Ancient Apocalypse 

 Erik von Däniken now has a worthy successor in Graham Hancock. 

 Graham has 7 documentaries available to watch on Netflix - search term "Ancient Apocalypse". Like von Däniken, he draws conclusions from his research that the established archaeologists sneer at and want nothing to do with. 

 But hisobservations are very interesting, so I have to recommend these programs.

  If you have Netflix, go download these documentaries. - "Ancient Apocalypse"

Todd

Also check: https://axiom1b.blogspot.com/2022/07/very-interesting-ted-talk-by-yuval.html

 

 

Then you fall behind – that's the grim truth

 The more young people read, the better their vocabulary and the more difficult texts they understand. A positive spiral – or a whirling merry-go-round that is difficult to jump on in the moment. The more young people read, the better their vocabulary and the more difficult texts they understand.

 Because what happens when our children don't read? It starts early. Already at the age of three, the differences between children's vocabularies seem to be established. Around the start of school, the gap widens further – and it continues in the teenage years.

 We talk about two vocabulary spurts during early childhood. One occurs between the ages of one and three, when some children gain a solid head start, The child's linguistic upbringing environment is behind the differences in the first leap, conversation and reading aloud. says Mats Myrberg, professor responsible for the vocabulary project.

 At the age of six to seven, comes another leap. - It is probably connected with the children encountering the written language and starting to read themselves. But the injustice is founded early. When children start reading, they come across a vocabulary that is significantly larger than the vocabulary of spoken language, notes Mats Myrberg.

 An American study from the turn of the millennium showed that the percentage of unusual words that appeared in a children's book was on average about 50 percent more than what appeared during, for example, an entertainment program on television. The results are clearly transferable to today and to Sweden, says Mats Myrberg: in books we come across words that we rarely hear spoken. Around 80 percent of the approximately 130,000 words in the Swedish Academy's dictionary never or rarely occur in everyday speech. If you don't read them, you won't meet them. If you don't get on this vocabulary-rich journey, you'll fall behind. That is the grim truth.

 Every year the vocabulary gap between those who read and those who don't read widens. But correlations can be tricky. Do children who initially find it easier to read read more? In several studies, researchers have controlled for both intelligence and the so-called decoding ability. And yes, those who find it "easy" to read generally read more. But even when you control for these factors, the connection remains: We seem to get better at reading from reading - and reading itself contributes to a larger vocabulary.

 Dawna Duff, linguist at Binghamton University in the United States, followed and tested more than 400 children from the age of 5 to 15 in a study. - Until around the age of nine, children learn new words above all by listening. Then, and for the rest of life, the vocabulary increases mainly through reading, she says. The researchers wanted to find out if vocabulary is related to how well and thus how much children read. They measured how much the students' vocabulary increased during school, and compared it to how well their reading skills were when they were nine. - The students who had good reading skills in grade 4 had a faster increase in vocabulary. There was a big difference, she says.

 But what was a basic good language ability, and what was connected with the children reading many books? To try to isolate the reading effect itself, the researchers took into account the students' measured language skills during preschool, and also their socioeconomic background – a factor that in studies always correlates strongly with children's vocabulary. The higher the socio-economic background, the more words the children know.

 But even when these factors were taken into account, it was seen that reading made a difference to how much vocabulary increased. How well students read at age nine was linked to their vocabulary at 15 – and reading could predict vocabulary as well as their socio-economic background. During our video meeting, Dawna Duff holds her hands up at an angle. - Because it affects over such a long period, the differences increase over time. When the students are 15, there is already a big difference in vocabulary.

 In short, word comprehension and reading comprehension seem to be linked - and increasing exponentially. It's just that Swedish children and teenagers read less and less every year. In the National Media Council's report Children & media from December, 7 percent of 13–16-year-olds stated that they read books or newspapers daily – compared to 20 percent in 2012. It is children of parents with low education who read the least, regardless of age. Among teenagers, 20 percent of those with parents with low education stated that they never read, among those with highly educated parents: 8 percent. How much we read affects our vocabulary. Alice Sullivan, sociology professor at the College of London, has followed thousands of Britons and studied their reading habits over decades in a series of studies. In one study, researchers followed 11,000 children and had them, at the age of 14, take a vocabulary test. The teenagers who said they read "for fun" every day understood 26 percent more words than those who didn't But it didn't stop at word comprehension - math skills also seemed to improve from reading.

