginative writing often requires deep research. In some ways, fiction can be a way of searching for truth.

    Does it matter whether something really happened? Are works of non-fiction always completely truthful? And would non-fiction even be as interesting without a flicker of imagination?

    Sometimes fiction can contain more truth than factual writing. Non-fiction may also include narrative shaping, interpretation, or omissions. This is especially true in journalism, where reporters must interpret events based on incomplete information and sources that may disagree.

    Historians face the same challenge. History is not simply a collection of facts; it is an interpretation of events layered with perspective. Even if we had witnessed an event ourselves, we would never see all its layers. A historical novel therefore becomes a mixture of fact and fiction by necessity.

    Perhaps the most useful approach is to keep an open mind. When we read fiction, we can assume there may be truth hidden inside it. When we read non-fiction, we can assume that interpretation and bias may also be present.

    After all, stories marketed as “based on a true story” often attract us more strongly. They seem to carry greater value, even if the boundary between truth and invention is unclear.

    Today it may not be literature that shapes our sense of reality, but the stories we share online. Viral stories often gain trust simply because they are popular.

    So, do we prefer fiction, or at least a mixture of fact and fiction? And is that why people are often more interested in the stories behind the news than the news itself?

    Perhaps fiction is not the opposite of truth, but simply another way of approaching it.

  • Don’t take a photo if you want to remember

    Presence is the memory

    I’ve had a smartphone for years. I do take photos. Just not of everything — and I don’t share them with everyone.

    The problem isn’t photography. It’s what happens when documenting replaces paying attention. The moment a camera comes out, something shifts. We start framing instead of feeling, managing instead of being present. The camera doesn’t just record the moment; it changes it.

    Some experiences imprint themselves precisely because they are fully lived. When we rely on photos to remember, we often remember less. Attention gets outsourced. Memory weakens. If the phone is doing the remembering for us, we don’t have to.

    When my son and I talk about Paris, we don’t scroll through images. We describe it to each other. What we noticed. How it felt. What stayed. The memory lives in language, not pixels. It remains active, shared, alive.

    What unsettles me isn’t the photo itself, but the need to show everything. Why does every moment require an audience? Why do we feel compelled to prove that we were somewhere, that something mattered? And why does the approval — the likes, the hearts — feel so good?

    That rush is not harmless. It trains us to measure experience by reaction rather than meaning. Moments become performances. Memory becomes external, dependent on validation.

    I take photos when something calls for it. I keep many of them private. Some I never looked at again. They exist as quiet markers, not content. And many moments are left unrecorded entirely — because they deserve full attention.

    Not everything needs to be captured.
    Not everything needs to be shared.
    Some things are meant to be remembered by being lived.