Sorry, You Must Adapt to the Machine

This article has been written over a few weeks, and therefore has changed direction slightly from beginning to end. The core of the article still remains intact and he is very much about people losing the ability to be flexible and insightful in their thought and actions. Choosing instead in many cases to go for the quick fix even though it misses a lot of the detail and depth. It doesn't matter what the topic of discussion is about people just want the answer quickly.

Personally, I love understanding the details and find it rather sad that we are going through this, faster, shallower time. From my perspective it is working through the details to gain greater understanding where a person really grows. It is not enough to know the answer, to really benefit one must understand how the answer was arrived at. The current buzz phrase is "Artificial Intelligence" and I have seen article after article praising it in this application or that application. Let us be clear, even if A.I. has some spectacular uses, people must not forget how to understand and ultimately learn so that indeed you can benefit the most from the use of artificial intelligence. It is not just the answer that matters, it is the details that make up the answer.

Take for example the photo at the top of this article: at first glance it is an old rusting truck but there are many other details contained within the photo that tell the story. Depending on your interpretation of the image the story can be dramatically different but as you examine all of the items and aspects your understanding will grow. A side note to this photo is it was taken many years ago but my father. He had a habit of just taking a photo of something that caught his eye and I think this is one of those cases. I came across it in a collection of old slides about 20 years ago when I had the presence of mind to scan it. We can be fairly certain that the photograph was taken in Canada and that's about all I know. Still something about it caught my father's attention… We will never know what it was… Perhaps the time of day the colours and shadows in the image. In the next few days I will post to this article the full size original scan. For now though consider the thought that went into not only the photograph but the actual creation of the vehicles depicted. There was absolutely no AI back then involved. The truck itself looks like it's from the 1950s which would mean that only be designs would be and calculated and drawn up. Think of the mental process that the people had and employed to make it all come together. It is truly inspiring to know that throughout history the human race has been able to repeatedly achieve remarkable things. Yes we still have to adapt… That is a good thing. There will be a time however when we have a choice in regards to artificial intelligence, however at this time...
 

Like it or not, we are still in an age where we must adapt to the machine.

 People are loosing their ability to adapt to new situations and they are doing so willingly.

In the last five years I have noticed a real degeneration in people's expectations.

• They are self-centred and usually quite extreme regardless of context.
  
  
• There appears to be a real lack of the amount of time or effort involved.
  
  
• There is an assumption that technology or someone else's work will take care of any aspect of their idea they don't want to address
  .
• They believe that using AI means that everything will be done perfectly.

Boy do I have news for them. More than ever, people need to improve their adaptability and social IQ. We are not living in a small cloistered community anymore. Unlike previous generations, all the benefits and issues are going to require people to be flexible and more aware. With greater achievement always comes greater responsibilities and it's not the other way around.

Society is going to have to begin to look at it entirely new paradigms. As I write this the USA is going through some very, very turbulent and destructive events. This is largely due to old attitudes and ways of perceiving the world. In a way this is the late 1960s all over again except that the upheaval is being caused by a very small group of old guard individuals.

These individuals are unwilling to adapt and what I see is that many people are being swayed emotionally to at least some of their ways of thinking. This is dangerous. The world is not what it was 100 years ago or even 50 years ago. You cannot go back because what you recall is a "simpler time" never existed. Every step in human history was and will be complicated and require the individuals of the society to be involved. When you invoke the idea of a simpler time you are just cherry picking the pleasant parts of the past.

This trend toward being more inflexible and one's attitude also has other side effects. If we approach one's lifestyle with such an attitude we may not only ignore danger signs but impact the quality of one's life as well. I mention this in the video when someone I know insists on drinking 11 cancel the pop per day and regardless of the health consequences. True that is an extreme situation but it is an extreme example worth mentioning because settler behaviours are occurring in society. People adopt a perception about the world and stick to it blindly. This is not a good way of getting the benefits from life and is ultimately extremely self limiting.

Anything worth doing well, takes time and this is the other component that I see people shying away from. Don't look for the quick fix. It doesn't exist. You must be involved in whatever endeavour you undertake and if it is a large event in your life by the time you are through it you will have changed. Usually this is a positive change because to encompass a great idea means you must understand things to a greater detail than you did when you started your endeavour. But again this takes time and a great deal of effort.

Don't assume that technology will come to the rescue and do all the things you don't want to do. You want to do as much as you can because this is how you broaden your horizons. Doing anything less leaves you at a risk of not understanding a part of your endeavour. It would be like learning only the rudimentary parts of a language and not understanding the subtleties involved in the phrasing which might lead you to some very unexpected results.

"For best results, be prepared to adapt to the machine, and in this case the machine is life itself."

Stay involved everyone. Stay flexible in your outlook and critically consider all that you hear and read.

Take care Patrick

The Exploration Afforded by Learning

This is most definitely going to be an opinion piece, but I just have to articulate how much joy I get out of real understanding. Or even not understanding and learning in the process that I have to open up another way of looking at things. It is a real joy, and in a strange way I like it when it is most difficult.

