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Ironing
When I was 17, after burning a triangle of skin on my forearm with an iron during my first attempt at ironing, my grandmother told me that she never ironed. To my great surprise, I had never noticed anything; my grandmother was always elegant. So, I said to myself, there is no way I’m going…
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La tensión económica nos está enfrentando unos contra otros
El hecho de tener dificultades para llegar a fin de mes hace que las personas sean menos tolerantes y solidarias. Bajo presión económica, las personas son menos solidarias y se comportan mal, anteponiendo sus propios intereses. Las desigualdades en cuanto a riqueza y estilo de vida hacen que las personas se culpen unas a otras.…
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Economic tension is turning us against each other
Struggling to make ends meet makes people less tolerant and less supportive of one another. Under economic pressure, people are less supportive of each other and behave badly, favoring an “every man for himself” attitude. Inequalities in wealth and lifestyle cause people to blame each other. When there is enough for everyone, people share without…
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La mine urbaine: les métaux dans les poubelles
Plus besoin de creuser profondément dans les mines, recycler les métaux devient plus avantageux que d’extraire des sols. Cela consomme moins de CO2 et pollue moins. There is no longer a need to dig deep into mines, as recycling metals is becoming more advantageous than extracting them from the ground. It consumes less CO2 and…
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The big change
Karl Marx demonstrated that capitalism would experience numerous crises due to its inherently unstable functioning, which penalizes the majority of the population. Companies cannot differentiate themselves from one another solely through their machinery, because their competitors also have machinery that they can push to its limits. Human labor can always be pushed to do more…
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Representatives selected at random
In modern democracies, the president is the head of the executive power. He or she is supposed to enforce the laws. He is not supposed to make decisions. He is supposed to be a technician who enforces the laws passed by parliament. He should be a civil servant. The fact that he is elected gives…
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The power of speech – The seductive power of language
Democracy means power to the people. But the people are influenced by rhetoric. Someone who is a good speaker can convince the people to go in one direction or another, for the common good or not, with accurate information or not. The people are easily manipulated. In fact, a demonstration made by speaking loudly, confidently,…
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Robots
Robotnik means ‘worker’ in Polish and robotník means ‘worker’ in Czech/Slovak. The issue of robots forces us to think about human labor, because human labor is becoming less necessary thanks to machines. We need to support the work of machines so that humans can survive without doing this work. If machines replace human labor, these humans…
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The diesel engine
Diesel engines are more efficient, more reliable, easier to repair, and more polyvalent than gasoline engines. Diesel engines produce combustion particles, but their ecological footprint can be reduced through the use of filters and additives. Like all combustion engines, they pollute, but they are the most efficient — meaning they use less fuel and emit…
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Billionaires are often squeezed by autocrats
Billionaires who support autocrats have no guarantee that the autocrat will grant them benefits once elected. Having an autocrat’s ear does not necessarily last. It is quite common to see autocrats discard their supporters. “He who can destroy a thing has the real control of it.” Dune, Frank Herbert. This means that when you bring…