Alter-Nomad: Supranational Species

I used to live at the French border to work in Geneva. Living across borders feels strange. You wake up in France, live in Switzerland, then go back to sleep in France. You belong to both and none. I find the concept of borders fascinating. Someday probably, a long long time ago, five dudes from a tribe decided to create invisible barriers between territories and people because they felt special, entitled to own a plot of land and everything in it. That’s basically how borders were born, from a socio-political agreement between two tribes. Borders are a cultural construct. Wars started when two tribes didn’t agree on imaginary lines and wanted more. I wonder what a world without borders would look like. I asked a friend once. She told me it would be chaos. I did not agree but said nothing. Europe gives me a sight of what it would be like. The ability to meet friends from different countries without having to request a visa feels great. Studying abroad played a key role in my personal growth. I can book a plane or a train from France to any country at an amazingly cheap price. In one hour’s time, I can live in an entirely different city. Borders are veils over humanity’s treasures. Imaginary, yet painful. Einstein stated human stupidity is borderless, but so is its genius.

Elon Musk wants humans to become an interplanetary species. We are not even a supranational one yet. As Attali highlights, it demands us to reinvent the way we work and we think to establish a “government of the planet”[@attali]: a transhuman universal democracy whose only preoccupation would be the Res Publica, the common good of mankind through emancipation, respect, and hospitality. On the long term, living as an alter-nomad should be scalable, a virtuous lifestyle willing to do good. Social entrepreneurship teaches proactivity: it is possible to make a positive impact at scale by solving important problems one by one with concrete solutions. However, more local and short term actions exist already for everyone.

One could say, living from the clutter of others, a digital nomad is similar to a cockroach. To me, it’s a compliment. Cockroaches can withstand any environment thanks to their adaptative nature. Similarly, I think it’s important to learn to live with less. It forces you to adapt. Only those who can quickly adapt can survive and strive. What happens to the individual who trained himself to carry on with his life, no matter the place? He becomes the freest person on earth. Nietzsche announced “the emergence of a new race of men, supranational and nomad, possessing a faculty of assimilation far greater than that of common mortal”. His character Zarathustra becoming the Übermensch - the Superman - was a great illustration of this nomadic ideal. Zarathustra is a traveler, sometimes solitary to meditate, sometimes living within a community to tell his adventures and transmit his knowledge. An ubermensch follows a constant iterative hero journey. He lives in harmony with his environment, as illustrated by his ability to talk with animals. It’s up to us to experiment with our lives, to seek our own answers, and ultimately to share our findings with the world. Global issues demand a glocal involvement from everyone. Not everyone has the same means and aspirations, but if we each keep in mind the Res Publica the compounding effect it creates makes everything seems possible.

Digital nomadism is an important trend that is still vastly misunderstood. Experimenting for yourself is the only way to know if this is a sustainable lifestyle for you. It is both an incredible opportunity for people to be their best and experience new perspectives on life. It can also become your doom. Just like most things in life, it is all about finding your own balance. This introspective work is not simple: it demands to leave the comfort of your daily routine. One can think that this lifestyle is not for everyone, a nomad must be brave because he tends to be marginalized. Wandering builds character. Nomads are change makers. Travel constitutes an apprenticeship, a vector of change, but, as the cave allegory of Socrates shows us, learning is suffering: we must be prepared to endure it. As Rolf Potts says, we have to define our fears to act against them[@potts]. We then notice that they are minimal in comparison to the benefits overcoming them bring in the long run. Historical nomadism is based on principles of common sense, applicable to a life lived in society. Life is movement, “the first sedentaries are the dead”. Ultimately, this lifestyle is aiming at making humans more human: nomadism as a vector for change.