Why America Spies on Allies, Enemies, and Itself | Barry Posen

Americans have gotten so used to being surveilled by the intelligence community that they barely register it as an invasion of privacy, says MIT professor Barry Posen. He goes further to say that the kind of data collection used by the government could very easily be used to in nefarious ways (should someone nefarious get their hands on it). Another big issue he suggests is the price tag that this surveillance costs American taxpayers. At $70,000,000,000... that so-called "security" might be priced way too high. The Charles Koch Foundation aims to further understanding of how US foreign policy affects American people and societal well-being. Through grants, events, and collaborative partnerships, the institute is working to stretch the boundaries of foreign policy research and debate by discussing ideas in strategy, trade, and diplomacy that often go unheeded in the US capital. For more information, visit http://ift.tt/12ICx9o. Read more at BigThink.com: http://ift.tt/2Asstqa Follow Big Think here: YouTube: http://goo.gl/CPTsV5 Facebook: http://ift.tt/1qJMX5g Twitter: https://twitter.com/bigthink Transcript: It is an unclassified number—and has been for several years—what the United States spends on intelligence every year. It’s an unclassified number. They don’t really break out what they’re spending it for, they break it out only in terms of two categories: “general intelligence” and military intelligence. And the totals for many years now have been around $70 billion. 7-0 billion dollars. $70 billion. About 20 billion for military, which helps you fight, about 50 billion, “just because”, to surveil the world. Now I have to say, I’m skeptical that we need to spend $70 billion on intelligence. I’m skeptical about what some of this intelligence is buying and doing. I’m skeptical. Intelligence in general is what you need for defense or offense, you need it for restraint, you need it for hegemony. Intelligence you need to run a great power strategy. But I’d like to unpack what it is that we’re doing a little bit better, and look at some of these activities and ask “is this really necessary?” Because my impression is we pretty much spy on everything given the chance: friends, enemies, whomever. During the peak of our 9/11 anger and hurt we spied on ourselves. And we spied on ourselves without really sorting out the legal ramifications of it. We collected vast amounts of metadata, stored it. This is spying on Americans! We’re doing a little bit less of it now, but it’s not very hard for an American who has friends abroad to get caught up in surveillance. There’s just a lot of collection, a lot of collection. And a lot of this information is stored so that if something happens, the IC, using fancy algorithms, can backtrack communications among individuals to figure out who was implicated and who knew who. If you have the big library and you have the guilty party, you can then reverse engineer to try and figure out who else was implicated. It doesn’t prevent the terrorist attack, but it does allow you to prosecute the group. But all the rest of us end up compromising our privacy for this purpose, and we have to... this is another thing where we should have a conversation. And it’s not an easy and straightforward conversation, because some people would privilege safety and say “Fine, they can have that metadata on me, the traffic, the numbers I called. As long as they’re not collecting the text of my phone calls they can collect the origins of my phone calls and emails, keep them in a library anonymized until they need to de-anonymize them.” Some people say “Fine, if that’s what we need to be able to backtrack a terrorist event and break up a network.” They’re fine with that. I’m a little uncomfortable with it, I have to say. But I don’t think it’s an open and shut straightforward matter, I think these things about the magnitude of the American intelligence effort worldwide, what that effort was focusing on, how much information it ends up collecting at home—this is something that really needs to be discussed, because I think it has something to do with American liberties. And so, this is not particularly what I spend my days doing, but I have some... I do feel uneasy about it, and I do tend to believe that the more active we are in international politics, the more this machine grinds on, the more we collect abroad, the more we’re going to collect at home, and the bigger the kind of amorphous mass of information waiting to be misused by someone is, and that’s the thing that kind of concerns me.

Betsy DeVos Is Making It Easier To Get Away With Civil Rights Abuses

Betsy DeVos is at it again. Hannah and Nando tell you how she is making it easier to get away with civil rights abuses. Let us know what you think of this move by Betsy DeVos. Don't forget guys, if you like this video please "Like," "Favorite," and "Share" it with your friends to show your support - it really helps us out! If there's something you'd like to see us discuss on the show, tweet us about it! See you tomorrow :) ***************************************************** Every day ThinkTank challenges preconceptions expose amazing new facts and discoveries, explores different perspectives, and inspires you to learn more about the world and the people around you. Feed your brain with new videos every day at 12 pm Eastern/9am Pacific! SUBSCRIBE or you'll miss out! http://ift.tt/O8HfZ3 Keep up to date with Hannah Cranston ON FACEBOOK: http://ift.tt/1ABSBLD HANNAH: http://ift.tt/1Q8R7gd ON TWITTER: http://twitter.com/thinktankfeed HANNAH ON TWITTER: http://twitter.com/HannahCranston ON INSTAGRAM: http://ift.tt/1ABSzU7 HANNAH ON INSTAGRAM: http://ift.tt/27qcZO7 HANNAH ON YOUTUBE: http://www.youtube.com/hannahcranston

