Yesterday, in my economics class, this guy started arguing that people have an intrinsic need to want. That people are born wanting to do nothing more than consume. In this way, advertising and other influences from the media do nothing to make a person want something more. They just want it.

The professor started arguing with him, asking the student how long advertising has been around. Turns out that, in the course of all humanity, advertising has been around for a fraction of the time that people have walked the earth.
He then mentioned that the first people were hunter-gatherers that worked in a team to share everything that they could kill just to stay alive. They didn’t have possessions, they just had relationships and what they needed to survive. He explained that the communal living of early human tribes were the basis of what humans intrinsically need or want.

The whole time this is happening, I’m in the back of the room with my mouth agape. Normally I’m the person who argues with the student who says anything like this in class. Yeah, I’m that douchebag. But this guy, with a doctorate and a nice suit, just completely leveled this kid. At best, I would have kicked him in the shins and run away. At best. His was a completely rational argument based in reality and there was no way to rebut it.
It may not be economics, but I think I can learn a lot from this guy.