In the News (from MintPress News): “The day after two major developments in the U.S. saw worker pensions put on the chopping block in order to bail out state and local governments, an analysis in the New York Times shows that across the Atlantic, European nations are now stripping their worker protections and dismantling pensions as they follow the established American model of putting corporate elites first in a race to the bottom for cheap labor and deregulated capitalism.

“On Tuesday in Detroit, a bankruptcy judge ruled that city pensioners can have their earned benefits cut as he approved the largest municipal bankruptcy in the state’s history.

“Also on Tuesday, the state of Illinois passed a measure that dramatically alters the pension formula for retired workers and diminishes those benefit programs for current and future public employees. …

“Meanwhile, in an expansive piece in the New York Times on Wednesday, titled ‘Americanized Labor Policy Is Spreading in Europe,’ Eduardo Porter explains how European governments and policy makers—by following the U.S. example of cancelling collective bargaining protections, attacking pensions, and slashing wages—are not only expanding income and wealth inequality but are ‘radically changing the nature of Europe’s society.’ …

“Andrew Watt, an economist who heads the Macroeconomic Policy Institute in Germany, worries that the push for labor market deregulation will cascade from one weak country to the next, as all engage in a futile race to create jobs by gaining market share from one another in a world of insufficient demand. ‘Whichever country is weakest at the time is forced into major cutbacks. First Germany, now Spain, next France,’ he said.”

My Comment: Thus they come to war. The solution to the world conflict is in a conscious concerted transition to rational sustainable production and living standards. But it is not possible to even dream about it with human egoism. That is why it is necessary to first implement the course of integral education at least for the part of humanity that is freed from work as a condition for providing them with welfare. Otherwise, sliding to the bottom cannot be stopped.
[123032]

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In the News (from Pew Research Center): “A new report from the World Economic Forum ranks the 10 most important global trends, based on a poll of 1,592 leaders from academia, business, government, and non-profits.

“Here are some data points that compare and contrast the public’s views around the world with the trends identified by the experts.

“1. Rising societal tensions in the Middle East and North Africa – People in this region were mostly dissatisfied with their country direction, according to the Pew Research Center’s survey of people across the globe this year. This includes particular disappointment in Lebanon (88% dissatisfied), the Palestinian territories (87%) and Tunisia (81%).

“2. Widening income disparities  – One of the most striking findings from our recent survey of general publics across the globe was the degree to which people see the gap between rich and poor as a major challenge. In 31 of 39 nations, half or more of those polled said inequality is a very big problem in their country.

“3. Persistent structural unemployment – The spring survey found that two-thirds or more in most countries say a lack of employment opportunities is a very big problem. When asked which of the four issues – inflation, unemployment, inequality or debt – the government should address first, 22 of the 39 publics surveyed said jobs.

“4. Intensifying cyber threats – U.S. policy experts were very concerned about the threat of cyber-attacks from China, according to our survey last year. However, while the World Economic Forum survey identified cyber threats as a top concern, 47% of experts admitted they have limited knowledge of the problem.

5. Inaction on climate change – A median of 54% or more of people surveyed in Canada, Europe, the Asia Pacific, Latin America and Africa saw global warming as a major threat to their countries, according to our global survey. However, only 40% of Americans and a median of 42% in the Middle East region regarded global climate change as a major concern.

“6. Diminishing confidence in economic policies – In our polls conducted across the globe, people voiced widespread concerns about economic conditions in their countries. Indeed, attitudes were particularly grim in European countries, such as France (only 9% said good), 4% said the same in Spain, 3% in Italy and just 1% in Greece. Nevertheless, in emerging markets such as China, 88% of the people said their economy was doing well.

“7. A lack of values in leadership – Between 2007 and 2012, confidence in Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) national governments declined from 45% to 40% on average, making it difficult for national authorities to mobilize support for necessary reforms, according to a recent report by the OECD. In the U.S., public trust in government has fallen substantially since 1958 and is near an all-time low.

