Episodes
Thursday Aug 11, 2022
Bipartisan Safer Communities Bill | Biggest Impacts on School Safety | SDP182
Thursday Aug 11, 2022
Thursday Aug 11, 2022
Doc highlights what has changed in school safety since the May 24, 2022, Robb Elementary School shooting that ended the lives of 19 students and 2 teachers in Uvalde, Texas. He interprets how schools will be impacted by the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act (signed into federal law July, 2022). Doc peruses each website to critically evaluate and assign ratings to the existing and “new” school safety clearinghouse websites. BIPARTISAN SAFER COMMUNITIES ACT: Per Everytown.org, the bill will purportedly enhance background checks for buyers under 21; support state red flag laws; disarm domestic abusers; clarify who must run a background check; crack down on gun trafficking; fund community violence intervention; invest in mental health services; and provide school safety funding. We will examine some of the centerpieces of the school safety section of the bill. (1) ANOTHER (and competing?) SCHOOL SAFETY RESOURCES WEBSITE. The bill installed schoolsafety.gov as the “official” repository for best practices in school safety. It will be situated at the Department of Homeland Security. However, this action is confusing because the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Safe and Supportive Schools, already has the robust and updated Readiness and Emergency Management for Schools Technical Assistance Center, or REMS. And, REMS TA has a “toolbox” feature that allows schools across the country to upload forms, job descriptions, tabletop exercises, organizational charts, and more - to be curated, easily-searched, and freely shared. These are from-the-field tools. (2) MORE MENTAL HEALTH DOLLARS TO SCHOOLS. Expanded reimbursement for schools billing Medicaid for Individualized Education Plan (IEP) mental health services. And, $500 million each for the School Based Mental Health Services Grant Program and the School Based Mental Health Service Professionals Demonstration Grant. The expected outcome is hiring and training more staff, but this doesn’t seem to be a problem that will be solved by more funding as school staffing shortages haven’t been ameliorated by increased pay and bonuses. In August of 2022, Des Moines Public Schools offered a $50,000 bonus to teachers who planned to retire but are willing to work another year. Also, grants are temporary. They are intended to start the ball rolling, not to keep the ball rolling. Professionals will hesitate to accept even well-paying grant-funded positions. (3) EXPAND ACCESS TO JUVENILE MENTAL HEALTH RECORDS. Thorough reviews of potential gun buyers under the age of 21 will require implementing a new protocol for checking juvenile records. This implies access to a student’s school records - specifically, discipline, disability, or mental health records. These are areas strongly protected by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and Family Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). This is a can of worms and will vary greatly per perceived discretion and authority to make a subjective summary decision based upon a student’s records. Schools might counter by pushing more behavioral events “off the books” by a practice known as ‘abeyance agreements.’ GLARING OVERSIGHTS FROM THE BILL: LOCKED DOORS AND REGULATED DEVICES. Absent from the school section of the bill was a requirement that schools lock their doors during instructional time. This decision continues to be defaulted to the states. Kentucky (2020) requires that schools lock their doors. Recently California, Wisconsin, Florida, and Massachusetts have taken steps toward stronger emphasis on “best policy” to require doors to be locked. However, most school districts’ board of education policies or handbooks continue to use the term “should lock doors” instead of “must lock doors.” It’s clear this is done to dodge accountability and liability. In addition, school safety devices or apps continue to be unregulated and able to be marketed and purchased by schools without some standard of testing and pilot trials. Think of Underwriters Laboratories, but for school safety. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE, BLOG & BOOKS: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David P. Perrodin, PhD. This podcast and blog post represent the opinions of David P. Perrodin and his guests to the show. This is episode 182 of The Safety Doc Podcast published on 08-12-2022.
Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Books:
- School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
- Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times. www.velocityofinformation.com
Tuesday May 10, 2022
Tuesday May 10, 2022
A popular Reddit thread is titled, “What’s a ‘Today is going to suck’ red flag. A top up-voted response was, “Waking up with a huge headache,” and another was “When you get all the red lights on your commute.” Each of us could add a comment to that thread, right? Per the National Institute of Health, “Consistent with this focus, an anxiety-linked negative expectancy bias reflects an inflated tendency for anxious individuals to expect an increased probability of negative relative to positive events.” In other words, when people expect negative events, bad luck, or suboptimal outcomes - that’s what they will observe, and perceive, of the world around them. This frame of thinking might be accurate, but it is also damaging to morale if allowed to continue for long spans of time. In this episode, Doc will share his current observations of negative expectation bias, identifies times it has happened throughout history, and offers research-supported and anecdotal suggestions to mitigate the languishing impact of negative expectation bias. He will read related excerpts from his book, The Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times (VOI). WE SEEK AND ACCEPT EVIDENCE ALIGNED TO OUR BIASES. Per Psychology Today, “A bias is a tendency, inclination, or prejudice toward or against something or someone. Some biases are positive and helpful—like choosing to only eat foods that are considered healthy or staying away from someone who has knowingly caused harm. But biases are often based on stereotypes, rather than actual knowledge of an individual or circumstance. Whether positive or negative, such cognitive shortcuts can result in prejudgments that lead to rash decisions or discriminatory practices.” Our life experiences shape our biases, as do our families, as do our sources of information. NORMALCY BIAS. One of the most-prominent biases in the safety community is normalcy bias - or the belief that an event isn’t severe enough to warrant a course-altering reaction. And, things will return to normal in a very short time. If this is how we think, then that’s how we will perceive the events that we observe in our world. People rooted to normalcy biases typically perform poorly during crisis situations. They fail to act, or the suddenly-changed context overwhelms them. They are slow to adapt. And, life and death is measured in the seconds between the onset of an emergency and one’s reaction to it. FILTERING FOR NEGATIVE EXPECTATIONS. On the other hand, if we expect negative news, then we will perceive news as negative - or filter out neutral or positive news as it doesn’t match our expectation for bad news. It’s also remarkably hard to convince people that authentic events are not matched to their expectation bias. In other