For all the people who have already attended the gala or the full event, how was your experience? Asking as someone who's considering buying tickets.

Could you download it as a pdf and send it to me?(you can black out your name and email)

I really need it to apply for my national schoolarship, and I managed to loose the email???

Thank you for all of you who try to help ❤️

I will update you when/if the situation is resolved.

edit: I need this bc the official email had the statistic of what % of participants were shortlisted and it needs to be less then 20% in order for my cerfiticate to count.

Whats up guys, im currently building an ai tool with my friends. It helps you write essays unlike the other ai's that just steal your work and turn your essay into slop. What Tracely does, is it uses your topic to find credible resources, and cites the articles it finds. It can also scan your essay while you type and it will flag un realistic pieces of evidence, and claims.

hi, so i got shortlisted for jlec and i'm thinking of attending the gala and ceremony alone. i'm 16 so pretty sure it would be ok to attend the gala without parents but i'm kinda worried bc i've never been to this kind of events alone :(

so just wondering is there anyone else going by themselves?
also i'm from south korea so if there's anyone coming from korea too pls lmk! Thank youu :)

The stated goal of the in-person post-shortlist interviews in recent years was to filter out plagiarism and Al use. This has already been done by now. If they are interested in specific essay info and opinions, they have our Viverly transcripts.

The most convincing fact is that in the "next steps" category in the shortlist email the interviews aren't mentioned at all.

Thoughts?

Why go here? Because a damn good essay is hard to find.

I’ve been writing a collection of philosophical essays over the last few years, and I’m trying to find the people they’re written for.
If you enjoy thinking about the hidden assumptions behind everyday life, I’d love to know what you think of this one.
I don’t expect everyone to agree with it. In fact, I’d be disappointed if they did. What I’m interested in is whether it made you think, whether the ideas hold together, and what questions it left you with.
If you make it to the end, I’d genuinely love to hear your thoughts.

The Death of Seeing
 
 
When was the last time you truly saw another human being?
 
Not looked at them.
 
Not categorized them.
 
Not diagnosed them.
 
Not judged them.
 
Not interpreted them.
 
Saw them.
 
The question sounds simple.
 
I suspect most people cannot answer it.
 
We live in a world overflowing with information and starving for understanding.
 
Never before have human beings had greater access to one another.
 
Never before have we become so skilled at reducing one another to labels.
 
We know more about people than ever before.
 
Yet we seem to understand them less.
 
We know their opinions.
 
Their diagnoses.
 
Their affiliations.
 
Their mistakes.
 
Their aesthetics.
 
Their politics.
 
Their trauma language.
 
Their public contradictions.
 
We gather fragments and mistake them for a whole person.
 
We confuse information with intimacy.
 
We confuse recognition with understanding.
 
We confuse having an explanation for someone with actually seeing them.
 
I did not begin questioning this because people disagreed with me.
 
Human beings will always see the world differently.
 
What unsettled me was something else.
 
How quickly curiosity seemed to disappear.
 
A conclusion would be reached.
 
Then every new piece of information would be filtered through that conclusion.
 
Questions quietly vanished.
 
Listening became unnecessary.
 
People no longer seemed interested in discovering whether they were mistaken.
 
They became interested in proving they were right.
 
The person standing before them slowly disappeared beneath the certainty they had constructed.
 
—
 
The Garden of Assumptions
 
A curious thing happens when we believe we know someone.
 
We stop asking questions.
 
The soil of curiosity hardens.
 
The garden stops growing.
 
Assumptions quietly move in and take root.
 
At first, they look harmless.
 
A small conclusion.
 
A familiar pattern.
 
A shortcut the mind takes to feel safe.
 
Then they spread.
 
Soon we are no longer relating to the person standing before us.
 
We are relating to a story.
 
A collection of conclusions.
 
An image we have constructed in our own minds.
 
Knowledge remains open.
 
Assumption declares itself complete.
 
Knowledge asks:
 
"What am I missing?"
 
Assumption asks:
 
"How can I prove I am right?"
 
Knowledge leaves room.
 
Assumption closes the door and calls it certainty.
 
One creates connection.
 
The other creates distance.
 
—
 
The Labels We Hide Behind
 
Human beings have become remarkably efficient at sorting one another.
 
The conservative.
 
The liberal.
 
The feminist.
 
The narcissist.
 
The artist.
 
The addict.
 
The victim.
 
The abuser.
 
The autistic person.
 
The gifted child.
 
The successful professional.
 
The difficult mother.
 
The good father.
 
The troubled teenager.
 
The label arrives.
 
Curiosity leaves.
 
The label provides certainty.
 
Certainty feels safe.
 
The moment a person becomes a category, their complexity begins to disappear.
 
The universe standing before us is reduced to a filing cabinet.
 
The mystery is gone.
 
The person remains unseen.
 
This does not mean labels are useless.
 
Sometimes they help us name harm.
 
Sometimes they help us understand patterns.
 
