About Me

I have always been an odd bird, and believe me I take that as a compliment. I am so interested in the next thing that I have a difficult time sticking to things. (I intend this blog to be as eclectic as I am, so that should keep me going.) This short attention span is very well suited for some things. I do very well with theatre, just about the time I start getting bored with the show, the run is over. Same thing with school. I love learning, and spending about a semester doing something is a good length of time for me.
Luckily I have a lot of interests. I am a historian, but when people ask what period I focus on, I cannot say. I go through phases. In first grade I was practically obsessed with ancient Egypt, by middle school it was Civil War. When I was young I did melodrama, as a result I focused on the Victorian Era, now I am in the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA) so I lean towards medieval.
I am very interested in new technologies, cutting edge research, and neuroscience, but also ancient cultures and technology. I will write about the failings of society and my thoughts on improvement, but also things that I love about the world and wouldn’t change for anything. Sometimes I may do nothing more than post a review of an old movie, but I will also post my books chapter by chapter.
I hope you enjoy reading what I have to say, I would like to create a lively discourse with readers and other writers.
Take Pride in Your Insanity!

Advertisements

The AI Will Steal Our Jobs!

They say that starting a post with a bolt statement is a good idea, so here you go: Artificial Intelligence will destroy our current economic structure. How’s that?

While that statement may seem like a gross overreaction and sound a little nutty, it is quite possibly true. As we move forward, AI will take more and more of the tasks we currently do ourselves. Right now they are mostly in highly repetitive tasks, such as manufacturing. These robots have already displaced many workers, they are cheaper and more accurate. But the presence of those robots have also opened up new opportunities in research and development as well as in maintenance. Here’s the catch: displaced employees cannot afford the new education necessary to go into these fields.

In the past, new technology has largely been geared towards making human beings more efficient at their jobs. If one person makes more stuff, the price of the stuff goes down and makes it available to more people. This has been the driver of our economic growth and high standard of living. Thus far technological progress has been the facilitator of our modern world.

But we are at a moment when this status quo is changing. Artificial intelligence is becoming better than we are at tasks we once considered exclusively the domain of human beings. This means that the jobs that were more nuanced and variable, are going the way of the dodo as those get replaced as well.

For awhile there will be new jobs created by this boom, but eventually those will be taken over as well. Eventually there will be very little, of anything, that human beings need to do.

So now it is not only the ‘unskilled’ laborers who will be out of jobs, but the more technical fields as well. The only people who will be able to make money will be those selling the products that the robots make, this will soon include such diverse things as health care and art to add to the products they manufacture today.

That won’t last long, if no one is earning, no one is spending.

So, now that I have completely depressed you; let me tell you why this could actually be awesome, and what we have to do to make sure that it is.

If you think about it, if robots are doing all the work and there is plenty of everything to go around, why should anyone ever have to go without? The only way this would happen is if we stay on our current economic course. If people need to trade their labor for money to trade for goods and services.

However, if we eliminate the need to pay for those goods and services, why do we panic over the loss of income? In other words, if we make those basic necessities available to all, it won’t matter if the robots do all the work.

Here we get a choice, how do we create an equitable system?

Option 1: Necessary goods and services are provided to all, and money is used to buy luxury goods.

This option is a good middle ground, and very likely to be the solution, but as I see it being implemented, it would be in a simple reactionary way. Like refugee camps, or homeless shelters. Necessities are covered, but living conditions are appalling with no visible path out of the situation.

If we plan ahead, we could create this as a positive way to keep everyone happy and healthy. But it would still leave the wealthy with power and influence over those who just get by on the basics with little upward mobility.

Option 2: Basic universal income.

The results of this option would be very similar to the plan ahead version of option 1. People would get some support, (although that income may not cover everything they need depending on health, implementation, and local economic variation.) but would still struggle to grow. Any growth would depend on the movement of currency to people from all walks of life. This would require that anyone attempting to improve their station from subsistence would have to advertise essentially, to gain the attention of those who do have money to burn. It would just be redistribution of the wealth between the wealthy.

Option 3: Preemptively create a non-monetary based system. No money means that all basic services would be available to all add needed. And anyone willing to grow would not need to convince someone else to part with their money, but only to show that they are providing some benefit to society. Without competition, the existing barriers of the economy would break down.

