{"id":8940,"date":"2019-03-21T11:50:23","date_gmt":"2019-03-21T10:50:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.mentor.com\/colinwalls\/?p=8940"},"modified":"2026-03-26T16:56:44","modified_gmt":"2026-03-26T20:56:44","slug":"a-kind-of-immortality","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/2019\/03\/21\/a-kind-of-immortality\/","title":{"rendered":"A kind of immortality"},"content":{"rendered":"

I had a thought, which I would like to share. Indeed I am dedicating this blog post to the sharing and expansion of what, to me, was a profound realization. Broadly, what I am thinking about are grandchildren, grandparents and the span of time \u2026<\/p>\n

My maternal grandfather was born in 1898. He served in the first world war, as he lied about his age, saying he was 18 instead of 16. I always thought that this was probably a family legend, but I found documentary proof that this actually occurred. Although he had no memory of the 19th Century, it always seemed amazing to me, as a child, that I knew someone well who had lived that far back. Indeed, in my childhood, I met quite a few elderly people who could remember the reign of Queen Victoria [the last few years of it anyway]. My great-grandmother died when I was 14, so I was well acquainted with her. She had been born in 1879 and her first job was working with the queen\u2019s dressmakers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Of course, there now nobody left with any connection to the 19th Century. Most of us just have experience of the 20th and 21st Centuries. But we can look forward \u2026<\/p>\n

I have always liked the idea of grandchildren. They can provide much of the pleasure that children do, but with the option to hand them back [legally]. I looked forward to having some little people to whom I could teach bad habits and rude words. Although my two daughters have yet to deliver, my wife\u2019s sons have provided us with 3 grandsons [so far]. Two are still babies, but the other is 4 and will start \u201creal\u201d school in a few months. The, IMHO, rather profound thought that recently dawned on me was the realization that these 3 boys have a very high likelihood of living into the 22nd Century!<\/p>\n

I cannot begin to imagine what kind of world they will be teaching their grandchildren about, but I do feel that I have a real stake in the future …<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I had a thought, which I would like to share. Indeed I am dedicating this blog post to the sharing…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":71677,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spanish_translation":"","french_translation":"","german_translation":"","italian_translation":"","polish_translation":"","japanese_translation":"","chinese_translation":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[302],"industry":[],"product":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-8940","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-off-topic"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8940","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/71677"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8940"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8940\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10772,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8940\/revisions\/10772"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8940"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8940"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8940"},{"taxonomy":"industry","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/industry?post=8940"},{"taxonomy":"product","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product?post=8940"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/embedded-software\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=8940"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}