There are, I would estimate, several thousand things on which you and I will never agree. No biggie: the world would be an inexpressibly tedious place if we all agreed all the time.

In the matter of peoples' opnions of me, there are two. One is that I'm completely barking mad, the other is that I'm a thoroughly unpleasant person. Both are probably true. I do have an odd way of looking at things, given that one half of my alleged brain is analytical and deconstructs things, while the other is a storyteller that constructs narratives to make sense of the world. I also find humour (admittedly sometimes very dark) in pretty much everything. As to being unpleasant, I do not suffer fools gladly and I believe that, as my late father-in-law was wont to say, "You get more with a kind word and a two-by-four than you do with just a kind word." I do not apologise for any of my foibles, I've earned them and I own them.

I do, however, take issue with the idea that I am a Socialist. There are any number of Socialists I've met who would laugh at the notion. If you're interested, I could lay out my ideas about how matters could be run to improve the situation for most people. A personal view, of necessity.

As regards my conjectures on reality and our relationship to it, I am currently engaged in producing another piece treating that. It is in response to another article and is more metaphysical in nature, but I will certainly tag you in if you're interested.

Many thanks for your response.