Todde

Also check: https://axiom1b.blogspot.com/2021/12/the-origin-and-development-of-alphabet.html

 

The greatest weakness of Dictatorship

 In a new BBC documentary about the last days of the Soviet Union, "TraumaZone", a director of the State Planning Committee in 1990 proudly shows around the premises in Moscow: "Here we get information about all aspects of life in the Soviet Union. The flow of information is filtered in the building, and becomes more and more concentrated. Then, once the plan is set, it becomes a tidal wave of information that rains down on every worker,” explains the director.

 Images from reality are shown: A laundry which, after a renovation, is now obliged to produce a certain amount of scrap metal every year; potatoes harvested to rot; fights in bread lines.

 "The system began to become absurd," states an informational text laconically. The same top management system now reaps Russian victims in Ukraine.

 A recurring explanation for why invasion forces suffer such heavy losses is that officers on the ground are not allowed to devise tactics independently. Everything has to be coordinated higher up, making it impossible for soldiers to adapt to rapidly changing conditions on the battlefield.

 It is difficult to understand how such obviously dysfunctional and ineffective systems can continue for so long. Maybe it's hubris. But in a way the absurdity is also the very purpose. A famous definition of power is that it is the ability to make a person do something that he would not otherwise have done.

 If you really want to demonstrate your power, then it is not possible to command things that are in the interest of the subordinates, because then how are you to know for what reason they carry out the action?

 Power is most visible when the order is most irrational, as schoolyard bullies have always understood. Say you're an idiot. Beat yourself up. Drink from the toilet. See what I can make you do!

 In an authoritarian state such as today's Russia or the communist Soviet Union, such demonstrations of power are important parts of state building. Since the whole arrangement is based on coercion, it is important to constantly remind who is really in charge.

 Russia's army is organized like a big bully gang, where everyone is harassed by their superiors, and themselves harass them further down the ladder. At the top is Putin, who orders brutal assassinations of those who might conceivably challenge him and does not shy away from publicly humiliating his own aides. A certain amount of absurdity is necessary. The problem with constantly forcing people to go against their own interests and their own better knowledge is that it also lowers efficiency.

 It is not possible to control in detail either a society or an army from the top. Over time, therefore, the ability to perform is depleted, even if the obedience apparently remains. Power becomes an illusion, as TraumaZone's contrast between plan and real economy clearly illustrates.

 True influence, in the sense of successfully achieving goals beyond blind obedience, paradoxically requires letting go of control, giving people the freedom to use their own knowledge and initiative. That dictatorships can never accept that will always be their greatest weakness.

 

Also check: https://axiom1b.blogspot.com/2021/02/populationgrowth-needs-to-be-slowed.html

 

 

EU leaders must increase aid to Ukraine

Now that there are signs that the American willingness to help Ukraine may decrease, it is required that the EU's leaders take a clearly greater responsibility than has been the case so far.

 On Tuesday, November 8, the United States will go to mid-term elections. This year, all 435 members of the House of Representatives and 35 of the hundred senators in the federal Congress are elected. Currently, Democrats hold a few-vote majority in the House of Representatives, while it's 50-50 in the Senate, where Vice President Kamala Harris has the deciding vote. The likely outcome of the congressional elections is that the Republicans will win the majority in the House of Representatives, while it seems to be extremely even once again in the Senate. An outcome in which Republicans win the majority in at least one of the houses will have implications for future US aid to the embattled Ukraine. The likely speaker of the House of Representatives, Kevin McCarthy of California, has already said that President Biden cannot automatically expect that new major aid packages for Ukraine will be approved by his chamber.

 Meanwhile, 30 liberal Democratic members have written a letter, albeit later retracted, arguing that the US president should push for active diplomacy to end the Ukraine war. The implication of such a statement is that Ukraine may find itself making significant concessions regarding its territory in order to end the war. In this situation, there are several signs that the American willingness to help Ukraine in the war against Russia is, if not disappearing, at least clearly decreasing.

