Amit Goes Blogging

The other day, my YouTube listing featured a video on novel-writing using ChatGPT. I did not bother to watch it. I like to keep certain aspects of my naivety intact. Now, Khan Academy plans to deploy ChatGPT-powered tutors to replace human tutors. That was another trigger to bemoan the oncoming demise of the teaching profession on social media. The profession enjoyed an imagined immunity from digitization. It was touted as the most in-person thing, after mothering and nursing, that children cannot do without. Although COVID lockdown came very close to dismantling that notion, the ineffectiveness of online instruction was evident to all participants including parents. But, online learning is not an instance of AI. AI was involved only so far as to cut out a father walking into the camera with only a towel hanging by the waist. Before children realized the usefulness of background blur feature, they had pried into the homes of their classmates sometimes allowing that voyeuristic pleasure...

The writing is simple; the subject emotionally overwhelming. The book eases the reader into life's grim realities we all have to contend with—old age, disease, decrepitude, and death. If suffering is likely to precede death and, in those final stages, you are expected to make tough decisions for yourself or on behalf of  your loved ones, you would do well to read the book. The author speaks to the medical fraternity and to those who look up to it to fight mortality. A targeted medical intervention or a technically successful surgery may bring professional/academic satisfaction to the medical practitioner, but for the terminally ill or those in their ripe old age, it usually comes at the cost of autonomy and quality of life. This hardly concerns the doctor if he is able to fix up the 'actual' problem. The doctor treats the patient’s problem as a challenge to his competence and speaks with the pride of a qualified medical practitioner. To his patients, he gives an objective e...

I am told wealth meaningfully transforms man’s relationship with things and people around him, placing him in a position of power in the relationship. Of what use is wealth and power if it is not wedded to vision. We are grateful to the wealthy corporates for their role in bringing the much-needed infrastructure and a life of dignity to the populace. But, why aren't bookstores part of that vision!  No, I don’t have a business plan to run a profitable bookstore. Mr. Ambani, you have the wherewithal to think it through. I just need to put my gripe out there. Why isn’t Reliance interested in running a book store or support the ones crumbling under the deep-discounting practices of online stores? No denying that majority Indians live in abject poverty. A small percentage has just begun their aspirational journey. A bookstore doesn’t strike as relevant or urgent considering we have just started on our way to being a prosperous nation. But, from the ultra-rich we expect a vision of w...