Welcome! And don't judge the  blog by its "cover", please.   

Appearances can be deceiving.

 

 What I Do: Dr. Voroshilov: from A to Z; (Professional past, present, and future of a driven professional, an eloquent expert, a productive author, and a collaborative colleague)

Who I Am: Dr. Voroshilov: A Peek Inside!

·      

          The Full List Of Posts

·                Politics

·                Artificial Intelligence

·                Fundamentals of Quantum Physics 

·                Full List Of Post On Education

·                Philosophy Of Education

·                Strategies For Teaching Science

·                From The Top Of My Head: a collection of random ideas

Two short video presentations:

1. Open Classroom Initiative: invest in the first world-wide open library of lessons

2. Invest in EdTech and disrupt K12 education

Specific projects for addressing different areas of education and science of education.

 1. Entry125253: High Frequency Data Streams in Education 
(link to the full text)

2. Entry124656: objective measures of physics knowledge 
(link to the full text)
 
3. Entry125317: National database teacher PD 
(link to the full text)
 
4. Entry124655: role of NSF in funding education
(link to the full text) 

5. Entry125719: The new type of a science course for science teachers.  
(link to the full text) 

6. Entry126205: The development of the uniform standard for measuring content knowledge in physics.
(link to the full presentation)

Executive Summary of Professional Experience
(An excerpt from the full description of my path)

(I) Teaching

(A) Groups

5th-graders; 6-th graders; 7-th graders; 8-th graders; 9-th graders; 10-th graders; 11-th graders; 12-th graders; 2-year college students; 4-year college students; university students; school teachers; school administrators; district administrators.
(B) Subjects

Physics for Engineers (two semesters); Elementary Physics (two semesters); algebra, geometry; trigonometry; formal logic; problem solving; group theory (discreet and continuous); methods for teaching science courses; methods for advancing individual teaching practice; managing innovations in education (initiation, implementation, growth, support, assessment, audit).

(II) Managing/Consulting

Assistant to Director of an Institute; Director of Department of computerization and information technologies; Director of Center for Development of City School system; member or a team, leader of a group of consultants for schools and school districts (initiation, implementation, growth, support, assessment, audit of innovations in education).

(III) Learning

graduated from schools with high GPA; participated in a wide range of extracurricular activities; developed personal approach to teaching (flipped the classroom before the approach was described in publications); published papers on various aspects of advancing education; converted publications into PhD theses and then found an adviser; moved to a country without knowing the language; learned the language; learned how to teach using foreign language; started publishing in foreign language.

P.S. A large portion of my ideas come to me while I am in traffic or in a swimming pool. During the day there is not often much of a time to formalize them in a fashionable way. Most of my post are written in one seating as a raw flaw of thoughts. This blog is the best I can do. Well, so far - let's wait for retirement (and the memoir! ). However, I welcome anyone who would like to coauthor a piece and transform it from my "singing as you go" to a fashionable publishable form - polish statements, new points, references, ... . And also, if someone would find in any of my posts a useful idea and used it, I would appreciate a reference to the original.
(C) Education Advancement Professionals consulting services

We, Humans, are the only anti-entropic force in the whole Universe! Everyone has to do his/her part in fighting chaos! That's why the Universe crated us.
P.S.S.
From On the Definition of AI: 

"This is what teachers can do! From the NASA's "Brief History of Rockets"
https://www.grc.nasa.gov/www/k-12/TRC/Rockets/history_of_rockets.html

“In 1898, a Russian schoolteacher, Konstantin Tsiolkovsky (1857-1935), proposed the idea of space exploration by rocket. In a report he published in 1903, Tsiolkovsky suggested the use of liquid propellants for rockets in order to achieve greater range. Tsiolkovsky stated that the speed and range of a rocket were limited only by the exhaust velocity of escaping gases. For his ideas, careful research, and great vision, Tsiolkovsky has been called the father of modern astronautics.”

What is the difference between an expert and a professional?

A professional does what is needed to be done.

An expert explains - why.  

How do people become professionals?

By accumulating professional experience.

How do people become experts?

By reflecting on accumulated professional experience.                                                        

A Master is an expert professional.

