Freelancing and the Ethical Issue of Late Payments

Getting paid late is the bane of a freelancer’s life. From personal experience, I know how frustrating, stressful, and tiring it can be to submit an invoice, not know when it will be paid and then – if payment doesn’t come in after a month – to have to chase the invoice, not even just once,…

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DMT and the Simulation Hypothesis

The simulation hypothesis (also known as the simulation argument or simulation theory) proposes that reality as we know it is a simulation – and most likely a computer simulation. If this argument is true, it means that everything – ourselves, everyone on the planet, and the universe at large – is not what we think…

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The Link Between Mass Media and Mental Health Stigma

Silence and invisibility do not mean that mental illnesses are non-existent. It’s these very characteristics of mental illnesses that blind our perceptions into thinking that they are mere fabrications. In most cases, this is the reason why you will not really know if someone is suffering from a mental illness. Your co-workers may be mentally…

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‘I’m a Traveller, Not a Tourist’: Examining Travel Elitism

Many people try to make a clear distinction between tourists and travellers, but the demarcation is value-laden. It is often a way for people to create a hierarchy of travel, whereby self-identified travellers can feel assured that they are travelling in a more adventurous, exciting, and authentic way. (I recently covered the topic of authentic…

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The Tourist Gaze and the Search for ‘Authentic Travel’

Authentic travel experiences: these are what we all seem to be after when we go abroad. When exploring new locales and relaying our experiences to others upon our return, there’s often nothing more self-satisfying than talking about how authentic a particular experience was. I have written previously about how this concept of authenticity can feed…

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