Analise - fundamentalismo - النقد الاجنبى للسلام

كرافت هاينز كوث (خك). - 08.02.2017 خك. 48،: 01:14 2017-02-08 UTC00 شركة مايكروسوفت (مسفت). - 08.02.2017 مسفت. ،. : 01:12 2017-02-08 UTC00 أوسشف. - 08.02.2017 أوسشف. : 01:11 2017-02-08 UTC00 راكو المؤلف المحفوظات: إميل فانوف لقد انتهيت مؤخرا من قراءة الطبعة الثالثة من كتاب ديفيد D. Friedman8217s آلية الحرية: دليل على الرأسمالية الراديكالية. الذي نشر في عام 2014. ونشرت طبعتان 1 و 2 في عامي 1973 و 1989 على التوالي. يحاول الكتاب شرح كيف يمكن لمجتمع أناركو رأسمالي أن يعمل في المستقبل، ويستمد من الأمثلة التاريخية لإظهار كيف أن المجتمعات المختلفة قد قدمت بالفعل حتى الحد الأدنى من وظائف الحكومة (الشرطة والمحاكم والجيش) من الدول القومية ولكن دون مساعدتهم أو كليا دون وجودهم. المجتمعات والنظم القانونية التي أشرت إليها من الكتاب تشمل: فترة الملحمة (القرون الوسطى) آيسلندا (ص 44)، الغجر رومينتشال (ص 49)، صوماليالاند (الفصل 49)، القانون اليهودي التقليدي والإسلامي، والبعض الآخر على أساس قانون العداء (الفصل 49)، وقبيلة كومانش الأمريكيين الأصليين (الفصل 52). وفي حالة آيسلندا التي تعود إلى العصور الوسطى، استغرقت قرابة 400 سنة شبه عديمي الجنسية (من 870 إلى 1263 سنة): قواعد قانونية منفذة من القطاع الخاص وبدون فرع تنفيذي للحكومة. كما لو كان هذا لا رائعة بما فيه الكفاية، وهو موضوع مثير للاهتمام على حد سواء تغطيها التحليل الاقتصادي للقانون، والتي يغطيها فريدمان بمزيد من التفصيل في كتاب آخر: قوانين النظام: ما الاقتصاد أن تفعل مع القانون ولماذا يهم. والتي أتطلع أيضا إلى القراءة. ما أود أن أورده بتفصيل بسيط هنا هو كيف مقاربة مدرسة فريدمان 8217s شيكاغو للاقتصاد (الرسم فقط من هذا الكتاب بالذات) يختلف عن نهج المدرسة النمساوية للاقتصاد. أنا أقول النهج (الجمع) لأنه لا يوجد اتفاق بالإجماع على كل نقطة داخل المدرسة النمساوية الفكر ولا أو أي دولة أخرى على الأقل يجب أن يكون هناك أو الناس قد توقفت عن التفكير لأنفسهم. 1 في الكلية أخذت دورات الاقتصاد السائدة المطلوبة مثل أي وطالب آخر، وقام عدد قليل من الدراسات المستقلة في الاقتصاد بالإضافة إلى ذلك. ولكن لم يكن حتى بعد الكلية التي بدأت لدراسة المدرسة النمساوية من تلقاء نفسها. لذلك بينما قرأت من خلال آلات الحرية. لمراجعتي الخاصة، وسجلت الأشياء التي لاحظت حول كيف نهجه في الاقتصاد تختلف عن ما تعلمت من المدرسة النمساوية. وبما أن أصدقاء الاقتصاد الاقتصاديين قد سألوني بالفعل عن الاقتصاد البروفيسور فريدمانز، قررت نشره هنا في حال كان من المفيد للآخرين. مرة أخرى في عام 2010 قرأت أيضا حوالي نصف كتابه المخفية النظام: اقتصاديات الحياة اليومية. ولكنني لم أكن قد قرأت في ذلك الوقت الكثير من الاقتصاد النمساوي، لذلك سأكون غير مؤهل لاستخدام مواد من هذا الكتاب في هذا التحليل دون قراءته مرة أخرى. لا يقصد بأي حال من الأحوال أن الأحداث التي يقترح فيها Freman8217 تشابه مع المدرسة النمساوية يعني أنه يتفق تماما مع أي خبير اقتصادي نمساوي معين. في الواقع، كما أفهم ذلك، انه فخور جدا ليكون شيكاغو. وبالمثل، فيما يتعلق بالأحداث التي يبدو فيها نهج Freman8217s أن تباعد عن المدرسة النمساوية، وأنا لا أشر لهم من أجل نقدهم نفسي. تتوافق جميع أرقام الصفحات أدناه مع الطبعة الثالثة (طباعة) للكتاب. وأود أن أذكر أنه منذ نشره باستخدام الأمازون طباعة على الطلب، بقدر ما أعرف، يمكن للمؤلف إجراء تغييرات على الكتاب في أي وقت دون أن تصبح هذه الطبعة الثالثة 4 ال. لذلك قد تتغير أيضا أرقام الصفحات التي قدمتها أدناه. الأحداث التي يبدو ديفيد فريدمان لتبادل أوجه التشابه مع النهج النمساوي في الاقتصاد في آلات الحرية: ص. 44: نقد ماركس لم أقرأ كتب يوجين فون بم-باوركس نفسي حتى الآن، ولكن من ما أفهمه، نقد فريدمانز لماركس هو نفسه (أو قريبا جدا) من النقد الذي قدمه بم-باويرك. نقلا عن فريدمان في ماكينات فريدمان. ودفع ثمن الأدوات اليوم وانتظار سنوات للحصول على المال هو في حد ذاته نشاطا منتجا وأن الفائدة التي اكتسبها رأس المال هو الدفع المقابل. خريج. 45: تفضيل الوقت على الرغم من أن هذا المفهوم مفهوما جيدا في الاقتصاد الكلاسيكي الجديد، بقدر ما أفهم، فإنه ينشأ مع بم-Bawerk.2 هذا المفهوم هو المفتاح في المدرسة النمساوية ويستخدم لشرح أسعار الفائدة. هنا أقتبس فريدمان: وهكذا عشرة دولارات اليوم يستحق أكثر من عشرة دولارات غدا. هذا هو السبب في وجود أسعار الفائدة، لماذا، إذا كنت أقترض عشرة دولارات منكم اليوم، يجب أن أعيد أكثر قليلا من عشرة دولارات غدا. خريج. 49: نظرية ذاتية للقيمة هذا المفهوم يعود إلى كارل منجرز نقد ديفيد ريكاردو والاقتصاديين الكلاسيكيين مقياس ثابت للقيمة. ومع ذلك، فقد شق طريقه إلى الاقتصاد النيوكلاسيكي 3. 102: حوار الحساب الاقتصادي الاشتراكي فريدمان يشير إلى مساهمات ميسس في النقاش الحسابي الاشتراكي الاقتصادي و ميسس بوك الاشتراكية: تحليل اقتصادي واجتماعي. خريج. 143: اقتباس روثبارد فريدمان يقتبس روثبارد على حكومة محدودة. ومن الواضح أنه لا يؤيد الاقتصاد روثباردز، ولكن النمساويين قد تكون مهتمة لمعرفة ذلك. 215-6: تدنيس المال كل النمساوي وأنا على علم يدعم إضفاء الطابع الشخصي على المال (على الرغم من أن العديد من لا يوافق بشدة مع بعض اقتراحات Hayek8217s حول هذا الموضوع). وبالنظر إلى أننا نعيش في عالم من البنوك المركزية والمال، فإن بعض النمساويين يقولون إنه نظرا لأن الأموال تسيطر عليها الدول القومية، ينبغي أن تكون مدعومة على الأقل بالذهب أو الفضة أو بعض الأموال السليمة الأخرى للحد من الإنفاق الحكومي، وما إلى ذلك. الذي يبدو ديفيد فريدمان يختلف مع النهج النمساوي (أو على الأقل الميسيسيان) في الاقتصاد في الآلات الحرية: ص. 166-7: نظرية مسبقة لحقوق الملكية هانز هيرمان هوب قد أنتج مثل هذه النظرية. ص. 212 أمبير 277: الناتج القومي الإجمالي يستخدم فريدمان الناتج القومي الإجمالي (غنب). فالنمساويون لا يميلون إلى مثل هذه الإحصاءات الاقتصادية الكلية (5). ومع ذلك، لاحظت في الماضي أنه إذا ذهبت إلى بلدان "ميسس" وبلدان معينة للبحث (ألبانيا على سبيل المثال)، فستجد إحصاءات الناتج المحلي الإجمالي تشير إلى البنك الدولي كمصدر. ص. 256 أمبير 263: المنافسة المثالية فريدمان يستخدم مفهوم المنافسة الكاملة. إسرائيل كيرسنر على وجه الخصوص يجادل بأن مفهوم المنافسة الكاملة يتعارض مع المعنى الحقيقي للمنافسة. رؤية واحدة من المحاضرات كيرزنرز على هذا هنا. ص. 259-60: العقلانية والتنبؤ يتطلب موضوع العقلانية مني أن أتعمق أكثر قليلا مما كنت على استعداد له هنا، ولكن بالنسبة للمهتمين بتحليل أكثر تعمقا، انظر ورقتي مع كارميلو فيرليتو حول العقلانية والحكومة البشرية مراقبة . وفيما يتعلق بالتنبؤ، يقول فريدمان إن الافتراض المركزي للاقتصاد هو العقلانية، وأنه يمكن التنبؤ بأفضل سلوك فردي من خلال افتراض أن كل فرد يأخذ تلك الإجراءات التي تحقق أهدافه على أفضل وجه (6). ويقوم النمساويون بتنبؤات خاصة بهم طوال الوقت (توقع فقاعة اقتصادية انفجار، على سبيل المثال)، ولكن التركيز، عندما تحدث التنبؤات، على التنبؤات النمطية والنظرية النمط حول النتائج المنسقة للتدخل. 281-2: خلط العمل مع الأرض كمبرر لحقوق الملكية. فريدمان لا يوافق على إغلاق العمل مع الأرض كمبرر كاف لحقوق الملكية. وهو يعيد النظر في تبرير القفل ويجادل بأن خلط العمل بالأرض يكتسب ملكية ما ينتج عن العمل لأن الشخص يملك عمله الخاص، ولكن هذا لا يوفر مبررا لملكية الأرض نفسها. ويعترف فريدمان بأن نسخته المنقحة من اعتمادات لوكان لها مشاكلها (8). كما أن كتاب ستيفان كينسيلاس ضد الملكية الفكرية ينتقد أيضا أقفال خلط الأراضي مع العمل. لكن كينزيلا يبدو أنها لا تتفق مع فريدمان على نقطة امتلاك تلك العمالة: ليست هناك حاجة للحفاظ على وجهة نظر غريبة أن واحد يملك العمل من أجل امتلاك الأشياء الأولى تحتل. العمل هو نوع من العمل، والعمل غير صالح بدلا من ذلك، بل هو الطريقة التي بعض الأشياء الملموسة (مثل الهيئات) العمل في العالم .9 كينسيلا يقتبس من مقال توم G. بالمر: الإشغال. لا العمل. هو الفعل الذي تصبح الأشياء الخارجية الممتلكات 10. مكافأة: روثبارد والمصرفية (وليس في الكتاب) من أجل أن نكون منصفين للعمل البروفيسور فريدمانز، أرسلت له رسالة بالبريد الالكتروني مع مشروع الخام لهذا بلوق وظيفة قبل النشر حتى انه يمكن أن تصحح أي سوء فهم قد يكون لدي عن أفكاره. أجاب على خلاف معين مع روثبارد لم يجعله من "آليات الحرية". أقتبس رده بالبريد الإلكتروني لي هنا: أحد الخلافات مع روثبارد هو حول كيفية عمل نظام نقدي خاص. وأتوقع أن يكون احتياطي كسري، الذي قال روثبارد، وأعتقد أنه من غير المعقول، كان بالضرورة الاحتيالية، وبالتالي يجب أن تكون غير قانونية. ولكن موقف روثبارد 8217s ليست، أعتقد، مشتركة من قبل جميع النمساويين، وربما ليس من قبل معظم. للراغبين في مزيد من التفاصيل (من منظور احتياطي المضادة للكسور)، انظر الفصل 11 (مذكرة حاسمة حول الكسور الاحتياطي المصرفية الحرة) من كتاب جيس هويرتا دي سوتو نظرية الكفاءة الديناميكية. ويشير هويرتا دو سوتو في حاشية إلى أن الاهتمام الأخير في مجال الخدمات المصرفية المجانية وتطوير مدرسة الاحتياط الجزئي الاحتياطي الجزئي ينبع من الكتاب الذي نشره فريدريش أ. هايك في عام 1976 بعنوان "ترسيخ الأموال: الحجة المكررة" (ص. 311). النقاط التي لا تناسب بدقة في الفئات أعلاه: ص. 265-7 أمبير 320: حقوق الملكية الفكرية (إبر) يبدو أن الإجماع الساحق بين النمساويين على عدم اعتبار الملكية الفكرية ملكية مشروعة (بسبب ندرة اصطناعية) وبالتالي لا تدعم امتياز الاحتكار من قبل الدولة. أنا أميل إلى الاتفاق. في كتاب مكافحة الملكية الفكرية. الكاتب ستيفان كنسيلا يكتب أن ديفيد فريدمان يحلل ويظهر لتأييد الملكية الفكرية على أسس القانون والاقتصاد، إطار مؤسسي النفعية. فريدمان لا يخرج لصالح أو ضد حقوق الملكية الفكرية في آلات الحرية. وهو يقوم بتحليل بعض تكاليف وفوائد حقوق الملكية الفكرية في الفصل 54، ويخلص إلى أن الفصل بالقول إن استصواب قوانين الملكية الفكرية يقع خارج نطاق الفصل. ومع ذلك، فإنه يشير القراء إلى كتابين: ضد الاحتكار الفكري من قبل ميشيل بولدرين وديفيد ليفين وكتابه الخاص في المستقبل الكمال. الذي يتضمن مناقشة حول كيفية توفير حماية الملكية الفكرية بطرق أخرى، على سبيل المثال عن طريق العقد. أيضا، في الفصل الأخير من "آليات الحرية" (الفصل 66)، فريدمان يعطي حل السوق القائم على التشفير لتحديد الكتاب الأصلي للعمل. خريج. 13: استخدام مصطلح سيادة المستهلك هذا واحد في الواقع له علاقة ضئيلة مع الاقتصاد النمساوي باستثناء حقيقة أن ميسس تستخدم مصطلح سيادة المستهلك في العمل الإنساني، 11 لذلك أنا أعلم أن النمساويين الذين قرأوا العمل الإنساني قد تكون مهتمة لمعرفة أن فريدمان كما أنها تستخدم في آلات الحرية. اختلف روثبارد بشدة مع المصطلح الضمني 12. وليام هارولد هوت (ليس النمساوي) صاغه في الثلاثينيات. 1 في مقدمة له الطبعة الثانية، طبعة العلماء من موراي روثبارد 8217s الرجل والاقتصاد والدولة. جوزيف ت. ساليرنو يقتبس روثبارد من مقدمة الطبعة المنقحة (صفحة زلفي)، التي نشرت في عام 1993: لقد أصبح من الواضح في السنوات الأخيرة أن هناك ثلاثة نماذج اشتباك في الاقتصاد النمساوي: الميسيسي الأصلي أو النموذج البرازيولوجي، فإن المؤلف الحالي يلتزم بنموذج هايكيان، مؤكدا على المعرفة والاكتشاف بدلا من العمل البرازيولوجي واختياره، والذي هو الآن الأساتذة البارزين إسرائيل كيرسنر و النظرة اللاإرادية من أواخر لودفيغ لاشمان، وهو نهج مؤسسي مناهض للنظرية مأخوذ من اللغة الإنجليزية الكينزية غلس تكبل. وكان بهم-Bawerk8230 قد نظر بالفعل بدقة العلاقة بين الحاضر والمستقبل من خلال طرح السؤال: لماذا المدين على استعداد لدفع الفائدة الدائنة للحصول على قرض على رأس سداد مبلغ القرض نفسه أجاب هذا من خلال شرح أن فإن السلع المستقبلية لها قيمة أقل من السلع الحالية، والنتيجة هي الفرق في القيمة بين الحاضر والمستقبل: بين القرض والسداد. 3 وطبقا للطبعة الثانية من كتاب مارك سكوسنس "صناعة الاقتصاد الحديث: حياة وأفكار المفكرين العظيمين" (pgs.185-6)، رفض منجر إعادة طبع أو ترجمة أفكاره الأصلية حول قانون العزو، التحليل الهامشي والنظرية الذاتية للقيمة. وكان يوجين بم-باويرك وفريدريش فايزر مسؤولين عن نشرهما. 4 ملاحظة: في الملحق الثاني من الآلات الحرية فريدمان يسرد معهد لودفيغ فون ميسيس في قسم المنظمات والمعاهد. ويذكر أن معهد ميسيس يميل إلى اتباع وجهات نظر روثبارد، وربما كنتيجة لذلك، أن ينتقد الألغام (ص 352). (5) انظر مان، إكونومي، أند ستات pg. 491: لقد سقط العديد من الكتاب في فخ الافتراض بأنهم يستطيعون، بطريقة مماثلة، أن يضيفوا قيمة رأس المال بأكملها للأمة أو العالم ويصلون إلى شخصية ذات مغزى. غير أن تقديرات رأس المال الوطني أو رأس المال العالمي لا معنى لها تماما. العالم، أو البلد، لا يمكن بيع كل عاصمتها في السوق. ولذلك، فإن هذه العمليات الإحصائية لا جدوى منها. ولا يمكن الرجوع إلى هدف الرسملة ذاته: التقدير الصحيح لسعر السوق المحتمل. ملاحظة: إيف لا تزال تستخدم الناتج المحلي الإجمالي أمب الناتج القومي الإجمالي في كتاباتي الخاصة ومعرفة النمساويين الآخرين أن تفعل أيضا. ومع ذلك، فإنه لا يزال يعطينا عددا سريعا للنظر في وفهم أن الاقتصاد الأمريكي هائل بالمقارنة مع كوريا الشمالية. 