Software: Evolving to Non Motility
January 5, 2021
I read a quite interesting essay called “The Great Software Stagnation.” The main idea is that software innovation has slowed. A number of programming languages were identified as examples of greater software innovation and some others as less innovative. The idea is that software has shifted from breakthroughs to incremental improvements.
However, the essay contains several statements which I found thought provoking; for instance:
- You can’t do research at a startup
- Megacorps only seem to be interested in solving their own problems in the least disruptive way possible
- “Maybe the reason progress stopped in 1996 is that we invented everything.”
What if this stagnation, motionless, or non motility is a characteristic of some sort of digital law; for example, the premise of zero gravity articulated by Steve Harmon?
Maybe Newton’s boring laws apply to the digital environment? Maybe there are more of these digital laws waiting to be articulated?
Stephen E Arnold, January 5, 2020
Digital Humanities Is Data Analytics For English Majors
January 4, 2021
Computer science and the humanities are on separate ends of the education spectrum. The two disciplines do not often mix, but when they do wonderful things happen. The Economist shares a story about book and religious nerds using data analytics to uncover correlations in literature: “How Data Analysis Can Enrich The Humanities.”
The article explains how a Catholic priest and literary experts used data analysis technology from punch card systems to modern software to examine writing styles. The data scientists teamed with literary experts discovered correlations between authors, time periods, vocabulary, and character descriptions.
The discoveries point to how science and the humanities can team up to find new and amazing relationships in topics that have been picked to death by scholars. It creates new avenues for discussion. It also demonstrates how science can enhance the humanities, but it also provides much needed data for AI experimentation. One other thing is brings up is how there are disparities between the fields:
“However, little evidence yet exists that the burgeoning field of digital humanities is bankrupting the world of ink-stained books. Since the NEH set up an office for the discipline in 2008, it has received just $60m of its $1.6bn kitty. Indeed, reuniting the humanities with sciences might protect their future. Dame Marina Warner, president of the Royal Society of Literature in London, points out that part of the problem is that “we’ve driven a great barrier” between the arts and STEM subjects. This separation risks portraying the humanities as a trivial pursuit, rather than a necessary complement to scientific learning.”
It is important that science and the humanities cross over. In order for science to even start, people must imagine the impossible. Science makes imagination reality.
Whitney Grace, January 5, 2021
Class Central: Learning in the Time of the Rona
December 30, 2020
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, educators speculated that schools would eventually transition to online learning. Most universities offer online classes and degree programs, but traditional public schools still have not transitioned. When the pandemic hit three was a rush for kids to resume their education and school districts scrambled to assemble online learning platforms.
Most online public education (through no fault of the teachers) stinks worse than cafeteria food, but there are other options for online schooling. With hundreds of online courses available, Class Central organizes all the providers into one catalog. Class Central’s goal is to:
Class Central is a listing of online courses. We aggregate courses from many providers to make it easy to find the best courses on almost any subject, wherever they exist. We focus primarily on free (or free to audit) courses from universities, offered through massive open online course (MOOC) platforms. Whatever you are interested in learning, it is more than likely that our catalog includes a course that will meet your needs. Through Class Central, you can find courses; review courses you’ve taken (and read other people’s reviews); follow universities, subjects and courses to receive personalized updates; and also plan and track your learning.”
In other words, Class Central is like a library catalog of all the courses online combined with Amazon reviews. The coolest thing about Class Central is that it allows you to search through all course offerings by subject. A search for “computer coding” resulted in classes from major universities as well as Udemy, edX, and more.
One of the benefits to Class Central is that is lists whether a course is free or requires a enrollment fee. While there are many free online courses, some services only have a few free lessons before requiring cash or enrollment in the actual institution.
Whitney Grace, December 30, 2020
Another Somewhat Obvious Report about Hippy Dippy Learning
December 25, 2020
What’s “hippy dippy”? That’s my code word for expecting students to sit in front of a computing device to learn. When individuals are freed from class and a motivated instructor, the students kick into screw around mode: Games, porn, TikTok, and digital mischief. Am I the only person in rural Kentucky aware of this fact? I don’t think so.