 Which countries and organizations have until now been the ones that have given the most help to Ukraine in support of the country's defense against Russia's cruel war of aggression? We find that the total aid promised by the United States during the mentioned period totals roughly 52 billion dollars. If we combine the total commitments from the 27 EU countries individually with the help promised by the EU institutions, we get roughly 29 billion dollars. In other words, the US alone has given, or at least promised, more than $20 billion more in aid to Ukraine, a European country, than Ukraine's European neighbors have. The signals coming from more and more politicians in Washington mean that American support for Ukraine can hardly continue at the same level unless the EU countries' support increases. Why, say these American politicians, should we spend many billions of dollars more on aid to Europe than the Europeans are willing to do to a country in their own continent?

Here, the ability of the EU and the EU countries to act forcefully to save the independence of a European country is tested. After all, it is the European security system that is primarily threatened by President Putin's aggression. Beyond the size of the EU's total financial commitment to Ukraine, there is another problem with EU aid. It refers to budget support, where until the beginning of October the EU only managed to spend barely 30 percent of the promised support, while the corresponding figure for the United States is just over 50 percent.

 If Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine results in a clear loss for Kyiv, or worse, a collapse of the Ukrainian state, the Russian threat to the European security order will continue and worsen. The European leaders are taking on a tremendous responsibility when they delay, or withhold, vital aid to Ukraine. We can illustrate the problem with both the just-departed and the newly-appointed Swedish government's difficulties in deciding to transfer a number of copies of the artillery piece Archer, which the government of Ukraine has repeatedly asked to be delivered. Sweden has access to 48 copies of this system. It is extremely difficult to understand that the military defense of Sweden could not function effectively enough if, say, six of these pieces were transferred to Ukraine in the near future. Perhaps, after further investigations, another six plays can be transferred later. In any case, it is potentially catastrophic for Ukraine's future that mainly European countries delay in this way in delivering weapons systems that could be of absolutely decisive importance for Kiev's combat capabilities in the near term.

 88 years ago, two Western European statesmen - Neville Chamberlain from Great Britain and Édouard Daladier from France - went to Munich, together with Italian dictator Benito Mussolini to discuss the situation in Czechoslovakia with German Führer Adolf Hitler. The gentlemen agreed that part of the independent state of Czechoslovakia – called the Sudetenland by the Germans – would be handed over to Germany. This decision was made above the head of the Czechoslovak government. Chamberlain emphasized when he returned to London after the conference that the parties had negotiated peace for our time.

 A year later, World War II broke out, resulting in tens of millions of deaths. Today's European leaders – led by Emmanuel Macron in France and Olaf Scholz in Germany – have an enormous responsibility to ensure that the Ukraine war does not end with an outcome unacceptable to Kyiv. Dictator Putin in Moscow does not care about any written agreements or treaties, he has already shown that repeatedly regarding Ukraine. In order to stop his attempts to redraw the map of Europe, and thereby undermine the independence of Russia's European neighbors, strong and continued aid to Ukraine is required now and until the war ends on terms acceptable to Ukraine.

 If Putin's military aggression against Ukraine succeeds, Europe's security risks being shaken for decades to come. The EU's leaders must take a significantly greater responsibility for this help in the future than has been the case so far. It is time for the EU and its member states to play a decisive role in solving a crisis that primarily concerns Europe. The traces from 1938 are terrifying, Europe's leaders must take responsibility this time. What may follow if they do not is not a world war, but rather a Europe that risks being dominated by a revanchist Russia.

Todde

Also check:

https://axiom1b.blogspot.com/2022/08/geopolitics-usa-russia-and-china-india.html

 

The alarmists have a point about democracy

 Since election nightin Swden, there has been a competion in gloomy predictions - that democracy in Sweden would be threatened. In fact, it is the opposite.

 "I was just interviewed by a French journalist and told about the uncertainty that Sweden is experiencing right now. Is Sweden a democracy? There are many indications that the Swedish democratic state was abolished on October 14, 2022 when the new Swedish government was formed"

 How central Henrik Arnstad - who wrote the above - has been for Stefan Löfven's (an earlier socialdemocratic prime minister in Sweden) understanding of the Sweden Democrats of today is difficult to know exactly. What is absolutely certain is that Löfven referred to Arnstad when he called SD "neo-fascist" in Swedish television in December 2014. Eight years have passed. But Arnstad's warnings of a fascist takeover seems to have stuck with Stefan Löfven, who before the latest Swedish election was joined by Bengt Westerberg (the former People's Party leader) when just before the election they issued a warning that the Sweden Democrats seriously threaten democracy.