My Mentors taught me a secret of becoming a master teacher:

There are ONLY two rules for becoming a Master

1. Learn from the Masters;  

2. Never stop pushing yourself.

"In order to be able to think you have to risk being offensive" (From Jordan B. Peterson), because ability to take risk is correlated with curiosity (only curious people are capable of taking risk; people who play it safe have no curiosity and hence a vision). 

Disclaimer 
I am an "investigative blogger". I insert myself into a situation I study and then I expose all BS I found there (BTW: BS means "beyond sense-making). I  am not an idiot or a reckless person. I am a person who has strong opinions on matters (I believe U.S. needs more people like that, people who can lay out strong reasons for their statements and take a "blow" of a disagreement). The reason I can allow myself writing what I think, even if that is perpendicular to commonly adopted and conventional views, is that my financial situation is sufficient and stable. Of course, as a normal person, I wouldn't mind making more money, or being involved in more interesting projects (as described in my generic resume). But I do not have to pretend to be someone I'm not to make my living. I am aware of the fact that my chance to find many professionals with views similar to mine is slim. The demand for "professional correctness" is taken to such an extreme that it has become a demand for personal conformity. I believe in telling truth. Truth is facts. Facts are science. I believe in science. Facts can be upsetting or encouraging, but facts cannot be offensive. As a master in my field, I have no reservation to offer my critique of people whose actions overlap with the field of my expertise (human intelligence). I know (and fine with that) that the chance that my writing will have a significant effect is negligible. But the butterfly effect exists, so the chance is not exactly zero.

Welcome! 
Thank you for visiting!
And don't judge the blog by its "cover", please. 
Appearances can be deceiving.

If

than you should not read this blog.

Although, if you can't handle the truth, you cannot solve any problem, because the first step of a problem-solving process is accepting the fact that you have a problem.
 

P.S. All I want to do

The Difference Between Online Learning and Remote Teaching

A recent piece “The Difference Between Emergency Remote Teaching and Online Learning” provides an attempt to analyze the difference between the two forms of distribute education.

Essentially, at first the authors describe general features of their version of online leaning:

and then state that an emergency remote teaching is “to provide temporary access to instruction and instructional supports in a manner that is quick to set up and is reliably available during an emergency or crisis.”

This difference only reflects the circumstances of the teaching-learning process: “online leaning” means the course has been developed during a long period of time with all content and technological elements designed specifically for being delivered via the Internet and then carefully tested before being employed; “emergency remote teaching” means “we create an online course but we do it in a hurry”, using the author’s terminology, it could have been called “emergency online leaning”.

First, I would like to make some notes:

The type of content delivery (modality) is missing the layered classroom format when at the same time some students are present in a classroom, when others connect remotely, or study later.

The time of the direct communication between students and an instructor during the content delivery (instructor role online) is missing the fact that “active instruction online” can have two forms: active content delivery or active tutoring.

The type of the progress control (pacing) is missing a group-paced option when a class is divided in groups (based on a chosen criterion).

The type of student activities (student role online) does not include direct communication with an instructor.

The size of the class (student-instructor ratio) is too formal - when 1000 students take the same online course (developed by one person) calling it “a class” makes not much sense.

The amount of direct communication (online communication synchrony) does not specify if that is student-instructor communication of student-student communication.

The forms of teaching (pedagogy) represent a standard list - all those forms are not specific for online learning, and none of those forms exists in a pure state, in reality it is always a combination.

Source of feedback is less relevant than the goal of feedback and has to serve that goal: goals may be set based on different criteria, for example, based on the time line (from immediate - to adjust a specific feature of a course, to the global - the end of the course).

Role of online assessment is no different from the role of any assessment, so technically is not the part of “online learning” per se.

However, more importantly, the difference between online learning and remote teaching is deeper than just “long-time in preparation” v. “we need it now”.

A “pure” online course is the course where all students can perform all learning activities independently from any other subject involved in the course (an instructor, or a student, or anyone else), meaning that all essential learning activities are the same for every student (they form the course), and every student is in the control of when to participate in those activities. Secondary/complementary activities, like tutoring, group collaboration, depend on the individual traits of a student (e.g. the background). A student taking such a course in ideal circumstance should be able to do it with no communication at all, without talking to anyone. The quality of the course is based on the quality of the developed course content entities (hence, on the expertise of the developers), and on the technologies used to organize student learning process.