I read with some amusement (short-lived, very short-lived) “Kids Are Failing Online Learning.” The write up reports:
… Students are still struggling with the switch to online learning months after in-person classrooms shuttered.
I noted these factoids:
Around the United States, as grades trickle in, it’s become clear how devastating the switch to remote learning has been for many students. In Austin, early data released to local reporters noted that failing grades had increased by 70%. (A spokesperson for the Austin Independent School District, Cristina Nguyen, said more recently updated data showed the district overall didn’t see a statistically significant increase in failing grades, although secondary schools did see an increase.) One notably detailed report from Fairfax, Va., on first-quarter grades found that F’s had increased from 6% the prior year to 11% this year. The report concluded that there was a “widening gap” among students…
Online has been around for decades. The shift to online learning has made clear that putting students in a classroom with a teacher works better than thumb typing.
Is this dismal report important? Yes, it is. The write up confirms that making a technology shift teaches. Students learn how to excel at displacement activities. Those are okay but may not be helpful in making informed decisions.
Sure, there will be exceptions. Is that why there is an elite in today’s social construct? In person and classroom instruction may reduce the gap between thumb typers who wander and those few who can suck in data and generate high value outputs.
Computing devices are not magical online teaching systems because what students learn may be how to islands of ignorance. The islands, however, each perceive their knowledge empire as comprehensive, robust, and informed.
Stephen E Arnold, December 25, 2020
Fixing the American Internet: Got the Plague? Burn Aromatic Herbs. Works Great, Right?
December 17, 2020
The underfed and poorly compensated research team upon whom I rely is beavering away on a pamphlet about my Arnold’s Laws of Online. Don’t worry. The pamphlet will be a freebie because as I approach 78 not too many people are into people like me who think thumb typing is genuinely stupid.
Here’s a preview:
Online presents the humans and systems using its functionality.
Those who know the difference between a high jumper and Heidegger are likely to want to argue. Spare me. I want to point out that online is not a cause; it is a part of the people and systems which use the technologies required to perform certain tasks. Yep, for those out of work due to disintermediation, you probably get the idea of “efficiency” intuitively.
In this context of this Arnold Law, I want to reference “In 2021, We Need to Fix America’s Internet.” The write up makes some remarkable statements in my opinion. As an old timer better suited to drooling in a long term care facility, I had to muster up the energy to identify this passage as interesting:
As FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel wrote for The Verge last March, as many as one in three US households doesn’t have broadband internet access, currently defined as just 25Mbps down and 3Mbps up — which feels like the bare minimum for a remote learning family these days. Even before the pandemic, that statistic might have been shocking; now, it’s the difference between whether millions of schoolchildren can attend classes and do their homework or not. Nearly 12 million children don’t have a broadband connection at home, the Senate Joint Economic Committee reported in 2017. And the “homework gap” hits harder if you’re poor, of course: only 56 percent of households with incomes under $30,000 had broadband as of last February, according to the Pew Research Center.
Let’s assume this paragraph is chock full of semi-real facts. What do we learn about the American Internet? How about these assertions:
- This is one more example of unethical behavior by a large outfit
- The Internet has become a way to split the population of the US into haves and have nots in a way which can limit learning, access to jobs, etc.
- This marketing approach to technology spawns a perception of one thing whilst the reality is quite another; for instance, the SolarWinds’ misstep which makes clear that security theater may be forced to shut down just like local Comedy Clubs.
Fix the American Internet? Why not consider that the “Internet” is a cultural manifestation, not a cause of the culture itself.
Stephen E Arnold, December 17, 2020
Modern Times: How Easy Is It to Control Thumbtypers? Easy
December 8, 2020
Navigate to “The Modern World Has Finally Become Too Complex for Any of Us to Understand.” You may want to read the listing of examples about how complex life has become. Note this sentence which refers to how humanoids accept computer outputs without much thinking:
What was fascinating — and slightly unnerving — was how these instructions were accepted and complied with without question, by skilled professionals, without any explanation of the decision processes that were behind them.