6 التركيز هو الألغام. أيضا، سوف أشير إلى أنه كاقتصادي في السوق الحرة والفوضوي، ومن الواضح أن فريدمان لا يجادل بأن الاقتصاديين يجب أن تعامل البشر على أنها عقلانية تماما بحيث يمكن توقع سلوكهم بحيث الاقتصاديين الاقتصاديين المهندسين الاقتصاديين أو المشرعين الاجتماعي يمكن أن تتدخل في السوق . (للتأكيد مرة أخرى: أنا لا نقد فريدمان هنا). ولكن للعديد من الاقتصاديين السائدين، فإن العقلانية والتنبؤ يخدمان هذا الغرض على وجه التحديد. لنقتبس نسيم نيكولاس تاليبس كتاب البجعة السوداء (الطبعة الثانية ص 184): إذا كنت تعتقد في الحرة سوف لا يمكن أن نعتقد حقا في العلوم الاجتماعية والإسقاط الاقتصادي. لا يمكنك التنبؤ بكيفية تصرف الناس. ما عدا، بالطبع، إذا كان هناك خدعة، وهذا خدعة هو الحبل الذي علقت الاقتصاد الكلاسيكي الجديد. أنت ببساطة تفترض أن الأفراد سيكون عقلانيا في المستقبل، وبالتالي التصرف بشكل متوقع. هناك علاقة قوية بين العقلانية، والقدرة على التنبؤ، وقابلية تراكتيميكال تراكتابيليتي. وهناك فرد عقلاني أداء مجموعة فريدة من الإجراءات في ظروف محددة يجب أن تكون الجهات الفاعلة العقلانية متماسكة: أنها لا يمكن أن تفضل التفاح إلى البرتقال والبرتقال إلى الكمثرى، ثم الكمثرى للتفاح في الاقتصاد الأرثوذكسية، وأصبح العقلانية ستريتاكيت. تجاهل الاقتصاديون الأفلاطون حقيقة أن الناس قد يفضلون أن يفعلوا شيئا آخر غير تعظيم مصالحهم الاقتصادية لن أكون أول من يقول إن هذا التحسين أعاق العلوم الاجتماعية عن طريق الحد من ذلك من الانضباط الفكري والانعكاسي الذي أصبح يحاول علم دقيق. من خلال العلم الدقيق، أعني مشكلة هندسية من الدرجة الثانية لأولئك الذين يريدون التظاهر بأنهم في الفيزياء ديسكوستو يسمى الفيزياء الحسد. وبعبارة أخرى، الغش الفكري. 8 فريدمان يعترف يتحدث كاقتصادي، أجد القواعد التي تنطوي عليها هذه الحجة أن تكون غير فعالة. لكنهم يقدمون على الأقل مبررا لإنفاذ شكل من أشكال حقوق الملكية في الأرض يتفق مع وجهة النظر التحررية للحقوق (ص 282). لا رجال الأعمال ولا المزارعين ولا الرأسماليين تحديد ما يجب أن تنتج. المستهلكين تفعل ذلك. وإذا لم يلتزم رجل الأعمال بأوامر الجمهور، إذ يرسل إليه له هيكل أسعار السوق، فإنه يعاني من خسائر، ويفلس، ومن ثم يخرج من منصبه البارز على رأسه. الرجال الآخرين الذين فعلوا أفضل في تلبية الطلب من المستهلكين يحل محله 8230 أنها تجعل الفقراء الفقراء والأغنياء الفقراء. وهي تحدد بدقة ما ينبغي إنتاجه، وما هي النوعية، وبأي كميات. إنهم زعماء لا يرحمون الأنانية، مليئة بالأهواء والخيول، قابلة للتغيير وغير متوقعة. بالنسبة لهم لا شيء يحسب غير رضاهم. والسيادة هي نوعية السلطة السياسية في نهاية المطاف، وهي القوة التي ترتكز على استخدام العنف. وفي مجتمع خال تماما، كل فرد هو السيادة على شخصه وممتلكاته، وبالتالي فإن هذه السيادة الذاتية التي يحصل عليها في السوق الحرة. لا أحد هو السيادة على أي شخص إلسيس الإجراءات أو التبادلات. وبما أن المستهلكين ليس لديهم القدرة على إجبار المنتجين على المهن المختلفة والعمل، فإن الأول ليسوا سيادية على هذا الأخير .2121 مشروع كتاب ديفيد فريدمان 8217s القادم: الأنظمة القانونية مختلفة جدا عننا (على دافيدفريدمان) قد تكون على دراية العمل دانيال Kahneman8217s. وهو طبيب نفساني ولكنه يحمل جائزة نوبل في الاقتصاد لمدى الحياة من العمل الذي قام به مع الراحل أموس تفيرسكي. واحدة من مساهماتهم الهامة في مجال علم النفس هو دليل على أن فقدان النفور هو اتجاه الإنسان أقوى بكثير من الحصول على مكاسب. وبعبارة أخرى، إذا كنت تريد أن تكون ناجحة تؤثر على شخص ما للقيام بشيء ما، لديك فرصة أفضل بكثير من خلال إخبارهم بما يخسرونه من عدم القيام بذلك من خلال إخبارهم بما يكسبونه من خلال القيام بذلك. في الواقع، من خلال بعض الحسابات ويقال فقدان النفور أن يكون حوالي ضعف قوة الميل كما اكتساب المكاسب. تأطير الدين: 8220 هل سمعتم الخبر السار 8221 معظمنا، على الأقل في أمريكا، كان الإنجيليون يطرقون بابنا إلى 8220 نرشوا الخبر السار. 8221 ولكن إذا لاحظتم أنهم عادة ما يقضون وقتا أطول بكثير على عواقب لا تقبل بعض الاعتقاد مما تفعله 8220 أخبار جيدة. 8221 وأعتقد أن ما يصفه معظم الناس السماء أن تتكون من الأصوات، حتى بالنسبة لمعظم الناس، لتكون مملة بعض الشيء: الجلباب البيضاء، وعقد اليدين، والغناء الأغاني الكنيسة، وما إلى ذلك وإن كان مع لؤلؤي بوابات وشوارع الذهب. ولكن حتى تقديم وصف أكثر من المرغوب فيه من ما قد تكون السماء مثل بدلا من الطريقة التي وصفتها أنه لا يزال أقل عرضة لتحويل غير المؤمنين من أي وصف للجحيم وأنا على علم (التعذيب، النار، 8220 وغسل الأسنان، 8221 إلخ). هذا يتبع التدريب ذهبت من خلال كطفل رفعت في الكنيسة. كرجل واحد كنت أعرف استخدامه لوضعه: 8220 عليك أن تحصل عليها غير المؤمنين فقدت قبل أن تتمكن من الحصول عليها حفظها. 21821 كنا تدرس للبدء من خلال شرح أنهم كانوا خطاة وكانوا يتجهون مباشرة إلى الجحيم قبل تقديم أي أخبار جيدة. وباختصار، يبدو أن الإنجيليين قد تعلموا من خلال التجربة والخطأ ما أثبتته أبحاث كانمان و Tversky8217s عن فقدان النفور. هذه الطريقة لتأطير الملعب المبيعات ليس فقط لشرح الكثير من انتشار المسيحية ولكن، على الأقل إلى حد ما، وربما انتشار معظم الديانات. 8220 إذا كنت don8217t تقبل ديني سوف تحرق في النار ل eternity8221 بدلا من 8220 إذا كنت لا تقبل ديني سوف تحصل على ارتداء رداء أبيض، عقد اليدين والغناء الأغاني (ونرى البوابات بيرلي وشوارع الذهب أيضا) .8221 لإعطاء مثال غير الإنجيلية: 8220 إذا كنت تعيش حياة سيئة، سوف تناسخ في الأنواع أقل مرغوب فيه 8221 من المرجح أن يكون حملة تسويقية أكثر نجاحا للدين الذي يعلم التناسخ من أن يكون 8220 إذا كنت تعيش حياة جيدة، يمكنك الوصول إلى إعادة تجسيد الإنسان مرة أخرى. 8221 صديق لي أرسلت مؤخرا لي هذا المقال رويترز من قبل دانيال تودور وجيمس بيرسون حول اقتصاد السوق غير المشروعة ولكن متسامح وراء كوريا الشمالية 8217s تملك 8220iron الستار. 8221 من بين عدد قليل من الموضوعات التي تغطيها المادة (و الكتاب من قبل المؤلفين أنفسهم) أنها تكشف العديد من محاولات حكومة كوريا الشمالية 8217s لتقييد التجارة الطوعية في كوريا الشمالية عن طريق التلاعب بالعملة وون (كبو). ما وجدته مثيرة للاهتمام هو التناقض بين سعر الصرف الرسمي الذي حددته الحكومة (96 كيلوبايت لكل كيلوغرام لكل 1 دولار أمريكي فقط) من وقت نشر المقال) وسعر الصرف في السوق (أقرب إلى 8000 كيلوواط لكل دولار أمريكي، وذلك اعتبارا من التاريخ نشرت المقالة). وهناك حالة أخرى، وفقا للمؤلفين، وشملت الحكومة إلغاء آخر صفرين من كل ملاحظة البنك. وقد فعلت الحكومة ذلك من خلال مطالبة المواطنين بتداول مذكراتهم الف وون، على سبيل المثال، مقابل 10 ملاحظات. ولم يسمح للكوريين الشماليين سوى اسبوع واحد فقط للقيام بهذه التجارة. وكان أحد المصيد هو أن الحكومة ستتبادل فقط 100 ألف وون كحد أقصى (حوالي 30-40 في ذلك الوقت). النتيجة تم تدمير وفورات الشعب الكوري الشمالي على الفور. وأصبحت الأوراق النقدية المتبقية المخزنة بعيدا عن المدخرات لا قيمة لها لأنه بموجب القانون، لن يسمح للتجار قبولها. بالنسبة لكوريا الشمالية للمطالبة بأن تتاجر الحكومة بأكثر من 100 ألف وون كحد أقصى من المرجح أن يؤدي ذلك الشخص إلى التعرض لاستجواب مكثف حول أي أنشطة السوق السوداء التي قد تشارك فيها. 8220 أين تحصل على هذه الأموال الإضافية. يجب عليك أن تفعل شيئا غير قانوني قبالة لمعسكرات العمل بالنسبة لك 8221 من الواضح، جعل أي حساب اقتصادي عقلاني مع هذه الأسعار المال من الصعب القول على الأقل. وفي نظام قمعي يبذل كل ما في وسعه لتثبيط نشاط السوق، يبدو أن هذه النية تبدو تقريبا نية الحكومة 8217. في ظل هذه الظروف، إذا كان هناك أي حساب الاقتصادي الرشيد على الإطلاق هو فقط بفضل السوق السوداء. إذا كان الناس لا يمكن الاعتماد على المال لا تفقد قيمتها بشكل كبير بين عشية وضحاها، وسوف نحاول بيعه في أقرب وقت ممكن لعملات أخرى، والسلع الاستهلاكية، وما إلى ذلك ولهذا السبب، أن الشعب الكوري الشمالي (بشكل غير قانوني) التجارة بالدولار الأمريكي و يوان صيني في السوق السوداء. وبالمثل، عندما يلاحظ الناس التناقض بين أسعار الصرف التي تحددها الحكومة (وهي محاولات حكومية فقط لإخفاء مدى سوء التضخم) وأسعار الصرف في السوق، فإنهم سيختارون الشراء والبيع بأسعار السوق التي لا تحددها الحكومة. ملاحظة: التضخم لديه أيضا ميل قوي لتشجيع الإنفاق والاستهلاك على الادخار. وأثناء التضخم المفرط في البرازيل في الثمانينات وأوائل التسعينيات، كان البرازيليون يتجهون في كثير من الأحيان إلى الأسواق لبيع أموالهم (عن طريق شراء السلع والخدمات) فور تلقيهم رواتبهم. التمسك بأموالهم حتى يوم إضافي غالبا ما يعني أن أموالهم شراء 8217s انخفضت بشكل كبير. إن الزيادة في الطلب وتوقعات البائع بأن الطلب سيواصل دفع الأسعار إلى أبعد من ذلك. وتقدم مقالة رويترز مثالا على كرة السلة للبيع في متجر في بيونجيانج مقابل 46،000 وون. في 96 كبو إلى 1 أوسد، وسعر كرة السلة هو US479.17. ومن الواضح أنه لا أحد يدفع هذا المبلغ من المال لكرة السلة في ظل الظروف العادية في أي بلد. الآن، على النقيض من ذلك، إذا كان سعر السوق حوالي 8،000 كبو ل 1 أوسد، ونحن نتحدث فقط عن US5.75. ولكن حتى على هذا السعر، يمكن للمرء أن يتصور أن معظم الكوريين الشماليين الذين يعانون من الفقر دون وجود روابط سياسية يفضلون بدلا من ذلك استخدام أموالهم لشراء السلع والخدمات التي هي أكثر أهمية للحفاظ على حياة الإنسان. للتبديل من الاقتصاد إلى علم النفس للحظة، I8217m مشيرا إلى السلع والخدمات التي هي قادرة على خدمة وظائف أخرى إلى أسفل المثلث في التسلسل الهرمي Maslow8217s من الاحتياجات (أي الاحتياجات الفسيولوجية مثل الماء والغذاء). دفعني الفضول لي للتحقق ز للتحقق من سعر الصرف بين كبو والدولار الأمريكي. في ما يلي أدناه المعدل المعروض في 16 أبريل 2015. لقد قمت بتحديث الصفحة بعد 2 ساعة، وكان المعدل لا يزال هو نفسه تماما. وبالنسبة لأي عملة أخرى (تنتمي إلى الدول القومية ذات الاقتصادات السوقية الأكثر رسمية)، فإن ز قادرة على تقديم معدلات محدثة لأنها تتقلب على مدار اليوم. هذا هو الجزء ذي الصلة من لقطة أخذتها من الصفحة في ذلك التاريخ: اليوم، بعد أسبوعين من الحصول على سعر الصرف أعلاه، ز تقارير أن يكون 124.753 كبو ل 1 أوسد. (أن 8217 م مائة وعشرون نقطة سبعة خمسة ثلاثة لأصدقائي من البلدان التي لها استخدام المعاكس للفواصل وفترات من ذلك من الولايات المتحدة لا مائة وعشرين وأربعة وعشرون ألف وسبعمائة وخمسون ثلاثة). تخميني هو أن ز يعلن عن أسعار الصرف التي أعلنتها الحكومة الكورية الشمالية منذ 124 إلى 1 دولار usn8217t تبدو مرتفعة جدا بالنسبة لأسعار الصرف مع العديد من البلدان الأخرى. أنا أيضا التحقق من معدل باستخدام 8220Currency المحول HD8221 فون التطبيق، وهو التطبيق أنا أعتمد على لجميع العملات الأخرى وأنا أسافر، وجدت هذا سعر الصرف مختلفة جدا. اليوم مرة أخرى، بعد أسبوعين من التحقق الأول وحصلت أخيرا على كتابة هذا بلوق وظيفة، التطبيق لا يزال يقول أن 1 أوسد تقدر في 900 كيلوواط. كما أجد صعوبة في الاعتقاد بأن سعر الصرف الجاري قابل للتقسيم تماما بنسبة 100 اعتبارا من 1 أيار (مايو) 2015، فإن غوغل تبلغ عن سعر الصرف نفسه الذي يستخدمه تطبيق إفون الخاص بي: فما هي الحقيقة هو معدل سوق الذهاب في كوريا الشمالية مقابل 1 أوسد أقرب إلى 96 كبو 900 كبو 8،000 كبو It8217s ليس من السهل أن تعرف. واليوم هو يوم حزين حقا. اليوم تعلمت أن ممثلي المفضل 8211 بيتر O8217Toole ونجم الفيلم المفضل لدي 8211 لورانس العربية 8211 توفي قبل يومين فقط. كان لورانس العربية تأثير على لي عندما رأيت لأول مرة في عام 2000 كمدرسة ثانوية العليا. كنت طفلا يبلغ من العمر 18 عاما، مستعدة للمغامرة ورؤية العالم. لم أتمكن من إدخال هذا الفيلم في فترة أكثر تأثيرا من حياتي. يعتقد لورانس (و O8217Toole بدقة) أن 8220 لبعض الناس لا يكتب شيئا ما لم يكتبوا ذلك. 8221 نحن نعيش في عصر وسائل الاعلام الاجتماعية الجماعية، ولذا فإنني قد أترك لكم أيضا مع اثنين من أشرطة فيديو يوتيوب سريعة. أنا يمكن أن توفر هنا الكثير من مشاهد مذهلة من الفيلم، ولكن أنا ذاهب لتقديم واحد مع الحوار الذي يصور فلسفيتي الشخصية في الحياة. المحادثة مع لورانس وصديقه شريف علي. الفيديو الثاني ليس جزءا من الفيلم. أشارك هذا الفيديو لإثبات (لتلك التي لم تراه بعد) ما ابن أنيق من العاهرة بيتر O8217Toole كان حقا. الذي يركب الآخر على الجمل على العرض المتأخر مع ديفيد ليترمان في حين تدخين السجائر مع حامل طويل فقط بيتر O8217Toole. الراحة في السلام، بيتر O8217Toole. سنشتاق لك. لقد سئل عدة مرات، ما هي أفضل طريقة بالنسبة لي لتعلم لغة أجنبية أو في بعض الأحيان يتم تقديم