3 . Who cares if people think wrongly that the internet has had more important influences than the washing machine? Why does it matter that people are more impressed by the most recent changes?

It would not matter if these misjudgments were just a matter of people’s opinions. However, they have real impacts, as they result in misguided use of scarce resources.

The fascination with the ICT(Information and Communication Technology) revolution, represented by the internet, has made some rich countries wrongly conclude that making things is so “yesterday” that they should try to live on ideas. This belief in “post-industrial society” has led those countries to neglect their manufacturing sector(制造业), with negative consequences for their economies.

Even more worryingly, the fascination with the internet by people in rich countries has moved the international community to worry about the “digital divide” between the rich countries and the poor countries. This has led companies and individuals to donate money to developing countries to buy computer equipment and internet facilities. The question, however, is whether this is what the developing countries need the most. Perhaps giving money for those less fashionable things such as digging wells, extending electricity networks and making more affordable washing machines would have improved people’s lives more than giving every child a laptop computer or setting up internet centres in rural villages, I am not saying that those things are necessarily more important, but many donators have rushed into fancy programmes without carefully assessing the relative long-term costs and benefits of alternative uses of their money.

In yet another example, a fascination with the new has led people to believe that the recent changes in the technologies of communications and transportation are so revolutionary that now we live in a “borderless world”. As a result, in the last twenty years or so, many people have come to believe that whatever change is happening today is the result of great technological progress, going against which will be like trying to turn the clock back. Believing in such a world, many governments have put an end to some of the very necessary regulations on cross-border flows of capital, labour and goods, with poor results.

Understanding technological trends is very important for correctly designing economic policies, both at the national and the international levels, and for making the right career choices at the individual level. However, our fascination with the latest, and our under valuation of what has already become common, can, and has, led us in all sorts of wrong directions.

4 . Social media is taking over our lives: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and now, TikTok. These social media platforms have changed from a way to stay connected to an industry where even kids can make money off their posts. While this may seem like another opportunistic innovation, it’s really full of hidden false realities.

The median income (中位收入) recorded in the United States of America was about $63,000 in 2018. TikTokers can make anywhere from $50,000 to $150,000 for a TikTok brand partnership, and TikTokers with over a million followers can make up to $30,000 a month—$360,000 a year. They are making more than the average person trying to feed their family and keep a roof over their heads simply by posting a 15-second video.

This is mad in more ways than one. Not only is it an overpaid “job”, it promotes undeserved admiration from viewers and a false sense of reality. Many of these famous TikTokers are still teens and the effects of fame at such an early stage in life might cause issues later in life, such as mental illness. Teens between the ages of 13 and 17 make up 27% of TikTok viewers, who can be easily influenced by what they are watching. They can put a false sense of self-value into who they look up to and what they represent: money, fame, being considered conventionally attractive.

While TikTok has become a great tool for marketing, it’s important to understand how this content affects young viewers. If we’re constantly consuming content that shows us all we need to do to be successful is be conventionally attractive and post a 15-second video featuring a new dance, it will challenge our knowledge of what really makes someone successful and will in turn affect our individual work ethnics (伦理). What about the people who miss birthdays and family holidays due to their jobs and aren’t getting paid nearly as much as these TikTokers?

Richard Colyer, president and creator of Metaphor, Inc, had his own view on this issue. “It sounds great that kids can make money for doing the latest dance moves in a 15-second video, but we should feed the minds of kids and not just their bank accounts. TikTok can be great if used properly. Money alone is not good; technology alone is not good and connectedness can be bad if it is only online.”

Again, as a fellow consumer of TikTok, I do enjoy the app when I have some time to kill and need a good laugh. I’m not against someone making a living on entertainment, but what does getting famous by posting a 15-second video teach young people?

5 . Nowadays, children spend less time in the fresh air. Many of them are addicted to a screen either on a computer or a TV— they seem to be living in a virtual world. They have lost touch with nature.

