URFACE

ACADEMIC FORUM OF PORTO > FAREWELL ISSUE > February 2015

Dear Participants of the Academic Forum of Porto 2015,

This is the farewell paper of the session – the longstanding drop the

media team created just for you.

This issue is a bottle thrown into your personal sea of memories. Some-

how, somewhere, somewhen this experience will resurface. You’ll then

notice how many waves you’ve overcome since then.

Moreover, the issue is meant to make your “AFP-Mode” last longer

by recalling special moments, inspiring people, and challenges.

Enjoy these best bits of the session even after it - full of thoughts,

emotions and self-awareness. We are happy to contribute to

that!

With lots of love and full of conviction,

Franziska Hülß

Bérengère Gouraud

Joana Gordinho

Sara Jasionowska

Teresa Wemans

Mafalda Rodriguez

FatihSeyfi

EditorialEditorial

Editorial

3

Content

Editorial

Board and Chairs

P. 8/9 Let’s tear down pacts against the rule of the people

P. 4

Leave a Farewellnote

P.11

P. 10

What is the Point 0f EYP?

P. 5The SuperCoopera-tors

P. 12/ 13

The Science of Friendship

P. 14 What About this Interactive Wall

Islamophobia, the new Anti-Semitism?

P. 6/7

ChallengeAccepted

P. 15

4

EYP

Challenge. Common identity. Shared experience. Pushing the boundaries. Hopefully, you have experienced most of those over the course of the last few

days and appreciate the impact the session had on you. What else have you experienced? Sleep depri-vation? Lack of inspiration? Doubtfulness?

I suppose that each EYPer faced most of the aforementioned. Apart from that, there is more - most of the officials would work months before the session to make it happen.

However, none of the session members I have spoken to would regret their time spent on both – preparation and participation in the session.

This made me wonder, what is the point? Why do people ac-tively participate in EYP ses-sions and more importantly, pro bono?!

I spoke to the session officials who helped me to find answers.

1. Is there such thing as a com-mon EYP identity, the unique ex-perience which is nothing like your daily life. “It is a means of escaping from your life routine and being the best version of you.”

2. EYP is intensive. Even dur-ing the three-day session you make long lasting friendships. Why? “Be-cause you get to spend time with them in the moments of extreme tiredness and happiness. You have the opportunity to let go and experience this time fully.”

3. Session preparation is not only enhancing time management skills or discipline, it forces you to rethink your life priorities and goals.

4. EYP organisation is hard work. It deprives you of your free or not-so-free time, forces you to push the

limits. However, according to existentialists, you are the creatorof yourownlife.Therefore,whynottofigureout how far you can push yourself in order to experi-ence something new and challenging instead of follow-ing life routine?

5. EYP sessions give you things which are more rewarding than money. “Are you afraid of public speaking? Speech writing? Debating? Managing groups? EYP gives it to you. It is based on the giving-receiving principle. What is even more exciting, along with the observable and palpable ‘skills’ you get an extra reward – it shapes your mind, motivates you and raises your self-awareness.“

6. EYP is not about the transfor-mation on a political level, it is more about changing people.

7. EYP is developing and chang-

ing according to members’ needs, though it’s not a perfect organisation, neither is democracy nor the EU.

8. EYP session organisation is mostly linked with lack of sleep, mul-titasking, fulfilling people’ wishesneeds and a lot of running. Most of it is done behind the scenes. Still, appli-cations for organiser-positions by far outnumber the spots available. It al-lows building from scratches, creating something unique and extraordinary as well as experiencing sessions from the other perspective.

9.EYP is a non-profit organisa-tion. In order to organise successful sessions you have to face denial many

timesbeforeyoufulfilyourgoals.Seemstobescary?“No, if you appreciate how your personality benefits from that.”

10. EYP is about taking risks. There are no rehears-als, no consequences, no bad moments. EYP shows that you can learn from everything.

what is the point of eyp? Sara has talked to long-involved EYPersof thesessiontofindout.

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Cooperation

The SuperCooperatorsWhydocountrieshelpeachother?Havinginmindthefactthatwearearatherselfishspecies, why do we cooperate? Does this come naturally? Take some time to think about the perks of a cooperative community. by Teresa

The widely accepted Theory of Evolution, by Charles Darwin, states that the mechanisms of nat-ural selection favor the most fitspecimens. Competition, being the only way of establishing a chain of fitness,isthenthekeytoevolution.You could think that this rule also applies to group interactions.That is very wrong.

Cooperation occurs when a self-ish replicator forgoes some of its reproductive potential to help an-other. It’s not strange if we are talk-ing about reciprocity, which means that we get back what we give, but it’s less clear when we are thinking about giving and getting nothing back.