A “pure” remote course is essentially a “on-site course without students in a room”, i.e. a course that is as close as possible to an actual on-site course, but in which all students participate remotely. A student taking such a course must participate in the same learning activities as if he/she would be taking this course on a campus. The quality of the course is based on the quality of the developed course content entities, the quality of  the technologies used to organize student learning process, and the quality of the instructions provided by an instructor.

The main activities of an instructor involved in an online course (“purity” is assumed) are focused on the development (a) of content of the course – lecture modules, assignments, assessments, laboratory activities – in the form appropriate for independent online consumption; (b) of guidelines for students; (c) of tools for students to follow the guidelines when working on the content. When the course has been developed and tested the main activities of an instructor are tutoring and assessing feedback.

The main activities of an instructor involved in a remote course are (a) content development in the form appropriate for live online consumption; (b) developing/testing/employing tools for live content delivery; (c) delivering the content (a.k.a. teaching); (d) developing/testing/employing tools for live communication with students; (e) developing guidelines for students.

Of course, every actual course represents a specific combination of those two “pure” forms, with one form may be dominating over another one (an online course with elements of a remote course, or v.v.).

Dr. Valentin Voroshilov

Education Advancement Consulting

There are many publications advising how to teach remotely/online, for example:
“The Hottest Job in Higher Education”

or
“50+ Tools For Remote and Distance Learning”

Why Do People Have To Work?

This post is a part of a series: the previous one is “In politics Thinking makes all the difference”.
___
The coronavirus pandemic forces us to reassess our answers to the fundamental question: “Why do people have to work?”

Due to social (meaning actual physical) distancing and a severe economic circumstances millions of people have been displaced from work and now the unemployment level has crossed 4 % and keeps climbing. Millions of people have no prospect of going back to work any soon.

No doubt, that has brought a devastating effect on millions of people because they have lost the source of their income and no one can predict when they would be able to work again.

There are also millions of people who didn't suffer a job loss. Those people have not suffered devastating consequences related to loss of income. Of course, those people may experience a certain loss of comfort: e.g. they cannot go to a restaurant or movie, but fundamentally their life did not suffer a severe quality loss.

In this situation the government stepped in. People who lost their jobs are getting a support from government through funds specifically created and delivered to those people, even though those people do not provide any input into the economy.

So, why do people have to work if they can be paid without working?

The standard answer is people have to work to make money in order to have a living.

But now there is a clear and abundant evidence that this is not a case.

But if the work is not for keeping people alive, then what is it for?

The answer actually comes from people who have a lot of money and hence who don't have to work at all but keep doing that.

If you ask any rich working person why does he/she work, the standard answer is “Because I like it, because it fulfills me, it gives me a sense of purpose” and many similar. In one word the reason for keeping working is self-realization.

Well, if we dig deeper we will also find out that many of those people think of themselves as special. The believe that they have special qualities that have allowed them to achieve their current position when they can work just for self-realization. But other people could not achieve the same social position because those other people did not have required qualities. If you ask a rich self-realized person why do other people have to work, the answer is to make money to sustain their living.

The world looks very simple form the point of view of the rich self-realized people: there are they, and there are others. They have special qualities and deserve social position that allows them not to work, but they work anyway because they like it. Others have no such special qualities and have to work to survive.

In a way, that is exactly correct – we live in a two-tier society.

There are three natural follow-up questions: (1) why do we live in such a society, (2) what is the reason for someone falls into one or another category , and (3) do we have to live in such society forever?

The answers are:

(1) This is just a historic tradition based on the natural evolution of the human society.

(2) Luck.

(3) No.

The first answer does not need much of an explanation beyond having a C+ in a history classes. Human society evolves, it has evolved through many different social forms and now we all live in one of those forms called “capitalism” (more specifically “am abusive greed-based capitalism”, or “monetary feudalism”).

The second answer is also obvious, it you think about it. Luck, good or bad, starts from parents who provide genetic material and the initial culture (“an apply does not fall far from a tree”) that surrounds a growing person for the most important period of his/her life – the period of a brain development and a character formation (that may last from ~13 to ~22 years). There are also other important factors like the group of friends, the quality of teachers (especially in the elementary school). There is a saying:

The Google AI translation is literal, hence wrong; the English analog is tell me whom you live with and I will tell you who you are.

