"It's now easy for us to see how other people around the world live, not just how our neighbors live, " says Barry Schwartz, a professor of psychology at Swarthmore College.

FORBES: The Average American: 1967 And Today

It's easy to see how that could change with access to the world's information -- and how the current war of rhetoric between North and South Korea could be ratcheted down if either of the countries had full and unfiltered access to information about the other side.

CNN: Let's get everyone online ASAP

"Employees of a news organisation have an obligation to break stories via their employer rather than to the world at large and it is easy to see that if a company's whole business model is built on breaking news then doing that on Twitter undermines that business, " she said.

BBC: Associated Press reporters told off for tweeting

This will not be easy, because in many ways black and white Americans see the world differently. (So, for that matter, do Asians and Hispanics.) To take one example: most blacks favour racial preferences for minorities in such things as university admissions.

ECONOMIST: Presidential politics

It's easy to forget that the world is full of people who have yet to see any Shakespeare play.

WSJ: Star-Crossed Teens Clueless in Verona

There is an argument that it should be made as easy as possible for any pilgrim coming to Rome to see this room that has such a significant place in the Catholic world.

BBC: Sistine Chapel ceiling at 500: The Vatican's dilemma

When the world is indeed transparent enough that we cannot only see what our neighbours are going through but an easy way to help them, then we can speak of a new obligation imposed by a new level of technological and cultural sophistication.

ECONOMIST: Letters | The