In the News (from DailyMail): “Hugging a loved one isn’t just a great way to bond – it has several physical benefits as well.

“Scientists found that the hormone oxytocin was released into the blood stream when you hold a friend close. This lowers blood pressure, reduces stress and anxiety and can even improve your memory.

“However, you have to be selective over who you hug. Giving a polite embrace to someone you don’t know well can have the opposite effect, according to research from the University of Vienna.

“Oxytocin, a hormone produced by the pituitary gland, is primarily known for increasing bonding, social behaviour and closeness between parents, children and couples.

“Increased oxytocin levels have been found, for example, in partners in functional relationships. In women, it is also produced during the childbirth process and during breastfeeding in order to increase the mother’s bond with the baby.

“Hugging can also soften your personality. The researchers said someone who hugs loved ones often become more empathetic over time.

“Neurophysiologist Jürgen Sandkühler, said: ‘The positive effect only occurs, however, if the people trust each other, if the associated feelings are present mutually and if the corresponding signals are sent out.

“’If people do not know each other, or if the hug is not desired by both parties, its effects are lost.’”

My Comment: This is only the beginning of knowledge about the need to create a friendly environment for all people, and especially for children at home and at school! This is one of the first conditions of the method of integral education.
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In the News (from Plan and the Overseas Development Institute): “Girls are bearing the brunt of the global economic recession – being more likely to experience poverty, reduced life expectancy and drop out of school, according to a new report from Plan and the Overseas Development Institute (ODI). …

“It says family poverty hits girls hardest – with only a 1% fall in GDP increasing infant mortality by 7.4 deaths per 1,000 girls versus 1.5 for boys.

“The findings also indicate that food shortages and malnutrition are more common among girls than boys. Women also reduce their own food consumption to become ‘shock absorbers’ for household security.

“As women go out to work longer hours for less money, more girls are pushed out of school and into filling the gaps at home with domestic work, into hazardous child labour or even transactional sex.”

My Comment: Integral education leads us to building a society of equals, providing everyone with basic needs, and everyone’s duty to participate in their own correction (education and upbringing). If we stop producing more than is essential for existence, we will get rid of unnecessary and harmful work and will be able to raise ourselves to the next level dictated by nature, the level of integral humanity.
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In the News (from Reuters): “British Prime Minister David Cameron told European leaders on Thursday that any attempt to force countries into ever-deeper political union was a mistake that Britain would not be part of. …

“’Countries in Europe have their histories, their traditions, their institutions, want their own sovereignty, their ability to make their own choices, and to try and shoehorn countries into a centralised political union would be a great mistake for Europe, and Britain wouldn’t be part of it,’ he said in a speech.”

My Comment: He is right. It is not worth getting closer. I must be prepared in advance to live with another person in one room. It is necessary to implement integral education first, and only then to the extent of its impact on the European nations, bring them closer together, up to a single country—only this approach will be beneficial.
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Opinion (Aditya Chakrabortty, columnist): “More than 2,500 business executives and bankers will converge on the highest town in Europe for the annual World Economic Forum. …

“The theme of this year’s conference is ‘Resilient dynamism.’

“As participants acknowledge, the real business lies in private sessions with industry peers and amenable politicians, and access to those starts at around £98,500.

“And this is what makes Davos so fascinating: it is the most perfect case study of how the practitioners of free-market, globalised capitalism give the public one explanation for what they are doing and why, while privately pursuing the complete opposite. … From its inception, the whole point of Davos has been to promulgate the gospel of free-market fundamentalism. …

“And it’s true: unlike previous generations of the ultra-wealthy, many of the modern super-rich work for a living, in running major businesses or in finance (although the Davos guestlist still includes plenty of sheikhs and royals). But that doesn’t mean they truly earn the millions they claim. …

“Take a look at who’s in the Davos set. Last spring, two American academics, Jon Bakija and Brad Helm, and a US Treasury official, Adam Cole, published the most comprehensive analysis yet of the richest 0.1% earners, based on tax returns. Of these top dogs, nearly two in three were top corporate executives and bankers. And the story in both those professions has not been of brilliant returns to shareholders or vast improvements for society, but of wealth extraction and lobbying politicians, Davos-style.

“Earlier generations would have known what to call this Davos set of wealth extractors and rip-off merchants. Andrew Sayer, a Lancaster professor working on a book to be called Why We Can’t Afford The Rich totes up the terms: Ruskin referred to such wealth as illth, the liberal JA Hobson as ‘improperty.’ Only now, the top 0.1% are able to conceal what they’re up to in plain sight.”

My Comment: Until people decide that only through changing themselves will they correct the world and that otherwise they will destroy themselves, everything will continue as dictated by our egoism, and everything will be done only for its sake, even if it does not lead to the better. After all, our nature is like the serpent that absorbs everything but is not sated. Only immense suffering will compel us to kill it (the path of suffering) … or we can come to the awareness that it is something that brings death (the path of awareness, Light).
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In the News (from Espanarusa.com): “The economic crisis has disappointed Spaniards so much that 14% of unemployed people aged over 30 are willing to work for free, with no financial reward. The survey revealed that among the Spaniards, who have a job, 18% do not receive a salary. Three out of every four explain that working for free will help them find a paid position in the future.”