It is not the challenge that drives me, it is knowing at the end of the day I will be a little different and I won't be able to say what that difference is until I get there. There is also a distinct feeling of building something. Not in the physical sense but in the sense of growth. The potential however for creating something real down the road based on the knowledge I have gained is most certainly there however. The barn door has just got a little more open 😀.

When I was younger the prevailing perception of getting older was that you slow down. Imagine my surprise then in the present day when I have discovered that things get faster and although sometimes I can't keep up I enjoyed the chase. Like "Wile E. Coyote" chasing after the Road Runner.

Obviously due to my current age, 65, I learned the skill of manually gaining knowledge a very long time ago. So it is more than challenging for me to understand the thinking and perceptions inherent in a "new model year brain". Do people today process reality in the same way and do they clean as much information as I think I do. Consider this there are adults out in the world right now who may have had not only the Internet available to them for their entire lives but to technology that goes along with it. So for example let's say they have always used a search engine for their research. Imagine if that wasn't available. The challenge of not only finding physical material but knowing where to look and how to piece things together, these activities might be completely new to them. I am intrigued as to how the problem would be approached by different people.

 

One of my memories when I was 12 or 13 was receiving for Christmas the hardcover version of "The Radio Amateur's HANDBOOK' which I absolutely adored and wore it out by the time I was 15.yes, I was an absolute nerd, quite content to spend hours with the book or work on a project. Guess what, I still am. Recently I found an original 1970s addition of the exact book online and in so attempted to spend $100 Canadian just for the sake of memorabilia. I fondly remember going through Ohm's law with my father while we discussed the latest chapter. I don't know whether I will get the book or not, but finding the exact copy online and available in good condition, sure makes it tempting.[Note: There were two completely different books published under the exact same name. The one I refer to is the one from the publisher Crowell, New York ]

The Radio Amateur's Handbook
by:A. Frederick Collins,
Robert Edward Hertzberg

WorldCat.org listing:
The radio amateur's handbook

Authors: A. Frederick Collins, Robert Edward Hertzberg
Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0690667736  

ISBN 13: 9780690667738

Year: 1970
Edition:12th rev. ed.
Publisher: Crowell, New York
Physical Description: vi, 374 pages illustrations 22 cm

Here's an idea: resolve for one day, or longer if you like, to find solutions to anything that comes up in your life without using the Internet. Even though the idea is simple do most people now days have the skill set to so the problem, by lack of a better phrase by doing it "the old-fashioned way of physical research"? This could be a lot of fun if taken in small steps. You could pose a question to a friend and go on an adventure to find the resolution. If you're going to play the game I would suggest keeping it simple at first, but not so simple in that it is boring. The question must be enticing enough to make you and your friend want to find the answer. Then you could pick another topic to solve. It could be a lot of fun and I would really be interested in knowing if it made any changes in your life or outlook.

The idea could be expanded upon for example: How would people in the 1960s find the answer. You could then set limits to use only the tools and technology that were available then. This could actually be very exciting. Debating teams used to be very popular in high schools and colleges. While this thought is not exactly on topic the idea of explaining your point of view is again an adventure in learning. Sometimes will explaining something you inadvertently learned something about yourself. Debating teams by the way are when a group of people ticket topic and have to group takes one point of view and the other usually takes the opposite. Then they begin to develop their rationales as to why their point of view is the better one. They debate this until one of the teams wins. Of course frequently when you do this you find out things you never considered. Which is one of the great payoffs to really learning something. It is usually not the end goal where most of the learning and experience a curse it is the trip toward the end goal that provides the benefits. Sometimes you might even completely change your mind on an idea.

Now days ideas tend to be polarized. Take a look at any set of videos on YouTube, pretty much on any issue. There won't be discussion between the various groups, there will be sensationalism and polarization of the topic. This is not a good way to learn about knowledge because it mixes far too much extreme emotion into the issues. To really consider the pros and cons of anything you must at least be willing to keep your emotions from overwhelming the issue and becoming more important than anything else. Many times I have set on this blog "Don't take anything personally." I would like to add to that statement "Frst consider what the issue is based on the information you have available to you" and then don't take anything personally." In this way you learn to think before you feel and that gives you the ability to make choices when the emotions do come into play.

 If you would like to download the original untouched full-size photo, just click on the following image. 

Original full-size photo of a close-up Hydrangea macrophylla bloom with shades of violet and white. Three flowers from a Crocosmia are poking right out of the Hydrangea macrophylla. The protruding Crocosmia flowers are a brilliant orange. Set against a background of naturally occurring large green leaves. This photo is completely untouched and natural. I ran across these flowers by accident. Clicking on this image will download the full resolution photograph. It is the same image as the one at the top of the article minus that headline embedded in the graphic.

 

IMG_2189.jpg

Date	2012-07-25 6:11:50 pm
Model	Canon PowerShot SX120 IS
Width	3648
Height	2736
ISO Rating	100
Shutter Speed	1/50 sec
Aperture	f/4.3
Focal Length	60 mm
Exposure Bias	0 EV
Metering Mode	Multi-Segment

Consider the tremendous benefit over once lifetime understanding how to acquire knowledge (learning) as well as apply it in new and interesting ways. The development of that skill has brought us creative people throughout the centuries. People who think, and feel, and then apply what they understand to the world and society. What a gift! The human race can simply not forget how to learn new things through effort and challenge. Not only does the person grow in spirit and ability ultimately the greater society benefits. The very technology we use every day is a clear demonstration of this. Information is now simpler to access than ever before, but in order for it to be fully used we must develop the skills only achieved by true understanding and learning.