 Yes, since the night of the election, there has been a competion in gloomy predictions. "History will remember this day and everyone who lent themselves to this," writes outgoing Climate and Environment Minister Annika Strandhäll (Socialdemocrat). Märta Stenevi (spokesperson for the Green Party and former minister) in turn believes that the government is "a killing blow for Sweden's democratic voice in the world"

 Sure, I can laugh at the overreactions, but I also bring up the above because I think several of them have a point – our democracy is more fragile than you might think. Just not in the way the hysterics claim, but in the opposite way

 The most common framing for the discussion of democracy concerns how it is challenged by right-wing populists, or Nazi-fascists to use a more popular term. But the opposite movement, from unelected technocrats, bureaucrats and other gray eminences, is instead to limit the will of the people in area after area. Ahead of Italy's parliamentary elections in September, Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, warned Italians of "consequences" if they were to vote for the right-wing coalition parties. "We have tools," she threatened.

 One can debate what the winner Giorgia Meloni and her party want to do going forward and the roots in fascism, but unlike von der Leyen and her commissioners, the incoming Italian government is elected by the people in Italy. When Lina Stenberg, former editorial writer at Aftonbladet (a major Swedish newspaper), tweets that she "wants to constitutionally protect democracy", it is of course not about our existing constitution. In the first paragraph of the form of government it is clearly stated that "All public power in Sweden emanates from the people".

 No, Stenberg wants to limit the will of the people. Her definition of democracy is that put forward by the Civil Rights Defenders, which she emphasizes herself, where the emphasis is on the rights of various minorities, migrants and individuals, rather than on the voters' ability to vote for change.

 The authoritarian, anti-democratic part shows itself most clearly in those who complain about the election results. It is an unhealthy dynamic that plays out in Sweden, but also around Europe. Populations are trying to vote back influence over their nations, over migration and the economy, while technocrats and the establishment try to strengthen their grip on power.

 There are of course different ways to measure how well a democracy works. One is to see how well the elected officials' opinions match those of the voters. Since the 2002 parliamentary election in Sweden, the representativeness of opinion between voters and elected officials has become increasingly better, political scientists Patrik Öhberg, Henrik Oscarsson and Jakob Ahlbom show in "Folkviljans forverkligare" (The realization of the will of the people). This is mainly explained by the fact that the difference in opinion on migration issues has reduced radically:

 "Overall, therefore, the entry of the Sweden Democrats into the Riksdag and the repositioning of parties and voters has meant an improved representation of opinion if we look at just these dimensions. [...] It is clear that the period before the Sweden Democrats' electoral success was characterized by a large representation gap in conflicts of values ​​that established parties in the Swedish Parliament chose not to make the subject of political battle."

 Democracy has, at least in this respect, not been weakened but on the contrary strengthened by the Sweden Democrats' increased voter support and influence over politics.

We should stop whining about climate change

 The transition will come whether we like it or not, but if we act now, we can more easily influence what a future sustainable society can look like. It won't give us as many gadgets but can still offer a safe and more meaningful life.

 Climate change is often discussed as a technology issue. It is about replacing fossil cars with electric cars, coal with wind power and making plastics from biomass, just to take a few examples.

 But these discussions miss what the transition leads to in the long run. The use of fossil fuels has meant changes in virtually all areas of society, from where we live to how we produce. Globalization, capitalism, motoring, housing, education, the pension systems, even the way we see ourselves as humans in relation to the rest of the biosphere are largely the result of the transformation of society with coal and oil.

 It is clear that we can produce fossil-free fertilizers, electric cars and fossil-free steel. The electric car is more than a hundred years old, and the first commercial production of fertilizer at the beginning of the twentieth century was fossil-free.

 Before Swedish steel became dependent on imported fossil coal, it was produced with fossil-free charcoal.

 It is also quite clear that there are a number of disadvantages with all the technologies that are supposed to replace the fossil ones. Even hydropower has major disadvantages. Protests against hydropower were the first major environmental protest in Sweden. It is a good thing that these disadvantages are highlighted and discussed, but not as an argument for the continued use of fossil fuels.

 Even without the climate damage, the fossil fuel economy is doomed because the costs of extraction only increase as more and more difficult-to-access sources are used. Instead, we must ask ourselves how much energy society should consume, for what and why.

 In addition to the direct disadvantages of various types of renewable energy, there is hardly any discussion at all of how the transition will change society at large.