The Harvard professor, Martin A. Nowak, has created a new theory on the mechanics of the develop-ment of Complexity. Applying sev-eral analysis of Game Theory and mathematics, Nowak explains how

cooperators can be more successful than solitary individuals. He also ap-plied this to a group situation.

A population is subdivided into groups. Cooperators help others in their own group. Defectors do not. Individuals reproduce proportional to their payoff. If a group reaches a certain size, it splits into two. It’s because of unequal growth and splitting rate among groups that Competitiveness arises. In particu-lar, pure cooperator groups grow faster than pure defector ones. This happens because by helping their neighbours, the group grows as a whole and not in a competitive way, which would imply that some indi-viduals would not reproduce. In any mixed group, defectors reproduce faster than cooperators because they do not “spend” reproductive potential on helping someone.So, it is clear that there are two lev-els of Selection: a lower level (with-in mixed groups) that favours de-

fectors and a higher level (between mixed groups) that favours cooper-ators. Taking into account that on a lower level of pure groups of co-operators, the cooperators win, this means that between pure coopera-tor groups the higher level of com-plexity is achieved.

With all this, Martin A. Nowak sug-gests that Cooperation, not Compe-tition, has always been the key to the evolution of Complexity.

When it comes to International Re-lations, we can see the European Union as a big, mixed group. The more we cooperate, the more we evolve and the more complexe we get.

Simple, right?

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Coexistence (1/2)

Islamophobia, the new Anti-Semitism?

2015 started with bad inci-dents for Europe – the terrorist attack against the French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo in Paris and the Copenhagen shootings in Denmark. In France, 17 peo-ple died, 11 were injured, and in Copenhagen, three people died, 5 were wounded. On the one hand, people are shocked after these dramatic attacks against western liberal societies among which tol-erance is taken for granted. On the other hand, more and more Muslims in these societies are facing prejudice, fear, even hate. This is a plea for more tolerance.

“One hates what one doesn’t know!” - this saying of Ali Ibn Abi Talib, the fourth caliph of Islam, describes correctly the sentiment of modern European societies. Success of xenopho-bic parties, huge anti-Islamic

demonstrations and incendiary attacks against mosques show that Islamophobia is rising in Europe. Muslims are subject-ed to stereotyping, all measured by the same yardstick. They are confronted with questions like “What is your stance on terror-ism? Do you believe in the holy war?” These and other kinds of questions show that the attacks were not only targeted at free-dom of press and opinion: they also targeted tolerance and social cohesion in European societies.

Our liberal society has to pro-tect everyone – Muslims includ-ed – from general suspicion

When a terrorist attack hap-pens, Muslims have to dissociate

themselves from it. Why? Do Muslims ask Christian people whether they are associated with the homicides of An-ders Breivik? Did the Turks of Ger-many summoned the Germans to take distance from xenophobe and racist incidents such as the arson attack in Solingen 1993, where three girls and two women died, or the arson attack of Neo-Nazis in Mölln 1992, where three Turkish girls were killed, or the actions of the National Socialist Un-derground (NSU), a far-right German terrorist group, which committed sev-eral murders and bombings against immigrants? No. So, why do Muslims have to prove that they are dissociated from the crimes of the so-called “Is-lamic State” or any other felons com-mitting crimes in the name of Islam?

One has to learn what Islam is in order to respect it Cat Stevens, who converted to Islam in December 1977 and adopted the name Yusuf Islam,

A plea for tolerance by Fatih.

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Coexistence (2/2)

said that he is happy that he got to know Islam by the Quran and not by getting to know it through Muslims. Islam is not represented by the Muslims – Islam is only the Quran and the teachings and practices of Mu-hammad. If a person is driving a car wrong and an accident hap-pens, it’s not the mistake of the engine. In our case, the engine is the Islam, represented by the Quran, and sometimes Muslims happen to be irresponsible driv-ers. The problem is that the West has never really known

Islam. And those people who demonstrate against an alleged Islamization of the West have no contact with Muslims.

Did you know that for Mus-lims Jesus is one of the greatest messengers of God? Or did you know that the meaning of the

term “Jihad” is “struggle”, and not as often wrongly translated as “holy war”. Jihad means that a Muslim should struggle against himself and against his soul. The image of a woman wearing a veil from head to toe gives us the misconception that women have no rights in Islam. Nonetheless, Mohammed said that “Assuredly, women are twin halves of men” and he also said in one sermon: “The best of you are those who are best to their wives.” Last but not least, Islam is a peaceful re-ligion. One Quran verse says: “If they seek peace, then you seek peace”, which implies not to attack people for no reason or innocent people. Neither the Quran nor Muhammad’s teach-ings, which are central to Islam, promote the killing of innocent people. Therefore, a terrorist

cannot be a true Muslim.I don’t aim to make persuade peo-

ple to convert to Islam. The only thing I want is that misconceptions, stereotypes and prejudices no longer exist and Muslims are not confronted with these. Sadly, the Christian church has been contributing to current mis-conceptions against Muslims for cen-turies.Westillsufferfromthis influ-ence. But if we want to live together in peace and respect, we have to learn and understand each other. The most important: it is not acceptable that Muslims become the new Jews.