Everyone could be required to work a certain amount of time in service to community or society as we grow to reach the time of robots doing all of the work. As robots take on more of the workload, the required human workload would be readjusted and distributed equally. Less work for humans would not result in lost jobs creating starvation in a land of plenty.

As a bonus to this idea, if we got rid of money, there would be a huge number of ‘jobs’ that surround the redistribution of wealth that would disappear with it. This means that the starting workload for each person would be much less work than we currently do today. These jobs would include things like cashiers, loan specialists, stock traders, bankers, accountants, investors, and sales to name a few.

Even if we only eliminated that workload and required a lot less work to keep the status quo, I suspect that we would actually make progress toward a work-free future faster. Without all that time spent on the redistribution of wealth, the free time that people would gain would go towards hobbies.

Everyone has a few things they enjoy doing in their free time, and some of those have the potential to drive us to the future. Some people enjoy listening to music or watching movies. Some people enjoy creating neat things. Some people enjoy robotics and coding in their free time. Giving people more free time, and unlimited access to education (one of the most basic services provided) would spawn a massive outpouring of growth in many areas, including STEM. There are many people caught in the day to day grind of living paycheck to paycheck who could do so much for our world if we can unchain them from the money train.

This does require a whole new way of thinking. But in a world without scarcity, we do not need to create a system of artificial scarcity, which is how money works.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Guns are not the Problem

I guess in light of recent events, it’s time for me to do another post about gun control. I recognize that my views on this topic may be a little unorthodox, but take a step back and give it some thought.

I believe that the solution to gun violence, and most other forms too, lies in a better health care system. Hear me out.

If everyone had access to health care, including mental health, at no cost people would go more. If we made visiting a doctor for prevention, rather than cures the norm, people would be able to avoid illnesses ranging from physical to mental. If everyone went to a brain doctor (psychiatry, psychotherapy, councilling, hypnosis, take your pick) on a regular basis, there would be no stigma attached to such a visit. In my experience, some of the people who needed treatment most were the most reluctant to seek it for fear of being labeled.

I’m not saying that everyone who commits the crimes we hear about on the news has mental health problems. Far from it, I’m saying that everyone could, and would, benefit from having the opportunity to sit and talk to someone without judgement on a regular basis. Things like anger, jealousy, loneliness, would also be addressed before hitting critical mass.

It really is a sign of how broken our system is when a student takes the route of going through the motions of a school shooting deliberatly not hurting anyone, just to get arrested so he wouldn’t be a true danger to others later.

When our health care system is inaccessible to some portions of the population, everyone suffers.

Twitch

So anyway, went back and edited Dystopian Dreams to date. I’m going to try to post new stuff on here once a week. I am also streaming on Twitch now on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays 9pm-midnight Pacific Time.

Lately I have been building a family cosplay based on Portal 2. I will be Chell, the main character, my husband will be the Companion Cube. My almost 4 year old will be a turret and the 2 year old will be potato Glados.

I am also working on a Period Viking Apron Dress & Chemise, Occasionally I do Embroidery Digitizing, and I usually have my embroidery machine running. I am doing ALL of the things. Stop by and hang out!

I try to post pics on my Instagram most nights too.

Long Time

I realize it has been a very long time since I posted anything on here, and I apologize for that. Changes in brief-new kid, new job, new house, new roomates. I have been putting most of my effort into starting a non profit called Children of Curiosity. We are dedicated to bringing high quality, free education to everyone.

I have started an Etsy store selling old patterns, old dolls, and handmade clothes and embroidery to raise funds for the school. I have started a Patreon account for recurring donations, although I have limited content posted so far. I will be posting my story on there as well. I have a facebook page as well. I am trying to get my sewing room hooked up so I can stream to Twitch too. We have had a few meetups at parks, and I am working to find locations for more, preferably where I am permitted to accept donations. I am looking into working with public schools in the area to create an after school program. First will probably be Living History oriented. I am also applying for an open seat on the local school board. In order to have more time, I have taken the frightening step of cutting my hours at work, even though money is tight. I am trying to use every bit of spare time in the most efficient way. It’s alot of goals and a lot of plates to juggle. I really enjoy writing for you all, and I hope I have not lost you during my long hiatus. I appreciate your patience, and I will be writing more as I can. Thank You

Thanksgiving and Religion

I think it was fifth grade when I asked why the days we got off school for Thanksgiving were just called ‘Fall Break’. My mom asked me who people were giving thanks to. I had to think about it a minute. I knew that it must be a religious thing, since that is why it’s ‘Winter Break’ not ‘Christmas Break’ etc. It did not take me long to realize Mom was referring to God, but what took me awhile was the idea that I was supposed to be thanking a specific entity. It hadn’t ever really occurred to me. I just kind of give thanks to the world, luck, all of the people whose effort it took to bring the meal together, whatever. It never occurred to me that it was supposed to be directed any particular direction. I still don’t think that it needs to. I can be thankful without having any one thing, or person, or event to thank. 

