The Open Door

This post is not science fiction.  It is about the natural progression of mind communication with computers.  We have opened this door and we like it.  You can watch a YouTube segment today about a non-invasive set of receivers, placed on your head that will tell a toy RC helicopter to fly up or down, right or left, back and forth by your mental command.  Thus, the language of your mind can be read by a computer and translated into a control command.  The first and most obvious useful adaptation of this technology would be the motorized wheelchair of a quadriplegic.  A more sophisticated application would be mind control of word processing.  Yet another wonderful application would be a two way communication between the computer and a blind and deaf person.  Virtual images and audio to this person would open their world.  Since the simple communication of the mind and the RC helicopter is now possible, so will be the above.

Now, since this is America, let’s take a look at some military application of mind control of a computer.  This area is where vast sums of funds will be available for development.  A sample of this application would be a small tank/robot that could be built to patrol the streets of Iraq.  It would be about the size of a lawn tractor, or smaller.  Its eyes would be a binocular camera 3D system with depth finding crosshairs.  This would be coordinated with either a high powered rifle or a laser beam.  The effective range would be four to five hundred yards.  A fleet of these little guys traveling the main corridors of a city could fairly well keep an area clear of IED placement.  The soldier/operator of the unit would be in an air conditioned bunker, far from the fight.  This basic concept is presently being applied to our drone force, which saves courtroom expenses by not having to prove a suspect’s guilt.  The soldier being virtually removed from the battle scene may well cut back on guilt driven suicides.

As this system of communication between the mind and the computer becomes more and more sophisticated, the uses of this alliance will naturally multiply, in quantum leaps.  You think that the cost of a college education is too high?  Sit down for twenty minutes and let a computer download a knowledge base to your brain’s memory bank equal to a degree in Physics.  If I can think the toy helicopter into the sky, it will be able to tell me what the world looks like where it is.  As our sensory devices create our real world now, so will virtual reality from a computer create much of our reality of the future.  You will be virtually doing a gold metal dive in The Paris Summer Olympics or having sex with the man or woman of your dreams, while a few of the “chosen”, with a larger brain, better health and better athletic bodies are having sex to reproduce.  This system will improve the breed and cut back on overpopulation.  The only consolation that you will have in this situation is that you are having more fun than they are.

We are gently preparing ourselves for this wonderful future with our smart phones.  Observe the young coupe at a romantic dinner, each playing a game on their own hand held.  See a young mother, with her iPad resting on her baby’s bottle as the new born is fed.  Read about the Long Beach rapid transit engineer, texting while passing a half dozen warning lights and crashing into another train, killing 22 of his passengers.  Yes, these pioneers are ready for virtual reality.  As my wise philosopher brother-in-law once said, “Life is what you think.”

Comments are welcome, Old Buz

American Caste System

Today we are creating a caste system in America, without the help of the Hindu religion.  We are doing it with our system of advanced education.  A college degree has become so expensive that it is only afforded by great athletes and the children of the wealthy.  The truly great athletes only finish a year or two, before going on to the pros. The children of the middle class and those with low income parents either don’t attend college or they graduate with a degree and a crippling college loan debt.  A shovel, a hammer or a rifle may be a better alternative than the college debt.  Does a hundred thousand dollars in college debt sound like an efficient means of separating the common folks from the wealthy? 

Presently there are caring college professors offering random online courses, at little or no cost, with no degree or acceptable college credits, at their conclusion.  There are also very expensive, private colleges’, online degrees being offered, without much prestige to the diploma.  The system is market driven or random at best.  The proper solution will involve long range planning (a rarity) to benefit our nation.  Presently, our government decisions are made by our large corporations and the range of their planning is their next quarterly income statement.  Below, is a letter written to our president, before “Affordable Healthcare”, to which I received a boiler-plate, “Thank You…”  The letter was obviously never seen by our president.  President Obama commented in a State of The Union speech that he would still be paying on his college loans, if he hadn’t  gotten a couple of successful books published.  Not all of us will hit the lottery in our lifetime.  Below is the letter I sent to the President, outlining a realistic method of turning back the clock to a day when a deserving student could become a college graduate:  

Dear Mr. President:

As you well know, the cost of higher education is shooting up like the cost of healthcare.  The difference in the two problems is that there is a simple solution to the escalating cost of college and post graduate work.  Today, the middle income, or below, parent can no longer afford a college education for their son or daughter.   Colleges are increasing tuition while offering less class selection.  The answer to the problem is currently seen as: student federal service time, more tax dollars to universities, government sponsored student loans, Pell grants and tax reductions to students and parents.  These all equal additional tax costs.  But none of the present solutions deal with the root of the problem.  The cost of higher education is too high and getting higher.  The solution to the problem lies in a well designed federal online university.    

