• FACE RECOGNITION TECHNOLOGY IS A “CUTTING-EDGE PRIVACY NIGHTMARE… The ethical and regulatory quandaries posed by artificial intelligence technology are not theoretical: they’re here already – inside your smartphone… with capacity to completely destroy the expectation of anonymity in public.” Concerns have been raised by Elon Musk, Stephen Hawking and others, but the technology also looks to provide positive benefits for some – like power for law-enforcement by identifying witnesses & suspects from photos or CCTV images; or power for retailers to target shoppers with immediate ads responding to their in-store behavior. The last “World Championship of Face Recognition” (‘Megaface’) involved a million images from which software of both Google and NTechLabs each accurately identified over 70% of tagged images; a Kaspersky Labs test identified 9 out of 10 people in the firm’s Moscow office. “In effect, these apps provide a real-world people-search engine; take a photo of anyone and know instantly who they are and whatever else they’ve chosen to disclose on social media.” [ECONOMIST 1843 – Aug/Sep 16]
  • LIFE IS ABOUT CHOICE. “Not all things are controllable – pain happens. But our opportunity is to decide how we want to act when that happens. Suffering is one option, but choosing to see pain as a wall with no hope for our turn or as a door through which we move on is another… It’s not the event which stresses, not the traffic that angers, not the indefinable accent at the other end of the phone that frustrates. It’s our perspective, our choice of how to react that determines if pain becomes suffering or not.” One proven skill to control crisis situations involves relaxing by using simple physical pain as a distracter. Example: wear a rubber band around your wrist and if/when you feel about to ‘lose it,’ pluck the rubber band, take a deep breath, and the anxiety will often pass within seconds. “By interceding in your normal pattern of blowing up or whining, you will find yourself making better behavior decisions.” [DEVELOPMENTAL EXCELERATIONS – June 21, 16]
  • WHY AMERICANS ARE SO GREATLY DISCONTENTED WITH THE DIRECTION OF THE COUNTRY: THE ‘RULING CLASS’! “Differences between Bushes, Clintons, and Obamas are of degree, not kind… The disdain with which the Ruling Class looks upon the rest is somewhat tolerable as long as that disdain is well disguised by hypocrisy. But eventually the disguise crumbles given the certitude and arrogance that characterize their self-regard and sense of entitlement…that the rest of Americans are retrograde, racist, and dysfunctional unless properly constrained… The Clintons are the embodiment of the consummate political insider in Washington – deeply distrusted by a majority of Americans as members and beneficiaries of the Ruling Class that have undertaken wars not won, presided over a declining economy and a ballooning debt, made life more expensive, raised taxes, and talked down to the American people… In contrast Trump is not only an outsider, he is a business tycoon who has nothing personal to gain except stand at the receiving end of relentless abuse from the surrogates of the Ruling Class for the threat he poses to their interests… seen by his supporters as their champion and defender of their country’s interests without being beholden to any special interest group… The whimsicality of his behavior in public, which grates upon those who see him as a boor or a bully, ironically endears him to that largest segment of the public that gets ridiculed or punished by ‘political correctness’ regulated and imposed by the Ruling Class.” [AMERICAN THINKER.COM – Jul 28, 16]
  • THE ‘REVOLUTION’ AGAINST BOTH ESTABLISHED POLITICAL PARTIES is primarily focused on “finding a president who will turn off the fan – the violent winds of change that are now buffeting every family – in their workplace, where machines are threatening white-collar and blue-collar jobs; in their neighborhoods, where so many more immigrants of different religions, races and cultures are moving in; and globally, where super-empowered angry people are now killing innocents with disturbing regularity. They want a ‘Wall’ to stop change, perhaps unrealistic but, in fairness, it’s not just about race and class. It is also about a yearning for community – about “home” in the deepest sense – a feeling that the things that anchor us in the world and provide meaning are being swept away, and looking for someone to stop that erosion.” [Thomas L. Friedman, LEVINE BRIEFING NOTES – Jul 27, 16]
  • ANTI-HACK TECHNOLOGY TIPS: (1) Browser ‘cookies,’ beyond enabling creepy ads, make hackers lives much easier. Clearing cookies resets the process and at least requires the hackers to restart; (2) Since hackers can easily and secretly record your actions & sounds through computer cameras, taping over the camera when not in use is simple and prudent.
  • THOUGHTS FOR THE WEEK: “It is well, when judging a friend to remember that he or she is judging you with the same godlike and superior impartiality.”                 
  • “Reality is the other person’s idea of how things should be.”