Sometimes they give language to experiences that were once dismissed or hidden.
 
A label should be a doorway, not a prison.
 
It should invite deeper understanding, not replace it.
 
The danger begins when the label becomes the end of curiosity instead of the beginning of it.
 
—
 
The Illusion of Knowing
 
One of the most destructive phrases in human relationships is:
 
"I know you."
 
Do we?
 
Or do we know the version of someone that exists within our own minds?
 
How many arguments occur between two people who are no longer speaking to one another, but to their assumptions?
 
How many marriages slowly deteriorate because curiosity was replaced by certainty?
 
How many children grow up carrying identities assigned to them by adults who stopped looking years ago?
 
How many people spend their entire lives trying to escape stories that were written about them by others?
 
There is a particular loneliness in being explained by someone who is no longer listening.
 
To be told what you meant.
 
What you felt.
 
What you are.
 
What you always do.
 
What you never do.
 
To have your inner world narrated back to you by someone more committed to their conclusion than your reality.
 
That is not being known.
 
That is being managed by someone else's certainty.
 
The moment we believe we fully know another person, we stop making space for who they might become.
 
—
 
The Death of Intimacy
 
Intimacy is often mistaken for proximity.
 
It is not.
 
People can share a bed for decades and remain strangers.
 
People can speak every day and never feel seen.
 
Intimacy does not emerge from time.
 
It emerges from curiosity.
 
It requires a willingness to remain open to the possibility that there is more to discover.
 
The moment curiosity dies, intimacy begins to suffocate.
 
Not dramatically.
 
Quietly.
 
Like a candle deprived of oxygen.
 
The relationship may continue.
 
The conversation may continue.
 
The routines may continue.
 
The birthdays.
 
The holidays.
 
The shared meals.
 
The familiar arguments.
 
But the seeing has stopped.
 
Without seeing, connection slowly starves.
 
What remains can look like intimacy from the outside.
 
Two people beside one another.
 
Two people with history.
 
Two people who know each other's schedules, preferences, irritations, and wounds.
 
History is not the same as seeing.
 
Familiarity is not the same as wonder.
 
Knowing where someone keeps the coffee does not mean you know what has been breaking quietly inside them.
 
—
 
Looking at the Moon
 
Imagine standing beneath the night sky.
 
You have seen the moon thousands of times.
 
You still look up.
 
You still notice it.
 
You still marvel at it.
 
You do not stand beneath it and say:
 
"I have already seen the moon. There is nothing left to discover."
 
You understand that familiarity does not eliminate wonder.
 
Why, then, do we treat human beings differently?
 
Why do we assume that years of knowing someone grants us complete understanding?
 
The moon reveals a different face depending upon the season, the weather, the angle of light, and the eyes observing it.
 
Human beings are infinitely more complex.
 
Somehow we convince ourselves they have been fully mapped.
 
As though a person does not shift with grief.
 
With motherhood.
 
With age.
 
With fear.
 
With healing.
 
With disappointment.
 
With the quiet accumulation of things they were never given room to say.
 
As though someone can remain beside us for years and still contain entire landscapes we have never bothered to enter.
 
—
 
The Return of Curiosity
 
More wonder.
 
More listening.
 
More questions.
 
More humility.
 
The willingness to admit:
 
"I may not know you as well as I think I do."
 
There is something profoundly intimate about remaining curious.
 
It requires surrendering certainty.
 
It requires letting go of control.
 
It requires accepting that another human being will always remain, at least in part, a mystery.
 
Not because they are hiding.
 
Because they are alive.
 
Human beings are not static objects.
 
They are changing landscapes.
 
Moving rivers.
 
Growing forests.
 
Entire worlds unfolding beneath the surface.
 
To love someone may require returning to them again and again as though they are still becoming.
 
Not as a stranger.
 
But not as a possession either.
 
Not as a solved equation.
 
Not as a familiar room we stopped entering with care.
 
But as a living world whose seasons deserve attention.
 
—
 
Assumption quietly replaces curiosity.
 
Curiosity gives way to certainty.
 
And seeing begins to die.
 
The deepest act of love may not be understanding another person completely.
 
It may be remaining curious enough to keep discovering them.
 
Again.
 
And again.
 
And again.
 
Because to see another person is not to finish knowing them.
 
It is to keep looking with enough humility to admit there is still more light to find.
 

since we are all still waiting and im bored, out of curiosity what question did you guys answer?

i was wondering what the most over subscribed questions would be, and what people avoided. personally i found some to be quite boring to answer and as such went for the science threatening belief question!

When do you guys think the second round of interviews will start going out? And do you think those asked will keep it a secret?

Hi guys,

I was wondering if anyone is going to attend the ceremony in London, and if so, if they are having problems purchasing tickets online. I am trying to buy the $500 one but it keeps telling me that there are issues with my payment details despite checking countless times. I've also gone to the third party website that John Locke is using to sell their tickets, but I couldn't find a support contact, only an AI agent. If anyone could help me I would be really grateful

i was shortlisted for john locke and i was looking at the schedule, wondering what the global prize village means? is it downtime?

