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Stephen Downes works with the Digital Technologies Research Centre at the National Research Council of Canada specializing in new instructional media and personal learning technology. His degrees are in Philosophy, specializing in epistemology, philosophy of mind, and philosophy of science. He has taught for the University of Alberta, Athabasca University, Grand Prairie Regional College and Assiniboine Community College. His background includes expertise in journalism and media, both as a prominent blogger and as founder of the Moncton Free Press online news cooperative. Downes is a member of NRC's Research Ethics Board. What I appreciate about this recap of the just-completed ALT conference is that everything is on one straightforward web page. It allowed me to explore the conference materials with easy and see the work in my own way. What struck me most was how little a role AI played in any of the presentations, as though the community has had a visceral response against it (which I think says more about the community than the technology).
Hannah John et al. Lucy Hamilton et al. The talk was OK, but I would rather see less restatement of popular arguments (localization, personalization, accessibility, empathy, care) and more on what the 'humane technology framework' actually it looks like. The advice in this post is, frankly, the Usual Playbook: get informed, organize, lobby, campaign. How often I've seen this playbook rolled out. My issue with it is that it treats everything as a political campaign (this needs a name - let's call it 'social cognitivism'). By contrast, I have long argued that if universities want to be funded by the community, then they need to be essential to the community. Not 'essential' in the sense that 'if people only knew what we do they would think of us as essential' but rather 'essential' in the sense that they constitute an important part of everyone's lives. That would entail a very different playbook - and one I would like to read one day. ANYONE offering a conference needs to read about this! Both emphasize a human-centered mindset, ethics and applications, while students also learn problem-solving while teachers focus on pedagogy and professional development. As Simon Willison notes, "Anthropic recently added CORS support to their Claude APIs," which means that you can call their AI using an API from your own web page or service located elsewhere. This sort of functionality is enormously useful. In this post he writes about what can be done with the Google AI studio - uploading a PDF and converting it to semantical HTML. I tested it using my own Google account and it worked perfectly. This would let me do with PDFs things I've only dreamed of in the past - in the test case illustrated here I asked it to translate the text into French.
It can be hard to knock the amenities -- movies on demand, music on the go, air conditioning in August. It's all good stuff. What else could a modern human need? Nature. Good, old-fashioned, ear-budless, non-digital, fresh-aired nature. Dirt, bugs and photosynthesis. Every option is wonderful -- but every option costs money and, typically, travel time. The idea of piling the kids into the car with all their gear can deter even the most outdoorsy of parents. But what if experiencing the great outdoors were as easy as stepping outside? Fun with nature doesn't have to charge an entry fee. It's right there for the taking, just outside your door. All that's required is a little ingenuity and some sort of outdoor space. A backyard is perfect, although you can take a nature walk on a well-decorated patio or even the city street outside your apartment. It's as easy as planning ahead with a quick Internet search, for a start. When you head into a National Park or a zoo for some nature time, it's easy to know what to look for: Just take a peek at one of the information brochures at the entrance.
Few of us have info packets in a pocket next to the back door, so it can be a bit harder to see what there is to see. So you might want to do some research. It's not that hard to find out what your backyard might have to offer. There are handy Web sites that will tell you what's in your area. Some may have a zip code search that lets you know which plant and animal species you could see around your home. Some city-government Web sites will often have similar information, as will local information kiosks. It can be helpful to give your yard a hand and hang a hummingbird feeder if you find out there are lots of them in your area, or install a birdbath or toss out some wildflower seeds in advance, just to make it extra interesting. Another crucial preparation, especially when kids are involved, is to know what interesting stuff not to touch, lest a perfectly lovely nature walk end in tears.
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