Let’s assume the write up is semi-accurate. The example may provide some insight about the influence, possibly power, online systems have which shape information. In my experience, most people accept the “computer” as being correct. Years ago in a lab testing nuclear materials, I noticed that two technicians were arguing about the output from a mass spec machine. I was with my friend (Dr. James Terwilliger). We watched the two technicians for a moment and noted that when human experience conflicts with a machine output, the discussion becomes frustrating for the humans. The resolution to the problem was to test the sample in another mass spec machine. Was this a fix? Nope.
The behavior demonstrated how humans flounder to deal with machine outputs. These are either accepted or result in behavior that will not answer the question: “Okay, which output is accurate?”
The incident illustrates that humans may not like to take guidance from another human, but guidance from a “computer” is just fine. And when the output conflicts with experience, humans appear to manifest some odd ball behavior.
Here’ are two questions:
How does a user / consumer of online information know if the output is in context, accurate, verifiable?
If the output is not, then what does the human do? More research? Experimentation? Ask a street person? Guess? Repeat the process (like the confused lab techs)?
This is not complexity; this is why those who own certain widely used systems control human thought processes and behaviors. Is this how society works? Are one percenters exempt from the phenomenon? Is this smart software or malleable human behavior?
Stephen E Arnold, December 8, 2020
Shocker: Online Learning Teaches Little
December 1, 2020
I may be misunderstanding “Failing Grades Spike in Virginia’s Largest School System as Online Learning Gap Emerges Nationwide,” but I think the main idea is that online learning does not teach the way students-teachers in an old-fashioned class do. You will have to pay to read this most recent report from a Captain Obvious “real news” outfit.
Back to the “news” flash.
The write up states:
But one Fairfax high school teacher, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution from the school system, said he is doing all of these things — and still, 50 to 70 percent of his 150 students are achieving D’s and F’s, whereas before they had earned B’s and C’s.
There you go. We’re teaching students something, just not what the school hopes will be learned. What subject do students learn? Inattention perhaps.
Another factoid. Sit down and take a deep meditative breath before reading:
Younger Fairfax students are struggling more than older ones: The percentage of middle-schoolers receiving at least two F’s quadrupled, while the percentage of high-schoolers scoring at least two F’s increased by 50 percent. The percentage of students with disabilities earning at least two F’s, meanwhile, more than doubled, while the percentage of children for whom English is a second language receiving at least two F’s rose by 106 percent to account for 35 percent of all children in this group. Among racial groups, Hispanic students were most affected: The percentage of these students with at least two F’s jumped from 13 to 25 percent. Comparing grades achieved in past years with grades this year showed that the drop in passing grades is significant and unprecedented.
Had enough? I haven’t. Several observations:
- Traditional educational methods evolved toward a human “teacher” presenting information.
- Students were monitored and tested.
- Peer pressure operated in a social setting like an old-fashioned school room.
- Peer mediated instruction took place in non-class settings; for example, at a lunch table or talking with a friend at a school locker.
- Old-fashioned family structures often reinforced “learning.” Example: Consequences if lessons were not completed.
Thumb typers now have to face up to a reality in which their expertise at inattention creates a false sense of knowledge.
The problem is that moving learning to Zoom or some other online platform has a shallow experiential pool. Traditional education benefits from a long history. Maybe online will catch up, but if the students are ill prepared, inattentive, and unable to draw upon a knowledge framework — not likely.
Anyone ready for the new Dark Ages? Whoops. News flash. We are in them. Plague, social unrest, and students who are not acquiring equipment for reading.
Hey, everyone has a smartphone. What could go wrong? TikTok and YouTube autosuggest are just super.
Stephen E Arnold, December 1, 2020
The Internet of Infomercials: Datasphere Thumbtypers Fret
November 30, 2020
I found “The Ad-Based Internet Is About to Collapse. What Comes Next?” interesting because of two points. The first was this passage:
For example, even as the value of the digital ad industry was continuing to rise, the average clickthrough rate on Google’s display ads fell to 0.46% in 2018, ad fraud was expected to jump 21% to $42 billion in 2019, and a Google study found 56% of its display ads may not even be seen by a human. These stats suggest the product being sold is not nearly as effective or valuable as many purchasers of digital ads believe it to be.