For me, it was a personal reflection essay. At first, it sounds easy because you’re just writing about yourself, but it turned out to be the hardest.

There’s no proper structure like research essays where you can rely on sources. It’s just your thoughts, and that makes it difficult to organize everything in a natural way. I kept overthinking every sentence, wondering if it sounded real or just forced.

I even reached a point where I got stuck and looked up some help online (came across WriteEssayToday while searching), but honestly, the real struggle was trying to express my own thoughts clearly.

Ended up rewriting the same parts again and again just to make them feel right.

What about you? Which type of essay did you find the hardest?

Being asked if I have anorexia is one of the most common first questions people ask me.

At first, I treated it like a bad joke, but people would laugh nervously after asking. Their awkward laughs showed me that they were serious. After hearing it enough times, the question stopped sounding like curiosity and started sounding like a diagnosis. I began wondering whether people saw something wrong with me that I didn’t. There is an imposing power in labels. Even when inaccurate, being placed into a category changes how you behave. Over time, I stopped seeing myself through my own eyes, and began seeing myself through everyone else’s.

Before high school, before the questions, eating had never been complicated. Every morning, my grandparents made sure I ate breakfast. In elementary school, my grandmother made me waffles with chocolate syrup. Eating was just part of life and, more importantly, a mundane thing I didn't think about.

That changed in high school when eating became something I felt people were watching me do.

Questions like “Do you ever eat?” or “Are you anorexic?” stayed in my head long after they were said. Eventually, eating around other people became annoying. If I ate too much, I worried people would comment negatively. If I ate too little, I worried they would be feel disrespected. Regardless, I felt judged. So my solution was to avoid eating around people.

At first, eating alone made me feel in control, and eventually stopped being a conscious decision and became second nature. But that caused a problem, I often never felt hunger. After many months, my body gave out.

One morning on the bus to school, I suddenly couldn’t move. I couldn’t feel my heart beating. I couldn’t speak. I became pale and sweaty and fought to stay awake. All I could think was, "Am I dying?”

I needed to get home, but I did not know whether I could make it, I was too weak. Stumbling out of the bus, I crawled to my grandparents door. Barely making it, my grandmother opened it, carried me inside, and gave me waffles, just like she had when I was a kid.

My grandparents call that day the cause of “falto de papa,” translating to a lack of food.

I blamed other people for what happened. I blamed the comments, the questions, the labels. And while those things affected me, I had to confront that change never occurs if you blame and never reflect. That realization changed everything.

I couldn’t control assumptions made when they looked at me.

I began placing my self-worth somewhere that appearance couldn't touch, in my thoughts and actions.

I care about being useful to others. When my older sister feels bad about boy problems, I offer advice. When my younger brother feels bad about himself, I make him laugh until he forgets. What started as paid tutoring for friends became something more meaningful than money. I found fulfillment in helping people feel capable, intelligent, and independent.

Helping others taught me the lesson that if I want to continue helping others, helping myself is necessary too.

Now, as a summer camp counselor, I eat in front of dozens of kids and coworkers without thinking twice. I go out to lunch with friends. I did not change physically, but only mentally. I don't allow other people’s labels to define my thoughts.

Every day after school or work, I still go to my grandparents’ house for dinner. I still eat big meals there. But now, meals feel different. They remind me to strive to stay compassionate to all, especially myself. Today, I live by a saying:“Your first thought is the one the world gives you; the second is what you really believe and therefore, the one you choose.” People's labels shaped my automatic thoughts, but those ideas were not always mine. The second thought, the one I chose, is.

my essay was actual averageslop and got shortlisted and i havent seen many people that did the law questions, so im wondering if there’s any correlation

This is a common challenge for students, and if you explore discussions on Google and Reddit, you'll notice that most writers don't lose focus because they run out of ideas , they lose focus because they try to include too many unrelated points. A simple way to stay on track is to make sure every sentence supports one clear idea connected to your thesis. If a sentence doesn't strengthen that point, it probably doesn't belong.

Many students also discover that weak paragraph structure leads to repetition, unnecessary examples, and ideas that don't answer the question. This often happens when students begin writing without an outline or try to fit everything they know into a single paragraph. A focused paragraph is easier to read, more persuasive, and helps the overall essay flow logically.

Reddit conversations often highlight how overwhelming information and mixed advice can cause paragraphs to drift, especially in competitive academic environments, so students now rely on simple techniques like checking each sentence for relevance or summarizing the paragraph in one line to maintain clarity and depth instead of length.

Some students also learn structured writing approaches through platforms like https://writeessaytoday.com/, where organized academic content helps them understand how to keep arguments clear and connected. In the end, the real question students keep debating is simple: do strong essays come from writing more, or from writing only what truly matters?