Facebook Will Use AI To Stop Suicides

Facebook is making a new move to help prevent suicide. Hannah and Kanika Lal tell you how Facebook will use AI to stop suicides. Let us know if you support Facebook's move. Don't forget guys, if you like this video please "Like," "Favorite," and "Share" it with your friends to show your support - it really helps us out! If there's something you'd like to see us discuss on the show, tweet us about it! See you tomorrow :) ***************************************************** Every day ThinkTank challenges preconceptions expose amazing new facts and discoveries, explores different perspectives, and inspires you to learn more about the world and the people around you. Feed your brain with new videos every day at 12 pm Eastern/9am Pacific! SUBSCRIBE or you'll miss out! http://ift.tt/O8HfZ3 Keep up to date with Hannah Cranston ON FACEBOOK: http://ift.tt/1ABSBLD HANNAH: http://ift.tt/1Q8R7gd ON TWITTER: http://twitter.com/thinktankfeed HANNAH ON TWITTER: http://twitter.com/HannahCranston ON INSTAGRAM: http://ift.tt/1ABSzU7 HANNAH ON INSTAGRAM: http://ift.tt/27qcZO7 HANNAH ON YOUTUBE: http://www.youtube.com/hannahcranston

Here's How YOU Can Save Net Neutrality

There's a way YOU can save Net Neutrality. Hannah and Ava Hill break it down Give us your thoughts in the comments below. Go to http://ift.tt/2zYIeYK Don't forget guys, if you like this video please "Like," "Favorite," and "Share" it with your friends to show your support - it really helps us out! If there's something you'd like to see us discuss on the show, tweet us about it! See you tomorrow :) ***************************************************** Every day ThinkTank challenges preconceptions expose amazing new facts and discoveries, explores different perspectives, and inspires you to learn more about the world and the people around you. Feed your brain with new videos every day at 12 pm Eastern/9am Pacific! SUBSCRIBE or you'll miss out! http://ift.tt/O8HfZ3 Keep up to date with Hannah Cranston ON FACEBOOK: http://ift.tt/1ABSBLD HANNAH: http://ift.tt/1Q8R7gd ON TWITTER: http://twitter.com/thinktankfeed HANNAH ON TWITTER: http://twitter.com/HannahCranston ON INSTAGRAM: http://ift.tt/1ABSzU7 HANNAH ON INSTAGRAM: http://ift.tt/27qcZO7 HANNAH ON YOUTUBE: http://www.youtube.com/hannahcranston

