This video did not surprise me at all. In the early stages of humanity, populations were smaller and therefore required fewer resources. Most of the time the people could get by on their own land and the majority of attacks were simply religion based or because two civilizations did not like each other. However, as these groups of people began to expand, the needs for more space and resources became readily apparent. This leads to more and more conflicts with more and more causalities. Of course most of the conflicts happened in areas of power, if a land has literally no or almost no value to it, why would people fight over it? They would simply let whoever is already there deal with it. The different types of resources these civilizations were looking for also changed. At one point food sources were the main source of conflict. At other points gold and silver mines or even vineyards became key resources needed by various civilizations. Now, the resource we battle over is oil, which is why the majority of modern conflicts occur in the Middle East. The Middle East is the primary source of oil for most people in the world, so people are going to fight to maintain political power there. This happens because if a president or other political leader takes over who is not friendly towards a country, they may have to go somewhere else that is more expensive for their oil needs. I find it interesting that most of the conflicts occur in Europe and Asia, but I do not think this is surprising either. It seems that Europe and Asia have the most natural resources that are easily accessible, so there would be more conflict there for those resources as it is far easier for someone to take power in the Middle East than for a person to fly or boat troops to North or South America. I find this video interesting, but not surprising, as I’m certain that over time the explosions will continue to get bigger and bigger.

I am not surprised that suicide is getting more and more common in the Military. As was discussed in the video, military culture is very alpha male oriented. No one wants to admit to being weak, and not being able to take the horror of war is not something that man soldiers are willing to talk about. All too often the casualties and injuries of war are only thought of in terms of bodily harm, however the mental effect that war has on soldiers can be just as, if not worse than bodily injuries. There are still not enough mental health programs for military soldiers, and until this problem is solved and soldiers are not afraid to talk about their experiences I fear that these suicide rates will just continue to rise. Other than suicide rates, soldiers can also become violent from PTSD, oftentimes blacking out and going back to their soldier instinct which could result in someone getting extremely hurt. In my home state of Colorado, a lot of soldiers go to Colorado Springs where a military base is located. There are constantly reports of violent fights and violent crime where soldiers are involved. After experiencing what they have experienced overseas in an active combat zone, I do not think the soldiers are at fault at all, but rather the military as a whole where it is taboo to seek mental health help. In some cases soldiers are even actively made fun of for this such as was demonstrated in the video. The emotional stress of war is only made worse by this mentality that the soldier must be a strong, fearless male. I think that everyone in the world would experience fear if they were shot at or almost killed as many soldiers are, and I do not think that they should be blamed for experiencing fear at these moments. Because the soldiers keep this bottled up, many end up exploding in either depression or rage and this is where we see these suicide rates increasing. Until soldiers are more comfortable and more easily able to seek help for this mental trauma, this problem will continue to escalate.

I feel that as long as we have election cycles where candidates spend around a year campaigning for office, and spend millions of dollars doing this, companies such as the various oil ones will always have a stake in government. These companies have such a high stake in the various policies that our government is passing, that having any amount of politicians in their pockets is well worth the cost. This form of what is essentially legalized bribery is everywhere in our government, as the candidates need funding from somewhere, and if they were self funded chances are that they received that money from their own business which likely has some stake in all of the policies the government passes. However, I do not believe we can blame the oil companies for taking advantage of this system. Obviously if I was in a position to manipulate the government to benefit my business and my income I would take it. The heart of the problem lies with how our government works. The privately funded campaigns have to be cut out first, and then new progress can be made. Presidents may make claims about how they are going to start removing outside influence from politics; however they themselves have already been influenced so this is impossible. The root of the problem has to be eliminated in order for this to be solved. However, the relationship between these two factors is quite essentially to the current government structure. The politicians need someone to fund them so that they can stay in power or gain power, and the oil companies want to make as much profit as possible. So both of these parties will do whatever it takes to make sure they each have as much power as possible. I’m not sure if there is a direct or easy solution to this problem, but it will certainly take time to resolve, and it may in fact never get full resolved.