If we could lower the cost of higher education, while increasing its quality, rather than sponsoring the ever increasing cost with student and taxpayer dollars, wouldn’t that be a good thing?  We can.  The technology is here now.    Take a look at the broad selection of degrees offered through the internet at The University of Illinois Online and at many other internet colleges across the nation. But, as you know, the virtual university costs are nearly as high as actually attending a campus.  Online college competition raises each of their costs by lowering enrollment.

The development of a federally sponsored online university would solve the cost penalty to a bachelor or graduate degree.  It would require initial support from the federal government.  A realistic target for the cost to a student would be under one thousand dollars per year (30 units) of education.  And this amount would ultimately self support the university.  If every online student of Accounting 101 across the nation is taking the course from the same professor and is using the same online textbook wouldn’t the cost of those 3 units be very reasonable for that student?  And could you not hire the best Accounting 101 professor at a top level salary to teach this course?  The professor could teach from his home or his university.  Many professors would get more satisfaction from teaching a group of twenty-five thousand students than from teaching twenty-five.    A faculty composed of the best in the nation would offer a highly respected diploma from a prestigious university.  Exams would be given just as the SATs are, in libraries, junior colleges and other locally monitored community facilities.  TA’s would be available for online questions.

An online low cost university would be open to all qualified students.  It would allow the student the opportunity to see a given lecture two or three times if they weren’t confident of their understanding the first time.  This would allow a student to master each subject.  As college exists today you can receive a D in a subject and balance it with an A in another subject.  This college could require mastery and therefore represent a better education and better qualifications to prospective employers.  Today, in classes, time is the constant.  The grade is the variable.  With this system, mastery is the constant and time is the variable.  Students would move at their own rate.  If a bachelor’s degree takes one person two years and another six, so be it.  They have mastered the curriculum in either case.  Some will be able to proceed full time and others, who might be supporting themselves or a family, will not.    

An online university has its shortcomings.  There is no socialization or establishing contacts in your chosen field.  Today, some students can’t afford this luxury or have no time for it or will not need it.  As an example, if you are a law student, one of your three graduate years might be spent in a courtroom environment or an internship.  The other two years could be accomplished online.  You have just knocked two thirds off of the cost of a law degree.  Study for the state bar can be done completely online.  Any given bachelor’s degree may require one semester or a full year on campus.  I believe that a good percentage of universities would gladly co-operate with such a program, offering the on-campus requirements.

 This is a shift in paradigms whose time has come.  It is time to make our citizens the best educated population in the world.  Ability and effort will become the determining factors for a great education.  A high school counselor will be able to tell an incoming freshman in a low income neighborhood, “Your education is no longer determined by your parents’ wealth.  You decide if you are working for a college degree.”  The student will be able to pass the message down to their younger siblings.  A new hope for the future will be born.

I enjoyed my four years in college in the sixties.  It provided me with a better future and a better life for my family.  I had no college loans.  College was reasonable in the 60s, so I was able to work and pay as I went.  This lack of debt also enabled me to start a small, successful business within two years of graduation.   With the present cost of tuition, room, board and books you couldn’t possibly do this.  The choice for a good student, today, having parents of average income, is to graduate with a diploma and a giant debt, or to not be able to go to college at all.   

I think that the federal, state and local governments, working together, could provide an excellent alternative route to a university degree.  State sponsored universities would need to cooperate with the online program in order to furnish the on-campus time that some majors require, such as labs, hands on study and discussion groups.  Turn back the clock fifty years for the cost of higher education.  Let all worthy students go to college.  Make The Federal Online University a reality.  And, set this online university on track to become one of the best rated universities in the nation.

