Online learning is one of the choices of MIT President

Latest issue of TIME magazine has an article of online learning by MIT President, Rafael Reif. MIT needs to spend three times as much to educate a student as the tuition that MIT receives. Reif seems to put a very positive spin on online learning, probably because he has been with MIT for 33 years and has a full understanding of MIT teaching and learning culture.  

 http://nation.time.com/2013/09/26/online-learning-will-make-college-cheaper-it-will-also-make-it-better/

Read the tea leaves what Chinese leaders are encouraged to think

Top 10 books recommended by Chinese 中央委員會 to all high-ranking government officials. Probably not all Chinese officals are just ideology-preoccupied. 1. 苦难辉煌 2. 激荡三十年 3. 曾国藩（上中下）4. 毛泽东的读书生活 5. 一个大国的崛起与崩溃（共三册）6. 中国经济专题 7. The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century (In English by Thomas Friedman) 8. 中国共产党历史（第二卷）9. 中国震撼 10. 历史的轨迹

whopping patent fee for universities and tax free

Recent BusinessWeek has reported Princeton Uni. has collected $524M in patent license fee in the last 7 years, mostly from the invention of an anticancer drug, Alimta. Google paid Stanford Uni. $337M because Google was founded in the Stanford campus. Sometimes universities can rake up a whopping windfall. (Princeton Uni. has $17B endowment!!!) 

More creative when you grow older

Recent Time Magazine has an article, "The Art of Living", describing how old people may gain creativity at the expense of other functions such as memory or physical strength. There are many examples, one of them is the famous architect, Frank Lloyd Wright (I really like his FallingWater house in Pennsylvania), who passed away at age 92 in the same year that his work, NYC Guggenheim Museum, was completed. Some theories support that old people may actually be more creative than ever. At least it gives me some taste whenever I pass another birthday. 

peer-to-peer MOOC

My two cents for the sustainability of MOOCs: “As in any new innovation, only products with efficacy and alluring power can survive.” Didactic-pedagogy-based MOOCs may be useful for some highly motivated students but may not be a magnet to attract ever-growing large audience. I am a strong believer that peer-to-peer interaction is a very effective learning tool (though may not be very effective in college entrance exam) and may keep the hype of MOOCs last much longer. Peer-to-peer discussion may actually save time and imprint the very few key and “eureka” concepts in your mind. In addition, peer-to-peer discussion is a perfect tool for social learning which is the part that we lag behind Westerners a lot. Online MOOCs actually can encourage this peer-to-peer interaction more effectively than in-classroom lectures. It can be done by, e.g., stopping the lectures intermittently by asking student questions followed by the “student-engaging time”. Any students’ online feedback can be evaluated by the peers (but not by the lecturers) by clicking a few buttons such as “like” “OK” “interesting” “Are you sure” “You are my hero” “More comments, please” etc. Again, the hype of MOOCs cannot just depend on the sheer volume, it needs some innovation too in order to be sustainable.

An extinct species in politics

A physicist-turned-president? Almost like an extinct species in the circle of politics. German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, is going to seek her 3rd 4-year term 10 days from today for the position she has held since 2005. A physicist becomes the world's most powerful woman, wow!

Autonomous car

Recent BusinessWeek has an article about autonomous car. Though it is still against the law to have driverless car, but luxury car now offers the option that car can drive for you at speed less than 10 mph or at cruise-control mode at high speed (as long as your hands are still on the wheel). That available package in Mercedes allows you to get off the car at the entrance of parking lot and let the car drive by itself to find the parking space. 10 years from now, for everyone, driving will be much easier and likely much safer.

National parks and Rockefeller

I was basically transfixed in front of TV in the last two nights to watch PBS "National Parks" series. In addition to the breathtaking scenery and early Americans' vision to preserve the pristine beauty, I was impressed by the philanthropic mind of the oil mogul, John Rockefeller Jr., son of the John Rockefeller Sr. He donated US $45M (probably worth US $500M now) to the land purchase and other activities for the national parks of Acadia, Grand Teton, Yosemite, Great Smoky Mountain and others. Some people use their wealth to flaunt their own pride while others use their wealth to show and preserve the national pride. 

Striving to the utmost one's whole life

Just watched PBS's "Mount Rushmore" which has the gigantic 18m-tall carved facial sculptures of four exalted U.S presidents. What it impressed me is their sculptor, Gutzon Borglum, who basically prosecuted this impossible project driven by his love of art and strong-willed endeavor. During the 14-year period in the throes of both Great Depression and WWII, he basically completed this mission impossible and died seven months before the last carving was done. Striving to the utmost one's whole life (鞠躬盡瘁死而後已)

Doomed future for all doing routine jobs

I recently talked to an executive officer of a charity foundation and really appreciated their dedication to help disadvantaged people. However, what it really scares me is the growing trend of disadvantaged people. In U.S. since 2008 financial tsunami, U.S. manufacturing had recovered 75% while manufacturing employment only recovered 21%. NY Port longshoremen has declined 90% since peaking in 1960s. This is basically due to the replacement of humans by robots as in the recent issue of Time magazine. Robots basically replace human beings in routine jobs and robots' average cost is NT$22K per month and decreasing. Amazon bought Kiva Systems in 2012 to deploy numerous smart robots in its huge distribution centers. As predicted by MIT & Harvard economists, the future is doomed for all who perform routine jobs since robots now are so smart that they eliminate jobs much more than the jobs they create. Without any innovative government policy, the storm of social unrest and the gaping chasm between the rich and the poor is gathering day by day. Only the people with capital and non-replaceable skills can survive under the continuing threat of robotics. (Robotics does not refer to just physical robots, it also involves office automation, automatic ticketing, automatic transaction or anything that is routine or semi-routine.)

Roving robots in distribution cetners