Category: Uncategorized

There’s more to getting a smart education than ever-smarter technology…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Education, Learning, Life, Smart & New Technology, Uncategorized

With a bleak Winter on the horizon, Pink Floyd’s ‘We don’t need no education…’ grumbling from the radio, and Remembrance Day a few days away, thoughts about the grip that tech has on our lives have been a trifle melancholic. Remembrance Day is always poignant for the Badger. His grandfathers, who he never knew, served in the Army during WW1, and his father rarely spoke of his childhood, his life during WW2, or his post-war Army service. The poignancy is heightened this year because the horrors and hardships they endured are evident today in a Ukrainian family currently being hosted by a family member. Sadly, the tech-dominated ‘progress’ of the 21st century has done little to change the propensity for humans to inflict harm on other humans.  

Research has expanded the Badger’s knowledge of his forefathers’ lives, producing enormous pride, and admiration for their resilience in the face of adversity. One grandfather won two Military Medals for bravery in WW1. The other was invalided out of the Army after being gassed in the trenches, a primary factor in his death in early middle-age. The Badger’s father was a child evacuee from London when WW2 started in 1939. He was orphaned in 1942 and joined the Army in 1946 serving in a decimated post-war Germany, and then in Egypt. When pressed, he would only say that these experiences were ‘character-building’ and had influenced his three favourite sayings, namely ‘There’s no such thing as can’t, try’, ‘If you’ve got a problem, don’t bleat about it, deal with it’, and ‘Every day is a day for learning’. When the Badger was growing up, these were part of the parental soundtrack of life and became embedded attitudes. It was his father’s way of passing on lessons learned from difficult life experiences. 1

The Pink Floyd rendition here reminds the Badger that education has not only changed dramatically over the decades, but also that today’s Tech makes it easier, in some respects, to adopt an ‘Every day is a day for learning’ attitude. The days of blackboard and chalk, and throwing chalk at a pupil not paying attention, are gone! The smartest of educations, however, comes from complementing learning delivered by ever-smarter technology with face to face, non-virtual, cross-generational discussions with people sharing their experiences and life lessons. Part of the Badger’s melancholic tinge is due to a feeling that ever-smarter technology is progressively diluting this kind of learning. Another part is a feeling that whilst today’s world is different to that of his forefathers, it isn’t really any better. The melancholic tinge will no doubt fade in a few days. On Remembrance Day, the Badger will be paying tribute to his forefathers, and their values, with great pride. ‘Every day is a day for learning’ is very much part of their legacy. Make it part of yours too.

Advertisement

Technology has redefined normal life…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Electric cars, Life, Smart & New Technology, Technology, Uncategorized

A century ago, the world started emerging from the Spanish Flu pandemic that followed World War 1. After years of turmoil people wanted change, and the 1920s certainly provided it.  A century later we’re emerging from another pandemic, and the 2020s looks destined to be transformational too. History might repeat itself!  For most people, of course, life today is very different to that in the 1920s. Scientific and engineering advances, and especially the internet and information revolution of recent decades, have put technology at our fingertips and redefined what constitutes normal life for most of us.  

Just how much normal life in the UK has changed since the 1920s can be illustrated, for example, by reflecting on the motor car. In the early 1920s when the UK population was ~40 million, there were only 383,525 cars .  By 1930 the number of cars had risen to 1 million with ~ 7,300 annual road deaths. Today the UK population is ~67 million, and there are 33 million registered cars and around 1800 annual road deaths.  The first traffic light on a road appeared in the mid-1920s, and driving tests became law in the mid-1930s. Cars of the 1920s were ostensibly fuelled mechanical devices owned by a tiny minority of households, whereas today they are essentially fuelled electronic devices with mechanical components which are owned by nearly every household.  Roads are also vastly different, and its amusing to think that any concept of a ‘Smart Motorway’ suggested in the 1920s would have been considered as the ramblings of a lunatic.   

