- SERRV (serrv.org/category/gifts)
- UNICEF (market.unicefusa.org)
- Heifer (heifer.org/marketplace)
- World Wildlife Fund (gifts.worldwildlife.org)
- National Wildlife Federation (shopnwf.org)
- kiva micro loans (kiva.org)
- Samaritan's Purse (samaritanspurse.org/operation-christmas-child)
- Arbor Day Foundation (shop.arborday.org)
Wednesday, October 30, 2019
Holiday Gifts Come From Away
Investigate presents that help others and the world.
Monday, October 21, 2019
Cost Out A Better Future
Democratic candidate for U.S. President, Andrew Yang, proposes sending every person over 18 years of age a government check for $1000 each month. Why? Human beings need food, shelter, and clothing every month. Yet, automation is expected to eliminate more and more of the ways people now earn the funds needed to provide these necessities, while corporations accumulate greater wealth by replacing employees with machines.
Already, Yang notes, big tech companies, such as Facebook, Amazon, and Google, grow rich by packaging and selling the private information millions and billions of individuals supply free of charge.
Technological changes require changes in other sectors of human life. When work requires manipulating information on a computer, the physical strength of men is unnecessary. Childcare is still necessary, but how it is provided and by whom need not be confined to unpaid natural mothers.
Not only childcare, but $1000-a-month paychecks also would provide compensation for those whose time creates an enjoyable community life: the shoppers and clerks who get to know each other, community leaders who organize groups and boycotts to solve problems, gardeners who share crops with neighbors and plant flowers to beautify walking paths, visitors who watch sports with the homebound, families who attend religious services together, friends and relatives who celebrate birthdays with homemade cakes, cards, and presents, and those who write "Thank you" notes.
Those dissatisfied with $1000 a month will innovate. Designs can be sleeker. Drugs can cure more. Experts can develop more effective teaching methods. Constitutions, standards, and collective agreements can harness, not only the temporary impulses of a mob, but also the independent actions of robots and AI. Dives can go deeper. Spacecraft can go farther. Games can be more fun.
$1000 a month is a small price to pay for a better world.
Already, Yang notes, big tech companies, such as Facebook, Amazon, and Google, grow rich by packaging and selling the private information millions and billions of individuals supply free of charge.
Technological changes require changes in other sectors of human life. When work requires manipulating information on a computer, the physical strength of men is unnecessary. Childcare is still necessary, but how it is provided and by whom need not be confined to unpaid natural mothers.
Not only childcare, but $1000-a-month paychecks also would provide compensation for those whose time creates an enjoyable community life: the shoppers and clerks who get to know each other, community leaders who organize groups and boycotts to solve problems, gardeners who share crops with neighbors and plant flowers to beautify walking paths, visitors who watch sports with the homebound, families who attend religious services together, friends and relatives who celebrate birthdays with homemade cakes, cards, and presents, and those who write "Thank you" notes.
Those dissatisfied with $1000 a month will innovate. Designs can be sleeker. Drugs can cure more. Experts can develop more effective teaching methods. Constitutions, standards, and collective agreements can harness, not only the temporary impulses of a mob, but also the independent actions of robots and AI. Dives can go deeper. Spacecraft can go farther. Games can be more fun.
$1000 a month is a small price to pay for a better world.
Monday, October 7, 2019
Understanding Medical Practices
If you ever received a consent form mere hours or minutes before a hospital procedure, you can imagine how confused the mother was when she received a form asking her to agree to let one of her unborn twins participate in Dr. He Jiankui's gene-editing experiment. Relying on information learned from Dr. Michael Deem, his U.S. Ph.D. mentor, Dr. He used the CRISPR-Cas9 technique to disable the gene that enables HIV to enter a cell by attaching itself to a protein.
Medical professionals cannot be expected to write informed consent forms lay people can understand. Communication experts in the countries where forms are used need to choose the best ways to translate modern medical research and procedures and to pilot test forms before they are used.
Since drugs produced in one country are used and sold at different prices throughout the world, they have the potential to be weaponized by overpricing them for, or withholding them from, enemy countries.
Other practices also require attention. Some countries and companies offer financial rewards for stealing intellectual property.
The FBI is investigating Yu Zhou for making millions by forming a company based on a discovery he made while using U.S. government grants and performing research owned by Ohio's National Children;s Hospital while he worked in a lab there for ten years.