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Democracy (1/2)

Let’s tear down

pacts against

the rule of

the people

What is Democracy and which dangers are we facing these times? Fatih went to findoutaboutit.

What is democracy? The term comes from the Greek and means “rule by the people”. While chairing at an EYP@school event, I asked the students what comes to their mind when they hear the term democracy. One of them answered me that democracy is something like “people going to elections every four years”. Sad-ly, a lot of young people just think that democracy is the ballot. Furthermore, there are also a lot of politi-cians who think that democracy is just the ballot – and believe that the result gives them a free ticket to act as they want. Although democracy is often reduced to elections, one has to be reminded that it is not easy todefinewhat“rulebythepeople”encompasses.Ina lasting process of a changing world, every time we havetoredefinewhat“rulebythepeople”means.

Every time people fought for “rule of the people”For centuries, people fought for universal suffrage and popular sovereignty in the belief that we should overcome the authoritarian state and the belief that freedom and rights are not restricted by race, sex, be-lief, wealth, or social status. As an honor for the peo-ple who gave their lives for these rights it should be our duty to be active and stay involved. Still, we do not stand at the end of our democracy, we are only just beginning.

Democracy is a lasting process – not just every four orfiveyears,everytimewehavetoquestionwhetherthe system is ruled by the people or not. We have to confront ourselves with the paradox of every de-mocracy – the question is if the will of the majority is realized and the will of the minority is respected and represented. Or is it the other way round? Are today’s democratically elected decision-makers dependent on thewillof thepeople,oristheirgovernanceinfluen-ced by the will of a privileged minority?

There is one historical example. For centuries, rulers were dependent on the will of the church and its cle-rics. The church is a business which preaches water while drinking wine itself and controlled the state for centuries. Rulers and church had a Faustian pact – the

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Democracy (2/2)

rulers let them fool the people in order to gain power and enrich themselves, the clerics let them oppress the people in order to stay in their privileged positi-on and let their business go on. For centuries, peop-le fought for the separation of state and church – in ordertofinishthedependencyof decision-makerson the will of religious clerics. Although religion is still part of political culture and separation of state and church is not entirely achieved, religious clerics have no political power anymore and politicians do not depend on the will of them.

Another Faustian pactNowadays, one can observe another Faustian pact between the elected representatives and the class of bankers. Politicians rescue banks, banks rescue sta-tes. Politicians ask banks for money to realize their pre-election promises and run into debt with no re-spect for the future generations. Therefore, banks are declared system-relevant and if they fail politi-cians rescue them. And if states are failing, banks rescue them – but at the end, the common man has to rescue both. I am convinced that this problem will not be solved if there is no strict separation

between the political class and the economic class.

What does separation between the political class and the economic class mean? I am convinced that politicians should be forbidden to chair in super-visory boards and have no secondary income ad-ditional to their ordinary salary – and of course any engagement in businesses in their post-officetime should be forbidden as well. For the economic class, this would mean that donations to politicians and parties should be forbidden – and of course any direct and indirect lobbyism in national and EU parliaments and institutions. We need the withdra-wal of the state from monetary economy, and the withdrawal of money economy from the polity.

My plea is to take a chance on more democracy. We have to return to a moral of responsibility, because then we will be able to live freedom and equality for everyone and there will be room for a government of the people, by the people, for the people. Let us not forget that we do not stand at the end of our democracy, we are only just beginning.

by Mafalda

Illustration

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EYP

Have you ever written ‘things to do’ down not to forget them and felt relief each time you crossed anything out? Have you ever felt overwhelmed with all the dead-

lines, paperwork or studying? And most important-ly, have you ever wished to magically add a couple of hours to your day? I have been there too – and I still am every now and then.We all have things to do, places to be at and people to meet. Thus, is it possible to manage work, university AND EYP as a single person?

CHALLENGE ACCEPTED!

EYP sessions tend to be quite intense. You debate a lot, work a lot and don’t get much sleep. However, you have probablyalreadyexperiencedfirstsi-gns of PED , so you know it’s worth to commit! It is an opportunity to meet new people or reunite with old ones, get inspired, enrich your knowled-ge and most importantly: to have lots of fun.