“8. The expanding middle class in Asia – More than any other region, Asians are hopeful about the economic prospects for the next generation. In contrast to Asia’s relatively positive outlook, majorities in the United States, Canada, and throughout Western Europe believe the economic future will be worse for the next generation.

“9. The growing importance of megacities – Life is increasingly lived in the world’s urban centers. According to the United Nations Population Division, more than half of the world’s population lives in urban areas. However, not all of the world’s regions are equally urban. Africa, for example, is predicted to reach 50 percent urbanization by 2035.

“10. The rapid spread of misinformation online – One-third (30%) of the world’s youth have been active online for at least five years, according to the International Telecommunication Union. Social networking has also spread around the world. In 19 of 21 countries, about three-in-ten or more of those polled use sites such as Facebook, according to our survey last year.”

My Comment: The report is correct, it just has completely incorrect conclusions. But the organizers can understand; they have not means to solve this crisis. It is not like in the past; it is not at the level of our world but at the level of the forces that control this world. And it can be solved only by raising society to the level of these forces.

This rapid decline of society by all socio-economic indicators tells us about the need to quickly disseminate the method of Integral Education and Upbringing, without which no changes are possible because now they can be only in the direction of destruction or the rise toward unity of a new generation.
[122838]

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In the News (from newsland): “Swarms of locusts accurately find their way through the desert to green valleys where there is food. But one creature, separated from the swarm, loses direction. Studying annual migrations of birds, scientists believed that old and experienced birds led their movements.

“But today, it has been found that migratory flocks have no leaders; often young birds that emerged from eggs in the summer and have no experience, are at the head of the flock. However, being separated from the flock, a bird cannot find the right direction. Fish also become ‘smarter’ when they are inside their school: a group of fish chooses the right direction while one fish cannot.

“Scientists put partitions in a termite colony that was under construction. Termites continued to work, and every passage, ventilation channel or space, which were divided by partitions, was exactly connected with each other.

“Having encountered a ditch during migration, mice and lemmings fill it with their bodies, so that others can continue movement. The trampled ones make no attempt to escape, forming a bridge for those who follow them. The strongest instinct of survival becomes completely suppressed.

“It has not been proved that the organisms, inhabiting the Earth, form a certain next, higher order entity; yet, this hypothesis has not been refuted either. Its undeniable advantage, however, is that it not only explains the ‘will’ of this or that population, but also offers a model of the world, in which there is no us or them, where everything living is interconnected, interdependent and harmoniously complement each other.”

My Comment: To prove the unity of the world it is necessary to reveal the single and only force that controls it: “There is none else besides Him.” The science of Kabbalah reveals this. Other sciences, based on the study of the world by egoistic limited properties, are not able to reveal this unity.
[122659]

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In the News (from Paranormal News): “Numerous examples from everyday life seemingly convince us of the inability of the collective intelligence to make the right decision.

“Meanwhile, under certain conditions, a group, even consisting of people who cannot boast great intellect, is often closer to the truth than its most intelligent members. Averaging eliminates errors made by everyone, and the errors of individuals are mutually cancelled; what remains is the truth or something close to it. The following four conditions must be met for the group to come up with the right solution:

• The members’ opinion should vary (everyone should have some of his own information, even if it is a misinterpretation of the true facts).
• They must be independent (everyone’s opinion should not depend on the opinion of others).
• The group must be decentralized (it does not have leader, whose opinion could be followed by the rest).
• A mechanism that detects the collective solution.

My Comment: If a group is connected by a single goal but in different ways of achieving it, and seeks the correct way of reaching this goal, independent of anyone’s individual correctness, they will find the true solution with mutual support and general clarification.
[122452]

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In the News (from The Voice of Russia): “The US police have begun a round-up of participants in the popular teenage game ‘Knockout.’ Its task is to ‘cold cock’ a passer-by in one blow. The main condition is that the victim must be a white person. But it is exclusively African Americans and immigrants from Latin America who are carrying out these attacks. More and more teenagers are becoming involved in the game thanks in no small part to the Internet and social networks.