This could be a university with the best professors in the nation, demanding mastery of their students and offering a prestigious degree.   The described federal online university would offer an equal opportunity to all students, at a cost that both they and their government can afford.  The student, who should get a college education, will get a college education and our nation will be better for it.  Is this a non-partisan issue or would you face a Republican filibuster?  Wouldn’t our corporations get behind this in order to supply themselves with a better educated work force and be more competitive in the world marketplace?  You will take some flak from the present universities, but this idea will come to be.  I would love to see it implemented properly during your administration and be a part of your legacy.

Comments are welcome, Old Buz

(Sorry for this blog post being so long, but I thought you might enjoy reading something that the POTUS was not allowed to.)

"You Tomorrow"

A couple of posts ago, in this blog, a kindly reader named John, commented, “You are now officially a curmudgeon!  Congratulations!”  If you take a look at Webster’s New World Dictionary, the definition of curmudgeon is: a surly, ill-mannered, bad-tempered person; cantankerous fellow.  Most other sources add the word elderly.   Now if the definition were simply, a cantankerous, elderly fellow, it would be pretty close.  Surly, ill-mannered and bad tempered really don’t apply.  (But, if a pessimist living in his seventh decade is all that is required, congratulations were in order.)  The comment was made after the post titled, “HR 20….” And, HR 20 is in fact a stupid piece of legislation, co-sponsored by most of the Democrats in The House.  You need only to read it and see who co-sponsored it, in order to see that my criticisms of it are valid.  It would have been nice if the Democrats who co-signed the bill had read it first.  They simply cannot be dumb enough to think that HR 20 is a good piece of legislation for campaign reform.  It is a major increase in campaign spending.  You see, “they simply cannot be dumb enough” is a compliment and would certainly not be said by a curmudgeon.

 

In a logic class, while at Loyola University, I learned that appealing to one’s prejudices rather than to reason, as by attacking one’s opponent rather than debating the issue, is the fallacy of ad hominem.  Ad hominem is constantly seen on our TV editorials (cable news programs), talk radio and in far right and far left emails.  A good example, that is way overused, is comparing anyone to Hitler.  I don’t know that John read enough of my blog posts to know my age before his comment, so for all he knew, I may have been simply a pessimist (realist).  John, please read H.R. 20 and see if you can find any error in my analysis.  I would love to hear it.

You may ask why, “You Tomorrow” as a title?  It’s a warning.   My life trajectory has been: good student, to non-believer, to activist, to lobbyist, to realist, to pessimist, to John’s curmudgeon.  I would guess that the simple majority tend to see an elderly male pessimist as a curmudgeon.  I kind of like the title, see it as a badge of courage and awareness, but if you don’t, and are a middle aged pessimist, you had best mend your ways.  You women reading this don’t need to worry; because the term is normally applied to males.

Comments are welcome, Old Buz

"Lost a Son"

I met a man in the pharmacy line at Walmart recently.  We exchanged email addresses.  He later informed me that he had lost his youngest son and two grandchildren to religion.   His son married a fundamentalist Christian, so he said the “Mourner’s Kaddish,” a Jewish prayer, which declares his son dead to him, along with his daughter-in-law and his two grandchildren, as collateral damage.  From the man’s email, I suspect that he doesn’t realize that the loss was due to his religious beliefs, not those of his son’s wife.  The man calls himself an Atheist, but obviously still lives with ancient, ignorant traditions.  This experience inspired me to write a poem, something that I just don’t do and you, if you are a poetry lover, will soon understand why:

A man lost a son to cancer

            He visits the grave annually and cries.

A man lost his son to life in prison

            He visits the young man monthly and cries.

A man is raising a handicapped son

            He cries himself to sleep each night

A man said the “Mourner’s Kaddish” on his son

            He bathes himself in self-righteous pride

The Jewish Faith is not the only holder of such draconian traditions.  Heck, in Islam a father might actually kill a daughter for marrying outside of the Faith.  This takes the symbolism out of the deed.  Not all people of Faith are such fools.  Some don’t take their religion literally.  Some, with wisdom, don’t even take their religion seriously.  Steven Weinberg, Nobel Prize-winning physicist, said, “Religion is an insult to human dignity.  With or without it, you’d have good people doing good things.  But, for good people to do evil things, it takes religion.”  I think that pretty well sums it up, but I would say it takes religion, or patriotism for good people to do evil things.  (See, “United We Stand”, elsewhere in the blog.)

Comments are welcome, Old Buz