But now 400 organizations in the UK, from playgroups to the National Health Service, are encouraging children to have some “wild time”. They want kids to swap at least 30 minutes of watching TV or playing computer games for time playing outside. Activities such as building dens, climbing trees, rummaging for conkers and playing hide and seek are just some of the things kid can do. Even if they live in a city, they can go on adventures in the garden or the park.

Children often need a helping hand from mum and dad. They need to be shown what to do and where to go. Andy Simpson from National Health Service says, “We want parents to see what this magical wonder product does for their kids’ development, independence and creativity, by giving wild time a go.”

So despite the complicated world that young people grow up in now, it seems that going back to basics and experiencing “nature’s playground” is what modern children need. David Bond from Project Wild Thing says, “We need to make more space for wild time in children’s daily routine, freeing this generation of kids to have the sort of experiences that many of us took for granted.”

This might sound a bit old fashioned to you or maybe, like me, it’s made you think about sticking on your boots, getting outdoors and reliving your childhood. There’s no age limit on enjoying yourself!

7 . It was the day before Thanksgiving and Kaleb Benham was wandering around outside his home in Noring California. His 90-pound pit bull, Buddy, was playing around nearby, doing what dogs do: getting into trouble. And this time, Buddy was getting into a whole lot of trouble.

The unmistakable sound that no one wants to hear alone in the woods caught Benham’s attention. It was the deep, strange roar of a black bear. Benham wheeled around to see the beast, which Benham figured weighed around 350 pounds, some 100 feet away. In an instant, the bear fastened on to Buddy’s head and started dragging him away.

Benham, a thin, fit 24-year-old, took off after them. “Honestly,” he told CBS13, “the only thing I could think of was ‘save my baby’.” Sprinting, he lowered his shoulder and plowed into the bear. But it only tightened its grip on Buddy. Benham grabbed the bear by the throat. Nothing. He tried getting its mouth open, but the jaw was locked tight. Benham resorted to street fighting—punching the bear over and over around its snout and eye. It worked. The bear dropped the dog and ran off into the woods.

Buddy was in bad shape. His face was bloodied and ripped up. His ears were dangling. He had a bite mark clear through his lip and one that barely missed an eye.

“My first thought was that I was going to lose him,” Benham said. He scooped up Buddy, put him into his car, and sped off to a nearby veterinarian. Buddy’s surgery took nearly four hours. Benham watched the procedure through a window. “I just stood there,” he said, watching as Buddy’s ears were stapled back on and skin flaps were stitched, and tubes were inserted into his head to drain fluid.

This was the second time Benham had rescued Buddy, says CBS13. The first was from a shelter a few years ago. “If it was your kid, what would you do?” he asked. Nodding toward Buddy, he added, “That’s my kid.”

9 . In the digital age, we rely on technology such as social media in trying to build interesting and varied lives. Social networking sites like Facebook are designed and promoted to make us believe enthusiastically that they are able to open up new experiences for us. There are constant notifications (通知) and updates, urging us to check-in to find out what is new.

But if we do not use the technology wisely, we can end up becoming overly attached and trapped in a cycle of social media FOMO, a sign of deeper unhappiness. FOMO, or fear of missing out, is a fear that exciting or interesting events are happening somewhere else and that we are not able to join.

People who experience high levels of FOMO have been found to be more likely to give in to urges to write and check text messages while driving, as well as to use Facebook more often directly after waking, while going to sleep and during meals.

When it comes to lasting happiness, it is best not to give in to FOMO, but rather to deal with the cycle of desires that fuel it. Hard as it is, we are better off working toward facing the fearful reality that we cannot experience everything we might like than to get caught in a cycle of checking behaviors that only cause anxiety.

If we have become used to using social media as part of our attempts at living interesting lives, we must admit that it is not easy to change our approach. But change is almost always worthwhile in the long run.

The fact that FOMO is so common in our digital age is a sign that there is something wrong with the way we are pursuing happiness and that we are not as happy as we might think we are. It should warn us that, in our eagerness to use digital technology to try to make ourselves happier, we may unintentionally (无意之中) be bringing on exactly the opposite result.