Have an unequal distribution of wealth and power is just a necessity of society. If everyone were equal, there would be no motive for others to work harder, and this would result in a smaller amount of goals being accomplished. However, I do not believe that wealth is achieved solely through hard work. After all, looking at various people, there are arguably more hard workers in the lower class than the upper class. A substantial amount of luck is involved in someone rising through the classes without a family connection or some other built in “get out of jail free” card. For example, a person starting up a company may work 18 hour days for years and accomplish barely anything other than being able to survive. This person may decide to go to a bar and meet an investor who is interested in his company, and can give him money to advance his company farther, ensuring his success. However, if the person had not gone to the bar and met this investor, then his company could go out of business fast, regardless of how much work he put into it. I believe that a person making his way to the upper class solely on his own power is extremely rare. That is why we see stories about it in the news and in movies and novels. In today’s society, it is more who you know, than what you know. If a person knows many people in the upper class, he or she will have a much higher chance of getting there than someone who does not. This is why so many colleges have begun stressing their notable alumni, because college is becoming more of a place where people go to meet others who can help them afterwards, than to actually get an education. I am not sure if this is a bad thing or not, as meeting people and making connections has always been an important part of the business world. I feel it is becoming much more vital to people joining the work force, and it will be interesting to see what this results in, in the years to come.

I feel as though managing a large crowd of people without some degree of chaos is impossible. When large groups of people come together, even if there is a collective goal that benefits everyone, it is almost impossible to have complete conformity. I believe that the root of the free rider problem comes from the sense of anonymity that we get when we are in a large group. As we discussed in class, people feel comfortable texting or talking to friends and not paying attention in large lecture halls because it is very unlikely for the professor to notice that that one person is not obeying the rules in a group of hundreds. In order to motivate a group to act together, there must be a common goal among everyone. For example, the article is about evacuating from cities when natural disasters are approaching. In this case, the goal is to survive and leave the city safely. Everyone has the same goal, as no one wants to die or see family members die from a horrific natural disaster. If everyone has the same goal, then the group will make steps towards progress. The free rider problem will continue to exist because of the anonymity of the group, because of this, even though the free riders may not help the group achieve its goal, they will not hinder the progress because they will still benefit from what the group is doing. In order to have a group achieve its goal efficiently, there must be some form of organization. I believe doing this is a fine art, as the level of organization cannot be too much or there will likely be some confusion within the group, and if organization is lacking then the group may fall into complete chaos. However, if the proper amount of organization is created so that the group can clearly see what each individual must do, or not do, in order for the group to reach its goal, then there will not be chaos like there was in the article about evacuations.

I completely agree with the points that Zach made in the video. Even though he had two mothers and no father, he turned out, as he states it “pretty well”. However, it is not clear if Zach is an outlier, or if he represents how the majority of children with gay parents think about their parents. I personally see no reason why gay parents should be unable to have kids or be married. I think if any type of parental situation would be damaging to children, I believe it would be divorced or having a single parent. Obviously, this occurs more and more often in today’s society, and it happens with straight couples as well. I think it would be interesting to do a study that monitors families of various situations over a long period of time to see if there is any impact in the children of straight, gay, divorced, and single parents. I would bet that the differences between the children of these couples are minor, if there is any real difference at all. As long as children receive love and attention that a family is supposed to provide, they will turn out just like Zach, regardless of what the family consists of. I believe that now, because of the age range of most politicians, there is a divide between generations on the thoughts of gay marriage and rights. I believe that our younger generation is much more tolerant of such things, as we realize that if two men or two women want to get married, it really does not have that large of an effect on us. In the near future, I believe we will see policies preventing gay marriage being overturned, as more open minded politicians begin to take office. When this happens, I think it will ease any doubts that gay marriage might be harmful to our society. It will quickly become clear, that as long as children receive love, support, and attention, they will turn out perfectly fine, no matter who gives them those things.