The first years of growing up greatly affect the brain development, especially important the way children are being taught.

A brain is basically a thinking muscle.

Like for every muscle in our body, the development of brain is directly related to the exercises a brain has to perform while developing. Everyone is focusing on the intensity of exercises – “practice makes perfect”, “if you didn’t succeed first time try and try again”. But in reality, the most important factor is the variety of the exercises.

As I write in “Fundamental Laws of TeachOlogy”: “If the only exercise students had been doing for 12 years is squats, they will not be good at push-ups and pull-ups. Do not expect from students an ability to think if all the had to do for 12 years was memorizing facts and rules”.

And in “What Does It Mean To Be Smart” I write: “An ability to run has its own physiological basis - legs. An ability to reason (including being smart), also has a specific physiological basis - a developed brain.” And in order to achieve a top social level one must have an ability to reason – with other people, because, as I write in “A Curios Case of a Risky Entrepreneur”: “The most important quality of every successful entrepreneur is not his or her knowledge, technical skills, or even intelligence, but communicability – an ability to convince people in their ideas.”

Unfortunately, nowadays there is only one factors that decides who will be propelled to the top social level and who will not – luck. Kids who are lucky to be born and grown up in the right conditions have a high probability to get to the top, and will achieve the status when they will not have to work for a living. And all other people, who do not have such a good luck, who did not have either good parents, or friends, or teachers (due to the lack of good en mass public education) are destine to work simply to provide food to the table.

And anyone who believes that this system is fair should stop reading this article.

I, however, do not believe that social stratification based on luck is a fair game.

And I believe that there is a better way to structure a society. That is why the third answer is “No”.

The way people live is bound by the rules people accept. Rules include laws, but also go beyond those.

Rules/laws are not given by gods, by written, and rewritten, and then corrected, and then changed again – many many times of the course of the human history – by people. Rules evolve, like everything else. Hence, when people want to change the rules they can do that (that includes the rules for changing rules).

Current economic rules/laws are based on certain economic models.

All existing or past economic models are based on essentially the same premise - that in order to live a person must be need to other persons.

I am not talking about slavery, well, not just about it. Slavery was pure representation of this principle. One person was a property of another one, same as a hammer or a chandelier. Those times went away (mostly). But the principle remains unchanged. The realization just has become more subtle.

Now, in order to make a living one has to be able to satisfy someone else’s needs for – well, something, anything: cooking, delivering food, writing a code, etc.

If one cannot do anything – one does not deserve to live.

Naturally, a society was able to correct this principle for certain categories of people – children, old people, sick people, but as they say, exceptions only prove the rule.

If no one needs anything from you - you are worthless.

This is the cornerstone of all economic models – past and current (including MMT).

This principle automatically favors people who have been blessed with good luck. Due to good luck of being born and grown up in right circumstances those people possess skills that make them useful for other people. 

If someone can be useful to one but a very rich person, or to poor but many persons, that someone climbs up the social ladder.

Otherwise, ...

_____________

To be cont.

AI v. a kitten: or what is AI cloning?

Some time ago my niece  saved a little kitten. She found him on the street and took home. Now he is a happy strong 6-month old hunter.

The other day he went into a yard and saw a bird on the ground. The moment he saw a bird his whole posture immediately changed. He almost fell on the ground and started slowly crawling toward the bird. His years were trembling; he was slowly gliding along the ground; only his elbows were moving. Kind of like in this pictures.

How did he know how to hunt?

No one taught him.

He was taken from his mother and left on a street when he was very little and naturally my niece didn't teach this kitten how to do it.

So where does the hunting knowledge come from?

The answer is obvious. That knowledge has been stored, built-in in his DNA code. The DNA has the information, not just about the bones and muscles and how the body grows and structures; but also the information about the behavior in specific situations. There are actions that get ignited automatically because those reactions are built-in in the DNA, and hence no one has to teach when and how to activate those actions.

When a kitten is born, his DNA is not a “tabula rasa”.