words, if you expect things to be good and they are, in fact, negative, you’ll have a predisposition to perceive things as good. Such a person might be happy and easy going, but they are also the last one into the lifeboat or out of the burning building. MEDIA ABHORS IN A VACUUM. “The media abhors an information vacuum. It will take what information it has and amplify it, completing the ensemble with speculation when deemed necessary. Uncertainty makes us crave more information, so many people spend a lot of time looking for news updates, refreshing screens every few minutes to seek reassurance. As people lose proportion and perspective, they spiral down a whirlpool of confirmation (expectation) bias.” Pg. 50 of VOI. MARTIAN ATTACK. “On October 28, 1938, many Americans believed they were being invaded by Martians. This erroneous belief was the result of a Halloween stunt orchestrated by Orson Welles in which he adapted H. G. Wells’s War of the Worlds to the radio and then broadcast the play as though it was actually happening. “[A] few short weeks before this broadcast, millions of listeners had kept their radios tuned for the latest news from a Europe apparently about to go to war.” Radio listeners therefore had a preexisting expectation bias toward catastrophically bad news. In the weeks that followed, Psychology professor Howard Cantril of Princeton University and colleagues interviewed people to try and understand their reactions to the broadcast. Of those that mistook the radio play as a live news report, almost none of them tuned to another station where they would have quickly found that life was completely normal.” Pg. 67 of VOI. HOW TO LIMIT YOUR BIASES. Humans have biases - they are part of our survival wiring. Acknowledge when your biases are influencing your perceptions - you’ll probably be aware of this - more than you think. Listen to others’ perspectives. Vary your information sources. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE, BLOG & BOOKS: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David P. Perrodin, PhD. This podcast and blog post represent the opinions of David P. Perrodin and his guests to the show. This is episode 181 of The Safety Doc Podcast published on 05-10-2022.
Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Books:
- School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
- Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times. www.velocityofinformation.com
Tuesday May 03, 2022
Tuesday May 03, 2022
It is legally recognized that time is cleanly divided into years, months, weeks, days, hours, minutes, and seconds. But in certain chaos conditions, the construct of time might distort and collapse into what is known as a flow state. All that matters is the moment. And while we convince ourselves that we will observe and respond to bountiful warning signs, we’ll learn that the collapse of physical time is a hard bifurcation that appears “obvious and avoidable” in hindsight. In this episode, Doc talks about the 2016 Gatlinburg wildfire’s collapse of physical time and reads excerpts from pages 10-11 in the book ‘The Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times’ by David P. Perrodin. PIGEON FORGE AND GATLINBURG WILDFIRES. “Consider the wildfires that killed 14 people and destroyed nearly 20,000 acres in the Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg areas of the Great Smoky Mountains of Eastern Tennessee in November and December 2016. More specifically, imagine being among the residents and vacationers in the Gatlinburg, Tennessee area attempting to flee down the mountainside at night, in the dark, in some cases encountering downed trees and abandoned automobiles blocking roadways, while walls of flame consuming trees and underbrush rapidly approach the road from both sides. “At 8:30 p.m. on November 28, 2016, high winds and roaring flames disabled cell towers, melted fiber-optic cables, disrupted digital radio signals and shut down phone lines. Backup systems and protocols failed.” Everything cut out in an instant.” LULLED INTO FALSE SENSE OF SECURITY. “Emily Walpole, a NIST scientist who studied the incident, uncovered a perplexing finding in her analysis of the multiday fire. “It’s possible that you get used to smelling smoke and it basically lulls you into a false sense of security . . . the fire could be miles away and be producing smoke.” Likewise, some resorts and vacationers in the area ignored the nearby threat until it was almost too late. “It seemed that people expected that if a large wildfire requiring evacuation was going to happen, they would be told. Instead, many had to find out on their own.” Resorts closed, issuing eleventh-hour evacuation orders as their hope that the fires would spare their area was extinguished, while the fire was not. One such couple relates how it was not until they texted a picture of encroaching fire to their firefighter son—who replied for them to get out of the area immediately—that their own perception of their immediate situation changed.” THE FIRE WAS OBSERVED TWO DAYS BEFORE HELL BROKE LOOSE - SO WHY WASN'T THE PUBLIC ALERTED? Survivors blame park rangers and other federal personnel for failing to adequately alert the town about the fire's danger and speed. Insurance companies also have filed litigation in the case. The fire started as a small blaze Nov. 23, 2016, the day before Thanksgiving, on the popular Chimney Tops trail in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Authorities said it appeared two teenage boys set the fire, which grew in subsequent days until it became an inferno that swept into Gatlinburg on Nov. 28. INSUFFICIENT NOTIFICATION LAWSUIT CAN CONTINUE. In 2020, Senior U.S. District Judge Ronnie Greer stated that the government failed to properly alert neighbors of the risk of the fire. "The United States cannot rely on the press releases and an E-Blast to satisfy a requirement to notify “Park Neighbors, Park visitors, and local residents” when it doesn’t tell the Court where the press releases and E-Blast were sent to," Greer wrote. He continued: "Likewise, the United States relies on the information posted to websites and social media accounts to satisfy the requirement. The problem with this argument is the same as the problem with the press release and E-Blast argument. The information posted on the websites gave notice to the visitors of the Park’s website, the Instagram posts may have given notice to the people who follow the Park on Instagram, etc. But posting information on websites and social media accounts is not the same as notifying “Park neighbors, Park visitors and local residents . . . of all planned and unplanned fire management activities that have the potential to impact them. RELYING ON SMART DEVICES. Many of us rely so heavily on “smart” devices on a daily basis when hell is not breaking loose. We have trained ourselves to assume that the technology that allows us to receive the information we need to navigate our home turf on a typically uneventful day will always work because it always has worked. This assumption is our torus, our normalcy bias. When your observations are mismatched to your technology, choose a course of action to get out of harm’s way. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE, BLOG & BOOKS: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David P. Perrodin, PhD. This podcast and blog post represent the opinions of David P. Perrodin and his guests to the show. This is episode 180 of The Safety Doc Podcast published on 05-03-2022.
Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Books:
- School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
- Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times. www.velocityofinformation.com
Wednesday Apr 27, 2022
Wednesday Apr 27, 2022
In 2017, America’s tallest dam complex had partially, but catastrophically, failed. The Oroville Dam, located in northern California, left operators scrambling to figure out how to manage a main spillway failure, eroding secondary spillway, and a rising water level in the reservoir. Remember those tense days when America was riveted to the nightly news for the latest updates? Remember the engineers who calculated that Sacramento, which is in a geological basin, would be hip-deep in water if the Oroville complex collapsed? The thing is, this didn’t make the nightly news - at least nothing more than five seconds of video and another ten seconds of narrative. But, that didn’t mean Americans, Californians, and people near Oroville didn’t have questions. They had a lot of questions. In fact, people across the world were thirsty for updates about Oroville - and they received them from Juan Browne. In this episode, Doc discusses Chapter 2: Face Validity, from his book, ‘The Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times. He reads an excerpt about Juane Browne and the Oroville Dam and points out how there are reliable, organic journalists around us - and how we can responsibly break our own news to inform our communities and friends. David will reference pages 41-45 from The Velocity of Information. THE OROVILLE DAM. Completed in 1968, Oroville Dam was a showpiece of the California State Water Project. Located on the Feather River, east of the city of Oroville and 70 miles north of Sacramento, the earthen embankment dam was used for flood control, water storage, and hydroelectric power generation. The dam was modern and, until 2017, had an insignificant history. But as all structures, entropy took its toll. 2017 SPILLWAY FAILURE. On February 8, 2017, during a routine water release, a large portion of the center spillway collapsed. With fears that continued use of the spillway could erode further toward the gates and completely collapse the structure, a decision was made to pass water over the emergency spillway. On February 11, 2017, Oroville Dam, America’s tallest, at 770 feet, overtopped and damaged its emergency spillway for the first time in its history, forcing the evacuation of nearly 200,000 people. The unnatural disaster took about one billion dollars to repair and caused millions more in property damage. JUAN BROWN’S FIRST VIDEO OF THE DAM. “Just one day prior to the incident, on February 10, Browne made his first video about the dam. Fearing that the government would soon restrict air traffic over the site, Browne, a commercial pilot for American Airlines, got into his 1946 Luscombe 8A single-engine plane to offer the world the rarest of bird’s-eye view. Browne used a GoPro Hero5 camera to shoot the video. He added narration and published it to his YouTube channel, @blancolirio, the next day. The video immediately went viral. It has since amassed more than 500,000 views. In the five-minute, ten-second video, Browne shows a command of the scene, the situation, and the possible consequences of the dam’s failure. The view from 3,000 feet is intimate and dramatic. With no other planes in the sky, and no people at the site, the rarity of the vantage is apparent. One gets the feeling of being led on a backstage tour. Throughout, Browne’s tone is even and informative, never breathless or excited. “That’s the big concern going forward: how much erosion are we going to get?” Browne says at one point, summarizing the fears of his neighbors who were watching. That concern was justified. BROWNE BECAME THE TRUSTED SOURCE. Up in the air, seeking truth, and answering the questions that mattered to neighbors fearing for their futures is when things took off for Juan’s YouTube Channel. He was granted special access to the dam complex to film his updates and to interview workers. When he appeared at state informational meetings, the audience sought his input as much as it did the engineers at the front table. “As the months-long repair effort went on, Browne continued his reports. Over time, he was perceived as an honest broker by the state and the engineering firm, and was allowed a unique level of access to the dam. “Nobody else was really doing it with this level of detail or interest,” Browne said. PEOPLE WANT THE FACTS. Juan also believes that is why the public responded so strongly. “There is a huge void, or a huge market for, just the facts,” Browne said. “People really responded to that, and it seems to be so lacking in today’s modern infotainment industry. They just wanted the facts.” THREE LESSONS FROM JUAN. (A) See it for yourself, (B) You have not because you ask not, and (C,) Be curious, not cunning. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE, BLOG & BOOKS: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David P. Perrodin, PhD. This podcast and blog post represent the opinions of David P. Perrodin and his guests to the show. This is episode 179 of The Safety Doc Podcast published on 04-26-2022.
Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Books:
- School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
- Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times. www.velocityofinformation.com
Tuesday Apr 19, 2022
Tuesday Apr 19, 2022
Between 1933 and 1944, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivered 31 evening radio addresses to ameliorate the fears and concerns of the American people as well as to inform them of the positions and actions taken by the U.S. Government. The addresses were both novel and sticking. Ranging from 11 to 44 minutes, these informal addresses resembled a pull-up-your-chair fireside chat atmosphere more than a formal projection originating behind an ordained podium. In this episode, Doc examines FDR’s fireside chats as he unpacked them (for messaging strategies during uncertain times) in his book, ‘The Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times.’ Doc notes striking similarities to the style of presentation adopted by Ukraine President Volodymer Zelnskyy. Has Zelenskyy managed to modernize the propaganda formula that was a resounding success for FDR? ROOSEVELT’S FIRESIDE CHATS - THE MAGIC IS THE MEDIUM. The following excerpts are from pages 96-98 of Dr. Perrodin’s book, The Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times. “Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s presidency stands out not only for its duration but also the challenges he and America faced together from 1933 to 1945, from the Great Depression to World War II. The enormity of those two challenges, but especially the Depression, which welcomed FDR to office, forced him to the radio airwaves, early and often, in his now famous ‘fireside chats.’ The fireside chat was the creation of a White House aide. The idea was that beaming the president’s words, live, from his house to yours, unfiltered by time or editors, would allow unprecedented intimacy between the president and the public. “To many, the Great Depression confirmed what they had suspected all along: individuals no longer mattered in the new economic order (1).” THE FIRST FIRESIDE CHAT. “The first fireside chat went out live just eight days after FDR’s inauguration, on March 12, 1933. “I want to talk for a few minutes with the people of the United States about banking,” he said at the start of the inaugural chat (2). The fireside chats were “the first media events—live, pre-planned, extraordinary broadcasts that riveted the attention of the nation—in American history,” writes history professor David Ryfe (3). “Roosevelt often used the ‘you’ form,” Ryfe continues “throughout the chats, he is concerned to ‘tell you,’ ‘interest you,’ ‘make it clear to you,’ and ‘make you understand (4).’” It was as if the president were speaking directly to each individual. FEATURES OF THE FIRESIDE CHAT: FDR vs. ZELENSKYY. The appeal and enduring success of FDR’s fireside chats are attributable to several features, many of which are observed in the addresses of Ukraine President Zelenskyy amidst the 2022 military invasion-conflict by Russia. (A) Talk of the particulars and not mechanics: During the 1933 banking crisis, FDR didn’t speak at lengths explaining the banking holiday (closed banks), but rather the “fortitude” of Americans and the inconvenience and hardships they endured due to closed banks. Zelensky appeals to emotions, strength, and allegiance - even if he seemingly enrolls allies that are not formally allies, such as NATO. He avoids updates on the specifics of the conflict, but does not soften the devastation. (B) Short duration speeches: FDR’s fireside chats were between 11 and 44 minutes. This kept his message relevant without becoming rambling or redundant. During chaotic times, people have less tolerance and information-processing capacity for long-winded messaging. Zelensky’s addresses to Ukrainians mirror these figures. (C) Consistency: FDR spoke in plain language and without walk-up promotion. Zelenskyy is similar with his use of common language (and recognizable visuals) and his green-henley shirts have not yielded to suits. ZELENSKYY TALKING TO THE WORLD AS FDR ADDRESSED A NATION. As speeches are now just a smart-device away, Zelenskyy tends to address his countrymen through his addresses to the European Union, NATO, and Congress. And while the world tuned into FDR’s fireside chats, FDR was never addressing the world - he was talking to fellow Americans as the world listened in. CITATIONS: (1) Ryfe, David Michael. “From Media Audience to Media Public: A Study of Letters Written in Reaction to FDR’s Fireside Chats.” Media, Culture and Society 23 (November 1, 2001): 767–781. doi: 10.1177/016344301023006005; (2) History.com Editors. “FDR Broadcasts First ‘Fireside Chat’ During the Great Depression.” History.com. November 24, 2009. https://www.history.com /this -day -in-history /fdr -gives -first -fireside -chat; (3) Ryfe, From Media Audience to Media Public, 767–781; (4) Ibid. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE, BLOG & BOOKS: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David P. Perrodin, PhD. This podcast and blog post represent the opinions of David P. Perrodin and his guests to the show. This is episode 178 of The Safety Doc Podcast published on 04-19-2022.
Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Books:
- School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
- Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times. www.velocityofinformation.com
Wednesday Apr 13, 2022
Wednesday Apr 13, 2022
Stagnant, sweltering summer days cocoon us with unshakable pulsing heat and sticky humidity in what is known as a wet bulb effect. It’s downright uncomfortable. Our attention deviates from things at hand and centers on making an escape to our air-conditioned cars and dwellings, but the reprieve is temporary - and some of us lack the luxury of climate control other than sitting beneath the canopy of trees and sipping on a cold drink. But, it’s that combination of heat and humidity which agitates us, saps our energy, stifles our motivation, and can even knock us out with heatstroke. It’s uncomfortable just thinking about it - and that’s what most people have been doing the past two years, sweltering in their minds - bad news is the heat and unrelenting information is the humidity. In today’s show, Doc explains the wet bulb effect as it relates to information and human attention. We’ll learn how human attention works and ways to mitigate information overload during uncertain times. Doc will read an excerpt about Wet Bulbs from pages 74-75 of his book, ‘The Velocity of Information: Human Thinking During Chaotic Times.’ WHAT IS A WET BULB? “A wet bulb temperature is taken when you wrap an ambient-temperature thermometer bulb in a wet muslin fabric, exposing it to air flow to promote evaporation, and then measure the difference in temperature. When the air is hot and humid, evaporation is stifled and the wet bulb and dry bulb measurements will be close—too close for comfort. We are saturated, swimming in sweat, and overheating.” COMPETITIVE CYCLISTS, WET BULBS, AND MAKING CRITICAL DECISIONS. Competitive cyclists, like former Soviet National team member Nikolai Razouvaev, rely on the wet bulb measurement to inform their decision to take the bicycle out on a hot and humid day. What can be done to cool down? Perhaps lighter clothing, extra water, frequent breaks, easier terrain, or postponing the outing for a time with a lower wet bulb reading. But what if you do not have an option? What if you must race?” EXAMPLE OF PSYCHOLOGICAL WET BULB EFFECT. “Your phone buzzes. It is a push alert from the newspaper you trust, about the governor’s upcoming press conference on COVID-19. Another alert comes in an hour later: case and death numbers and summary guidance from the press conference.The phone buzzes a third time. It is an emergency alert ordered by the governor; if you had somehow missed his comments earlier. On your way home, a dynamic messaging sign on the freeway encourages you to “mask up.” Your televised football game is interrupted by misty-eyed celebrities urging that “we’re all in this together.” The 11 o’clock news will offer the very latest.” “[In] a global pandemic, at the height of the Information Age, we are all wet bulbs, spinning away. We are not just wet, we are soaked. OPTING IN FOR INFORMATION. And we chose this situation for ourselves.” “[W]e opt in to news push alerts. And we could opt out of emergency alerts, if we so chose. But in both cases, we have decided that the risk of saturation is tolerable compared to the alternative, fear of missing out. The velocity of information is too great to remove ourselves from the equation. MITIGATING THE WET BULB EFFECT. Begin by acknowledging your behaviors. Short-tempered, frustrated, overwhelmed, unable to attend to tasks. These are reactions to stimuli. Change the channel, or better yet, turn off the receiver. The information is still hammering down on you, but if you’ve turned off your receiver, your attention shifts to the hike or the golf game (Aaron Clarey?) and you seemingly be the last person around who hasn’t heard the “latest hyped news” which, actually, likely won’t have a significant impact on your life. And, what are you going to do about it? During uncertain times when media and people feverishly pass headlines, take a pass. You can sample from time to time and get the information that you need. No use in hovering at the buffet table waiting for another pan of wings to be dumped into the trough. OPT IN TO BECOME FORCE IN? Putting a toe in the metaverse, real-time digital tracking of our phones and cars, and Elon Musk’s hints of neural links are all easements (or encroachments?) into a life where opting out will require effort and consequences. How are you preparing for the omnipresent wet bulb? SAFETY DOC WEBSITE, BLOG & BOOKS: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David P. Perrodin, PhD. This podcast and blog post represent the opinions of David P. Perrodin and his guests to the show. The content here is for informational purposes only. Please consult with your safety professional regarding the unique needs of yourself or your organization.This is episode 177 of The Safety Doc Podcast published on 04-12-2022. Order Doc’s new book today and suggest it as a purchase for your local library! The Velocity of Information: Human Thinking During Chaotic Times.
Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Books:
- School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
- Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times. www.velocityofinformation.com
Tuesday Apr 05, 2022
Tuesday Apr 05, 2022
In June, 2019, U.S. lawmakers held their first hearing devoted primarily to the threat of artificially generated imagery. Then in October, 2019, California banned political deep fakes during election season. But, such actions have raised questions. What might be consequences looming at the intersection of deep fakes and public policy? WHAT ARE DEEP FAKES? Per Tim Biggs and Robert Moran of Explainer, “Deep fakes are the most prominent form of what’s being called ‘synthetic media’: images, sound and video that appear to have been created through traditional means but that have, in fact, been constructed by complex software. [D]eep fakes are, in their most common form, videos where one person’s face has been convincingly replaced by a computer-generated face, which often resembles a second person.” Deep fakes, which came to prominence in 2017, can be of a single person or people. RISKS OF DIGITAL DEEP FAKES. Digital deep fakes could rapidly erode trust in people’s main source for information - the Internet. Deep fakes will damage reputations, end careers, and cause people to be skittish and hesitant to trust most media sources. Deep fakes could fuel civil unrest and toss dust in the eyes of stressed citizens anticipating negative news as they plot high-stakes next steps in order to navigate war-torn landscapes. Furthermore, anyone can be the target of this technology. We have to play defense and offense. How do you prove your innocence against a convincing deep fake that portrays you as a fraud or of association with their ilk? FIND THE TRUTH. The following are excerpts from pages 69-70 from the book ‘The Velocity of Information: Human Thinking During Chaotic Times.’ “In any investigation, the goal is to find the truth, not to confirm suspicions or predetermined positions. If you approach panic-inducing situations with that attitude, you will arrive at awareness, rather than panic. Your initial assumptions and conclusions may not always be correct.” THE PACKED STADIUM - OR IS IT? “[I]magine watching a professional baseball game on TV and texting your attending-in-person friend, “Stadium is packed! Hope the concession lines aren’t a mile long!” Seconds later, they respond with a wide-angle selfie from a bleacher seat, “What are you talking about? This place is practically empty!” FOX SPORTS’ DIGITAL FANS. “On July 23, 2020, Fox Sports posted a thirty-seven-second video to its Twitter account demonstrating how it would place thousands of virtual lifelike fans in the stands of major league stadiums (1). “Fox Sports producers will be able to control things like how full the virtual ‘crowds’ are for a given game, what weather fans are dressed for, and what percentage of the crowd will be home fans versus away (2).” The crowds appeared strikingly authentic and would be indiscernible from real crowds to most TV viewers. That snippet was both incredible and chilling at the same time.” HACKED REALITY? “What other real-world scenarios could be “hacked” to distort crowd density? Political rallies, protests, lines outside stores? Is there an app for that?” CITATIONS: (1) Fox Sports. [@FoxSports.] “No Fans? Not on FOX Sports. Thousands of Virtual Fans Will Attend FOX’s MLB Games This Saturday.” Twitter. July 23, 2020. https://twitter .com /FOXSports /status /1286281346390740993. (2) Gartenberg, Chaim. “How Fox Sports Will Use Virtual Fans Created in Unreal Engine to Fill Empty Stadiums in MLB Broadcasts. Real Sports, Fake Fans.” The Verge. July 25, 2020. https://www .theverge .com /2020 /7 /25 /21336017 /fox -sports-baseball -virtual -fans -epic -unreal -engine -empty -stadiums -mlb. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE, BLOG & BOOKS: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David P. Perrodin, PhD. This podcast and blog post represent the opinions of David P. Perrodin and his guests to the show. The content here is for informational purposes only. Please consult with your safety professional regarding the unique needs of yourself or your organization.This is episode 176 of The Safety Doc Podcast published on 04-05-2022. Order Doc’s new book today and suggest it as a purchase for your local library! The Velocity of Information: Human Thinking During Chaotic Times.
Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Books:
- School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
- Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times. www.velocityofinformation.com
Tuesday Mar 29, 2022
Tuesday Mar 29, 2022
Remember fiddling around until the final hour to hunker down and complete an assignment for school or a project for work - even though you knew of the deadline for weeks? There you were, confident you could serviceably complete the task and submit it in a nick of time. WHAT IS PARKINSON’S LAW? Parkinson’s Law is the adage that work will expand to fill the time allotted for its completion. The term was first coined by Cyril Northcote Parkinson in a humorous essay he wrote for “The Economist” in 1955. If someone has 5 hours to rake leaves from a yard - and apprises that task of clearing the small yard might take, at most, 2 hours, the tendency - per Parkinson’s Law, is for the person to take the full 5 hours to rake the leaves. They might rake at a slower pace, take frequent breaks, walk around to assess their progress, adjust their gloves, hat and jacket, and so on. NEW DEFINITION OF PARKINSON’S LAW. In his book The Velocity of Information: Human Thinking During Chaotic Times, Doc postulates a second interpretation of Parkinson’s Law. In this take, Parkinson’s Law represents the ingrained need for humans to have a distinct ritualistic start and end routine to their work days. He wrote about this in his book, centering on a business owner in Chicago who found people knocking on his door (a closed non-essential virtual reality gaming business), to inquire about renting a table for a few hours - so they could unfold their laptops and “got to work.” BREAKING PARKINSON’S LAW IN CHICAGO. The following is an excerpt (pages 75-76) from the book The Velocity of Information: Human Thinking During Chaotic Times by David P. Perrodin. “Prior to 2020, Aaron Sawyer’s Redline VR, a virtual reality club and bar in the Ravenswood neighborhood of Chicago, was doing great business. His mega-computers, 3D game configurations, and 360-degree immersive goggles and haptic wearables were something that people could not get at home. He offered the best zombie-battling experience in the city. So much so that Sawyer considered opening a second location (1). Then the pandemic hit. Chicago city government started deciding which businesses were “essential,” and thus allowed to operate, and which were not. Redline VR was not deemed “essential.” Under Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s plan, Redline VR was allowed to reopen in phase four (2) at 25 percent capacity. There was no phase five. There was no revenue coming into the business. So Sawyer pivoted. Again and again (3) Parkinson’s Law states that “work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion (4).” Linda Stone, the consultant who has studied attention behavior, found that during the pandemic, people were checking work emails “at all hours of the night,” as their homes became their workplace (5). At the outset of the pandemic, many people left their office on a Friday, began working remotely the following Monday, and did not return to their offices. Many still have no return date in sight, and a significant number of positions have become permanently remote. Getting out of the home, and into an office setting, became an attractive option for some people. At home, the roles of spouse and mother and caregiver all intersect with the workday. Work now fills the physical space once reserved for family and relaxation. The mind is not always able to differentiate between the two.” REMOTE WORKERS WANTED A PLACE TO GO TO WORK. In May and June 2020, Aaron Sawyer observed an uptick in people asking if they could rent his VR stations, which were similar to work cubicles, for a few hours or for a day. “Redline VR rebranded to offer rented office space, at just fifteen dollars for the day. Curtains and separators were put up so people could keep their social distance and have a work space of their own, away from home and family.” CITATIONS. (1) Aaron Sawyer, interview with the author, August 14, 2020; (2) City of Chicago. “Reopening Chicago.” City of Chicago. 2020. https://www.chicago .gov /city /en /sites /COVID -19 /home /reopening -chicago .html; (3) Sawyer, interview with the author; (4) Parkinson, Cyril Northcote. Parkinson’s Law [And Other Studies in Administration] (Cambridge, MA: The Riverside Press, 1957), 3. http://sas2 .elte .hu /tg /ptorv /Parkinson -s-Law.pdf; (5) Linda Stone, personal communication with the author, August 14, 2020. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE, BLOG & BOOKS: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David P. Perrodin, PhD. This podcast and blog post represent the opinions of David P. Perrodin and his guests to the show. The content here is for informational purposes only. Please consult with your safety professional regarding the unique needs of yourself or your organization.This is episode 175 of The Safety Doc Podcast published on 03-29-2022. Order Doc’s new book today and suggest it as a purchase for your local library! The Velocity of Information: Human Thinking During Chaotic Times.
Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Books:
- School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
- Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times. www.velocityofinformation.com
Tuesday Mar 22, 2022
Tuesday Mar 22, 2022
What are the differences between crisis and chaos? Is a sudden bifurcation better than a gradual bifurcation? How might a "strange attractor" contribute to the sometimes long duration, and difficult-to-recognize, patterns in chaos? Doc will discuss these questions and read an excerpt pertaining to them from his book 'The Velocity of Information: Human Thinking During Chaotic Times.' WHAT IS CRISIS? The following excerpts are from pages 139-140 of the book The Velocity of Information: Human Thinking During Chaotic Times. “Crisis implies a decisive point in a dangerous situation with anticipation of an abrupt change to the condition, for better or for worse. [A] crisis is often of short duration and will have an identifiable turning point(s). It tends to scale in a predictable manner. People believe their own actions might resolve a crisis. This is a key distinction between crisis and chaos. While people believe that they can negotiate to resolve a crisis, the mindset when faced with chaos is to survive, or “wait-out” the condition. HARD OR SOFT BIFURCATIONS. A crisis may be characterized by a bifurcation, which is a parameter-dependent change in dynamical behavior. A useful distinction exists between hard (abrupt) and soft (gradual) bifurcations. Hard bifurcation: the ice on a lake slowly warms (temperature is the bifurcation parameter) and suddenly breaks, dropping you into the cold lake. Soft bifurcation: an ice cube (temperature is again the bifurcation parameter) once at a temperature greater than or equal to 32 degrees slowly melts into a glass of Scotch. A soft bifurcation is clearly preferable, particularly because its impacts are dispersed over time. STRANGE ATTRACTORS (Has Nothing To Do With Gravity). As mathematically defined, a crisis occurs with the appearance of a strange attractor. The word “attractor” has nothing to do with gravitation. As in dynamic systems, attractors provide a way to describe the asymptotic behavior of typical orbits. Operationally, this means that there is a dramatic change in the dynamical behavior of the system. The present disconnects from the past and the past behavior has little or no predictive value as the system navigates its way through a profoundly altered landscape. An undetected, racing comet with a 20,000 year orbit could be a strange attractor that alters life on earth. HYPERINFLATION AS A STRANGE ATTRACTOR. In a fiat money economy, sudden-onset hyperinflation might be characterized as a strange attractor resulting in extraordinary behaviors in the country’s monetary system. For example, during the 1923 hyperinflation crisis of the Weimar Republic, “workers were often paid twice per day because prices rose so fast their wages were virtually worthless by lunchtime (1).” In addition, “[f]armers refused to take any form of paper money for their crops. The harvest of 1923 sat in farmers’ warehouses while supermarkets in the cities were empty. Starvation and civil unrest loomed (2).” WHAT IS CHAOS? “Chaos is a state of disorder that is amorphous and without clear turning points. Chaos quickly or gradually settles into outcome basins or creates a new mean. Chaos describes a system that will develop in unpredictable ways and will not scale linearly. It exists on a continuum with degrees of absorption by systems. A state of chaos, due to a lack of, or impossibility of, a scripted response will usually, if not inevitably, spread. Chaos affects the global consciousness, even if only temporarily. The 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami near Japan was a chaos event that killed 15,899 people and caused the Fukushima nuclear energy plant disaster. CITATIONS: (1) BBC. “Bitesize The Weimar Republic 1918-1929: The Hyperinflation Crisis, 1923.” https://www .bbc .co .uk /bitesize /guides /z9y64j6 /revision /5.; (2) Forbes. “In Hyperinflation’s Aftermath, How Germany Went Back to Gold.” Forbes .co m. June 9, 2011. https://www .forbes .com /2011 /06 /09 /germany -gold -standard.html ?sh =330426c35934. FOLLOW DR. PERRODIN: Twitter @SafetyPhD and subscribe to The Safety Doc YouTube channel & Apple Podcasts. SAFETY DOC WEBSITE, BLOG & BOOKS: www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David P. Perrodin, PhD. This podcast and blog post represent the opinions of David P. Perrodin and his guests to the show. The content here is for informational purposes only. Please consult with your safety professional regarding the unique needs of yourself or your organization.This is episode 174 of The Safety Doc Podcast published on 03-08-2022. GET the book VELOCITY OF INFORMATION. Purchase the preeminent book of scholarship for an uncertain epoch from your favorite bookstore or online retailer and recommend it as a purchase for your local library! The Velocity of Information: Human Thinking During Chaotic Times (2022) by David P. Perrodin.
Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Books:
- School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
- Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times. www.velocityofinformation.com
Tuesday Mar 15, 2022
Tuesday Mar 15, 2022
What is comorbid chaos, how is it different from other types of chaos, and what are its consequences for societies and individuals? Doc explains the markers of uncertain times and reads an excerpt from his book, The Velocity of Information: Human Thinking During Chaotic Times. COMORBID CHAOS. (Pages 144-45) “This fourth state of chaos includes qualities of Extended and International chaos events with the addition of one or more secondary, population-level chaos events that are intermediate and regional or extended and international. The secondary event happens concurrently with some or the entire primary event. In addition, chaos at this level oscillates in intensity. For example, there may be civil unrest affected by weather patterns (e.g., protests taper off on rainy days). Populations exhibit a lack of trust in government and authority. There is a corresponding loss of credibility by those in authority due to changing narratives.” EXAMPLES OF COMORBID CHAOS. Examples of comorbid chaos include The Great Depression from 1929 to 1939 confounded by the 1931–1939 Great Plains Dust Bowl and the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic in conjunction with racial justice protests. THE GREAT DEPRESSION. The Great Depression was the worst economic downturn in the history of the industrialized world, lasting from 1929 to 1939. In 1932, many politicians, businessmen, and journalists started to contemplate the possibility of massive revolution in the United States. In fact, thousands of the most desperate unemployed workers began raiding food stores (1). By 1933, when the Great Depression reached its lowest point, some fifteen million Americans were unemployed and nearly half the country’s banks had failed (2). Economic stability gradually returned in 1939 due, in part, to government New Deal projects that reformed financial systems and put people back to work. Many people who lived through the era distrusted banks and would no longer buy goods using credit. THE DUST BOWL. But before the economic improvement, the Dust Bowl intensified the crushing economic impacts of the Great Depression. In 1931, severe drought hit the Midwestern and Southern Plains of the United States. As crops died, crumbling topsoil from over-plowed and over-grazed land led to powerful dust storms that pummeled the region (3). “Residents crawled to safety in the dust (summer) storms and ‘snust’ (winter) storms. Many towns were abandoned (4)” Hundreds of people succumbed to what doctors at the time called “dust pneumonia,” a respiratory illness caused by tiny inorganic particles in the windblown dust (5). Famine gripped the region as it was impossible to sustain livestock. “Cattle went blind and suffocated. When farmers cut them open, they found stomachs stuffed with fine sand (6).” RECENT EXAMPLES OF COMORBID CHAOS. Since March 2020, there have been two instances of comorbid chaos in the world. PANDEMIC AND SOCIAL JUSTICE PROTESTS. The epoch of March 2020 through January 2022 was marked by the pandemic as the primary event with episodic anti-racism demonstrations serving as the secondary event. INFLATION AND WORLD CONFLICT. The consumer price index climbed 7% in 2021, the largest 12-month gain since June 1982, according to Labor Department data. Gasoline prices also approached $5 a gallon in many parts of the United States. Inflation, which many pundits speculate to be higher and more severe than official statistics, brought further instability to the roaring housing market and faltering supply chain. On February 24, 2022, Russian invaded Ukraine, leading to military conflict, over 2 million people fleeing Ukraine, and widespread sanctions applied to Russia. The world was brought closer to the first use of nuclear weapons since World War II. CITATIONS: (1) Marx, Jerry D. “American Social Policy in the Great Depression and World War II.” VCU Libraries Social Welfare History Project. 2011. http://socialwelfare.library .vcu .edu /eras /great -depression /american -social -policy -in -the -great -depression-and -wwii. (2) History.com Editors, Great Depression History. (3) American Experience. “Surviving the Dust Bowl. Timeline: The Dust Bowl.” PBS. n.d. https://www .pbs .org /wgbh /americanexperience /features /dust -bowl -surviving-dust -bowl/. (4) Gordon, Dan. “When Deadly Dirt Devastated the Southern Plains.” The Denver Post. May 12, 2011. https://www .denverpost .com /2011 /05 /12 /when -deadly-dirt -devastated -the -southern -plains. (5) Williford, James. “Children of the Dust. The Dirty Thirties as Witnessed by People Who Were Actually There.” Humanities 33, no. 6. National Endowment for the Humanities. November/December 2012. https://www .neh .gov /humanities /2012 /novemberdecember /feature /children -the -dust (6) Gordon, Deadly Dirt. FOLLOW DR. PERRODIN: Twitter @SafetyPhD and www.safetyphd.com. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David P. Perrodin, PhD. This is episode 173 of The Safety Doc Podcast published on 03-15-2022.
GET DOC’S BOOKS. Purchase the preeminent book of scholarship for an uncertain epoch from your favorite bookstore or online retailer and recommend it as a purchase for your local library! The Velocity of Information: Human Thinking During Chaotic Times (2022) by David P. Perrodin.
Purchase Dr. Perrodin’s Books:
- School of Errors – Rethinking School Safety in America. www.schooloferrors.com
- Velocity of Information - Human Thinking During Chaotic Times. www.velocityofinformation.com