Massive hucksterism. Got it.
And how about a fix to the Internet of Infomercials? Try this:
Logic editor Ben Tarnoff suggests that the proper organizational structure would depend on the scale of the service. In some cases, cooperatives would be ideal.
Several observations:
- The author is describing external characteristics of online information, not the dynamics of the datasphere
- Cooperation is an interesting idea; however, in a datasphere, cooperation is not the “it takes a village” fairy tale
The nature of online is now being considered by thumbtypers. News flash: It’s too late to pull disconnect. Goldfish in a fish bowl accept their environment as the norm. Replace the glass container with zeros and ones and what do you get? Fish in one environment trying to figure out another environment without the means to figure out what’s TikTok-ing, Parler-ing, and Facebook-ing.
Stephen E Arnold, November 30, 2020
Younger Person Explains the Information Age
November 30, 2020
Do you pay attention to young people? Some have great ideas; others edge up to an idea and back away; and others just explain the world the way it really is. To test your receptivity to that I call the jejune ethos, navigate to “The Paradox of the Great Information Flood.” Note that the younger person does not go with the “tsunami” metaphor. This is no wave; this is a flood which means, according to Dictionary.com:
A great flowing or overflowing of water, especially over land not usually submerged. Any great outpouring or stream.
One minor point: Floods recede, but let’s look at other revelations.
- Central authority is not a hot ticket.
- More information produces more uncertainty.
- Existential wobbling and nihilism-on-the-rise are us.
How do these observations stack up against the reality of online information. I would point out a few modest differences; for example:
- Online information fosters surveillance ecosystems
- Online information erodes traditional structures; that is, the authority thing, the certainty thing, and the wobbling thing
- Online information evolves into monopolies; for example, Google in search and other FAANG centroids
- Online information requires deleting “old”, “historical,” and fungible data and information
- Online information is manipulable; that is, the deep fake capability is the norm
- Online information facilitates blurring the real with the construct; that is, gameification of data and experience.
Net net: The essay addresses observable facets of the information flood. Floods and tsunamis don’t capture what has been in operation since the mid 1970s. Floods go away; waves pass.
Digital information refines permanence. Hello, world. You are neither brave nor new. Thumb typers are justifiably uncertain, wobbly, and suspicious of “authority.”
Stephen E Arnold, November 30, 2020
Fact Checking Backward Through Time
November 26, 2020
Hooray for the truth! Though Business Dateline introduced corrections to online news stories in the mid-1980s, most online indexing services never bother to fix errors. Now, Internet archive the Wayback Machine is addressing this oversight with “Fact Checks and Context for Wayback Machine Pages,” the site announces on its blog. Writer Mark Graham reports:
“Fact checking organizations and origin websites sometimes have information about pages archived in the Wayback Machine. The Internet Archive has started to surface some of these annotations for Wayback Machine users. We are attempting to preserve our digital history but recognize the issues around providing access to false and misleading information coming from different sources. By providing convenient links to contextual information we hope that our patrons will better understand what they are reading in the Wayback Machine. As an example, Politifact has investigated a claim included in a webpage that we archived. Our.news has matched this URL to the Politifact review which allowed us to provide a yellow context banner for Wayback Machine patrons. In a different case, we surfaced the discovery that a webpage is part of a disinformation campaign according to the researchers at Graphika and link to their research report. As a last example, the Internet Archive archived a Medium post that was subsequently removed based on a violation of their Covid-19 Content Policy.”
The post supplies screenshots to illustrate the yellow context banners in each of the above examples. Graham makes it a point to acknowledge the work of several organizations that make it possible for the Wayback Machine to supply this context: FactCheck.org, Check Your Fact, Lead Stories, Politifact, Washington Post Fact-Checker, AP News Fact Check, USA Today Fact Check, Graphika, Stanford Internet Observatory, and Our.news. We are glad to see veracity still matters to many.
Cynthia Murrell, November 25, 2020
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