السؤال بطريقة أخرى: سوف روزيتا ستون البرمجيات مساعدتي تصبح بطلاقة في سبانيسماندارينتاغالوغ، الخ I8217ve أجاب على هذه الأسئلة مرات عديدة أن سوف أكتب فقط إجابتي هنا. أنا ليس بأي حال لغوي مع خبرة في اكتساب اللغة الأجنبية. ولذلك، فإن جوابي أكثر شخصية وعملية مما هو نظري. وأركز أيضا على تعلم الكبار في هذه المقالة لأن الأطفال عموما لديهم ميزة رائعة لتعلم اللغات الأجنبية ببساطة عن طريق النمو في المنزل الذي واحد على الأقل من الآباء يتحدث اللغة الأجنبية، والنشأ في الخارج حيث يتم توظيف الوالدين، أو وحضور مدرسة دولية مع دروس تدرس في اللغة الأجنبية منذ سن مبكرة جدا. عدد قليل من الأطفال يقولون أنفسهم أنا ذاهب لتعلم اللغة X دون توجيه الوالدين، وتذهب في الواقع من خلال الخطوات اللازمة لتحقيق الطلاقة. ملاحظة: الطريقة التي يفترض I8217ve كتابة هذه المقالة يفترض أن لغتك الأولى هي الإنجليزية فقط لأن I8217ve كتابة المقال باللغة الإنجليزية. إذا كانت لغتك الأولى شيء آخر غير اللغة الإنجليزية، فما عليك سوى استبدال كلمة إنجليش في هذه المقالة بلغتك الأولى، وستسري عليك طرق التعلم الموضحة هنا على قدم المساواة. حتى ما بلدي توصية رئيسية لتعلم لغة أجنبية تفعل أفضل مع ما لديك على أساس هدفك. الحق البسيط أنا أتناول جانبي هذه الإجابة (1. بذل قصارى جهدك مع ما لديك، و 2. توجيه التعلم نحو تحقيق هدفك الخاص) في القسمين التاليين. بذل قصارى جهدنا مع ما لديك لا يوجد بأي حال من الأحوال طريقة واحدة لتعلم لغة أجنبية، والطريقة التي تختارها لتعلم لغة من الواضح أن يقتصر على الموارد لديك. على سبيل المثال، قد لا يكون لديك 300 لبرنامج روزيتا ستون أو 20،000 لدراسة لمدة سنة في الخارج أو 600 لفصل دراسي من التعلم في الكلية أو الجامعة المحلية. أو ربما يكون لديك المال ولكن متزوج ولديه أطفال لا يزالون يعيشون في المنزل، والانتقال إلى بلد آخر أمر غير وارد. ولكن دعونا نقول أن لديك موارد كافية. دعونا نقول يمكنك أن تأخذ سنة الخروج من الحياة والمشاركة في برنامج الدراسة في الخارج المعترف بها من قبل الجامعة منزلك، أو يمكنك فقط الابتعاد وتعليم اللغة الإنجليزية في البلاد حيث يتحدث اللغة التي تريد أن تتحدث. نهجي هو الانغماس الكامل. ممارسة الحزب عندما قررت منذ ما يقرب من عقد من الزمن أن كنت ذاهب لتعلم الإسبانية ذهبت كل شيء. كنت طفلا يبلغ من العمر 22 عاما، طازجة من القوات الجوية وفي طريقي إلى الكلية. كنت أعرف أنني ذاهب للدراسة في الخارج في مكان ما في أمريكا الجنوبية، ولكن كان مطلوبا من قبل بلدي الجامعة المنزل لحضور دروس في المؤسسة المحلية بالفعل قبل الدراسة في الخارج. كيف أبدأ الاشتراك في دروس الإسبانية على الفور. سألت حول وجدت مدرب السالسا الإناث المحلية بدأت الدروس على الفور وحضر أسبوعيا. (للسجل، يمكن إقناع غير الإسباني، ولكن الإسبانيين التعرف بسرعة لي مجرد غرينغو آخر الرقص ليس شيء بلدي، وهذا 8217s على ما يرام معي). أنا أيضا يتردد المطاعم المكسيكية في المنطقة وأجبر نفسي على التحدث باللغة الإسبانية مع الجميع. وبما أن جامعتي كانت لديها هيئة طلابية بوليفية كبيرة، فقد جعلتني أصدقاء مع البوليفيين. وبالمناسبة، والأحزاب الكلية عندما تتكون من الناطقين بها في المقام الأول من اللغة التي تريد أن تتعلم هي أفضل وسيلة لممارسة اللغات الأجنبية عندما كنت عالقة في بلد يتحدث الإنجليزية. عندما تشرب الكحول، أنت لا تمانع في ارتكاب الأخطاء. عندما يشربون آخرون، هم أكثر صداقة مما قد يكون خلاف ذلك وأكثر تسامحا من أخطائك. إذا كنت تعبت من التحدث مع شخص معين أو الشخص يتعب من التحدث معك، يمكنك مجرد ضرب حتى محادثة أخرى مع شخص آخر إذا كنت حضور الأطراف التي تتكون من الناطقين بها حصرا من اللغة الأجنبية التي تريد أن تتعلم و كنت غير قادر على التحدث في البداية، والعصا معها لا أستطيع أن أقول لكم كم مرة وقفت حول تبدو وكأنها أحمق لعنة حتى حصلت أخيرا بلدي الإسبانية حتى مستوى العمل. عندما اتصلوا بي غرينغو أنا فقط ضحك، بقي ودية وأبقى يتحدث (سيئة) الإسبانية. As a happily-married man, I dont do college parties anymore (thank goodness), but having subjected myself to so many situations that were so far outside my element in so many countries since that time, I can do formal business dinners throughout East Asia, or negotiate a deal in the Middle East or attend a funeral in Ethiopia (all real examples), and feel at ease whether or not I speak any of the local languages. So get out of your comfort zone Comfort comes from either: 1. keeping yourself closed off from new experiences, or 2. constantly forcing yourself to adapt to new experiences. I find the latter to be so much more rewarding. Walking dictionaries Even better still than party practicing is obtaining a walking dictionary. My academic advisor in college told me that when he was studying abroad in Paris during the early days of the Vietnam War, a US Army officer who had been granted leave to study in Paris referred to local girlfriends (and native French speakers) as walking dictionaries. So I have named this section after that. The best walking dictionaries are native speakers of the language that you want to learn. It is not enough that the person speaks the language fluently. If they are not a native speaker and the dominant common language between the two of you is not the language you want to learn, you will find yourself speaking the dominant common language almost exclusively. For example, lets say that you want to learn Spanish. If English is your first language and you are dating a Brazilian a native Portuguese speaker that happens to also be fluent in Spanish and English, and the dominant common language between the two of you is English, then you both are probably going to find yourself speaking English the majority of the time not Spanish. Maybe you cant control who you fall in love with, but you can at least control who you surround yourself with. So if you surround yourself with native speakers of the language you want to learn, you just might find love within that pool of people and better your foreign language ability simultaneously. Nothing wrong with that Watching movies Foreign language students often have the debate: Which is better for learning Watching foreign films (spoken in the foreign language) with English subtitles, subtitles of the same foreign language, or no subtitles at all My answer: Theyre all great for different reasons Here is what watching movies in each of the following ways does for your learning: Spoken in the foreign language and English subtitles Helps you practice your listening but with a little assistance. This is like starting to ride a bike in the beginning with training wheels. ليس هناك أى مشكلة. Its still great learning Spoken in the foreign language and subtitles in that same foreign language Helps you practice listening while reinforcing grammar, vocabulary and spelling. Spoken in the foreign language and no subtitles at all Helps you practice your listening. This gives you the most realistic learning environment, since obviously people dont have subtitles when they speak in real life. Of course there are other ways to learn foreign languages by watching movies: Spoken in one foreign language and subtitles in another foreign language As an English speaker, watching a Brazilian movies spoken in Portuguese but with Spanish subtitles can also help you learn Spanish. The practice is great, but if you want to focus on learning Portuguese, for example, it can be distracting. Spoken in English and subtitles in the foreign language This is fine Assuming the subtitles are translated well, this reinforces grammar, vocabulary and spelling. It obviously lacks listening practice but is still good as long as you dont ignore the subtitles. Living abroad Let me be perfectly clear: There is no substitute to living in the country of the language you want to learn period. Living abroad gives you constant intense practice in all categories of learning. If you can live (or at least travel) abroad, you want to make sure that you do as many different kinds of things as possible. The wider the variety of activities you participate in, the wider variety of vocabulary you will acquire. If you dont accept a friends invitation to go fishing, necessity is unlikely to force you to learn words and phrases like: to catch a fish, bait, worm, hook, fishing pole, and codfish. Similarly, if you dont study at a school of some sort, necessity is unlikely to force you to learn words and phrases like: to enroll in a class, to do homework, classmate, chalkboard, and notebook. And if you pass up the opportunity to watch a sports game, necessity is unlikely to force you to learn words and phrases like: to score a goal, stadium, ball, foul, and so on. You get the point. To maximize your experience, do as wide a variety of things as possible. Simply going to the foreign country without engaging in many activities will only limit your learning. If you have the opportunity to take classes while abroad, know that taking classes helps you learn to speak on an educated level. You are forced to learn grammar rules and verb conjugations, keep up with a classroom pace, do homework and pass exams, etc. Plus a teacher corrects your mistakes. If you live in an English-speaking country and you are taking Russian classes, thats great. But obviously, taking Russian classes in Russia is unbeatable. Immersing yourself without living abroad If you cant move abroad for a season of your life (or permanently), you can do the next best thing. In addition to frequenting ethnic restaurants, obtaining a walking dictionary, participating in cultural events (like salsa lessons), you can do some of the following: Set your GmailYahooHotmail email and Facebook user interface to the language you want to learn. Each of these online services offers the option to change to all major languages and more. Download your internet browsers (Google Chrome, MS Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, etc.) in the language. Set your cellphone to the desired foreign language. If the language you wish to learn is not available, consider setting it to a similar language. For example, if Slovak isn8217t available, set it to Czech. If Dutch isn8217t available, set it to German, and so on. At this point in my life, I no longer actively study Spanish, but my cellphone bill still arrives every month in Spanish something that I arranged with my cellphone carrier when I was a college student. When I need to review my bill, I catch myself thinking in Spanish. The point is to surround yourself with the language as much as possible so that you are forced to think in the language as much as possible. If you dont force yourself to think in the foreign language by an exhaustive full immersion approach, you will never acquire fluency. Orienting your learning toward achieving the goal Obviously not every person has the goal of becoming fluent in a foreign language for a whole host of reasons. Maybe you live in an English-speaking country but travel on business to China from time to time, or maybe you work with Arabic speakers from different countries and just want to learn to be able to converse on a basic level. Thats fine indeed In this case, moving to another country to study abroad or teach English is far too much effort than what it is worth. Consider some of the other things I suggested: take a class or two at a local university make friends with international students get Rosetta Stone buy a phrasebook and dictionary. You get the point. Taking formal foreign language classes is important for learning the rules and to speak properly. Attending social parties, dating someone