The car and it’s embedded technology has become an essential in the average UK person’s life in less than a century. It’s not only changed the landscape and infrastructure of our country, but also become a fundamental part of our personal freedoms. The 2020s will see cars become powered by electricity, filled with ever more technology to control our driving habits, and become taxed differently to compensate for the reduction in the £28 billion annual revenues currently generated fuel duty on petrol and diesel.  The car as a metaphor for technology has redefined what constitutes normal life over the last 100 years, and that redefinition will continue throughout the 2020s.   

However, there’s something that hasn’t changed since the 1920s, namely primeval human behaviour.  Today’s global connectivity and social media platforms readily bring the most unattractive aspects of this to the fore for all to see. That’s a worry, because the end of the 1920s saw the Great Depression, and if history repeats itself then we could see some similar crisis at the end of this decade, triggered perhaps by a serious failure in the world’s technology infrastructure. If this were to happen, then primeval human instincts will take over and the ensuing anarchy might highlight that life without cars and modern technology is actually survivable, just as it was in the 1920s a century ago

Giant smartphones with motors and wheels…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Uncategorized

According to a recent Top Gear article, BMW – amongst others – will radically overhaul the way it designs and builds cars by ~2025, liberating itself from mechanical-first architectures and moving to a software/IT-first philosophy. This is a radical change because car manufacturers have historically been great mechanical engineers, not great software/IT engineers. Tesla, of course, already uses a software/IT-first approach. Catching up means abandoning old ways and developing new capabilities, both of which involve time, money, and risk.  However, the potential profits from making cars like smartphones with motors and wheels and with an associated ecosystem are huge.  

If the mainstream car giants are moving to a software/IT-first architecture over the next few years, why buy today’s electric cars based on the old architecture?  Do people really want cars to be like giant smartphones with motors and wheels? Do people really want their cars to be full of every sensor you can imagine and the data they capture about their lives to be used by huge corporations for their own purposes? Do people want this erosion of their privacy?  Do people really want in-car cameras that can transmit video of passengers, aka Tesla? Today’s millennial, completely digital native generation are likely to answer such questions very differently to those who have more life experience.  

The Badger remembers his first car fondly. It was a simple, solid vehicle, with a small engine, a starter handle, and no plastics or software – a 1960s A35 van! It was easy to fix if it went wrong, and in driving it there was never any threat to the driver’s privacy.  Today the A35 would be a ‘Classic Car’, still as much fun to drive, and still a vehicle uncompromised by modern, connected, digital technology. The Badger feels that it is rather sad that privacy in the software/IT-first architecture cars of the future is essentially bettered by a car built 55 years ago!  We all, and millennials in particular, should worry about protecting our privacy regarding the cars of the future.  Despite an article entitled ’24 things wrong with electric cars that millennials choose to ignore’ on hotcars.com being a couple of years old, many of its points remain pertinent, but protecting privacy remains key because restoring it once it is lost is extremely difficult.

Soon there will be few new car models available that aren’t giant, software/IT-first architected, highly connected, smartphones with motors and wheels on offer. However, as the Top Gear article notes at the end, if people do not embrace this type of vehicle then the car manufacturers are stuffed! So, if your privacy is important to you in the car of the future, now is the time to think about it. The Badger has already decided; he is reverting to a classic car to relive his youth and the freedom and purity of real motoring in a car free from the software and IT of the modern world…

 [ST1]

V-J Day, Animal Farm, and the digital world; a poignant moment…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Change, Education, Life, Opinion, social media, Uncategorized

The only light in the dark lounge was from the flickering images of a TV programme about V-J Day, the end of World War II in Japan 75 years ago. It was poignant not only because the Badger had relatives who served in the Far East, but also because the Badger’s baby grandson was cradled in his arms, fast asleep. It’s moments like this that make you think about what people endured in those times with how it is today, and the slumbering innocent in his arms, that’s just what the Badger found himself doing.  

