Letters: Lessons for homeless | Overestimating AI
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Refugee camp affords
classes for homeless
Re: “What did $116M yield in homeless fixes?” (Web page B1, Might 15).
Monday’s article on San Jose’s $116 million spending on applications to alleviate its homeless disaster ought to increase the query of how that sum of money might be spent with nearly no influence on the 6,700 or so homeless inhabitants. Inept involves thoughts.
I recommend a small job drive goes to check how the refugee camps housing a whole bunch of hundreds of Syrian refugees in Jordan and elsewhere perform. For instance, the Za’atari refugee camp in Jordan homes roughly 78,000 Syrian refugees in a large tent metropolis. Tents of all sizes from single-occupant to family-sized tents with a number of rooms and kitchens are current. Germany offered a $15 million photo voltaic system for electrical energy. The French army has a surgical staff offering surgical procedure for conflict wounded.
I think that beneficial classes might be realized and a small fraction of that $116 million would supply a good tent neighborhood for six,700 folks.
Norman Miller
San Jose
Overestimating AI
creates personal issues
Re: “How will we management AI genie?” (Web page A6, Might 16).
Garey Johnson’s letter of Might 16 relays his justified concern about synthetic intelligence. The problem of making accountable AI merchandise is one thing that we’ve barely begun to handle. The ebook “Rebooting AI,” by Gary Marcus and Ernest Davis, is a good useful resource for understanding the problem and promise of AI applied sciences.
Johnson additionally illustrates a main short-term problem of the know-how, as he ascribes to AI capabilities far past what’s there, resembling the flexibility to “produce a novel that rivals the talent and creativity of our most gifted writers.”
This tendency to overestimate the skills of present AI results in severe issues. Individuals get medical recommendation from an AI chatbot and assume that it’s the finest, or belief their Tesla “Full Self-Driving” mode to drive them extra safely than a human driver. These aren’t good selections, and our schooling and rules have to sustain.
Jim Von De Bur
San Jose
Local weather resilient faculties
supply essential motion objects
Re: “Why state should spend money on local weather resilient faculties” (Web page A6, Might 4).
Many because of Mary Ann Dewan’s name to motion for faculties to handle local weather change. It’s crucial to maintain faculties open throughout excessive climate, via actions together with retrofitting buildings with renewable vitality, changing heat-producing blacktops with greener alternate options, and out of doors studying via faculty gardens.
Faculty gardens, cover bushes and shaded seating tackle college students’ psychological, emotional and bodily well being. Arms-on, experiential studying in pure areas in schoolyards is well-documented to scale back stress, enhance attitudes about studying and data retention, and assist more healthy our bodies via rising vegetables and fruit and bodily exercise. And native habitat gardens create islands of biodiversity, enabling understanding of the significance of habitats for wildlife, and creating an consciousness of nature in our lives, our neighborhoods, and sure, our faculties.
Inexperienced schoolyards and gardens play an vital function in assist of environmental literacy that equips college students with the data and know-how to handle our environmental challenges.
Vicki Moore
Los Altos
Financial institution failure just isn’t
regulators’ fault
Re: “Regulators didn’t assess SVB dangers: report” (Web page C7, Might 10).