that natively speaks the foreign language, etc. is important for learning the vernacular (spoken language) including slang. Computer programs like Rosetta Stone compliment all of these. Personal confessions When I conducted a yearlong study abroad in So Paulo in 2007, all my university classes (since day 1) were taught in Portuguese for Brazilians, not for gringos like me, so I was forced to study intensely. In addition to university classes I had Portuguese language classes with other American gringos. I had never studied Portuguese before moving to Brazil, but luckily, I had three years of university Spanish classes behind me, which met the requirements for the study abroad program I participated in because of the similarities between the two languages. But my first semester was less than an ideal learning environment. I lived with a well-educated gentleman that preferred to speak English all the time. As part of my study abroad program I also had many activities with other Americans. Remember what I said earlier about defaulting back to the dominant common language Not surprisingly, the Americans, including me, spoke almost exclusively English with one another. Since I had moved to Brazil with one primary goal to acquire fluency in the Portuguese language before my second semester began I requested to be moved into another home. Luckily, my study abroad organization was able to accommodate me. I quickly moved in with an elderly woman. She couldn8217t speak any English she was an amazing, kind woman, and she could cook so well So finally I was speaking Portuguese in the home. Secondly, I also determined that when the American students from my first semester had returned to the USA and the new ones came in, I was going to attend the Portuguese classes with them but not allow myself to make friends with them. This was a hard decision Im social I like people But I didnt go to Brazil to make friends with Americans as much as I did to learn to acquire fluency in the Portuguese language. I knew if I simply explained to them that we could be friends but would have to only speak Portuguese, I would enjoy their company, accept invitations to hang out, and would be stuck in the same English-speaking trap as I was in my first semester. At the end of the first day of Portuguese class with them I just left. No introduction. I felt like a real asshole. But I wasnt mean to anyone I just didn8217t socialize. Every day after class for the rest of the semester I did exactly the same thing. I almost exclusively surrounded myself with Brazilians, which is exactly what my mind needed to consistently think in Portuguese. I noted a couple of times that some of my American classmates viewed me as a snob for my behavior. It was tough to not explain myself, but doing so I believed then and still do now would have led to normal conversations, to great conversations, to friendship, then English speaking. So I held firm. After finishing my year abroad I spoke with one of the fellow American study abroad students from my second semester over Facebook. He also stayed one year (and finished one semester after me). I was pleased to learn from him that he did exactly the same thing as I did for his second semester he avoided the gringos Thats what it takes to acquire fluency in a foreign language Im proud of him Another authors perspective Tim Ferriss correctly points out in his book The 4-Hour Workweek that it is possible to become conversationally fluent in three months. He suggests first looking at the most commonly spoken words of a foreign language and beginning with that. Tim8217s list of the most commonly spoken and written words in the English language has been cached here . Although I have never approached foreign language learning exactly in this manner per se, his point stands. When living in Japan during my days in the US Air Force, I quickly became able to speak Japanese on an upper-basic or lower-intermediate level by always asking the Japanese nationals that I worked with How do you say in Japanese. I didn8217t work off of a list of the most commonly spoken or written words and memorize those. Instead, I asked how to say words that I needed to say in order to survive in Japanese society. My goal was never to achieve fluency but rather to be enabled to go anywhere in Japan or do anything I needed to do without having the language barrier as a personal crutch. I did take one elementary-level Japanese class at a university bought a Katakana workbook, Japanese dictionaries and phrasebook, and surrounded myself with Japanese speakers (including a walking dictionary). I could have achieved fluency in the language by doing all of this plus taking more university classes, but that wasnt my goal. At that time the Air Force was keeping me busy enough. Concluding remarks So to conclude, theres nothing that says that you have to study a language for the purpose of acquiring fluency. My suggested approach for you is to do as many of these things as you can based on your particular goal. Learning foreign languages develops your mind in so many ways. It helps you understand your own language better. And when combined with living abroad it helps you to challenge the world around you in ways that you never would otherwise. Just for the record, each language that you learn makes learning new languages even easier. After a while, you just get good at learning languages. As for relearning forgotten languages thats fairly easy. Just go through your old notes, go back to the country where the language is spoken, and it comes back to you quickly. Case in point, my father never spoke French or any other language but English. His parents, however, used to speak French to each other in his presence when he was a young child. To this day, when I ask him How do you say in French, he replies I dont know But a couple of minutes later he comes back and says, I really dont know why I remember this, but Im pretty sure you say . Why do I know that If you are young enough in life to enjoy many years of benefits from all the hard work required to learn new languages, I would highly suggest becoming fluent in at least 2-3 languages and beginning as soon as possible. Dont become one of those nerds that try to impress people by learning dying or dead languages. Old Aramaic and Latin are about as worthless as Elvish and Klingon in my opinion. The modern, spoken break off languages from Aramaic and Latin, by contrast, can be highly useful as long as you put yourself into situations in which you can actually use them. It is no use spending thousands of hours of your life learning a valuable social skill if it never helps you make new friends that you would not otherwise be able to have, travel to new places that you would not otherwise been able to go, or live a life that you would not otherwise be able to live. Work smarter, not harder. - Author unkown For the very fortunate breed of travelers that finds him or herself in one country after another on a regular basis, it is essential to make the best use of technology in order to maximize efficiency. I have spent the past couple of years exploring the best iPhone apps to automate my life. For me, the apps listed here below are the bare minimum to keep my life as an international traveler moving smoothly. Priority Pass This app is only useful for paying customers of Priority Pass. Priority Pass is a company that allows its customers to use airport lounges around the world 8211 no matter which airline they are flying on. If you fly to the same places all the time using the same airline, you might be better off paying the airline for access to its own lounges. However, if you find yourself flying on a multitude of airlines around the world and do not wish to spend your 8-hour layovers waiting at the gate or in a food court somewhere, you will want Priority Pass. Trust me it8217s beautiful. With the Priority Pass app, you can push the 8220Find Nearest Lounge8221 button, and the app uses your iPhone8217s GPS to find the lounges that you have access to at the particular airport that you are at. I8217ve been in situations in which I found myself at smaller regional airports in countries like Brazil and China. It didn8217t matter Priority Pass still had lounges for me to use in those airports Here is a link to 10 off your first year of Priority Pass 8211 no matter which membership plan you choose. If you are among the rare breed of culture warriors out there, you should already be aware of Professor Geert Hofstede8217s work on the dimensions of national cultures. For international businessmen and businesswomen, the Hofstede index is an indispensable resource. It breaks down cultures of many countries around the world into the following dimensions: Power Distance Index (PDI), Individualism versus Collectivism (IDV), Masculinity versus Femininity (MAS), Uncertainty Avoidance Index (UAI) and Long-Term Avoidance (LTO). Newer dimensions added to the Hofstede index (not in this app, unfortunately) are: Pragmatic versus Normative (PRA) and Indulgence versus Restraint (IND). Let8217s say, for example, that you are an account manager for the company your work for and will be meeting with a new buyer of your company8217s product in Country-X for the first time. The purpose of the meeting is to negotiate future terms between both companies. If Country-X happens to score high on Hofstede8217s Power Distance Index (PDI) dimension, you can expect that it is less likely that you will have access to the owner or other high-level decision-makers of the foreign company (since you are an account manager 8211 a lower position than an owner in corporate hierarchy). This is cultural intelligence at its finest. If you frequently travel to a diverse range of countries (geographically, linguistically, ethnically, religiously) I highly recommend this app There are many books that I could also recommend here that have been instrumental in my personal development in cultural intelligence, but if I had to recommend only three they would be the three below. In some ways they overlap with information, however, the countries they cover vary. So if you travel just about everywhere you will find it beneficial to keep all three in your library. The first two books below dedicate each individual chapter to the cultural and business practices of specific countries (every chapter is a different country). The latter concentrates more on cultural and business practices of geographical clusters (Middle East and North Africa, for example) as well as provides specific information for a few key countries. Kiss, Bow, or Shake Hands by Terri Morrison Kiss, Bow, or Shake Hands, Sales and Marketing: The Essential Cultural GuideFrom Presentations and Promotions to Communicating and Closing by Terri Morrison How to Negotiate Anything with Anyone Anywhere Around the World by Frank Acuff I tried at least three of the world clock apps before falling in love with this one by Orlin Kolev. The World Clock is able to not only track the time zones in the