What Would You Do?

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You have applied for a job and the interviewer asks you a question that lands like a bombshell: do you have a boyfriend? Then another: do people find you desirable? And a third: do you think it is important for women to wear bras to work? If you are a woman you probably know what you would do. Perhaps you would refuse to answer, complain or walk out. You would certainly be furious.

This is how 197 female American undergraduates, asked to imagine such an interview, said they would react. But they—and probably you—were wrong. The psychologists who asked them, Marianne LaFrance and Julie Woodzicka, orchestrated a real-life version of this ordeal, by advertising for a research assistant and arranging for male accomplices to interview the first 50 women who applied. 

Half were randomly chosen to be asked those three questions. Not one refused to answer, let alone complained or walked out. When they were asked afterwards (and offered the chance to apply for a real job), they said they had felt not anger, but fear.

Videos of the interviews showed how much this supposedly minor sexual harassment threw the women off their stride. They plastered on fake smiles.

In a final twist, the researchers showed clips of the videos to male MBA students. Fake smiles are fairly easy to tell from real ones: they involve fewer facial muscles and do not crinkle the corners of the eyes. But many of the men saw the women as amused, even flirtatious.

The Economist

Chatbots & Health Care

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It’s not that chatbots can’t do some impressive things in health care. The problem is that they’re designed to respond with an “average” answer, says Rachel Draelos, a physician and computer scientist who founded the health tech start-up Cydoc. “But nobody’s an average. What makes medicine really interesting is that every patient is an individual and needs to be treated that way.” - Washington Post

 

A 'Not-to-Do List'

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New Year's Eve is time to resolve what you want in the year ahead. Rather than creating a list of resolutions, Jim Collins, author of Good to Great, sits down and does the opposite. Before setting down any strategic objectives, he comes up with three corresponding things to stop doing. So if he decided he wanted to read more, he first determined to unplug the TV.

He suggests you ask yourself what you're:

a) passionate about

b) good at

c) able to make a living doing.

Then consider how you're spending time. How much of it falls outside those three factors? If the answer is most of it, a not-to-do list could be a valuable tool.

17 Articles about AI & Legal Issues

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Will Human-generated Content Maintain its Value?

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Multiple times daily, I find myself silently asking, Did you really write this or did AI? Just like handwritten notes have decreased over time, human-generated content will also decrease over time, but it will maintain its value—because we hunger to be heard and cared for by another human. However, unlike handwritten notes, it will be harder to distinguish between AI-generated content and human-generated content. - Tara Chklovski writing in Fast Company

AI Definitions: Hallucinations

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*Hallucinations – When an AI provides responses that are inaccurate or not based on facts. Generative AI models are designed to generate data that is realistic or distributionally equivalent to the training data and yet different from the actual data used for training. This is why they are better at brainstorming than reflecting the real world and why they should not be treated as sources of truth or factual knowledge. Generative AI models can answer some questions correctly, but this is not what they are designed and trained to do. However, hallucinating AIs can be very useful to researchers by giving scientists innovative insights, which speeds up the scientific process.

More AI definitions here

The price of avoiding uncertainty

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In order to manage the avalanche of information that our senses are absorbing at all times, our brains work to find patterns, simplify information, and look for clarity. That allows us to be able to make decisions and act. But sometimes in the rush to make order of the world, our brains jump to unwarranted conclusions — taking in the myriad of information around us and deducing something that just isn't quite right.

A high need for closure isn't necessarily a bad thing. You may just be the type of person who likes to make plans and avoid surprises. However, the need for closure can lead to two major pitfalls in decision making.

The first is what psychologists call the "urgency effect," which is basically the tendency to jump to conclusions. The second is the "permanence effect" — a stubborn tendency to stick with your beliefs and not change your mind, even in the face of contradictory evidence. Both of these effects result from your brain trying to avoid feelings of uncertainty.

If you have a high need for closure, research suggests you should be careful making decisions, especially in times of fatigue or stress.

Ana Swanson writing in the Washington Post

Jesus’ Doings

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It happened in those days that a proclamation went out from President Augustus that every citizen must register. This was the first registration while Quirinus was Secretary of War. So everybody went to register, each going to his own hometown. Joseph too went up from south Georgia from the city of Valdosta, to his home in north Georgia, a place named Gainesville, to register with his bride Mary, who by now was heavily pregnant.

While the were there, her time came, and she gave birth to her first boy. She wrapped him in a blanket and laid him in an apple box. (There was no room for them at the hospital.)

Now there were some farmers in that section who were up late at night tending their baby chicks. And a messenger from the Lord appeared to them, and evidence of the Lord was shining all about them. It nearly scared the life out of them. And the messenger said to them, “Don’t be afraid; for listen, I’m bringing you good news of a great joy in which all people will share. Today your deliverer was born in the city of David’s family. He is the Leader. He is the Lord, And here’s a clue for you: you will find the baby wrapped in a blanket and lying in an apple box.” 

And all of a sudden there was with the messenger a crowd of angels singing God’s praises and saying. “Glory in the highest to God, And on Earth, peace to mankind, The object of his favor.” 

When the messengers went away from them into the sky, the farmers said to one another, “Let’s go to Gainesville and see how all this the Lord has showed us has turned out.”

So they went just as fast as they could, and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in an apple box. Seeing this, they related the story of what had been told them about this little fellow. The people were simply amazed as they listened to what the farmers told them. And Mary clung to all these words, turning them over and over in her memories. The farmers went back home, giving God the credit and singing his praises for all they had seen and heard, exactly as it had been described to them.

Clarence Jordan, Cotton Patch Gospel

He Came … to Give

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For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many. -Mark 10:45

When Jesus took the time to explain his reason for coming among us, he was simple and direct: to serve and to give. Not to be served. Not to grab the spotlight in the center ring. Not to make a name or attract attention or become successful or famous or powerful or idolized. 

Charles Swindoll, Improving Your Serve

Jesus Chose the Gritty

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The Scriptures are filled with the ruggedness and struggles of actual life. But in our teaching of the gospel we have sweetened or repressed the universal human qualities of our Lord’s stories almost beyond recognition. Jesus evidently talked about the things like people’s sexual escapades and crooked business deals to illustrate his message about the reign of God. And he furnished additional wine for at least one celebration. Read the parables. With the whole of human behavior from which to select, Jesus chose the gritty, earthy areas of life to illustrate the way God loves people. He was real! He expressed his own uncertainly and doubt in the midst of his faith. And he got very angry. Jesus talked about the same deep separation, dishonest and inner restlessness we experience in modern life. I had always heard the church saying the God prefers the poor, the despised, and the weak… Religious people have difficulty admitting that (Jesus) prefers sinners to the righteous. Those who call themselves righteous are not free from it but have repressed it. Those called sinners are aware of their guilt and are, for that reason, ready to receive pardon and grace.

Keith Miller, The Becomers

Love and Boundaries

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Falling in love is not an extension of one's limits or boundaries; it is a partial and temporary collapse of them. Once the precious moment of falling in love has passed and the boundaries have snapped back in place, the individual is disillusioned. Real love (the will to extend one's self for the purpose of nurturing one's own or another's spiritual growth) is a permanently self enlarging experience. Falling in love is not.

M Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled