Tag: Society

ULI – Demographic Changes Mean Dramatic Shifts In Demand for California Housing: ULI Report Finds Imbalance Between Consumer Preferences and Existing Stock

A recent poll of Southern California voters conducted by FM3, a public opinion research firm, confirmed the trend: nearly two thirds of respondents (64 percent) would prefer to live in communities that are pedestrian friendly, rather than in conventional residential communities that require driving to stores and other businesses. Sixty-five percent indicated they would rather live in communities with smaller lots and shorter commute times than in communities with larger houses and longer commutes.

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Source : ULI

Quote of the week – on society

They try to solve the problem of poverty, for instance, by keeping the poor alive; or, in the case of a very advanced school, by amusing the poor. But this is not a solution: it is an aggravation of the difficulty.  The proper aim is to try and reconstruct society on such a basis that poverty will be impossible

– Oscar Wilde

Utopia

He is an unskilful physician that cannot cure one disease without casting his patient into another. So he that can find no other way for correcting the errors of his people but by taking from them the conveniences of life, shows that he knows not what it is to govern a free nation.

by Sir Saint Thomas More

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Living in the End Times

When we are shown scenes of starving children in Africa, with a call for us to do something to help them, the underlying ideological message is something like: “Don’t think, don’t politicize, forget about the true causes of their poverty, just act, contribute money, so that you will not have to think!”

by Slavoj Zizek

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The Condition of the Working-Class in England in 1844

The bourgeoisie, on the other hand, is far better off under the present arrangement than under the old slave system; it can dismiss its employees at discretion without sacrificing invested capital, and gets its work done much more cheaply than is possible with slave labour, as Adam Smith comfortingly pointed out.

by Friedrich Engels

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Rising Awareness in Class Divide, Many Point to OWS

A new Pew Research Center survey of 2,048 adults finds that about two-thirds of the public (66%) believes there are “very strong” or “strong” conflicts between the rich and the poor—an increase of 19 percentage points since 2009.

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Source : Common Dreams

#5 Collected Reading : May 22nd 2011

Quote of the week

“The Third World today faces Europe like a colossal mass whose project should be to try to resolve the problems to which Europe has not been able to find the answers. – Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earch.”

1.BITTER PILLS : The real cost of healthcare

“In American medicine, supply often creates its own demand, and paying doctors on a fee-for-service basis encourages more high-cost procedures. The I.P.A.B., in conjunction with other cost-cutting provisions in the bill, would look to fix the skewed incentives that lead to overtreatment, bargain for better prices, and insure that we’re spending our money more effectively.”

Health, Policy, Politics

Source :  The New Yorker

2. Interview: Wim Crouwel at the Design Museum 

“I hope they will always remember me as straight forward designer, still trying to find some tension in the work, work that is recognizable “

Design, Typography, Clear

Source :  www.dezeen.com


3. The Illusion Of Social Networks

 “Surely, the benefits of participation are well-documented, but there are costs, too. While information is being channeled through these social networks, the fact remains the same illusions created by television have mutated into a stronger strain within social media. While more interesting information gets to us faster, the downside is that the new channels—and, we are all the channels—sometimes unknowingly create “little white illusions” that, over time, compound into something that may or may not reflect real life.” 

Social, Networks, Culture

Source :  Techcrunch

4. Faulty Towers: The Crisis in Higher Education

“What we have in academia, in other words, is a microcosm of the American economy as a whole: a self-enriching aristocracy, a swelling and increasingly immiserated proletariat, and a shrinking middle class. The same devil’s bargain stabilizes the system: the middle, or at least the upper middle, the tenured professoriate, is allowed to retain its prerogatives—its comfortable compensation packages, its workplace autonomy and its job security—in return for acquiescing to the exploitation of the bottom by the top, and indirectly, the betrayal of the future of the entire enterprise..”

Education, Politics, Dialogue

Source : The Nation

5. There’s Only One Way Gas Prices Will Really Fall

“The scenarios differ, but there’s one common thread: When demand for oil falls, prices fall. The one proven way to push down the price of oil and gas is simply to use less of it.”

Oil, Consumption, Society

Source :  Business Insider

Hope you like this collection. Please comment, share and most of all enjoy.

– Kaushik

#3 Collected Reading : May 8th 2011

1.Sherlock Holmes & the science Fiction of Deductions

“Like a science fiction writer, Doyle seemed to start with the premise of “what if?” Instead of a detective who arrived at the answers through intuition or moxy, Doyle asserted a different premise with the Holmes stories — what if the detective discovers the answers scientifically? What kind of adventures might he have? Looked at from this semantic angle, the original canon of Sherlock Holmes almost passes for science fiction.”

Deduction, Scifi,Mystery

Source :  Clarks World Magazine

2. Honeybees ‘entomb’ hives to protect against pesticides, say scientists

“Honeybees ‘entomb’ hives to protect against pesticides, say scientists Honeybees are taking emergency measures to protect their hives from pesticides,  in an extraordinary example of the natural world adapting swiftly to our depredations,  according to a prominent bee expert.”

Environment, Society, Bees

Source :  The Guardian


3. The secret life of libraries

 The libraries’ most powerful asset is the conversation they provide – between books and readers, between children and parents, between individuals and the collective world. Take them away and those voices turn inwards or vanish. Turns out that libraries have nothing at all to do with silence.” 

Social, Learning, Society

Source :  The Guardian

4. The economic—and other—benefits of regulations

 “The economic—and other—benefits of regulations

A series of studies over the past several decades 
find that the value of the benefits of regulations has 
consistently and significantly exceeded their costs. 
Also, the cost estimates typically made by the government and 
industry representatives have tended to be significantly overstated. 
When regulations are implemented they tend to be much less 
costly and more efficient than expected.”

Teaching, Design, Leadership, Digital

Source : Economic Policy Institute

5. Boyd Tonkin: A bookish boom in Buenos Aires

“Argentina’s capital boasts at least 350 bookshops, apparently more than in the whole of Brazil.”

Books, Culture, Global

Source :  The Independant

Hope you like this collection. Please comment, share and most of all enjoy.

– Kaushik