For instance; I am thankful for my family. Who do I have to thank for that? Well let’s start with the recent past: I have to thank my husband for giving me my kids. I have to thank cancer for not taking people from me. I have to thank all of the other drivers on the road who have not killed my family members. I have to thank everyone who has made our society a more healthy place. I have to thank my parents for having me, and my husbands’ for having him. I have to thank their parents (this could keep going…). I have to thank whoever designed the school bus routes for my high school so that I could meet the boy who would become my husband. I have to thank my employers and everyone who employs my family. I could go way back in time to thank the people who moved to this country, and whoever set them up to take that path for whatever reason they did. I could talk about how thankful I am that this ‘tiny blue dot’ is able to sustain life, and how grateful I am to evolution, the stars, and the big bang.

I know that for many people “Thank God” is kind of the way to express that whole last paragraph, and that is fine. I prefer to think of it as an endless series of events that put me where I am today, this allows me to run through them and kind of say ‘thank you’ individually, or just give one big collective ‘thanks’ to the universe. 

 

I consider myself a bit of an outsider, an observer to the battle between religions that has been waging recently. When I was young, I was really very little aware of different religions, I only was really taught about Christmas, maybe a bit about Easter. I found it odd that some people did not celebrate Halloween, but hey, each to his own. I knew the concept of religion and that people believe differently, but I had no idea what they believed. It didn’t really make much of a difference, at that time it seemed like everyone was pretty okay with other people. That could be a young kid growing up with White Privilege on her side, but that is how it seemed to me. 

In middle school I started becoming more aware of politics and the state of the world. It was during this time also that 9/11 happened. The announcement that it was Muslim terrorists made very little difference to me. If I had really thought about that statement at all it would have been something like ‘Ok, so they happen to follow that religion, why mention it?’ Today I believe very much the same thing, but now I know why they mention it, because it is a scapegoat. The media tells us the answer so that we won’t go looking, and having a whole religion that reportedly wants to kill us is a great copout.

On that same note, this is not a ‘Christian Nation’. We are guaranteed freedom of religion under the constitution. This does not mean freedom of Christian religions, it means freedom of all religions. There is a lot of debate right now about the beliefs of the founding fathers, but some believe that not all of them were Christian. Throughout history, while newcomers to this country have been marginalized, they came for a new start, and many for that religious freedom. We are a nation of different people, different races, different sexualities, different ages, different beliefs, but we have all come together in a place that is better for our differences. It is this melting pot that keeps us fresh, and at the top of our game. It is the exposure to new things that allows us the ability to be the best. So why are we not the best right now? We have embarked down a dangerous road, in international policies, educational policies, climate policies, and civilian monitoring, we are limiting the very diversity that made us great. We need to stand up and make the changes that will allow us to use our greatest strength to our advantage again.

Welfare and Socialism

Today there is a great debate over how much assistance should be given to people just by right. The main arguments go something like this;

“Can I get some help here so my kids don’t starve?”

“Work for it.”

“I work as much as humanly possible, my pay is too low.”

“Go to school to get a better job.”

“I cannot afford to go to school, I can’t even put food on the table.”

“I did it, why can’t you?”

And so it goes. Families that have both parents often find that they have more take-home pay if only one works, due to the expenses of child care. I cannot even begin to imagine how a single parent family is expected to do it.

As with most problems, I think that both sides have the best of intentions, and there is something that just doesn’t convey. I will try to do my best to represent both sides, but I know that it will probably become clear where I stand on this issue if it is not obvious already, and from my other posts.

This is an issue now because the pay that many workers receive does not allow them to maintain a basic standard of living. The national minimum wage is woefully inadequate to support even one person. In fact, many states have higher minimum wages, and many cities are even higher than that. According to citylab.com there is only one state that pays more than bare minimum for one person to get by on.

