Sway: Unraveling Unconscious Bias

Museum of Science, BostonStreamed live 91 minutes ago
Sway: Unraveling Unconscious Bias Thursday, September 9 7:00 pm – 8:30 pm Eastern Are unconscious biases hardwired as an evolutionary response or do they emerge from assimilating information around us? We all have unconscious, or unintentional, biases, whether based in race, gender, age, or other designations, but is there anything we can do to eliminate them? How do they influence our world and society? How have these unintentional prejudices affected modern-day technology (specifically AI)? In Sway: Unraveling Unconscious Bias, author Pragya Agarwal uncovers the science behind our biases. Using real-world stories underpinned by scientific theories and research, this book unravels the way our unconscious biases affect how we communicate, make decisions, and perceive the world. At a time when race politics, the gender pay gap, diversity, inclusivity, and bias training in the workplace dominate our conversations, understanding how unconscious bias functions is more important than ever. FEATURING- Pragya Agarwal is a behavioral and data scientist, author, speaker, and consultant. She is a Visiting Professor for Inequities and Social Inclusion, and founder and director of the think tank the 50 Percent Foundation. Her books include Sway: Unravelling Unconscious Bias (2020); Wish We Knew What to Say: Talking with Children about Race (2020); and (M)otherhood: On the Choices of Being a Woman (2021). She lives in the UK. This program is made possible by Science Sandbox, an initiative of the Simons Foundation. For more SubSpace Adult Programs at the Museum of Science, visit: https://www.mos.org/explore/subspace

The New Teaching of Old Subjects ~ Exploring the Digital Humanities

The “digital humanities” at Yale have made great strides in recent years by launching innovative teaching techniques and engaging students in new forms of self-generated and self-motivated research in a vast new array of digital resources that are now becoming available world-wide.

To a large extent has been inspired by the best of Yale’s scholarship in the past.

Other initiatives have only become possible because of the development of new technologies that have only recently been applied to valuable old documentary collections

Still further forms of research~education have only become possible because of innovations in digital communications….

Consider for example:

The result is that digital technology has altered both the subject and the methods of teaching the humanities in the contemporary world.  In effect, it has thoroughly transformed our understanding of what we can and should expect to learn from the humanities on this small, finite and fragile planet in a vast and expanding universe.

WHO: Rich countries failed in COVID-19 vaccine donation promise

CGTNSep 8, 2021
For more: https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-09-09…

World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus called for vaccine equity during a news conference on Wednesday. “We don’t want any more promises, we just want the vaccines,” he said, noting that only about 15 percent of the 1 billion vaccine doses promised by wealthy countries for low- and middle-income countries have materialized.

9/11 conspiracy theories cast long shadow

Associated PressSep 8, 2021
While the Sept. 11 attacks united much of America in grief and anger, conspiracy theories about what happened that day uncovered a well of distrust. Twenty years on, those conspiracies have metastasized into ever more wild claims. (Sept. 9)