Should rich countries try to get their citizens to have more children? Social conservatives generally say yes. Centrists often tentatively agree, worrying that the financial burden of paying for aging populations will be intolerable for a shrinking base of young workers. Liberals often counter that more people in rich countries would just put pressure on the environment, and that population problems are better solved by higher immigration.　The truth is, the right answer to this question probably

Has there ever been a covert action that backfired as disastrously as Russia’s attempt to meddle in the 2016 US presidential campaign?Granted, we know all the reasons Moscow is gloating: Donald Trump is president; America is divided and confused; Russia’s propagandization of “fake news” is now repeated by people around the world as evidence that nothing is believable and all information is (as in Russia) manipulated and mendacious.　But against this cynical strategy there now stands a process emb

What’s the future of work? Will gigs replace salaried employment, and will robots eventually leave humans with nothing to do? I see reason for skepticism, but also for concern.　Technology, of course, is already making independent work a lot easier. It puts workers into contact with customers and helps them run a back office. More importantly, it allows individuals to build and promote their reputations at low cost. Customers used to rely on a taxi company’s reputation, or choose a washing machin

At the 41st World Scout Conference held at Baku Congress Center in Baku, Azerbaijan, on Aug. 16, 160 member countries voted on the host location of the 25th World Scout Jamboree in 2023. Saemangeum, North Jeolla Province, was chosen as the host.　While etymological theories abound for the word “jamboree,” the scouting movement’s founder Robert Baden-Powell popularized the term with the 1st World Scout Jamboree in 1920, whereupon he said the term “will be associated to the largest gathering of you

Do not talk about religion and politics at the dinner table, we have been taught. The age-old maxim shows just how sensitive and controversial a subject those matters can be. Best to avoid them because you may offend someone across the aisle in politics or of another faith, it is said.Talking about religion and politics seem to arouse passions that lurk inside us that are usually kept at bay by our rational, cool heads. If you have seen political or religious rallies, you know what I mean. The c

“Among our institutions and customs there are things so atrocious that nobody can legitimately feel himself innocent of this diffused complicity. It is certain that each of us is involved at least in the guilt of criminal indifference.”- Simone Weil (1909-1943)“The death penalty, corporal punishment and public prostitution will be abolished.” - Constitution, Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea (1919)Human trafficking is a unique category of evil. Deploying multifarious stratagems --

In the popular American TV series, “Game of Thrones” noble families, divided by north and south, and also by east and west, fight to control the Iron Throne of the Seven Kingdoms. Meanwhile, an army of the zombie-like white walkers is coming from far north to annihilate the entire realm. To make matters worse, the impending severely-cold winter threatens the realm. Indeed, throughout the entire episodes, there is a constant warning: “winter is coming!” The mesmerizing drama was inspired by Georg