My Comment: Society is not obliged to provide everyone with work, but it must take care of providing basic necessities for everyone. It also should take care of integral education for all the citizens in order to bring society to equilibrium with Nature.
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In the News (from Business Inquirer): “The world’s political and business elite gathered in the snow-covered resort of Davos on Wednesday, aiming to instil some confidence in the global economy amid tentative signs of recovery.

“About 45 world leaders will rub shoulders with around 2,500 lobbyists, journalists, captains of industry and economists in the picture-postcard Swiss ski resort for the five-day annual meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF). …

“Organizers have chosen the theme ‘resilient dynamism,’ reflecting the need for an improvement in the structure of the global economy to resist sudden emergencies like the eurozone debt crisis.”

My Comment: As long as politicians and economists are not aware of the dead end in egoistic protectionist development, do not recognize that the future of the world lies in global integral development, sustainable production and consumption, avoiding excessive production, and accept the need for equal rational consumption by all the people in the world, up to the point of full integration of all of humanity as the next stage of our development, the crisis will inevitably force us to recognize our mistakes through its dramatic manifestations.
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Opinion (Silas Beane, physicist): “There is a famous argument that we probably do live in a simulation. The idea is that in the future, humans will be able to simulate entire universes quite easily. And given the vastness of time ahead, the number of these simulations is likely to be huge. So if you ask the question: ‘Do we live in the one true reality or in one of the many simulations?’ the answer, statistically speaking, is that we’re more likely to be living in a simulation. …

“In our universe, the laws of physics are the same in every direction. But in a grid, this changes since you no longer have a space-time continuum, and the laws of physics would depend on direction. … I gave a lecture on this topic the other week and the turnout was amazing. Half of the people looked at me as if I was disturbed and the other half were very enthusiastic.”

My Comment: I understand him perfectly, but as always with a breakthrough, scientists get hit by the ignorant, and they need to be prepared for criticism and wait patiently until people mature…
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Opinion (David M. Smick, global macroeconomic adviser, founder and editor of the International Economy magazine, author of The World Is Curved: Hidden Dangers to the Global Economy): Here’s a prediction: The political party that controls the White House after January could, four years later, be out of power for a generation. The economic challenges are that daunting. …

“The globalization model of the past 30 years is cracking up. And there appears to be no new model to replace it. …

“It is difficult to underestimate the degree to which this flawed, sometimes frightening, good we call globalization has been the proverbial goose that laid the golden eggs. As a result, the public has unrealistic expectations about how much the economy can deliver in a post-globalization world.”

My Comment: We have to reconsider the whole model of the world as the economy reflects only one of its ugly relationships. Globalization, which was built by egoists, failed, but it has accelerated the realization of evil in egoistic dependence and forces us to recognize the finality, a dead end, of the general egoistic approach to life. A truly global, integral world lies ahead in which all relationships and solutions will be based only on the likeness to the laws of nature, the Creator.
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In the News (from GlobalScience.ru): “American psychologists are alarmed. Today’s kids increasingly abandon traditional toys in favor of computers; moreover, the process begins at a very early age. This trend is observed in all the developed countries and brings producers of traditional toys to ruin. Is it necessary to teach children to use computer technology so early, immersing them in the virtual world?

“Psychologists warn that happiness is in good communication with the child, spending time together with him, and therefore, they advise parents not to buy their way out of responsibilities with expensive toys, but to spend more time with children.”

My Comment: We have made our life so that we have no time for children; we push them towards computers. If it were not for the threat of the ruin of manufacturers and sellers of traditional toys, no one would have raised the issue. In integral education that Kabbalah offers, the main emphasis is on communication between children and discussions with the teacher, guided tours, and games; working with a computer is only supplementary.
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In the News (from Fox News): “ Nearly one-fourth of the students who try to join the U.S. Army fail its entrance exam, painting a grim picture of an education system that produces graduates who can’t answer basic math, science and reading questions. …

“The report by The Education Trust found that 23 percent of recent high school graduates don’t get the minimum score needed on the enlistment test to join any branch of the military. …

“The military exam results are also worrisome because the test is given to a limited pool of people: Pentagon data shows that 75 percent of those aged 17 to 24 don’t even qualify to take the test because they are physically unfit, have a criminal record or didn’t graduate high school. …

“The study shows wide disparities in scores among white and minority students, similar to racial gaps on other standardized tests. Nearly 40 percent of black students and 30 percent of Hispanics don’t pass, compared with 16 percent of whites. The average score for blacks is 38 and for Hispanics is 44, compared to whites’ average score of 55. …

“A Department of Defense report notes the military must recruit about 15 percent of youth, but only one-third are eligible. More high school graduates are going to college than in earlier decades, and about one-fourth are obese, making them medically ineligible.

My Comment: Nothing can be achieved by force. Integral upbringing must come first and education only in parallel with it. Otherwise, students will not study. And with integral education, they want this education themselves; this is what we see in our system. Integral upbringing uses the natural inclination of children and adults, not pressure and coercion.
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