 Only now are people starting to discuss the imbalance and weaknesses in the Swedish electricity system. Irregularities and unreliability of the electricity system are a big problem for businesses, in addition to all the inconveniences (like thawed freezers) they cause to people in general.

 This can be seen in California where both households and businesses invest heavily in backup systems, usually diesel-powered generators. In turn, this reduces the scope for investment in the power grids, making them even more vulnerable to disruptions.

 Fossil-free fertilizer will be 2-3 times more expensive than the fossil one. How farming is done and the relative prices of different agricultural products will then change. It will also lead to reduced specialization in agriculture and reduced global trade in food products. These, in turn, will lead to significantly greater price increases than the actual cost of the fossil-free fertilizer.

 Sustaining the food supply will require recirculation of nutrients from city to country, with rebuilt sewage systems. Megacities of 20 million people will most likely need to reduce their population.

 These two examples together with greatly increased costs for transport give a foretaste of the cascading effects that will affect society if we take climate change seriously. These effects will inevitably lead to greatly reduced consumption and non-existent economic growth.

 As long as the economy has been able to grow, better living conditions and more toys have kept people (relatively) happy. Instead of bluffing people about green growth, we need to start a fundamental transformation to a society with a much smaller ecological footprint. 

Todde 

Also check: https://axiom1b.blogspot.com/2021/02/populationgrowth-needs-to-be-slowed.html

 Reasons need to be nuanced. Inflation is not only due to wars and pandemics, but even more to the fact that over many years an enormous increase in the money supply has been created. The high debts have created a huge distortion.

 When you follow the media reporting on the sharply increasing inflation in the world and in Sweden, you get the impression that it is a phenomenon that only occurs, such as natural disasters. Now they also call it Putin prices with reference to the ongoing war in Ukraine. But the explanation is not that simple.

 There is a need for greater transparency and honesty when it comes to reporting on why inflation and even deflation occur and what are the reasons behind it. These problems are largely of our own making and the institutions we have created to manage the monetary system.

To quote the Nobel laureate in economics, Milton Friedman: Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon, insofar as inflation is and can only be created by a greater increase in the quantity of money relative to production.

 In order to understand inflation, one must understand how money is created. The majority of all money in existence is created by the banking system and only a small portion is created by central banks.

 Money is created when someone takes out a loan. Money is created out of debt. Banks are often described as money brokers, that is, they take in savings and then lend them out. This is not true. Banks create money through a multiplier effect. The explanation is that regular transaction accounts are actually equivalent to money - they are fully money.

 If at the same time the bank created a loan for a borrower with the help of this money, that money is also immediately available to the borrower. That is to say, the amount of money, which today is mostly electronic and not notes and coins, has increased. The bank has created new money that previously did not exist. The central bank is responsible for the control mechanism of this system.

 You control how much loan and thus how much money is created through your policy interest rate. If the central bank has a high policy rate, it becomes expensive to borrow and fewer loans are issued, that is, less money is created. Therefore, it is the central banks together with the banks that determine how much money there is in circulation. You control, so to speak, the amount of money in circulation, the money supply.

 But not only the money supply affects what we call inflation today. Inflation is measured in the consumer price index (CPI). This measure is based on the changes in the prices of goods and services in a preselected basket. In Sweden, Statistics Sweden (SCB) determines the contents of the basket. Some things are not included in the CPI, for example real estate prices or prices of securities.

 If we return to Friedman's quote, inflation is affected by two things, money supply and production. If the money supply increases or if production decreases, inflation will occur. In the media, you usually only highlight one side, i.e. decreasing production due to various reasons mentioned above, but you very rarely highlight the other side - increase in the money supply, i.e. what central banks and banks control.

 Since 1971, when the gold standard was dismantled, the money supply has been controlled via monetary policy according to the mandates given by the political system to central banks. In Sweden, the Riksbank must keep the CPI at 2 %. In recent years, we have had to learn new concepts such as quantitative easing (QE) and negative interest rates. These concepts have one thing in common. There are active attempts by the institutions to increase the amount of money in society.

The idea is that more money will fuel growth and prevent recession from occurring. This thought is good because low growth and recession bring with it undesirable things such as unemployment, exclusion and poverty. The problem is that this medicine can be overdosed and I would say that it has been severely overdosed.