individual cities of your choosing, but it even works with your Google Calendar. Let8217s say that on a particular date and time you have scheduled a conference call with a customer in Ghana, but on that date you will be in Bangkok, Thailand. With The World Clock you can enter the date and time that you told your customer in Ghana you would call him, and the app shows you what date and time the appointment will be in Bangkok. You can then choose to setup a Google Calendar event right from the app along with alert reminders so you don8217t forget to actually make the call Note: While gathering the necessary links and information to produce this blog post I ran into a competing app that looks quite good called World Clock Pro . Documents can open all of your Microsoft Word and Excel documents and allows you to edit them, organize them in folders, send them as email attachments, back them up on Dropbox and more. It can also open other major file formats, such as PDF. It8217s simple. Without it, an iPhone is limited to the Notes app, which is as plain as Microsoft Notepad. With this app I am able to work on the go. I experimented with two or three competing apps before choosing this one. The first one I tried was by XE, only because XE is popular in FOREX. Unfortunately, the XE app bombards the user with ads and does not have some of the other options I appreciate from Currency Converter HD. Currency Converter HD8217s nifty calculator also saves you from having to open the iPhone8217s Calculator app in order to do a calculation after converting the currency. Like other competing currency exchange apps, this one updates the latest conversions frequently and automatically as long as your phone is connected to the internet and the app is running. When I am flying with American Airlines or other member airlines of the oneworld alliance, I often open this app as soon as the plane lands to see if my next flight8217s departing time or gate number has changed. (The app can notify you if there are flight changes) Using airline apps like this one saves you the time and hassle of having to locate the monitors in the airport with all the flight schedules listed. When I am flying with Delta Airlines or other member airlines of the SkyTeam alliance, I sometimes open this app as soon as the plane lands to see if my next flight8217s departing time or gate number has changed. (The app can notify you if there are flight changes) Using airline apps like this one saves you the time and hassle of having to locate the monitors in the airport with all the flight schedules listed. When I am flying with United Airlines or other member airlines of StarAlliance, I sometimes open this app as soon as the plane lands to see if my next flight8217s departing time or gate number has changed. (The app can notify you if there are flight changes) Using airline apps like this one saves you the time and hassle of having to locate the monitors in the airport with all the flight schedules listed. Frequent Flyer Miles Tracker This is the app I use to store my frequent flyer mileage numbers for each airline that I have an account with. If you are at the check-in counter at the airport and for whatever reason do not have your airline priority membership card readily available, just open this app so that the airline official can check you in with your frequent flyer mileage number. National Geographic World Atlas I discovered this app while researching for this blog post and was looking for a better app to recommend than the world factbook that I had been using. I am impressed with this one. When connected to the internet the apps can zoom in even closer. Other than maps, it has information on each country such as: languages spoken, economic and government data, major holidays, religions practiced, information on major cities within each country and more. It even has a currency converter tool (but no calculator built in). I8217m sold If I had to choose only one app it would be this one. How else am I supposed to pass the time Read more here for my thoughts on audiobooks. Athan Pro Prayer Timings and Tracking If you do business in the Muslim World, you8217ll want this app. It is always helpful to know when the prayer times are in each country so that you can setup appointments without interruption. I once had an international guest from Morocco visit me in the USA. He told me that on Friday of that week he wanted to go to the local mosque and pray. I opened the Athan Pro app, typed in the local zip code, and I instantly had all the prayer times at my fingertips. Later I called the mosque to verify that the time was correct. It was spot on. Sometimes you8217re in an international airport, and all the available WIFI signals are either blocked, or to use them, you would have to go through the annoying hassle of entering your credit card number and personal information. Skype WiFi bypasses all of that. If you have a Skype account (which you should) you can simply use your Skype credit to connect to connect to the WIFI networks that require payment. Connection times are in 30-minute intervals. If you8217re an international road warrior or at least speak a foreign language you are probably already aware of this one. Google Translate is able to translate from any one language to another with more than sixty to choose from. The app requires a connection to the internet. I realize that not everyone speaks a combination of Portuguese and English. This dictionary app represents whatever advanced dictionary app you would need. If you find yourself often conversing between German and Japanese and you do not speak both at a native level, then I suggest keeping an advanced dictionary around such as this one. I recommend the Michaelis Moderno dictionary apps. They are very complete and even come with other features, such as being able to see a full breakdown of conjugations for any verb. For that reason, this particular app is sold for 29.99. It was well worth what I paid. Michaelis Moderno dictionary apps require no connection to the internet and give all possible alternative translations for each word Google Translate, by contrast, only gives a single, best guess translation. This is the 1 app that you should have for all communication while abroad. You can call anywhere in the world for free (if the person you8217re calling has a Skype account) and can call telephones for only a few cents per minute. But you8217ve probably been using Skype for years already, so keep reading8230 To me, Viber is just another app for chatting since it has all the same major features as Skype and WhatsApp. But if you have business partners and customers around the world, at least some of them will be using it, so it is very useful to have. WhatsApp is just like Viber. If you8217ve got a wide range of friends and business contacts, you should probably have this app too. No doubt you8217ll hear music while abroad, and you8217ll want to identify the artist and song title. SoundHound is a free app that can listen to the music in the background wherever you are and then look up the artist and song title for you. If you have no connection to the internet where you are, no worries8230 SoundHound can temporarily store the recorded audio clip and try to locate the song for you later once you8217ve reestablished an internet connection. Full disclosure: Although SoundHound has access to a giant database of all sorts of music, I8217ve noticed the app is better at identifying more mainstream music. Don8217t be surprised if it cannot recognize, let8217s say, a Turkish song that hasn8217t yet made it to international radio stations. I also refer frequently to the following resources: Airline alliance Wiki page 8211 Since I generally purchase flights from budget travel websites, I fly a wide range of airlines from all three major alliances and some others that do not belong to any alliance. When purchasing my flights, it is important to enter in the frequent flyer number of the airline that 1) is a common member airline of the same alliance of the particular flight in question, and 2) is the airline that I track my frequent flyer miles with for that alliance. To maximize your frequent flyer miles (assuming you want free upgrades, flights, etc.) you are going to want to try to make sure that as many of your flights as possible are on member airlines of one of the three major alliances: Star Alliance, SkyTeam, and oneworld. This Wiki article is the only single place on the WWW that I8217ve found that keeps them so well-organized. I8217ve noticed that the article also gets updated often when airlines move from one alliance to another. Air Miles Calculator 8211 Enter in just about any two or more airports, and this website will tell you how many frequent flyer miles you should accrue. The website does not account for multipliers, so if you have elite status on a particular airline, you might earn something like 1.25 or 1.5 frequent flyer miles per actual 8220butt in seat8221 mile that the Air Miles Calculator website tries to calculate for. If you know of an app that deserves to be on this list you may leave a comment below or email me at emileaphaneuf (at) gmail. I am also looking to produce an equivalent post to this one for Android and Blackberry. If you have international travel experience and a number of favorite apps for smooth travel for either the Android or Blackberry platforms you may also contact me. I have traveled to the People8217s Republic of China (PRC) a few of times. On this particular occasion I had no plans to go China. I was on the way to Southeast Asia, and my itinerary was changed by the airline, so I found myself having to be rerouted through Beijing Capital International Airport (PEK). Once at the airport I headed to one of the VIP lounges. At the check-in desk I asked the lady for the WIFI password, as I always do. Most airport lounges give the WIFI password on a small piece of paper, but the lady instead directed me to a kiosk where I was expected to register my passport for Internet usage. Immediately upon seeing the kiosk I knew exactly what I was looking at. It is unfortunate that Internet monitoring and censorship is so normal in the PRC that the government does not even try to maintain a faade of online privacy. Both citizens and international passengers must censor their own online activities in fear of what political affiliations or otherwise they may be accused of having. It is interesting that the government law requiring individual registration comes from the Ministry of Public Order. No doubt, if 8220public order8221 means ensuring that no one speaks out against the Chinese Communist Party, then closely monitoring and censoring the free exchange of ideas and information is an effective way to do it. I wonder how many foreign diplomats have been ignorant enough to check their email after registering with one of these kiosks. Never a dull moment in China not even in its international airports. Passport registration kiosk required for Internet access at