In a major example of "ethics dumping," the practice of performing a medical procedure in another country that is banned at home, China's health ministry prevented Italian neurosurgeon, Dr. Sergio Canavero, from attaching the head of a paralyzed patient to the body of a deceased donor in China.
When a doctor suggests a child take a prescribed drug or undergo a procedure, does the child's parent or guardian truly understand the side effects and alternatives? Modern medicine is not only costly; it is complicated. Busy adults often lack time to obtain a second opinion, ask a pharmacist if there is a lower cost generic, analyze internet opinions, or subscribe to and read a newsletter from a medical research center. At the very least, a relationship with a child's doctor and specialists needs to feel comfortable enough to ask questions and follow-up questions to make answers clear. As soon as children are old enough, involve
them in the questioning. They want to know if a needle or the dentist will hurt and how long they will be in the hospital or have to wear a cast or braces.
Teachers, scouting groups, boys and girls clubs, etc. might look for opportunities to assign reports on subjects, such as gene editing, bioethics, using drones to deliver drugs in Africa, hair growth products, vaccines, and vaping. Also, see if the Red Cross, nursing organizations, emergency medical services, local hospitals, or other medical associations have outreach programs that provide speakers and tours.
Students always ask how what they are supposed to learn is relevant. Everywhere in the world learning about health is relevant.
Medical professionals cannot be expected to write informed consent forms lay people can understand. Communication experts in the countries where forms are used need to choose the best ways to translate modern medical research and procedures and to pilot test forms before they are used.
Since drugs produced in one country are used and sold at different prices throughout the world, they have the potential to be weaponized by overpricing them for, or withholding them from, enemy countries.
Other practices also require attention. Some countries and companies offer financial rewards for stealing intellectual property.
The FBI is investigating Yu Zhou for making millions by forming a company based on a discovery he made while using U.S. government grants and performing research owned by Ohio's National Children;s Hospital while he worked in a lab there for ten years.
In a major example of "ethics dumping," the practice of performing a medical procedure in another country that is banned at home, China's health ministry prevented Italian neurosurgeon, Dr. Sergio Canavero, from attaching the head of a paralyzed patient to the body of a deceased donor in China.
When a doctor suggests a child take a prescribed drug or undergo a procedure, does the child's parent or guardian truly understand the side effects and alternatives? Modern medicine is not only costly; it is complicated. Busy adults often lack time to obtain a second opinion, ask a pharmacist if there is a lower cost generic, analyze internet opinions, or subscribe to and read a newsletter from a medical research center. At the very least, a relationship with a child's doctor and specialists needs to feel comfortable enough to ask questions and follow-up questions to make answers clear. As soon as children are old enough, involve
them in the questioning. They want to know if a needle or the dentist will hurt and how long they will be in the hospital or have to wear a cast or braces.
Teachers, scouting groups, boys and girls clubs, etc. might look for opportunities to assign reports on subjects, such as gene editing, bioethics, using drones to deliver drugs in Africa, hair growth products, vaccines, and vaping. Also, see if the Red Cross, nursing organizations, emergency medical services, local hospitals, or other medical associations have outreach programs that provide speakers and tours.
Students always ask how what they are supposed to learn is relevant. Everywhere in the world learning about health is relevant.
Thursday, October 3, 2019
Foreign Policy Need Not Be "Foreign":
Every year the Foreign Policy Association identifies the areas of the world that need our attention and prepares information to help us understand and discuss these issues. The association has prepared materials on the following for 2020:
- Climate change
- India and Pakistan conflict
- Red Sea security
- Modern slavery and human trafficking
- U.S. relations with the Northern Triangle of Central America (Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador)
- China's Road to Latin America
- U.S. relations with the Philippines
- Artificial Intelligence (AI) and data
To find out how to obtain these materials and how to start a foreign policy discussion group, go to fpa.org/great_decisions.
Wednesday, September 18, 2019
How to Make A Capitalist
First, provide a child with a pack of index cards, a rubberband, and a pen or pencil. On each card, suggest children write down the names of companies that make the items they use, such as toys, playground equipment, snacks. They also can make cards for the retail shops and grocery stores they visit and for companies that provide services: banks, dry cleaners, fast food restaurants, Netflix, and those that provide repairs.