“Similar incidents occur in different cities and states across America: St. Louis, Syracuse, Washington DC, and the state of New Jersey. Policemen say that the dangerous game is spreading throughout the United States like a virus. And social networks are only warming up public interest. Such behavior of adolescents is a consequence of the position the majority of African Americans have in American society, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences Vilen Ivanov believes.

“’Such outbursts of violence, including with the use of weapons, became frequent, and often this violence is wanton. And we cannot say that these facts are inspired by someone. It is a spontaneous expression of discontent at the teenage level.’

“However, there is another explanation, expert of the Moscow Institute of Psychoanalysis Vladimir Fainzilberg believes. In his opinion, the main reason for the increasing aggression of adolescents lies in imposing strict limits and norms of behavior on them, as well as in restriction of freedom for security purposes.

“’Of course, this creates a negative impact on the psyche of young people. It makes them nervous and provokes the use of weapons. Moreover, nowadays there are numerous computer games also based on the use of arms and exaltation of the identity of those who possess it. This forms a certain world outlook among the American youth.’

“According to the expert, mass media and cinematography also exert enormous influence on formation of opinions and behavior of adolescents.”

My Comment: So far, our egoism dominates us so much that we cannot contradict it, even against common sense. If even at home we cannot prevent our children from viewing violence and base programs, if the society and the state allow the media to be as they are, then the problem is not the youth, but the adult population; so maybe fear that you could be “cold cocked” will affect and bring to the correct decision: to ban harmful media.

I think that destructive consequences of egoistic development of society will accumulate until it no longer can exist and only at the last moment before its self-destruction, will it see the light and accept the method of integral education and upbringing. To prevent this from happening in such a tragic way, a broad explanatory work is required.
[121988]

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In the News (from Radio “The Voice of Russia”): “Despite the country’s economic growth and low unemployment rate of 6.5 percent, the number of poor people in Israel is growing; there are more poor children in Israel than in any other developed country; a third of Israelis cannot afford to heat their apartment in winter or cool it in summer; 40 percent had to forgo dentist visits, and 15 percent failed to purchase medications.

“Israeli sociologists warn that the middle class is experiencing a difficult situation and finding it more difficult to survive. Anyone in the country can find himself out of work and livelihood: hidden unemployment, rising credit card debt, high housing prices could lead to financial disaster.”

My Comment: With the example of Israel, you can see firsthand how it is necessary to implement universal education of the population towards its unification, only in this will it be possible to solve all the problems of society and show an example for the entire world.
[121981]

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In the News (from RBC Daily): “An unexpected change in usual climatic conditions, a sharp cooling or warming, brings businesses higher losses than the most serious natural disasters.

“The annual damage of weather whims costs EU companies over 400 billion euros. Losses from about 900 natural disasters in 2012 were only 126 billion euros.”

My Comment: The amplitude of climatic changes will increase, the losses will grow, and then problems at the level of the still, vegetative, and animate nature will start. And there will be no protection from them… Salvation is only in the likeness of the human being with nature, attaining the property of bestowal, and connection. This can be achieved only by implementing the method of integral education for the general population.
[121690]

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In the News (from The Independent): “There’s a lot more to being bored than you might think, if new research is to be believed.

“Science has known about four types of boredom for a while now, but a team of international scientists have now built on their research and discovered a fifth, “especially unpleasant” form of tedium.

“Dubbed ‘apathetic boredom,’ it elicits a feeling of learned helplessness similar to depression.

“According to the scientists, led by Dr Thomas Goetz of the University of Konstanz in Germany, boredom can be categorised by levels of arousal (ranging from ‘calm’ to ‘fidgety’), and how positive or negative boredom is experienced – its ‘valence.’