airport lounge in Beijing. Big Brother is watching. Receipt issued by kiosk declares Internet monitoring as required by the Chinese Ministry of Public Order No. 82 Update (August, 2014): Is Zurich Airport in Switzerland following suit In July, 2014 I passed through Switzerland8217s Zurich Airport (ZRH). At the lounge I visited I was required to scan my boarding pass (which contains personal information, of course) before I was given a special code to allow me to connect to the internet. The lounge already had my personal information upon entering. Maybe this is an airport-wide rule maybe it is a Swiss law. I have no idea. But the fact that Zurich Airport at least appears to be monitoring internet traffic on an individual basis as airports in the People8217s Republic of China do does not say good things about it. Boarding pass scanner and instructions at VIP lounge in Zurich Airport, Switzerland required for internet access. Machine on the right prints a receipt with special code unique to each individual. Receipt printed after scanning boarding pass. The code allows access to the internet at this VIP lounge in Zurich Airport. Its not an accident that successful people read more books. - Seth Godin I must begin by asking the question: If you could increase your book learning from say, 2, 3 or 10 books per year (or however many you are reading now) to 20 or 30 books per year, would you If you could distinguish yourself among your peers and become the most well-read, while using less effort, would you do it If you could easily breeze through books on difficult subjects rather getting frustrated and putting them down, would you do it Could these things not better your life Audiobooks have made my whole life better. No exaggeration At the age of 25, during a study abroad I began my first audiobook on Audible format. Before that time I had always been an autodidact (self-learner) for many subjects, so books were definitely a part of my life before then. However, I did not have the habit or the know-how to go through endless amounts of books like I do now. Of course, anyone that has gone through a reading-intensive degree program has had to push their reading limits. In my graduate program I had to read, on average, about one full book per week. I8217ve been there Unfortunately, the books I was required to read in graduate school were rarely available on audio, so I found myself at coffee shoppes and 24-hour restaurants (anywhere I could find caffeine) until the early hours of the morning night after night. Needless to say, this is not a highly-efficient method of acquiring book knowledge. I must admit that despite no longer being a university student I still spend several nights per month reading at Denny8217s restaurant until 2am and often 5am, where I have my own special table on the other side of the restaurant away from distractions from other customers. You don8217t have to do all this, and even if you do, audiobooks will greatly enhance your learning. As I have posted previously. thanks to audiobooks, I can go through about 30 books per year. A little more than two per month or so (24 per year) of these are audio format (mostly books from Audible on my iPhone) and the other 6-10 are books in print. Personally, my reading is geared toward acquiring new skill sets and learning (not just entertainment), therefore my audiobooks and print books are almost exclusively non-fiction. (It is my opinion that life is just too short to read fiction however, I do make very rare exceptions for books that come highly-recommended). Here are some of the reasons why audiobooks have spawned a reading revolution in the people I know that have embraced them (myself included): You will enhance your education: Your education is everything. Hopefully I don8217t have to convince you of that. Read on8230 You will increase your productivity: Time that was previously non-productive (driving in your car, riding your bike, walkingcommuting to work, etc.) is now productive learning time. Anytime I8217m in my car, I8217m listening. When I8217m on airplanes, I8217m listening. When I8217m riding my bike or runningwalking 2-3 times per week around a lake nearby where I live, I8217m listening. And when I8217m sitting in my living room or relaxing in a coffee shoppe or airport lounge, I8217m reading (the old-fashioned way) print books that have not been released yet on Audible. You will breeze through difficult subjects: For all those books that you wanted to read, but they were a bit over your head, you no longer have an excuse. You no longer have to doze off, staring at the same paragraph until you lose all interest. Listening on audio pushes you through the boring parts. If you want to go back and listen to the last few 8220paragraphs8221 again, you can just click the 8220Go back 30 seconds8221 button if you8217re using the Audible app on your smartphone. Or, if you prefer, you can allow the narrator to continue speaking until the audiobook gets more interesting again. You will increase your reading speed: If you8217re a slow reader or not a book reader at all, you no longer have an excuse. Get audiobooks. My father was not much of a reader until I gave him his first audiobook on Audio CDs. He was able to listen in his car (which he used for work). He became instantly hooked, and in about a year and a half he went through over 40 books on Audio CD With audiobooks, you can listen as fast as the speaker can talk. And if you use Audible on a smartphone to listen to books, like I do, you can even adjust the narrator8217s reading speed to 0.75x, 1x, 1.25x, 1.5x, 2x, 2.5x and 3x, respectively. Personally, I go through most audiobooks at 1.25x. For boring and unimportant parts of audiobooks, I sometimes speed through at 1.5x. Apparently, scientists claim that most people 8220can understand quickly spoken passages of natural speech 8221 at up to 500 words per minute. But since I8217m paying for my books (and thus, my education), I prefer to take time to absorb the content. You will still be able to take notes: I take detailed notes on almost every page of print books and write even more notes on the inside flap. (Example 1. Example 2 ). Luckily, you don8217t have to sacrifice your methodology by switching to audiobooks. If you listen to audiobooks using Audible8217s smartphone app, you can take notes at any reference point in the audiobook. That way, you can later scroll through all of your notes, and when you select any of them, the Audible app will resume the audiobook at the exact point in which you made the note. You will pay very little: If you use Audible, you can sign up for Gold and Platinum Memberships to save money. Personally, I pay 14.95 monthly for the Gold Membership, which gives me one credit per month (and buys me almost any audiobook on the website 8211 no matter the price) and 30 off of all audiobooks. Furthermore, the Gold Membership gives me access to great discounts throughout the month, which I receive from Audible8217s newsletter, and I use them In the past there have been a couple of instances in which I needed to catch up on audiobooks that I had already purchased and did not wish to be billed yet for new books. I was happy to learn that Audible had an option to freeze my membership without canceling it for three months. During those three months I was not billed the 14.95 for new credits, but I still had access to the 30 discount if I wished to download any other audiobooks. Downsides to audiobooks: As a believer in full-disclosure, I must mention that there are still, in my opinion, four downsides to audiobooks so I will identify them: The first is that most people (myself included) tend to remember more when they read the traditional way. Most people tend to be visual learners. C8217est la vie. Nonetheless, even if you are a fast reader, being empowered to use all those otherwise mentally non-productive hours of driving in your car, exercising, etc. to enhance your learning by listening to audiobooks makes the adjustment well worth it many times over There is such a high opportunity cost if you continue to only read books in print. Think of all the books won8217t read The second downside to audiobooks is that the referencessources are often not given. When recording, the narrator reads the print version of the book as if no reference was even given (unless the author included the reference into wording in the paragraph). Honestly, as much as I love audiobooks, this seems like plagiarism to me, and in my opinion, books on Audio CD format should include a. docx or. pdf file with references on one of the CDs, and AudibleiTunes books should have such a file available for download as well. But even with this hurdle, I have still been able to find references when I need them by going to books. google and locating the book I am listening to on the Google Books database then searching for three or four keywords that were mentioned in the audiobook around the time of the needed reference. If I get the keywords right (spacing and everything), Google Books brings me right to the page that I was listening to right on my web browser. I find the footnote number and chapter then refer to the book8217s References section in the last few pages, and there8217s my reference. Similarly, Amazon8217s Look Inside feature allows you to browse through the books in a similar way. Therefore you can also look through the book8217s references using this website. The third downside to audiobooks, in my opinion, is that audiobooks do not always come with all the images containing supporting graphics, charts, etc. that traditional books do. This is annoying no doubt. There are a few ways to find these images when you need them. If you are listening to an audiobook on Audio CDs, sometimes the first CD will contain images just look at the CD casebox to find out. If your audiobook is on Audible, thankfully, all or most of the images are often available on the Audible website for download in. pdf format (but not always, unfortunately). When they are available I always download the. pdf files and save them onto my iPhone. If I want to refer to them while listening to the audiobook, I can open the. pdf from the Documents app (made by SavySoda and available on iTunes ). And of course, alternatively, you can still refer to Google Images or Amazon8217s Look Inside feature to scan through books to find the image. Maximizing your learning experience: I am able to maximize my learning experience by also purchasing many of the books that I listen to on audio in print. If the book covers material that is particularly important to my long-term goals, then I take notes in the print book after I8217ve identified something from the audiobook that I want to highlight. This is a perfect solution to the previous four aforementioned 8220downsides to audiobooks.8221 With this technique these 8220downsides8221 are no longer downsides at all. Next, in order to really immerse the book material into my long-term memory I almost always search YouTube for