Many people’s first reaction is to tell the person working at this low wage that it is all their fault. They must have made bad choices in the past, and now they have to pay for that mistake. While some people may have had the opportunity to go to college, or join the military and chose not to, not everyone has that luxury. If your family needs money now, a kid, even still in high school, may need to work to help their family get by. This means that college gets put off until later, if ever. The military is a great option, provided that you meet the physical and mental health requirements. (Not to mention that some people choose not to join for political, religious, or ideological reasons.) There are many people who are in minimum wage jobs not because of their own errors, but because of the cards that life dealt to them.

But let’s imagine that we are talking about someone who had made the grade in high school, could have gone to college, but chose to put it off for whatever reason, a common enough scenario. In the meantime, they get a job and try to get a place. Now they are not living with mom and dad anymore, and they have a whole place to themselves that needs rent to be paid. This makes it very challenging to get together the necessities for school, especially if a second job is needed to pay the bills. While their is some financial assistance available, it is more challenging than getting that assistance straight out of school. (And many of these programs fall into that category of government aid that we are debating here anyway.) The question then becomes how long should they suffer for that one bad choice?

There is also the increasingly common scenario of someone who followed all the rules, they made good grades, went to school, got a degree, worked their own way through school with as little debt as possible. Now that they are out, no-one is hiring in their field. And when they do find an opening the competition is fierce. Employers have their pick, and usually will chose someone who offers not only the educational background, but experience as well. The question then arises, “How do I get experience if I can’t get hired because I have no experience?” In some industries, the answer has been internships, but, potentials for illegality aside, this is a system that does not work in all fields.

It is frightening when even getting a minimum wage job has the same pitfalls I just discussed. Increasingly I hear about people needed to go to two or even three interviews just to ‘flip burgers’! There are so many people actively looking for work, that employers can be, and are, very picky even for supposed ‘entry level’ jobs. If people did not have to work 2 or more jobs to get by, there would be more jobs to go around.

Having established that living itself can get in the way of trying to improve oneself, lets talk about that a bit. There is enough food in the world to feed every person on the planet, and plenty of housing for all homeless, at least in many ‘developed’ nations like the US and the UK. What gets in the way is not supply, but rather, means. In some cases creating the infrastructure to distribute food might take some time, but is within the realm of possibility. In the case of housing, the largest struggle is simply the legality of it.

There are many people who have ‘made it’, and proudly proclaim that they did it all without any government aid. That may be true, they did not file for need-based assistance programs. However, they certainly have benefited from for more socialist type of structure. The type that you don’t need to apply to use, it is available to all. Some examples of this would be public roadways, utilities, and emergency services. These things are generally agreed to be for the public good and are therefore made available to all. Parks and Community Centers are other great examples.

My question is, why are these things thought of as public rights, and the things that are considered human rights and even necessary for life, are things that must be paid for? I have no problem with money. Money is a fine way to distribute wealth and luxury goods. However I do not believe that anyone, no matter how lazy, should be denied basic necessities of life, or the internationally agreed upon human rights.

Teaching Today

A few years ago I was a substitute teacher.  As any teacher will tell you, subbing is, in many ways, more difficult. The kids are the main reason. Usually subs don’t have to do all the grading and lesson planning that teachers do, but the students make up for it by being little pains in the ass.

Students often think of it as a free day. And it kind of is. Most teachers will fill in the day with boring worksheets. If the kids aren’t going to be doing something of value, why can’t I fill in the time doing fun learning with them. I love hands on things where the kids don’t really know they are learning. Living History, science experiments, crafts, there are all sorts of these things out there, and since subs are not held accountable for the student’s learning in the same way, I had hoped I would be able to do some of that, but that is not the way it worked.

Teachers (especially in a state where substitutes do not have to be licensed teachers) are used to the subs not really having a clue. They tend to ‘overplan’, that is, plan far more than could ever get done to assure that the students to not sit idle. This makes the kids feel overwhelmed, if they know they are expected to finish, or they just don’t care, especially if they know the teacher won’t grade it. Either way is not good for students. Students take the opportunity to do things they normally are not allowed to, and test the limits of the substitute. This is completely natural, but day in and out is exhausting.

The real value of my year in substitute teaching, was the opportunity to meet so many students, and see so many different teaching styles. I would sometimes see the same students in multiple classes and see how their behavior differed. Sometimes I would take assistant positions, which allowed me to observe the teacher directly. In other instances, if I was only there for part of the day, I would meet the teacher, sometimes get to observe for a bit, sometimes not. It was one of these days that I learned about Teach for America.