Those who lived through World War II and its aftermath – regardless of their allegiance, age, colour, or creed – endured great hardship for years. Rationing, for example, only ended in the UK in 1954.  The Badger’s relatives rarely discussed their experiences which undoubtedly set the high values they held dear for the rest of their lives.  They lived without selfishness and took responsibility for dealing with whatever curve-balls life dealt them. They also had a strong sense of right and wrong, a great respect for law, order, and justice, and they put freedom and their families at the centre of their universe.

The world today is different, but is it better? Hmm.  As he watched the TV, the Badger found himself lamenting that the baby in his arms would grow up in a world in which ‘online’ has already hugely challenged the values and moral compass that his relatives held dear.  Today people seem less willing to take personal responsibility for anything; blame seems to be the first instinct and privacy and freedoms seem to have been willingly traded for convenience. Daily living is dominated by ‘online’ devices and social media whose negatives far outweigh its positives.  The news media is full of questionable content rather than fact, and respect for those who uphold law and order seems to be waning.  There’s something wrong with society when a first instinct is to video any interaction with upholders of the law and immediately upload it to Twitter or YouTube. It won’t be long before everyone videos their one to one meetings with their boss and immediately puts them on YouTube too!    

Looking at the peaceful innocent in his arms, the Badger felt that his relatives, now no longer alive, would be horrified by the erosion of values they held dear.  As it happens, George Orwell’s book Animal Farm was published two days after V-J Day in 1945. The book is as relevant today as it was then, and it will continue to be relevant when the Badger’s grandson reaches adulthood. As the little one gurgled and opened his eyes, the Badger vowed to ensure he knows not only of the values held dear by a generation who did what they had to do for the greater good and suffered personal hardships by just stoically getting on with life, but also that life itself is much more important than anything on the internet and social media.  

ITER – Another step forward to the world’s new normal

Posted on by The Information Badger in Change, Digital Transformation, Education, Science & Engineering, Systems Integration, Technology, Uncategorized

The announcement that the assembly of ITER, the world’s first device aiming to produce net energy from nuclear fusion, has started put a spring in the Badger’s step. Why? Because it’s an international joint experiment that will ultimately benefit everyone on the planet, and also because it has the support and cooperation of world powers who, in the wider sphere of global politics, often spend more time antagonising each other.  Perhaps naively, the Badger feels ITER provides a twinkle of light in the current sea of sour relationships amongst the world’s largest powers.

ITER will move us closer to the ultimate goal of large-scale carbon-free energy. It also represents a ‘moment’ for the Badger who has had a long-standing interest in the science, engineering, materials, and information technology aspects of workable fusion reactors. It’s a massive ‘Build & Systems Integration’ project and the software system that makes it function is just as critical as everything else in its construction. But ITER is also something else; it’s yet another illustration that 2020 is heralding a decade of enormous real change in what constitutes ‘normal’ in life across the world.  The ‘normal’ of six months ago has disappeared and a new ‘normal’ is evolving fast.   Change is very much in the air. Just ask those you bump into in the local supermarket and you’ll find they feel it too.

SpaceX’s recent success, missions to Mars, satellite networks,  health and wearable technologies, video technology for consultations with health professionals, battery and hydrogen powered vehicles, 5G, robotics and artificial intelligence are all examples of an enormous wave of technological advancement that is rippling throughout the world with extra momentum in 2020.  Reliance on fossil fuel is declining. The COVID-19 pandemic has shown that life goes on and the environment benefits with less planes in the sky and vehicles on the roads, that high street retail has changed for ever, and that working remotely from the office is effective and productive for many people.

Bosses and workers alike are now questioning the need for expensive offices in city centres and the daily commute. Cities and their transportation infrastructure are accordingly likely to change over the next decade.  The world order is changing too, with the USA and China jockeying for position as top dog and the EU in decline. The election of the oldest president in US history in the next few months doesn’t look as if it will change anything. The world order is increasingly distrustful of each other and the United Nations is largely toothless.

