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Obese bullied man gets laughed out of a dance club and humiliated online. Soon after, he's getting a "dance party" hosted by celebrities? I'm trying to be positive about this, but something doesn't feel right. What are your thoughts? This story is trending on Facebook right now and it's getting overwhelmingly positive feedback.

So today while studying psychology I met this girl who said that she doesn't believe that we have free will. She said that we are like animals, only a bit more complicated. She also said that we can't really effect on what happens to us in the future, because everything we do is just a chain of complicated decisions made by our brains for us in search for happiness. This made me very sad and I can't get it out of my head... What if I really am just a brain and couple of other organs in my body. Perhaps I don't really think about things the way I believe, but am just being l controlled by a bunch of mindless instincts. It's really making me a bit nervous... Has anyone ever thought about this, or could share his opinions? I would like that a lot. Markus FIN

As some make the claim that war and violence can lead to revolutions in technology and human organizations, I am going to propose the claim that it also prepares the human race against external threats. Namely, aLieNS. Here's why. When we meet aliens they will likely be aggressive. In fact, if we look at life on this planet as evidence, life seems to be pretty aggressive! Think about it. Complicated life forms need to eat other life forms in order to survive.That means most of the life on the planet has to be aggressive to others in order for its very survival. Like almost all of it! Almost every living thing is a savage beast devouring other life forms constantly........... So you really think aliens are going to FOR SURE be that cool? Not likely, from the evidence. Even if they have totally switched to using synthetics for their energy, I would still see the obvious evolutionary advantage to keeping an aggressive, opportunistic gene in the gene pool. War and violence and governments and large corporations and huge superpower forces of humanity all struggling against each other in a human eat human world might be our only chance to mature enough to deal with aliens. Most large scale animals are completely dominated, as is most vegetation and land mass. We have some issues with bacterial and viral forms of life but that's about it right now. But as a race? As a power in the universe? We are doing crazy good! We just took over a planet for crying out loud. One life form suddenly gaining dominance over most others would be a strain on any planet, we deserve a pat on the back. And we did this all by "aggression" towards the natural state of the planet. Otherwise we wouldn't even have food let alone shoes, cellphones and rocketships. Maybe being aggressive towards another is exactly what we need to harden and expand our power at this point. Unless we completely annihilate ourselves, we are the only thing left to challenge us. And as most capitalists would agree, competition breeds streamlined and effective systems. Which we will need when the aliens come.... It just doesn't seem like the NAP is a stable system, or that it even does any good for humanity as a struggling species. It only makes sense for small local systems that have no outside forces or ability to expand. Fortunately for us, we are starting to hit up the solar system for energy and resources so really we are in expansion mode. A bit of good old fashioned evolutionary brute competition might just be what the doctor ordered. grin As long as we don't end it all by accident first.