I have seen special education teachers struggle to teach an autistic student handwriting, because under No Child Left Behind they are held to the same standards as other students.  I have had the opportunity to see the damage of Common Core as well. I have seen kindergartners in tears because they were expected to understand something they were not ready for.

The combined effects of these failed policies are students who range from disinterested to disheartened. They learn from an early age that they cannot meet expectations. This is terrible for their self-esteem. One way to protect themselves is to give up their emotional attachment to success. On the other end of the spectrum, the students who do understand are completely ignored  because the teacher is required to bring up the kids who are behind. This gives those kids a free pass. In the midst of all of this is the testing. How are teachers expected to help students understand when all year they are either preparing for, taking, or recovering from some high stakes test or another. I have actually had a teacher get a sub for the day so she could come in and do required one-on-one testing. How is such a thing supposed to be accomplished?

All of this added stress has had a very negative effect on teachers as well. Those who are not so dedicated see no point in putting up with the stress, and those who are see that they are not able to make a difference in the current system. Between teaching to the test, being issued scripts for lessons, not being allowed to teach the way they learned (and not having been shown any other way), not having time for any activities the students might actually find engaging, and writing convoluted lesson plans to meet vague requirements, it is no wonder that even the best, and most dedicated teachers are leaving.

This leaves a huge vacancy, which substitutes fill in. I took 2 long term positions during my single year of teaching. The longer one was 30 school days. The rule they follow is that after that time, substitutes get more pay for the position. During that time I was the teacher, I wrote lesson plans, taught students, and graded work. My assignment was for a gifted English class. (Gifted is not a program in all states, but it is a way to address the special needs of advanced students.)

It did not take me long to realize that I was  right. When I first heard of No Child Left Behind, and bringing kids to ‘average’ I was keenly aware, as a gifted kid, that in order to get everyone to average, the higher scoring students would need to be brought down, or the average would just keep going up, that is, if they were successful bringing the bottom up.

These high school juniors and seniors were missing the basic parts of speech and had difficulty keeping a basic five paragraph essay format (like the 5 paragraph part). I graded in what was considered a lenient way when I was in school less than ten years before. Rather than not accepting work after the due date, I just took 10% off the score for each class day it was late. The way that the school schedule worked, because they only had my class every other day, if they came in on an off day, I still gave full credit. The students considered this terribly cruel and thought that turning papers in for anything less than full credit was pointless. I found out that many students would do the work, and not take it out of their bag to hand in. As a result I had a shockingly high number of students failing the class. They even had an entire class period twice a week dedicated to doing homework, which I try to refrain from giving anyway.

During my time in this position I attended multiple professional training days that I was not required to attend, nor was paid for. I did what I could to help the students to succeed. Even so, according to the principal at the school I had parents call to complain about me. The only complaint I heard about was about body odor. After I heard that, I went overkill. I continued to shower right before work, but I started putting on deodorant between every class. I received one call from a parent asking what my qualifications were to be teaching English. After our conversation, she was more than satisfied. But it occurred to me that if a parent called the office instead of me, the only thing they knew about me was that I was a substitute teacher, they probably did not even know whether or not I had a bachelor’s degree.

At the end of my thirty days I asked the secretary if they wanted me longer. I was told that I should come back, and I started to tell the students that I was definitely going to be there after fall break. Soon it was brought to my attention that my dress was a bit sheer, admittedly, I should have been more conscientious of that. I immediately went home to change. After classes ended for the day I was asked to the principal’s office and was written up for the dress, and more body odor complaints. That night I stayed late to leave a record of grading rubrics and lesson plans so that the next teacher would actually know what was going on, something that their actual teacher had not bothered to do.

I understand that parents would be upset to find that their students are failing a class, and that they would call into question the credentials of a substitute. But I do not respect a school that would not look into those credentials, or ask the teacher why the students were failing. This seems to be part of the current trend of parents holding teachers, rather than students, responsible for the students grades. (And why shouldn’t they, the national government does). I also find it suspect that this would all have occurred on the last day before they would have to pay me more. I should have suspected this type of thing when a student told me one of his classes had had no fewer than eight teachers in one year.

That said, my year substitute teaching was not all bad. In fact I think it may be my favorite job I have ever had. I met teachers who were trying to make a difference, I was honored to be trusted enough for students came to me with life-changing events, I met students who changed my perceptions, and I can only hope that I touched lives too.