presentations by the author on the book8217s topic. These days when an author goes on book tour and presents on the book topic, fortunately, those presentations usually make it YouTube. Often they appear as TED Talks. Listening to a presentation by the author is like getting all the best highlights of the book presented in a well-organized outline form. It8217s beautiful. And lastly, I search for documentaries on the book topic. As documentaries are audiovisual, watching them helps commit the content to long-term memory and provides depth since the documentaries usually present the content differently than the book, so you think about the information from different perspectives. With listening to audiobooks, taking notes on the print versions of the book, watching presentations given by the authors and then watching documentaries on the subject you get a very well-rounded education indeed. This might possibly seem like a lot of work. But to me, this way of doing things is both easier and more efficient than trying to read cover-to-cover book after book. The traditional method of reading alone is only a crutch for most people because it limits their learning speed to their reading speed that is, they read slowly so they learn slowly as a result. Thanks to audiobooks and the techniques I8217ve mentioned here, a slow reader like me can go through about 30 books a year 8211 and not by merely skimming books then claiming I 8220read8221 them like many people do. With audiobooks and the techniques I8217ve explained in this article, I really do go through the books cover-to-cover and then some Conclusion: As you see from the previous section, the pros far outweigh the cons (in my opinion), and the cons still have easy workarounds. So go to Audible and look for that book that you always wanted to read and never did. Get going. Become more well-read than all of your peers. Kick ass take names. Enjoy your enlightened new life. Find the best books via my mailing list: Join me in my quest for knowledge No spam that8217s my promise. I send emails out once every two months and then one more email in January of each year announcing my favorite books of the previous year. If you are not yet much of a reader but would like to challenge your thinking in new ways, my reading email list is a great way to get started. To give you a general idea of what type of books you will find in my reading list, below are a few from the past couple of years from of the most common genres: business and economics: Josh Kaufman8217s The Personal MBA . Henry Hazlitt8217s Economics in One Lesson , negotiation and influence: Robert Fisher and William Ury8217s Getting to Yes . Robert Cialdini8217s Influence , human behavioral sciences: Daniel Kahneman8217s Thinking Fast and Slow . Steven Pinker8217s The Blank Slate , philosophy: John Locke8217s Second Treatise of Civil Government . Thomas Sowell8217s A Conflict of Visions , sales and marketing: Bob Burg8217s Endless Referrals . Ryan Holiday8217s Growth Hacker Marketing , history: Robert Lacey8217s Inside the Kingdom . Paul Kennedy8217s The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers , foreign policy: David Sanger8217s Confront and Conceal . Henry Kissinger8217s On China public speaking and writing development: Jeremey Donovan8217s How to Deliver a TED Talk . William Zinsser8217s On Writing Well A Dark Truth, a film starring Forest Whitaker and Andy Garcia, takes a swing at capitalism and misses by a longshot. It is also almost as ridiculous tactically as it is ideologically. Apparently the film8217s budget did not include hiring a consultant with military or police experience to ensure that the actors playing roles with supposed years of tactical experience (soldiers, a former CIA operative, etc.) would handle guns in a way that would appear they8217ve actually been trained to use them. But the film8217s blatantly absurd gun handling is the least of its problems. In the film, Jack Begosian, played by Garcia, is a radio talk show host and former CIA operative. He is hired to go to Ecuador to expose a massacre of innocent civilians. The massacre is supported and covered up by a North American water company and carried out by the Ecuadorian military. What the film attempts to show is that evil corporations run by businessmen and inspired by greed, will stop at nothing to earn a profit for themselves and their shareholders, including massacring countless innocent women and children. But to anyone that understands the functions of free enterprise system, what the film actually shows is an entity of government (in this case, the Ecuadorian military) that fails to maintain its proper role of protecting life, liberty and property of the citizens it is empowered to protect. Instead the military itself becomes a profit-seeking entity and partners with the evil senior leadership of the water company. Important to note is that it is not the businessmen in the film that carries out the deed of massacring innocent civilians with guns it is the Ecuadorian military. The films flaw in reasoning is that without the privileged and corrupt alliance with the Ecuadorian government, the water company, driven by men who seek a profit, would be forced to gain its profit only by peaceful and voluntary exchange in the free market. That is, it would only gain profit from customers that would willingly trade money for water because they consider themselves better off by purchasing the water in the first place. In the unlikely event that the water company was to try to sell its water to citizens at gunpoint or perhaps outright rob them without providing water in return, the only proper role of government in this case would be to defend innocent life As a direct attack on property rights, Begosian explains to one live caller on his radio show that 300 years ago in England the government privatized public land. It changed the way we think, the way we view time, and land, and water, he says. Is it wrong to sell water What about air, would it be wrong to sell air Is it so far-fetched that you can sell water but you can8217t sell air During another scene in the film, Francisco Francis, played by Forest Whitaker says We are talking about a natural resource. Natural resources should be controlled by the government for the people. Not by the private entity whose major interests are to maximize profit. Let us think about this for a minute. Air is abundant all around us. The air you breathe comes at no expense to anyone else. But what if you wanted to breathe outside normal circumstances What if, for example, you wanted to breathe underwater Would you not have to buy an air tank or a snorkel Since to breathe underwater, you would have to pay to acquire the means to breathe by purchasing a device that would make it possible, what is the difference The difference is that when you buy an air tank or a snorkel you are compensating many other people for their labor, ideas and for their property all of which have made the production and availability of your tank or snorkel possible. And the seller He would not sell you an air tank or a snorkel unless he believes he is better off with the money you offered to him. So how then does all of this apply to water I ask you. Does water not need purification Does water not need transportation Does water not need bottling or to be stored in a large tank Why then is selling a natural resource different than selling any other Let us compare the role that the Ecuadorian government played in the film to the view of Frdric Bastiat a 19th Century French defender of free enterprise. In his book The Law he argues: individuality, liberty, property this is man. And in spite of the cunning of artful political leaders, these three gifts from God precede all human legislation, and are superior to it. Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place. In Bastiats view, life is important therefore the proper role of government is to protect women, children and anyone else not massacre them. Liberty is important therefore the proper role of government is to allow individuals to make choices for themselves. Citizens are free (not forced) to buy water from anyone they please, and sellers are free to sell to anyone they please. Property is important therefore the proper role of government is to protect the private property of citizens and of the water company, which is, after all, comprised of individuals that aspire to earn a profit. And should one entity whether that be the citizens or the water company act by force against the other, the proper role of government is then to act by force against the aggressor in order that justice be upheld. I go through about 30 full books per year (2 or more audiobooks per month (24 pear year) another 6 or so books in print per year), even as a slow reader that underlines and takes notes on every page. How Audiobooks I have been hooked on audiobooks since 2007 when I first began. If you are reading this page right now it is likely because you are an author, an editor, or a publisher, and I contacted you requesting that you make your book(s) available on Audible (my preferred format). In the past, I have successfully helped authors, editors and publishers get audio versions of their books available. Assuming the publisher is willing to do it, it is a fairly simple process. So this page is intended to help you as an author or publisher to get setup How audiobook customers like me behave: When audiobook customers like me cannot find a book that we are looking for on audio format we do one of two things: We add it to our much smaller queue of print books and prioritize it according to interest level, or We disregard the book altogether. Don8217t let this happen to your book My suggested solution for you: Making your book available for 8220readers8221 (listeners) using smartphones can be done easily through Audible (owned by Amazon) and iTunes. In order to do this for audio CD format, you can contact companies like Blackstone Audio or Random House Audio. Whether you are an author, an editor, or a publisher, you can do this in 3 easy ways: Audible8217s wonderful ACX (Audiobook Creation Exchange) website allows you to listen to voice samples and choose a narrator of your liking. Once the book has been recorded, it will automatically be sold on Audible, Amazon and iTunes. You can get started8230 Authors click here . Publishers click here . Just follow the very simple directions. For audio CD format: Contact Blackstone Audio and Random House Audio. (These two publishers are among the largest for audio CD format). Intellectual Properties: In many cases the publisher of the print book only owns the rights to the print edition. Therefore the author would, by default, own the rights to other editions (audio, for example). In this case, the author can hire a narrator using ACX or another service or narrate himherself. According to ACX8217s Authors8217 page. granting Audible exclusive distribution rights allows you to earn royalties of 40. If the publisher owns