HOW and why do people stay in EYP despite being too busy without it?

From my own experience, social media can be a very helpful tool in remaining an active member of the EYP. It takes absolutely zero effort! How to do it? Join Facebook groups which will allow you to track the la-test events and opportunities. You can try the Face-book-Group Sessions! or EYP Opportunities to start with. Thanks to that, all the application deadlines, dates and people involved will be easily accessible for you. Try to make it diverse and educational. Ever thought about improving your communication or planning skills? Or maybe learning how to write a quality news

article? An EYP session is a chance to make it real. I bet you won’t perceive the time when you learn new and useful skills as a wasted time.Keep in touch with people you have met during your past sessions. Teamwork makes things easier… and so-mebody will keep an eye on you so you will submit your application in time.

WHYBecause being a part of the EYP is rewar-

ding. You meet new people. You tra-vel to places you have never been

to. You learn not only about the European Union but also about the current affairs affecting your life. You develop as a more skilful speaker, writer and most importantly person. You try new things and play ga-

mes which were appropriate for you ages ago but still allow you

to have fun. You challenge yourself and your views. And you drink loooots

of coffee (which is always good).

IknowitmightbehardasIfinditchallengingaswell!Despite the numerous endeavours I have to pursue in my life to become a doctor in few years, whenever I can I seek for EYP opportunities. Even though it means less time, more stress and complicates my life a bit. I still do it because I like to work with other people and learn from them. I like how energised I feel after each session. Even it’s not easy, when one EYP session is over I can’t wait to take part in another one!

Having said that, do you accept the challenge?

Challenge AcceptedHow to combine EYP and a (busy) everyday life? Sara is telling you how she manages it.

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Friendship (1/2)

You Look Familiar...

There is no set rule when it comes to ma-king friends. However, statistic data has helped us develop theories that bear an interesting value.One of those is that we choose our fri-ends based on genetic swimilarities. Do you have ever been mistaken for your best friend‘s sibling? Well, that’s not enti-rely wrong. Friends are the genetic equi-valent of fourth cousins and are even li-kely to share certain traits concerning the sense of smell.

You made lots of friends during this Academic Forum.Butwhydid you choose these specifichumanbeings to relate to? They are probably living in another city, or in another country… Why do we even build ‘friendship’? Here are the whys, whats and hows of human friendship.by Teresa

The Science of Friendship

The Internet is Your Friend, Too!The key to maintaining friendship is time.

Recent studies on the consequences of technology on friendship determine that all of the things we need to maintain connections are easily found on the internet. -Eye contact - Most psychologists say that it is a vital part of human relations. The answer: Skype! Easy instant connection. 10 minutes of eye contact can make up for a week of no communication. -Shared experience - Watching and liking the same things. Sounds familiar? Facebook is the perfect way of sharing experiences when you have long distance friendships. -Communication - Close friends need to create their own ways of communication. A set of symbols and signs that only you can understand. This is easily at tained with social networking. Private messages are the equivalent to coffee-sipping chats.

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Friendship (2/2)

There Really Is a Limit to Your Love

Robin Dunbar, an anthropologist and psychologist of the University of Ox-ford, has set the numbers of friendship.Every individual can only maintain up to 150significantrelationshipsatthesametime. 50 of these relationships are close friends (that you would invite to a dinner party, for example), 15 are true intimates, and only 5 are a part of your close sup-port group (your besties).This study also states that loving someo-ne costs you two of your five best fri-ends. Instead of the close group of 5, people in a romantic relationship have 4 best friends, including their loved one.

Like One Hand Needs Another to Clap

“With familiarity, other people become part of ourselves,” said James Coan, a psychology professor who has been stu-dying the mechanisms of empathy and friendship through neuroscience.Coan proved that our brain is hardwired to empathy and friendship and that our self-identity is largely based on whom we know and empathize with. This likely is because humans need to have friends and allies who they can side with and see as being the same as themselves.So, if you think you are good on your own, think again. Our brains need fri-ends!

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Concept

Instead of overloading you with mas-sive paper, the interactive walls aim at giving you a platform to share and reflect. More generally it gives you

a platform to also have a say outside your committee. Easy concept: a pen, a pencil, and watercolour to express yourself and create.

Wha

t abo

ut thi

s Inte

ractive

Wall

?

Berry& Franzi explaining the Interactive Wall...

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KATEGORIEFarewell

WELCOME TO THE EYP

Leave a Welcome-note to friends

Under the patronage of Instituto Português do Desporto e da Juventude, I. P. and the Municipality of Porto.

With the support of the Royal Norwegian Embassy, Uni-versidade do Porto, AEFLUP and Gabinete do Parlamento Europeu.

an eyp portugal event in partnership with apa