So make a commitment to regularly put down the easy way of doing things and revisit some of the learning traditions that have helped humanity evolve.
 

This has been a very short but hopefully inspiring and thoughtful article.
Take care and as always leave comments.

Patrick

 

Are People Becoming Resistant To Learning?

 

Image created with Vector FX
by Distinct AI.

People do seem to be less interested in learning and critical thinking.  

For a long time now I have followed the YouTube channel "Technology Connections" the host has a wonderful blend of insight and humour in the topics he presents. In the video "Algorithms are breaking how we think" he points out that people now in a large part seem to desire to just follow whatever the algorithm on a social platform or YouTube presents to them rather than deciding what to watch or read. The video is very good and I encourage you to watch it. I personally love to learn and I love to investigate but I agree with the host that people do seem to be less interested in learning and critically thinking.

This has me thinking, If this trend continues what will that mean for society in the future. Yesterday I was working with a young person and by that I mean someone in their mid-20s and I got the distinct feeling that although they were obviously very bright, that they would just prefer to do things by routine and not really have to think or consider anything. I thought for a moment that I might've been primed by watching the Technology Connections video but I can assure you that was not the case. I have seen similar behaviours in the last five or six years and it is becoming prevalent. I think we are reaching a point where some people are beginning to have difficulty in breaking apart concepts and really understanding the impact of what those ideas mean. This is a critical point because this is the essence of innovation.

 I don't want people to become mere consumers of data. I want them to grow from learning. As I write this, I am undertaking a mathematics course at brilliant.org some of it has been very challenging to get through. I usually spend at least an hour every morning, and currently it's closer to two hours just working on grasping the concepts. I really want to learn this, not just the mechanics of getting to the answer.

I think one of the reasons we are seeing the current trend of people just following whatever algorithms present to them in their media is because they have never learned the process of actually understanding and learning. (Related article on this blog: Learning and knowledge in the shadow of AI) Or at least knowing why some bit of information works. I went searching the other day for methods to improve my sites ranking on search engines. I've done all the basics but I also see that Google and presumably other search engines are not picking up many of the articles. When I investigate the Google search console one can see that there are many "redirection errors" and there shouldn't be. I volunteer in the IT sector specifically related to webpages. Something about the site is really throwing off Google's smart phone crawling robot. As I dug into the whole topic of SEO (Search Engine Optimization) I only came across scads of articles and websites recommending that I use, blindly, various AI tools. There was only one YouTube video which presented facts that I could check related to various HTML tags and I was able to verify that they were all correct in my site. So my quest will continue... But my point here is that what is happening to critical thinking?

I have nothing against AI (Artificial intelligence) to be clear. But I am very concerned about people's eagerness to avoid knowledge and just go for the answer blindly. They are indeed missing out on the fun of learning! When you really understand something your mind expands and the knowledge becomes applicable all over the place. It is a very empowering experience. Learning however does require you to slow down and maybe that is part of the issue here for people. They don't know how to slow down and develop extended attention spans.

Society needs to refocus on some core activity's especially for children so that the mind gets a chance to develop the skills of attention and builds the framework necessary for enjoyment and knowledge. When it works new knowledge is the ultimate "high".

This is what I suggest and please be aware that these are my opinions not necessarily backed up by empirical data.

• Children should not be given their own unsupervised smart devices like tablets and smart phones until about the age of 10. This would keep them off the train wreck of rapidfire media and allow them to develop an attention span beyond the one minute mark.
  
  
• This in turn would allow them to develop some thoughtfulness about their world and investigate in the real world. With other children and people.
  
  
• They would also get a chance to deal with difficulty on a real-time scale. Not all problems can be solved instantly.
   
• Side Note (March 8, 2025): *CBC Marketplace did a segment on "How gaming apps use your private data to track you" and part of the piece deals with how video games affect children. Running time 21 minutes.
  

Now I know that technology is everywhere and that some of these points are far too idealistic but they should be implemented in some way and indeed the adults can take this advice as well. Consider for a moment how you use your technology. Are you using it to open doors and expand your horizons or are you using it as a shortcut around thinking?

Bring back the joys of pondering something… Consider again the idea of sitting with a group of people and going at a problem saying "What If We Do This?… Will that work?" Think of all the great adventures that are brought us to this stage in societal evolution. We could not have arrived here without them. The skills they had were critical for them. These are skills we must rediscover.

This article may grow a bit larger but for this moment I will leave it there and look forward to your comments either here or on YouTube. Let's get into this shall we and expand our knowledge and understanding. 😄

Take care Patrick

*  The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) is a Crown corporation that serves as the national public broadcaster. CBC produces "CBC Marketplace" Canada's consumer watchdog series since 1972.