I’ve reached a point in my life where I’m trying to work out a path forward in life. I’m 24 years old, born and raised in Sweden. Educational background For the last two years I’ve been studying economics at the undergraduate level at a university in Sweden. The reason for this was that I initially wanted to engage in politics to change the system. I wanted to be able to contribute to the debate in economic/overall policy and provide research and statistics to support the libertarian/voluntaryist cause. My expectations of the quality and the methodology of the educational material were never really high and I knew that I would have to withstand some pseudo-scientific elements during the course of my education. But it turned out to be far worse than I expected. One doctoral candidate took notice of my briefcase from the Ludwig von Mises Institute and told me that he thought that the Austrian methodology was superior to the methodology used by most economists but also told me that the Austrian methodology was unlikely to find any widespread support amongst professors and other economists because the implementation of Austrian methodology would render many of them unemployed. During the course in public economics/finance the professor stated that she was insulted by a comment made by a student wherein he stated that any valid measure of value is impossible in the public sector due to the coercive nature of the transaction (the personal stakes/interests for the professor in these matters makes rational analysis impossible in this situation). It has become ever more evident to me that one of the core purposes of the publicly funded and approved education in economics is to find semi-sophisticated excuses for government force and intervention and a lot of obstacles for anyone daring to claim otherwise. It got increasingly hard for me to pass exams in courses based on faulty methodology combined with mathematical and statistical methods which seemed to increasingly lack relevance for a true study of human action. After failing 7 out of 8 courses in a year I’ve decided to take a break and probably change the path forward for me. I would still enjoy the increased awareness that could be provided by studying economics but this awareness will not be realized through studies at my university. I’m quite confident that I will be able to reach this awareness through self-studies in Austrian economics with some help from the Ludwig von Mises Institute. Thoughts on future education or human capital accumulation I’ve also come to realize that a focus on personal development, self-knowledge and personal relationships will do far more to improve society and the cause of peaceful interactions. Following this path I would primarily work on my own self-knowledge and my own personal relationships. I’ve been thinking about studying psychology or something similar to eventually be able to support others with their self-knowledge and personal relationships. However, I don’t know really where to start. If I were to work with people in this field I would most of all prefer to work with parents and children at an early stage. But I don’t know if there is any demand or market for this. The most interesting case that comes to mind would be to work with people thinking about having a child and support them in their thoughts about parenting/child raising. But perhaps I’m looking on this from the wrong angle. Maybe it would be better and more realistic to work with people individually with self-knowledge as a psychotherapist or something of that sort. One concern I have regarding this topic is that the government authorities would try to intervene if I were to advice people in some way that went counter to the approved goals and methods of the government if I were to work as a licensed psychotherapist for example. What are your thoughts on this subject? Is it possible to work/find work in this area (I would like to help people in similar ways as Stef is doing but with more in depth application to specific cases like talk therapy. I think Stef is doing a phenomenal work but I don’t think that podcasts is the right format for me and I think that this area would profit from some division of labor)? Should I pursue formal education? If so, should it be mostly in psychology, behavioral science, sociology, social work or something else? If not, what should I do alternatively to accumulate the human capital necessary to provide some real value in this area? Do you think that my concerns regarding government intervention in my practice is valid? If so, what should I do to make the best of it given this environment? Strategic relocation As long as I can remember I’ve felt an unsettling and frustrating lack of control over my own life and elements of my surroundings that I feel I should be able to control to some degree. I’ve been bossed around and told what to do in school for 12 of my formative years only to find myself steadily unemployed and unqualified to do most anything. I can see the very same chaotic symptoms and consequences of forced economic planning in almost any aspect of my life such as healthcare, law enforcement/provision of security, the food industry, the financial industry, building and construction etc. It should be noted that I’m in the process of starting therapy to work on my self-knowledge after several failed attempts to find a therapist that would help me within the public sector. The only therapist I’ve been able to meet within the public sector was the one responsible for an initial assessment of my mental health. After scoring high enough on a standardized test for depression she started talking about medication and when talking about my lack of motivation she asked me about lack of motivation in school when I was young and said that she was scanning for symptoms of ADD. The only treatment available for public funding was a 6-12 session long treatment for certain specific problems. With potential shortcomings in my self-knowledge in mind I would say that the most damaging aspect of my childhood from my perspective would be the time spent in school with many years of forced schooling robbing me of my inner drive and power of initiative (much like Stef's video on procrastination). As noted above I believe that a focus on self-knowledge and personal relationships is the best way to achieve freedom. Peaceful parenting and minimizing abuse is crucial for the formative years of human life. That is why I believe that one of the most important things if I were to ever have a child would be the freedom or ability to raise my child independent of government influence or intervention. Sweden recently became one of the most restricted countries in Europe with regards to educational freedom (Sweden and Germany being the two most restricted in Europe). This is one of the most important reasons why I’m looking for alternative countries/places to live my life as independent of government influence as I can. I would also prefer to live amongst other unschoolers and peaceful parents/people. The United States is one of the places I’ve contemplated. Do you have any thoughts with regards to strategic relocation? Is the US a good alternative or would you suggest another destination?