 Since the 2008 financial crisis, there has been an explosive increase in the money supply via QE and negative interest rates. As previously mentioned, money is created via debt, i.e. from loans. If you want to create more money, debts must increase. That debts increase does not have to be a problem if the increase in debts occurs at the same level as growth.

 In recent years, this has not been the case. Debt has increased much faster than growth. The problem then is that there is more money chasing fewer goods. This is inflation.

 One can ask why, since the financial crisis in 2008 until recently, we have not seen any inflation measured in CPI?

 The reason is that new money is not only used to buy goods and services according to Statistics Sweden's shopping basket. The new money is also used to buy real estate and securities on the stock exchange and financial market. One should ask who get the new money and for what purpose. To borrow, you must be creditworthy. The more creditworthy you are, the easier you can borrow. When you borrow, new money is created. It is easy to see that it is the well-off who have access to new money and these use the money to invest in real estate and shares, among other things. The new money has mainly gone to these assets and has therefore driven up their value (inflated prices in thoose areas.).

 Money has to a lesser extent found its way into the shopping basket and wages, so despite the enormous amount of money created, the CPI has not been significantly affected until 2022. On the contrary, it has been difficult to have an effect on the CPI and difficult to get good growth started. This is an unfair process that favors the creditworthy who have gotten richer and richer in real estate and stocks and that has clearly disadvantaged wage earners, senior citizens and the poor.

 This is also clearly seen in the measure of inequality that exists, the so-called Gini coefficient. The recent inflation is due to two things. Partly the reduced production due to war and pandemic, but even more so because for many years there has been an enormous increase in the amount of money.

 This money is available and when investors see risks of falling real estate prices and bad upside in the stock market, a little more money will move from real estate and the stock market to physical assets such as goods, productive land, etc. This then drives up prices of goods in the CPI basket . It is enough for a small part of the money supply to be moved from stocks and real estate to the physical market for the CPI to take off.

 Central banks are now in a difficult situation. If inflation is allowed to be, it can derail into a price and wage spiral, and in the worst case, society can end up in a hyperinflation - like in 1930s Germany.

 But if you try to fight inflation through sharply increased interest rates, it becomes problematic when the indebtedness is so high. Interest costs would greatly reduce the consumption space of people, which affects the companies that have to reduce the workforce, leading to unemployment. A deflationary spiral can occur which in the worst case can resemble the Great Depression.

 To a large extent, inflation is a problem caused by the politically appointed institutions which have certainly tried with good intentions to prevent recessions, but instead built up a huge distortion in the monetary system with high debts, large redistribution from poor to rich and which also now entails that we risk having to go through a significantly deeper recession in the future.

 We need to talk much more about this in the future.

 A very interesting TED talk by Yuval Noah Harari. He talks about Why Humans are Superior to other animals, Why Humans run the World  and Why Humans are in control of our Planet. It is basically a talk about the superiority of The Group Mind that only humans posess (as far as we in our modern western civilisation know).

 You will  find the TED talk at:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzj7Wg4DAbs&t=29s

 Maybe you would also be interested in Hararis talk on Nationalism at:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UVG0SEyylso:

also check:

In Swedish:

https://axiom1a.blogspot.com/2015/09/sapiens-en-kort-historik-over.html

or in English:

https://axiom1b.blogspot.com/2015/09/sapiens-brief-history-of-humanity.html 

Todde

 

Sewage, Urine, Poop, Life, Biology, Chemistry - fantastic resources in future recycling.

  In our stool there are lots of useful substances that it is possible to recycle.

  Check out the program below on URplay and learn more about the opportunities we have to improve our environment and our ability to reuse our shit.

Sewage systems, Sewage treatment, Biological treatment, Treatment plants, Technology, Technical hygiene

 English title: The secret science of Sewage.

https://urplay.se/program/222249-avloppens-fantastiska-resurser

  The program is available on URPlay until December 31, 2023 with English spoken and Swedish subtitles.

Todde

Also check: https://axiom1b.blogspot.com/2016/02/

 

Speaking of the crisis / war in Ukraine

 

  Youval Harari (who wrote the book Sapiens) leaves interesting and rewarding views on this in an interview on TED talks. 

  My daughter Caroline told me about this link. Check it out at:

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQqthbvYE8M

Todde

Feel free to also check:

http://axiom1b.blogspot.com/2015/09/sapiens-brief-history-of-humanity.html