“Previously, it was thought that people could suffer from ‘indifferent boredom,’ in which people felt withdrawn but relaxed; ‘calibrating boredom,’ a feeling of uncertainty in which people are receptive to but do not seek out change; ‘searching boredom,’ which is restless and pursues distraction; and ‘reactant boredom,’ wherein people are motivated to leave their situation for a specific change.

“Goetz, his colleague Anne Frenzel, and a team of fellow researchers conducted two studies among 63 German university students and 80 German high school learners. …

“Apathetic boredom was reported in slightly more than a third of the high school students – a fact the researchers found ‘alarming.’”

My Comment: This is a transition period from the egoistic lifestyle, with its natural energy, search, and competition aimed at obtaining at the expense of others, to the altruistic lifestyle of society, with its energy, exploration, and competition aimed at bestowal unto society and getting the fulfillment of the whole society.
[121968]

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In the News (from Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations): “The waste of a staggering 1.3 billion tonnes of food per year is not only causing major economic losses but also wreaking significant harm on the natural resources that humanity relies upon to feed itself, says a new FAO report. …

“Among its key findings: Each year, food that is produced but not eaten guzzles up a volume of water equivalent to the annual flow of Russia’s Volga River and is responsible for adding 3.3 billion tonnes of greenhouse gases to the planet’s atmosphere.

“And beyond its environmental impacts, the direct economic consequences to producers of food wastage (excluding fish and seafood) run to the tune of $750 billion annually, FAO’s report estimates. …

“‘We simply cannot allow one-third of all the food we produce to go to waste or be lost because of inappropriate practices, when 870 million people go hungry every day,’ said FAO Director-General José Graziano da Silva. …

“Where wastage happens:

“Fifty-four percent of the world’s food wastage occurs ‘upstream’ during production, post-harvest handling and storage, according to FAO’s study. Forty-six percent of it happens ‘downstream,’ at the processing, distribution and consumption stages.

“As a general trend, developing countries suffer more food losses during agricultural production, while food waste at the retail and consumer level tends to be higher in middle and high-income regions — where it accounts for 31-39 percent of total wastage — than in low-income regions (4-16 percent).

“The later a food product is lost along the chain, the greater the environmental consequences, FAO’s report notes, since the environmental costs incurred during processing, transport, storage and cooking must be added to the initial production costs.”

My Comment: All this says only one thing: Until we change ourselves, our egoistic nature, we will not stop suffering from hunger and destroying each other. We must decide where the root of evil is and look for the ways to solve it—this will take us to the realization of the need to use the method of integral education.

It is possible to bring integral education to the entire planet by the modern means of communication and technology. After all, we are talking about saving humanity. Baal HaSulam writes that otherwise we will come to a war of extermination, after which a small number of remaining people will reach unity and equality, becoming similar to nature and moving to the next stage of development.
[121586]

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In the News (from Finmarket): “Alexander Fleming, the creator of penicillin, warned still in 1940 that the effect of his discovery would not last forever, that microbes would adapt to medications. The more available medications became, the faster microbes developed the ways to protect against them.

“Antibiotics are losing their properties so quickly that it becomes unprofitable for companies to develop them. Making one drug cost about a billion dollars, and these costs do not have time to pay off before the microbes adapt to them. Soon, minor infections will become fatal again.

“Without antibiotics people would not be able to treat cancer and to transplant organs because these procedures are not possible without suppressing the immune system. Any treatment which requires injecting drugs in the human body, for example, kidney dialysis, will become impossible.

“We will have to forget about implants. This also applies to cosmetic surgery and heart valve surgery. Childbirth will become as dangerous, as a hundred years ago, when five of a thousand pregnant women died.”

My Comment: The problem is food: the development of new varieties, processing plants, and raising meat with antibiotics. We get a huge amount of food with harmful substances together. Objections are usually limited to the notion that this is better than starvation. But if we had changed ourselves to a mutual caring attitude, then we would have distributed good correctly, and we would not have to grow plant and animal food with pesticides, antibiotics, etc.
[121584]

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