How Boredom Supercharges Your Original Thinking | Manoush Zomorodi

Are cell phones destroying creativity? Podcast host, author, and relentless examiner of the modern human condition Manoush Zomorodi believes that they are. When we are bored, the brain enters what is called "default mode"—think about the way your mind wanders when you're in the shower or doing the dishes. This might not seem like valuable time but our creativity really kicks into high gear. We now use up a lot of that boredom-time by poking at our phones, and in doing so are starving ourselves of a main source of inspiration. Read more at BigThink.com: http://ift.tt/2BtEniA Follow Big Think here: YouTube: http://goo.gl/CPTsV5 Facebook: http://ift.tt/1qJMX5g Twitter: https://twitter.com/bigthink So the original Bored and Brilliant challenge was based on an extremely mundane situation that happened to me in that I sat down to try and come up with some good ideas for my podcast. We were doing well. I wanted to like, you know, I wanted to kill it. It was 2014 and I sat down to sort of make a list which has usually worked for me and I felt like there was nothing. There was this blankness. It was almost as though there was sand in my brain. And I started to think like what the—you know, first of all, what the hell, and second of all, well wait a minute. When had I had my last best ideas and why was I potentially having so much trouble now? And I thought back and it was really when I was staring out the window – it was such a cliché. It was when I was staring out the window or I was in the shower or I was pushing my kid’s stroller for miles and miles. That is when I had my best ideas. And now I realize that all those little cracks in my day, all those moments when I used to sort of just be spacing out what was I doing? I was looking at this thing, right? I was looking at my phone when I was waiting in line for coffee, when I was on the bus, every single one of those moments. And it made me realize like I was never bored ever in my life anymore. In fact, I might not have been bored since I think 2009 which is when I first got an iPhone. I was a late adopter. And so then it made me thing like well what actually happens in our brains when we get bored and what could potentially be happening if we never get bored ever again, if we got rid of this human state all together. Is boredom actually a useful sort of emotion. So I reached out to my audience and I was like are you guys thinking about this too? And you have to remember this is a couple of years ago, right. So are you thinking about this? Are you thinking about the fact that your phone could be disrupting the way you think, the way you come up with ideas, maybe your creativity. And people were like yes, absolutely I’m thinking about this. So I put it out to them. I was like well would you be willing to do an experiment with me where we take a week. We try to tweak our digital behavior and we see if we can indeed jumpstart our creativity by getting bored more often. And I kind of thought like 200 people would sign up to do this or something and 20,000 people signed up within the first 48 hours. So it was pretty exciting and gratifying that it wasn’t just me who was feeling like there was sand in their brain. So what I wanted to understand first of all was what actually happens in our brains when we get bored. And it’s fascinating. I had no idea that we are at this moment in history where we are starting to understand what happens in the brain when we allow it to just sort of wander where it wants to go. And so what they know now is that when you get bored you activate a network in your brain called the default mode. And you can’t – this is different than mindfulness, right. This is when you’re folding laundry or like ambling down the street or just lying on the couch. Not watching Game of Thrones and tweeting at the same time. So what happens in the default mode is this network ignites your most original thinking. It is where you do your best problem solving and you also do something called autobiographical planning which I had never heard of. This is where you look back at your life, you take note of the highs and the lows and you build a personal narrative. You figure out what is your story and then where are you going to go from there. Where does the story continue. You set goals and then you figure out the steps that you need to take to reach those goals. Now, of course, you can’t ignite the default mode if you are focusing on something like your phone or you can’t tap the brain power if you’re tapping a screen. Now this is extremely important things... understanding who you are, theory of mind, what you want to be when you grow up because... it feels like we all want to know what we’re going to be when we grow up. This is really it’s long term planning.

Support Others During Tough Times | Qasim Ali Shah

In this video, Q.A.S talking about on the topic "Supporting Others". He is also sharing his experience, wisdom and knowledge that will be helpful for all of those who want to improve their lives with their efforts. ===== ABOUT Qasim Ali Shah ===== Qasim Ali Shah is a Public Speaker- Teacher- Writer- Corporate Trainer & Leader for every age group- Businessmen- Corporate executives- Employees- Students- Housewives- Networkers- Sportsmen and for all who wish everlasting Success- Happiness- Peace and Personal Growth. He helps people to change their belief & thought pattern- experience less stress and more success in their lives through better communication- positive thinking and spiritual knowledge. ===== FOLLOW ME ON THE SOCIALS ===== - Qasim Ali Shah: https://goo.gl/6BKcxu - Google+: https://goo.gl/uPyGvT - Twitter: https://goo.gl/78MVoA - Website : https://goo.gl/Tgjy6u ===== Team Member: Waqas Nasir =====

Reality Is A Strange Loop - The Beauty Of Paradox + GRAPHICS

Strange Loops - A guided tour through Douglas Hofstadter's paradoxical concept of 'strange loops', and what they reveal about the ultimate nature of existence and consciousness. The Ultimate Life Purpose Course - Create Your Dream Career: http://ift.tt/29w9I9y Leo Reviews Top 200 Self Help Books http://ift.tt/29Z66uZ Leo's Blog: http://ift.tt/2mWWGH7 Actualized.org Forum http://ift.tt/2a7wTJl Contribute subtitles & translations for any Actualized.org video, watch how: https://youtu.be/b9cKgwnFIAw Disclaimer: Advice provided without warranty. This is NOT medical advice. By watching & applying this advice you agree to take 100% responsibility for all consequences. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Special Thanks & Graphic Credits: Turquoise Penrose Triangle: Anton Kononov http://ift.tt/2ArQ9uN Varios pictures & animations: Wikimedia.org Wikipedia.org Twisted Donut animation: Jacobo Zabludovsky http://ift.tt/2AmfpV7 Rainbow Spiral animation & Strange Attractors animation: David Szakaly http://ift.tt/1nWnt3u Waterfall animation: Owen Chikazawa http://ift.tt/1GHSyva Wheel Forever animation: David Whyte http://ift.tt/1oFbjuS Swirling Dots animation: Iain Acton http://ift.tt/2Ak9LD7 Drawing Hands & Relativity: M.C. Escher http://www.mcescher.com GEB Recursion: Alexandre Duret-Lutz http://ift.tt/1ledGoQ Unknown Artists: Please contact me for credit.