Everything above shows transition to a new ‘normal’ is fully underway. ITER is just one of many indicators of this and the speed with which world change is happening. No one can predict the future, but the Badger is certain of one thing. The first fusion plasma in ITER, scheduled for December 2025, will happen before fully autonomous vehicles are in widespread use on UK roads!

Your privacy? Look before you leap…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Education, Ethics & Regulation, Legal matters, Life, Privacy and Surveillance, Technology, Uncategorized

The Badger was paying little attention to a dialogue between two experts on the radio until one said, ‘What the lockdowns have made us appreciate is that the world before the pandemic was not what it ought to be’.  The Badger’s ears pricked up. Why? Because this chimed with a recent debate the Badger participated in. It centred on whether people take enough personal responsibility for their privacy in today’s world and the Badger had stirred the pot with the following.

Pandemic or no pandemic, today’s world is dominated by the conduct of business, personal, and official affairs online.  Recent lockdowns just reinforce how over the last 20 to 25 years, since personal internet banking started to gain real traction, ‘online’ has become critical infrastructure for daily life. Most of us use online services to operate and administer bank accounts, investments, pensions, utilities, to search and apply for jobs, to interact with government departments (e.g. for vehicle licencing, benefit claims, taxation, health, passports, etc), to search for information, to buy things from Amazon, eBay, Uber, Deliveroo, supermarkets and retailers, for maps and directions on journeys, and – of course – to use various types of social media platforms.

Compare this with how we functioned 20 to 25 years ago and you’ll realise just how much of our personal data, likes, and life habits are now held somewhere in cyber space.  But ask yourself the following. Do you really know how the organisations or platforms you interact with use what they hold about you and your habits? Do you really know how they share your information with others and for what purposes? Do you really know if they sell your information, and if so to whom?

You will probably not answer with a crisp Yes. Why? Because you are unlikely to have really read the Terms & Conditions and Privacy statements presented to you, and if you have, then it’s doubtful you really absorbed what they said. Your privacy is not what it was 20 years ago, and we all bear some responsibility for that! Your information is a valuable commodity.  Others will use it to generate profits or influence the way you think and behave  and so we all need to be aware of good guidance and take more personal responsibility for preserving our privacy.

From the sheepish looks of others, the Badger had struck a chord.  The debate ultimately agreed that ‘technology has eroded personal privacy and governments must act to counter this’, and that ‘everyone must accept they have a personal responsibility for how they use online services’. The latter is crucial, even though it’s a challenge in a world where blaming someone else for our own failings is commonplace. However, one thing is certain, there’s truth in the saying ‘look before you leap’. If you value your privacy, always read and understand the Terms & Conditions and Privacy statements presented to you when you do anything ‘online’.

 

Less Twits, better education about what matters in life…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Climate & Environment, Digital devices and the environment, Education, Press & Media, Security, social media, Uncategorized

Halfway through a long walk on a hot day with a cloudless blue sky at the Devil’s Punchbowl, a break for a sandwich and a drink at The Gibbet provided some welcome respite. The view was glorious. The air was clear, and the edge of London, some 40 miles away, was visible on the horizon without the need for binoculars. The atmospheric benefits of much-reduced road traffic and air traffic for Heathrow and Gatwick were plain to see!

As the Badger munched his sandwich, a bird of prey hovered in the distance ready to swoop on its prey. The idyll, however, was broken by the arrival of a group of youngsters.  They weren’t rowdy, unpleasant, or badly behaved. They just talked incessantly about Twitter being hacked as if it were the end of the world!  It isn’t, of course, but their conversation influenced the Badger’s thoughts for the rest of his walk.  By the time the Badger reached home, these had converted into the following points:

