Tuesday, October 27, 2020

Coronavirus News (298)

A Photographer's American Road Trip 
After the Pandemic, a Revolution in Education and Work Awaits Providing more Americans with portable health care, portable pensions and opportunities for lifelong learning is what politics needs to be about post-Nov. 3. ........... one of the most profound eras of Schumpeterian creative destruction ever — which this pandemic is both accelerating and disguising. .......... No job, no K-12 school, no university, no factory, no office will be spared. .........  the Industrial Revolution produced a world in which there were sharp distinctions between employers and employees, between educators and employers and between governments and employers and educators, “but now you’re going to see a blurring of all these lines.” ............ the globalization of goods and people has been slowed by the pandemic and politics, but the globalization of services has soared — and “the half-life of skills is steadily shrinking” ........... whatever skill you possess today is being made obsolete faster and faster. ...........  a path of “work-learn-work-learn-work-learn.” ..........  accelerations in digitization and globalization are steadily making more work “modular,’’ broken up into small packets that are farmed out by companies. .......... platforms that synthesize and orchestrate these modular packets to make products and services .......... “work will increasingly get disconnected from companies, and jobs and work will increasingly get disconnected from each other.’’ Some work will be done by machines; some will require your physical proximity in an office or a factory; some will be done remotely; and some will be just a piece of a task that can also be farmed out to anyone, anywhere. .....................  As more work becomes modular, digitized and disconnected from an office or factory, many more diverse groups of people — those living in rural areas, minorities, stay-at-home moms and dads and those with disabilities — will be able to compete for it from their homes. ............. today Kumar is not looking just for “problem solvers,’’ he says, but “problem-finders,’’ people with diverse interests — art, literature, science, anthropology — who can identify things that people want before people even know they want them. ...............  AI will take away jobs of the past, while it creates jobs of the future. ........... lifelong “radical reskilling.” .......... “Radical reskilling means I can take a front-desk hotel clerk and turn him into a cybersecurity technician. I can take an airline counter agent and turn her into a data consultant.” ............ “just-in-time learning,’’ offering the precise skills needed for the latest task ......... will be able to “learn, earn and work,’’ all at the same time.  



The Life Of Christ by Fulton Sheen
 
Trump Tells Coronavirus, ‘I Surrender’ The president plays the climate-denial playbook on a pandemic. ............  Just between now and Election Day, we’re likely to lose almost twice as many Americans to Covid-19 as died on 9/11. .......... According to the right, climate change isn’t happening; anyway, there’s nothing we can do about it without destroying the economy; and it’s all a hoax concocted by a global conspiracy of scientists, who are just in it for the money. ......... climate denial is largely sustained by a network of right-wing think tanks supported by fossil-fuel interests ...........  “experts” claiming either that global warming isn’t happening or that nothing can be done about it are basically professional deniers, who make a living as “merchants of doubt.”  



Sunday, October 25, 2020

Much Too Much

Dry leaves 
Scavenged for fuel 
Tiny tracks to mud roads 
That wind down 
To engulf the village 
Into kerosene lamp dark 
That burts open into 
A rod red morning. 
 
Starry nights 
Time zones away from 
Big city lights 
That are a poor substitute. 
 
Hyperlinks that replace thoughts 
Stares that unblinkingly avoid 
The passersby 
The person next door 
And the coffee table mate 
Sitting across the table. 
 
When much is enough 
And much is too much 
Close your eyes and take a deep breath 
Of centering.