According to Peter Lynch's book, BEATING THE STREET, identifying firms you know is one way to decide where to invest, where to hold stock in a company, i.e. where to become a company owner.
At home or in a classroom, once children get in the habit of checking the names of companies they and their households use, they can add more information to each card. They might add the locations of company headquarters they find noted on boxes or that they find by checking internet contact information to see if companies are domestic or foreign. They can add the names of products, especially new products, these companies produce, as well as prices and, maybe, the number of ounces in each product.They might start counting cars in parking lots to note which stores are doing better than others.
In Britain, Imperial College transferred seed money from the school's endowment to a student investment fund. Young people can begin "investing" by becoming their household's and classroom's financial advisers by monitoring stock prices on CNBC or the internet and recording stock prices over time. If prices rise, they can figure how much the initial value of an investment would have increased. And stock might be listed as the gift they want for their next birthday or other special occasion.
According to Peter Lynch's book, BEATING THE STREET, identifying firms you know is one way to decide where to invest, where to hold stock in a company, i.e. where to become a company owner.
At home or in a classroom, once children get in the habit of checking the names of companies they and their households use, they can add more information to each card. They might add the locations of company headquarters they find noted on boxes or that they find by checking internet contact information to see if companies are domestic or foreign. They can add the names of products, especially new products, these companies produce, as well as prices and, maybe, the number of ounces in each product.They might start counting cars in parking lots to note which stores are doing better than others.
In Britain, Imperial College transferred seed money from the school's endowment to a student investment fund. Young people can begin "investing" by becoming their household's and classroom's financial advisers by monitoring stock prices on CNBC or the internet and recording stock prices over time. If prices rise, they can figure how much the initial value of an investment would have increased. And stock might be listed as the gift they want for their next birthday or other special occasion.
Saturday, September 14, 2019
How to Make the Boring Interesting
I was reading a book a friend recommended that I found very boring, when I discovered a trick to help make something interesting. Give it a purpose. When I didn't find the women characters in the book interesting, I started reading to see if the males in their lives were.
While watching the third Democratic presidential debate, I pretended I was watching to find, not only the next leader of the free world, but also the best vice president, attorney general, and Cabinet secretaries.
While watching the third Democratic presidential debate, I pretended I was watching to find, not only the next leader of the free world, but also the best vice president, attorney general, and Cabinet secretaries.
Wednesday, September 4, 2019
Beijing Meets Its Match
Continuous protests begun in Hong Kong in early June, 2019, achieved results on September 4, 2019. The government withdrew a bill that would have required those charged with domestic crimes to be transferred to mainland China for trial. Nonetheless, Hong Kong's leader, Ms. Carrie Lam, failed to resign and protests could continue.
When China's President Xi Jinping visited Hong Kong for the first time in July, 2017, he said attempts to challenge Beijing's sovereignty, security, and power were "impermissible." On June 30, 2017, a spokesman for China's foreign ministry had said Beijing no longer considered itself bound by the 1984 Sino-British treaty that ended the UK's rule and prepared Hong Kong to become a semi-autonomous region of China for 50 years.
Under terms of a secret provisional agreement, on August 26, 2019, atheistic China allowed the Roman Catholic Pope, Francis I, to ordain Bishop Anthony Yao Shun of Jining in China's Inner Mongolia autonomous region and Bishop Stephen Xu Hongwei of Hanzhong in Shaanxi. Previously, Beijing claimed such appointments would be considered foreign interference with China's internal affairs.
When China's President Xi Jinping visited Hong Kong for the first time in July, 2017, he said attempts to challenge Beijing's sovereignty, security, and power were "impermissible." On June 30, 2017, a spokesman for China's foreign ministry had said Beijing no longer considered itself bound by the 1984 Sino-British treaty that ended the UK's rule and prepared Hong Kong to become a semi-autonomous region of China for 50 years.
Under terms of a secret provisional agreement, on August 26, 2019, atheistic China allowed the Roman Catholic Pope, Francis I, to ordain Bishop Anthony Yao Shun of Jining in China's Inner Mongolia autonomous region and Bishop Stephen Xu Hongwei of Hanzhong in Shaanxi. Previously, Beijing claimed such appointments would be considered foreign interference with China's internal affairs.
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