the rights to all formats (including audio), I recommend that authors contact the publisher about releasing an audio version. There is potentially money to be made, so appeal to your publisher8217s business interests. Regarding costs, the rights holder can either pay Audible a flat fee to produce the audiobook, or royalties can be shared. انقر هنا للحصول على التفاصيل الكاملة. Suitability of certain books for audio format: If your book has charts, graphs, tables, photos, etc. you may believe that your book is not well-suited for audio format. But, this isn8217t necessarily the case. The reason is that Audible allows you to provide an accompanying reference guide that goes with the audiobook. To give you an example, here is a link to the accompanying reference guide for Daniel Kahneman8217s audiobook Thinking Fast and Slow . In the recording of the audiobook the narrator can just say 8220See the chart in figure one of the accompanying reference guide,8221 and listeners will know what to do What readers can do: Readers wanting to request that a book be made available on audio can submit a request to Audible by emailing content-requestsaudible and to iTunes through Apple8217s 8220Make Request for the iTunes Store 8221 page. A 8220Thank you8221 letter from an author: Here below is one letter from an author that I contacted about making his book available on Audible. The author describes his painless experience: I want to let you know that Audible now has book name withheld for sale as an audiobook, and it will be available on Amazon and iTunes within a few days. I really appreciate your cluing me in to Audible. The process was quick and painless the Audible people have clearly given a lot of thought to business process engineering, and the system seems to draw a lot of interest from would-be narrators 11 people auditioned for me by reading a short text in the space of 24 hours. As for future books, book name withheld is the only one of my books to which I hold the audio rights (which explains why no audiobook was released when book name withheld was first published in 2006). In the other cases, the print publisher has purchased all rights, including audio, and gets to decide how to use them. Again, thank you so much for prodding me to do this. Author8217s name withheld As for publishers: From time to time I email publishers of books in print and almost always receive equally-energetic responses. Publishers want to make money, and making books available on audio is one way to help them do it. I have very seldom submitted articles to newspapers, etc. for publication. Nonetheless, here are a few articles I have written, some with abstracts and some without: On Human Rationality and Government Control 8211 by Emile Phaneuf and Carmelo Ferlito October, 2014, Vol. XI n2 2014 8211 Procesos de Mercado: Revista Europea de Economa Poltica In this paper we first address a long-standing criticism of human rationality and what that means for the role of government. We review and compare much of the literature on rationality and demonstrate that various authors within various fields often mean very different things by the word rational. While we make no claims as to whether or not humans always behave rationally, we point out the flawed logic for what is suggested for the role of government as a way of addressing the human irrationality problem. Building on the Mises-Rothbard-Huerta de Soto tradition, we argue that what is more important than perfect rationality is purposeful action. We explain the dynamic nature of the market in which time plays an important role, and humans act with expectations to accomplish goals, learn from past mistakes, discover new information and modify their plans accordingly. Using Hayeks approach, we discuss the knowledge problem in which data is dispersed among millions of individuals (unknown in its entirety to any central authority) as well as the problems with applying the scientific method exactly as it is used in the natural sciences to the human behavioral sciences. These problems combined, we argue, make for a much more disastrous system than would be a system in which often irrational individuals would be free to make mistakes for themselves, discover new information and take actions for their own betterment. International Relations Glossary in Portuguese and Spanish July 2, 2013 8211 MyPoliSciLab (paid website) and InternationalRelations For IR scholars and students who also happen to be 8220latinoamericanistas,8221 this list of translations of IR terms in all three languages (English, Portuguese and Spanish) serves as a great resource. Sowell8217s Visions December 5, 2013 8211 Foundation for Economic Education In this article I summarize Thomas Sowell8217s book A Conflict of Visions and Steven Pinker8217s The Blank Slate and explain the importance of understanding the concepts of opposing world visions when discussing often controversial topics such as economics and politics. Developments in Brazil Energy Sector January 25, 2011 8211 The Rio Times This article discusses new developments in the Brazilian energy sector, including the buying of Brazilian utility company (Elektro) by Iberdrola 8211 Spain8217s largest electric company 8211 and plans to revive construction of Angra 3, the countrys third nuclear power reactor. Slow Start to PAC Development January 18, 2011 8211 The Rio Times Brazil8217s Growth Acceleration Program (8220the PAC8221) began in 2007 with a budget of roughly US300 billion with plans for public housing provisions, improvements in sanitation, transportation, infrastructure and more. But four years later, only about five percent of the projects have been completed, and the second PAC (PAC2) is already underway with even more ambitious goals than the first. Rio Real Estate Shielded from Burst January 4, 2011 8211 The Rio Times Real estate prices have risen significantly in Rio de Janeiro since it was announced that Brazil would host the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Olympic Games. Prices are also driven by an emerging middle class in Brazil with access to credit for the very first time. Some spectators have rumored that a real estate boom and bust cycle is near. In this article, I explain why the boom and bust is unlikely. UA Community Voices Opinion of Tibet-China conflict March 31, 2008 8211 The Arkansas Traveler Protests in the Streets of Sao Paulo (text only) Award-winning photography for this coverage (along with videos) March 12, 2007 8211 The Arkansas Traveler Organizations Dedicated to Individual Liberties and Free Markets in Brazil: Economics and Development: Instituto de Pesquisa Econmica Aplicada (IPEA) 8211 Brazil8217s Institute of Applied Economic Research Programa de Acelerao do Crescimento (PAC) 8211 Brazil8217s Growth Acceleration Program Banco Nacional do Desenvolvimento (BNDES) 8211 Brazilian Development Bank Bolsa de Valores, Mercadorias amp Futuros de So Paulo (BMampFBOVESPA) 8211 The Brazilian Mercantile and Futures Exchange (BMampF) merged with So Paulo Stock Exchange (Bovespa) Estados 8211 Statistical data for Brazil8217s 26 states and federal district Banco Central do Brasil 8211 Central Bank of Brazil Copa 2014 8211 Brazil8217s developmental plans for World Cup 2014 Jogos Rio 201 6 8211 Brazil8217s developmental plans for Olympic and Paralympic Games 2016 Rio 2016 8211 Rio de Janeiro8217s developmental plans for Olympic and Paralympic Games 2016 International Relations and Politics: Portal da Transparncia 8211 Brazil8217s Transparency Portal 8211 (If you8217re looking for government expenditures for specific programs, ministries, etc. this is the place to go) Certificado de Proficincia em Lngua Portuguesa para Estrangeiros (Celpe-Bras) 8211 Portuguese aptitude certification for foreigners offered by Brazil8217s Ministry of Education (Ministrio da Educao) Histrica Brasileira 8211 A historical resource covering colonial, imperial and the current republic Petrobras 8211 Brazil8217s (mostly) state-owned oil amp energy company Eletrobras 8211 Brazil8217s power utility company ndice de Transparncia 8211 A non-governmental organization which provides a transparency ranking index for Brazilian state governments and Braslia (the federal district) Federal Institutions of Brazil (Wiki) Brazilian government links 8211 From the website of Consulate General of Brazil in Houston This resource has also been published at MyPoliSciLab (a paid website for political science students) and at InternationalRelations by Professor Joshua S. Goldstein. (5 July, 2013). I have learned that somebody took this list and improved upon it using Google8217s Fusion Tables. With these Fusion Tables, the data can be manipulated in various ways using filters to suit the convenience of the user. Nice tool, and thanks to whomever did that Here is the link. (7 July, 2015). If you study Portuguese or Spanish and international relations (or related fields) this list could be of great use 8211 especially if you are studying abroad and the host language is not your own. My methodology consisted of taking the glossary of terms from a slightly older version of this textbook and translating the terms one-by-one from English to Portuguese and Spanish using online dictionaries and Wiki. A huge thanks to Dr. Sergio Villalobos (native speaker from Chile) for checkingcorrecting the Spanish translations and to Ana Lcia da Silva Kfouri (native speaker from Brazil) for checkingcorrecting the Portuguese translations and for setting them to the 8220reforma ortogrfica8221 standard. And lastly, thank you to Joshua S. Goldstein and Jon C. Pevehouse for writing the book that made this list possible. Resources: 1. The university Pontifcia Universidade Catlica do Rio de Janeiro holds a blog in which they provide international relations terms and definitions. The site is entirely in Portuguese and no cross-language translations are given. 2. Thomson Wadsworth publishing offers a list of translations of political science terms from English to Spanish. Very few of these are specifically related to international relations (IR), but they are related nonetheless. While role playing with geopolitics I often ask myself what a head of state8217s next political move will be. As with any competitive game, it is imperative to know your opponent. I8217ve recently come across a few official websites (and even blogs) of heads of state for various countries. These websites contain everything from photos of political leaders, to information on their upbringing, to (in the case of Ahmadinejad) blog posts containing their individual thoughts and aspirations. This is not an ongoing project but rather a compilation of resources for those like me who enjoy political psychology. If you find links below that seem interesting but are now obsolete, then just search for cached versions by entering the full URL in the search box at the Wayback Machine website. Post navigation Sign up for my mailing list for the best book recommendations. Just enter your email below. اقرأ عن هذا الموضوع هنا.