  • Anyone familiar with ‘security’ knows that the weakest link in any security regime is people. It’s as true in today’s digital world – as the Twitter incident shows – as it has always been.
  • Twitter has become, in just 10 years, one of the prime illustrations of today’s attention-deficit world. Organisations and individuals alike use it for many reasons, including FOMO (fear of missing out), vanity, attention seeking, recreation, influencing and self-promotion. Will you really miss anything that’s important to life if you don’t look at Twitter on your smart phone every few minutes? No.
  • More detailed primary and secondary school education on how the likes of Facebook and Twitter use what you do to make money is essential. A ‘think before you write, or upload photos or videos’ attitude needs to be deeply embedded in the psyche of youngsters.
  • Hundreds of years ago, the printing press ushered in the age of reason, science, and education. Over the centuries this ‘force for good’ has become slowly diluted by commercialism, politicism, propaganda, misinformation, and falsities of all kinds. The same has happened since the advent of TV and radio about a century ago, and also since the advent of the internet and computers a few decades ago. The same has also happened with social media platforms, which have gone from a ‘force for good’ to questionable, surveillance-based, money-making machines in just 15 years!

At the end of the walk, the Badger slumped into his favourite chair at home, hot, bothered, and tired. Perhaps it was this that triggered a final thought, namely that anyone or any organisation that puts great store in Twitter should be called Twits! The world needs less Twits and better education about what really matters in life. The Badger fell asleep in his chair…

The ‘Smart’ prefix has had its day…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Education, Opinion, Smart & New Technology, Smart Meters, Smart Motorways, Uncategorized

If something is prefixed with ‘Smart’ today, then the Badger tends to wince and immediately think of the need to tread carefully! Why? Because ‘Smart’ has become over-used in today’s digital world, although many may beg to differ.  The fact is that every new gadget in the last 100 years was thought to be ‘smart’ by those living at the time. The Badger’s parents, for instance, thought the introduction of a timer on their washing machine some 70 years ago was ‘smart’. They thought answering machines some 40 years ago were too.

In today’s Information Age, the word ‘Smart’ is much overused by marketeers, media pundits and politicians alike. For many the word has become tainted and a signal for something whose benefits are oversold, whose downsides are understated (or ignored), and whose value for money and longevity is questionable. Many feel that ‘Smart’ implies they will be fleeced of their hard-earned cash (and maybe their personal data, privacy, and security) for something that might quickly become obsolete.

Using the word ‘Smart’ as a pre-fix to something is becoming a euphemism for high cost and questionable benefit, at least from the average consumer’s perspective.  For example, the UK government’s ‘Smart’ Meter programme has already cost consumers through their bills, its roll-out is grossly late, and it’s not really delivering the promised benefits for consumers. Expensive ‘Smart’ Motorways appear to lead to more not less death on the roads, and the expense  of these complex ‘enhancements’ seems somewhat  questionable and wasteful to the average consumer if safety on the road has got worse.   And then there’s Smart Homes full of interconnected lights, fridges, power sockets, and so on. Do we really want or need to live inside a machine?

And then there’s the ‘Smart’ phone in your hand.  Apparently, the device itself has an average life of 4 to 5 years and we keep them, on average, for between 2 and 3 years.   How much did you pay for it? The percentage depreciation is probably worse than your car over the same period.

So, what’s the Badger’s point?  Simply that the term ‘Smart’ is not a relevant label for digital technology anymore.  Consumers today are no fools, are distrustful of the big Tech companies, and are more vocal about government expenditure. The pandemic has changed the way we think, behave, live, and work. It has made us realise not only the importance of technology in today’s world, but also that it doesn’t need to be labelled ‘Smart’ to have a positive impact on our lives, the planet, the climate, and wildlife.  The ‘Smart’ prefix has had its day.  There’s only one thing that should attract this label, and that’s us – we human beings! And some of you may well argue with that…

Hydrogen, Helium, Lithium, Beryllium…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Climate & Environment, Education, Life, Science & Engineering, Uncategorized

Did you know that the Periodic Table of Elements has existed since Mendeleev shaped it in the 1860’s?  The world has changed significantly since then, but the Periodic Table  is still a fundamental foundation for the world we live in. In the UK it is part of the national curriculum and so anyone who attends school should be aware of the Periodic Table’s existence. At least that is what the Badger thought…until this week.