I think it is definitely a good sign that the government in Finland realizes that this is a real problem, and is trying to act to help people who are suffering from depression due to the lack of sunlight, but I’m wondering how people who have lived in this town their entire lives would react to going to a place with mostly sunlight, such as Alaska, which at some points during the year has more hours of sunlight than nighttime. I feel like this would be something very interesting to see how those people would react to the change, and if it would enhance their mood, or if they are so used to the weather if it would have a negative effect. Clearly, this video shows that sunlight is directly linked to a person’s happiness, and I think this could be an interesting thing to investigate to deal with every day depression. (2/2)

Before I even watched this video, I was acutely aware of how having no sunlight can affect a person. I live in Colorado, which is one of the sunniest states in the United States. Coming to Pennsylvania during the winter time was a big shock for me. Almost every day the sky is overcast, and seeing any sun at all is a rare blessing. This began to impact my mood, and I realized I was feeling more sloth like and not as happy as usual. I know from firsthand experience that not having light in life can impact a person’s mood. However, my experience is just with grey skies, I cannot imagine how black skies and pure night would affect a person. I feel like we are taught that light is a good thing and that it represents happiness. When light disappears, so does our happiness and motivation. I also feel like the cold weather may have an impact. As winter comes, depression tends to increase and I believe this happens even more so in a place without sunlight. I know that I would not even be able to motivate myself to get up in the morning if I knew it was pitch black outside, so I can feel for the people who have to work by lights that try to simulate the effect of the sun. (1/2)

Bad things that are highly unlikely to happen still have a large frightening effect on society as a whole. With the rise of the Internet and the entire world being connect, we hear stories such as the one in the video daily. The news has grown into something that only reports shock stories, no one would tune in and watch if the news report was about the millions of kids who walked to school and walked home safely. We have grown accustomed to hearing such stories, and with the Internet we now hear them worldwide. This is a blessing and a curse. It allows us to become more educated on different cultures; however we also see the few negative things that happen in other countries and continents and think we should change our lives because of them. For example, I recently read an article about a Chinese man who died from starvation after playing a video game for such a long time. This prompted a psychologist talking about how video games may be too addictive. I think that is completely ridiculous, as one Chinese man dying from not moving from his computer seems more like a personal problem than a public one. I think this is the most important part of the issue. The mass media makes personal or individual problems appear to be public issues. Like we talked about in class, I think this can have positive and negative effects. The positives are things such as eating disorders or depression, which a person who has one of those things might hear a story that 30% of people are depressed or have an eating disorder, and that person would feel more comfortable seeking help. However, the negatives appear daily as well, such as in this news story. The reporters even made sure to interview other people who all seemed extremely frightened and worried. This inspires terror to emerge in society, and makes us worry greatly about things that we should not worry about. I hope that eventually this reaction from society will stop, otherwise I worry about the future of society as a whole, because if we all sit in our rooms and have no contact with anyone out of fear, that will destroy all of our culture.

To us, having multiple spouses seems like an extremely strange situation to be in. However, in other cultures this is perfectly normal, and seems like the only logical thing to do. As explained in the video, polygamy is considered normal because it preserves farmland. Marriage almost seems like it is a necessary work relationship for the people who engage in it. The video also explained that having multiple husbands to one wife controls the population. This might be one of the only ways that the people in this side of the world know how to deal with these issues. However, due to the new levels of education and now that they are less educated, they are most likely learning other ways to deal with these two issues that will make polygamy seem like a strange concept in a few generations. Here in the United States, we are taught that marriage is an extremely romantic thing. Few people get married to have shared incomes or other things that would make marriage seem more like a necessary thing like it is for the people in the video. In China, I can see situations like this where many men being married to one woman becomes normal in the future. It is much more valuable to have a son than a daughter, and because of the one child rule many families choose to kill or abort their daughters in order to have a more valuable son. This will clearly result in a huge ratio change of males to females in the future. Due to this, unless males in China want to remain single, they will have to start sharing the females. This could result in an entire country of polygamists, just out of necessity. This will also change the meaning of marriage in China, to something where it seems like the only logical thing to do, instead of out of passion like in most other countries in the World. This will redefine the Chinese culture, and may result in many other changes in the near future.