Why does everyone say 'travel' or 'volunteer' when these questions get asked?
<Hansonian cynicism> Because of the signals it sends about them. It says that they have high openness, are altruistic and have high enough confidence to go to strange places. </Hansonian cynicism>
Seriously, most people giving advice are (mostly subconsciously) doing it primarily to make themselves look good, or get the warm glow of being higher status than the person they are advising. This goes a long way to explaining why people are so eager to give advice, and why so much of it isn't good. Lots of good advice would be very unwise to give publicly because it sounds bad because it's cynical.
If you want to help people donate money to the Against Malaria Foundation and then go look at their video page [http://www.againstmalaria.com/Videos.aspx] while reminding yourself that your money has gone a substantial portion of the way to saving a life ($800 per life, IIRC).
Happiness resaerch suggest people get more satisfaction out of travelling than expriential happiness, looking back on it people are glad they did it.
<Hansonian cynicism> Because of the signals it sends about them. It says that they have high openness, are altruistic and have high enough confidence to go to strange places. </Hansonian cynicism>
Seriously, most people giving advice are (mostly subconsciously) doing it primarily to make themselves look good, or get the warm glow of being higher status than the person they are advising. This goes a long way to explaining why people are so eager to give advice, and why so much of it isn't good. Lots of good advice would be very unwise to give publicly because it sounds bad because it's cynical.
If you want to help people donate money to the Against Malaria Foundation and then go look at their video page [http://www.againstmalaria.com/Videos.aspx] while reminding yourself that your money has gone a substantial portion of the way to saving a life ($800 per life, IIRC).
Happiness resaerch suggest people get more satisfaction out of travelling than expriential happiness, looking back on it people are glad they did it.