The Badger was walking with a companion in the local park which has a beautiful lake. It’s a popular place with all age groups.  We stopped for a sandwich and a drink at a park bench overlooking the lovely lake with its many different species of ducks, geese, and waders. Nearby a group of about a dozen millennials, just about the age to be leaving College for University, were having a picnic, and discussing their aspirations, beliefs, and ambitions.  One was dominating conversation in the group and proclaiming they were going to be an environment and planet sustainability ‘activist’. They seemed to be very vocal and have strong views about what governments must do to fix the world’s problems.  What passion…and naivety…the Badger thought as he threw a few bits of crust to a friendly mallard. (I know. Bread is junk food for ducks, but this mallard was clearly hungry).

The youngster droned on and on, and even the Badger’s walking companion commented that they liked the sound of their own voice too much for their own good.  And then a young lad in the group piped up with a killer question. ‘Do you know what the Periodic Table is?’, he asked. ‘No, and I don’t need to’, was the swift response. The young lad just said ‘The Periodic Table captures all the elements that make up our world. How can you be an environment or planet activist if you don’t know its elements?’

The orator shut up. The Badger almost clapped. The young lad asking the question will go far!  But isn’t it a bit worrying that someone can go through an education system, aspiring to be a green activist, and not know something about the Periodic Table?  If you want to be a young ‘green’ activist – and there’s nothing wrong with that – then surely you cannot say ‘I don’t need to know’ about the Periodic Table of elements that are at the heart of  the gadgets we use and all life on the planet?

Anyone aspiring to be any kind of green activist should needs an awareness of the Periodic Table to be credible.  In fact, perhaps we should all remind ourselves of the elements (and their scarcity) that underpin everything on the planet by refreshing our knowledge of the Periodic Table. You can find it on the Royal Society of Chemistry’s site here.  

 

The most powerful people in the world are not who you think…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Education, Life, Opinion, Science & Engineering, Uncategorized

With coffee in hand, laptop on the knee, thunder overhead, and ‘what is wrong with people’ news on the radio, the Badger sat in his conservatory watching rain pummel the garden flowers and had a thoughtful moment. As the petals of a large peony disintegrated in the rain, one thing came to the fore in the Badger’s mind – that the world is in the grip of non-biological pandemics, not just the biological COVID-19 one!

There’s a pandemic of misinformation, disinformation and distortion, an escalating pandemic of disrespect for law and order, and a pandemic of the ‘human stupidity’ virus – a virus which appears to spread much faster than even COVID-19! Rational evidence for all this is easy to find. For example, this week  UK House of Lords peers led by Lord Puttenham issued a report demanding legislation because misinformation, disinformation and distortion is threatening lives and democracy,  the press is full of examples of unnecessary thuggery,  and Bournemouth beach illustrated just how quickly the ‘human stupidity’ virus has taken hold.  It seems to be similar in other countries too! On a more positive note, however, there is also a pandemic of appreciation that if human behaviour doesn’t change then our planet will be unsustainable, and we will be responsible for our own extinction.

The Badger sipped his coffee, watched a Blackbird tug at a worm in the lawn, and pondered on whether the most powerful people in the world are capable of addressing our problems. But who are the most powerful people in the world? A quick scan down the list here – where power is about control over resources to drive the world in a particular direction – doesn’t inspire confidence. The Badger found himself thinking laterally and deciding that these aren’t the most powerful people in the world! So, who are? The answer is real scientists and engineers, most of whom are not and never will be household names.

Chris Packham’s stirring and inspiring speech on why Alan Turing is the Greatest Person of the 20th Century, makes the point that scientists, not high-profile politicians, corporate leaders, media stars, musicians, sportsmen, or celebrities of any kind, are the only hope for the future.  The Badger agrees.  With deference to the last section of Chris’s speech, just pick up your phone, stare at it, and know that it only exists because of scientists and engineers.  If you are a youngster considering education choices, marvel at the device in your hand and know that if you study STEM subjects then you will become one of the most powerful people in the world. You will also be our hope for the future.