Letters to the Editor: We can use AI to help with cultural integration
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Growing up in the vibrant tapestry of India, I witnessed how technology could be a lifeline — bringing education to remote villages, connecting families across vast distances, and offering hope where it was scarce. Now, walking through the cobbled streets of Ireland, my new home, I see a different set of challenges. Societal divides based on background and immigration are becoming more pronounced, and the need to bring people together has never been more urgent.
I believe that artificial intelligence, particularly generative AI, holds untapped potential to heal these rifts. Imagine an AI-powered cultural exchange platform that creates immersive experiences blending Irish and global traditions. Through virtual reality and AI-generated storytelling, people could step into each other’s worlds — an Irish teenager might explore the festivals of India, while someone in Mumbai could virtually attend a traditional Irish music session in Galway. This shared experience could foster empathy and understanding, breaking down barriers rooted in unfamiliarity.
Another creative use of AI could be in personalised storytelling. Generative AI can weave together narratives from diverse communities, highlighting common threads in our human experience. By collecting stories from immigrants, locals, young, and old, AI could generate collaborative tales that celebrate our shared hopes and dreams. These stories could be shared in community centres, schools, or online platforms, sparking conversations that bring people closer.
Language barriers often hinder connection. AI-driven translation apps could offer real-time language support, allowing newcomers to engage more deeply with their communities. Picture a community event where everyone, regardless of their mother tongue, can participate fully because AI bridges the communication gap.
Education is another realm ripe for innovation. AI tutors could adapt lessons to include cultural references familiar to students from different backgrounds, making learning more inclusive and engaging. This not only helps students grasp concepts more effectively but also validates their cultural identity within the educational system.
Moreover, AI can assist in combating misinformation that fuels division. By analysing and flagging biased or false content on social media, AI can help promote a more informed and compassionate public discourse.
However, it’s essential that we approach these innovations ethically. AI must be developed with transparency and inclusivity, ensuring it doesn’t perpetuate biases or infringe on privacy. By involving diverse voices in the creation of AI technologies, we can build tools that serve and unite us all.
In a time when divisions threaten the fabric of our society, I see a profound opportunity to use AI not just as a technological advancement but as a bridge between hearts. Let’s embrace the creative possibilities of AI to foster understanding, celebrate diversity, and build a more connected and compassionate Ireland.
How could a man like Alexander McCartney be so depraved and think it was OK to abuse and blackmail children online?
Though he admitted to 185 charges, including manslaughter, approximately 3,000 indictments could have been put against him.
His modus operandi was to pretend he was a child, and when he gained a child’s confidence he threatened to expose them, while engaging with other paedophile’s online, and showing no remorse when a child of 12 shot herself because of his threats of exposure.
The devices which McCartney used — seized by the PSNI at his home — “held hundreds of thousands of indecent photos and videos of underage girls performing sexual acts while being blackmailed”.
While he used many fake accounts on online platforms, primarily Snapchat, to entrap and manipulate them, he had little or no remorse for the victims he abused.
In the dark corners of social media, the fact that social media platforms like Snapchat, and others, allow convicted paedophiles like McCartney to engage in wholesale abuse of young children, shows a social media industry that has policed itself for far too long, cutting corners by reducing the number of content moderators, while their owners make billions out of peoples misery.
I am sure there are many other McCartneys out there at this moment and time “catfishing” on an industrial scale and who enjoy the misery they inflict on others.
If social medial platforms cannot police themselves then we need authorities who believe in the basic tenets of right and wrong, and law and order, to enforce stricter legislation to curtail and to deny abusers an online forum and hold the owners of these platform to account in a court of law.
Another worrying issue is the lack of parental control when a child engages on these platforms.
How have we got to this juncture when a child is no longer protected from this very insidious and deeply depraved social media content?
The Irish Business and Employers Confederation (Ibec) have stated recently that attracting new staff to fully office-based roles is more challenging as employers push for more days on-site. While five days in the office used to be the norm, employee expectations around remote and hybrid working appear to be leading to conflict with the bosses who want them back.
I am rather bewildered as to why such an arrangement seems to be presenting such a challenge for businesses, especially if those employees who are working from home are being productive?
While many commentators have ridiculed Trump’s fast-food adventure, others construe a credible cogency out of the lazy propensity for many of us to deride the ‘McTrumpian’ tilt at serving the citizens in Pennsylvania last Sunday week as an abysmal electoral gimmick. For them, ‘The Donald’ is right on the money as he conjures a stroke of electoral genius, albeit they would not enlist as supporters of same ‘genius’. Welcome to McTrumpsville, USA — home of batty burghers and small fries.
Time will tell, of course, (and not much time now), as to whether the flaxen-topped ‘quarter-pounder’ will evolve to a full-blown Big Mac with all the garnished trimmings within the next couple of weeks. US elections are, by their ‘razzamatazz’ nature, a motley affliction of brash, bravado and bombast concocted by hook or by crook to get into that Oval Office.
There would seem to be few rules of engagement other than to spend as much money as possible masquerading the real self, insulting the opponent, and trying to galvanise the citizens with vicious invective and vacuous polemic. It’s called mature democratic politics, apparently.
In a crass, craven, and corrupted system of presentational jamboree, replete with mottled, kaleidoscopic sound-biting, brutal back-biting, and below-the-belt/full-frontal sniping, the whole farrago hits the fan with crude excremental utterance. Tasty nuggets of wisdom are banished, filleting the opponent is where it’s at, and there’s always many more fish to fry.
C’est la vie Américaine ... the McHustings ... doyen of all democratic entertainments, bar none.
Nothing for it, but to sit back and enjoy the ‘Samhainesque’ show of dark make believe and rollicking rocky horror.
As winter time began on Sunday when the clocks went back by one hour, the early evening darkness will add to Halloween’s foreboding atmosphere as the ghosts of the restless dead wander the earth.
The mornings are brighter but darkness falls an hour earlier in the evening. Darkness will gradually increase daily until the winter solstice on December 21, the shortest day in the year or, to be meteorologically accurate, the day with the least daylight in the entire year. Summertime begins again on Sunday, March 30, at 1am when clocks go forward to 2am.
Winter time is a harbinger of the harsh dormant season ahead. Humans, birds, animals, and plants have all developed strategies and defence mechanisms for surviving winter. But the most vulnerable are at constant risk. Let’s make a special effort, during the dark bleak days ahead, to reach out to the birds, animals, plants, and fellow humans, but especially to the children of the Middle East and other troubled parts of the world where Halloween won’t be celebrated by those surrounded by death, destruction, homelessness, starvation, fear, and despair.