When AI is “born” it is completely empty. People have to invent and then employ a specific training protocol to teach AI how to do some specific task – one specific task, like recognizing words, or recognizing pictures.

And when one AI is trained to do that, there is no way to just replicate this AI into another AI system. Another AI that needs to do the same that must be trained from scratch.

On the contrary, if we would take a DNA from a kitten and cloned it the new kitten would have the same “skills (i.e. reactions) the original kitten had.

AI has no DNA like that.

No one can clone AI. Every new functioning AI that has to function like already functioning AI has to be trained from scratch.

To my best knowledge, no none in AI field is even working on cloning AI. No one works on “AI DNA” that can be reproduced so the training for new AI system in the same field would not have to go from scratch.

The search does not give anything on this. 

There is a term “digital cloning” but it means using one specific AI to make copies of digital objects (sounds, images).

That is why using AI is too expensive. Every new AI that needs to be used in the same field with the same functions (i.e. image recognition) has to go through a long and extensive an expensive process of training. The development of that process requires highly skilled professionals. But even then many AI systems make mistakes or have some bias. 

That is why anything your read about AI is GREATLY exaggerated.

Things will not change much until the invention and perfection of AI cloning, that will eliminate the extensive training for AI working in similar fields.

But so far the field does not even have enough people who can developed and execute an effective AI training.

For more on what is actually going on in AI field: https://www.cognisity.how/p/arti.html

Dr. Valentin Voroshilov

How ignorance and bad instructions fuel a pandemic.

COVID_19 epidemic has conquered the planet Earth.

Read this on covid19 and vaccination:

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.24.20042937v1
_____
Today, the emphasis in the fighting coronavirus falls on the social distancing. That would be a perfect strategy if it would be possible to contain everyone for two weeks, preventing everyone from any contact in any form from anyone else. The key word is everyone. Clearly, that is impossible. 

Hence everyone has to be vigilant in protecting himself or herself from an infection.

And theoretically, everyone already knows how to prevent himself/herself from getting a virus, as well as what to do for not spreading it around.

For example, recently all media had stories about people voting in primaries and wearing a mask while doing that.

But as we see in the picture, some voters didn’t care to protect their hands. It is not a big deal if that person follows the instructions provided by the CDC, starting from “wash your hands”. But what if he/she doesn’t?

And even if people wash hands regularly, they may not do it the way they are supposed to. Check this instructions, for example (placed in a gym just two days before being closed for public).

The instruction says “Wash your hands … for at least 20 seconds”.

Some school students even made a video about washing hands.

We can see in the video how students rub their hands for twenty second – while keeping the hands in water. That is what people reading the gym instruction could think of doing, too.

But that is a wrong way to wash your hands.

CDC says that soap should be on skin for at least 20 seconds (an example of good instructions).

In order to kill a virus soap has to be in a contact with it for at least 20 seconds. If you start immediately washing soap off your skin you may leave an active virus on your skin.

This example demonstrates that people at that school are ignorant.

An ignorant is not a bad word, it is a scientific term.

In science it is very common to use one term (or even a symbol) that represents a whole sentence.

For example, instead of saying “the rate of change of velocity” a physicists says “acceleration”.

In psychology, an idiot is person who does not use an ability to think (due to specific psychological issues often rooted in the early culture of the person).

A stupid is a person who has no ability to think due to genetic deficiencies.

And an ignorant is a person who does not have in his/her memory relevant information.

Why someone is an ignorant?

There might be several different reasons for that.

For example, one is a monk, a social outcast, someone who does not have information channels to/from the world.

Or, one may refuse to accept information one receives.

Or, one may have bad instructions from relevant people (or in general – bad education).

The latter reason is widely common, starting from the fact that many school teachers are incapable of providing good instructions to their students (mostly because teachers themselves had no good instructions on how to teach).

In our example, when an ignorant person does not wash hands according to the right instruction, he/she is definitely at a higher risk of getting and transmitting a virus.

This is why ignorance of some is a danger for all.

Next what CDC tells people to do is cleaning up surfaces they may touch, and not touching uncleaned or unknown surfaces with bare hands.

Why shouldn’t people be touching uncleaned or unknown surfaces with bare hands if they will wash those hands anyway?

Because people are … well … people. They forget things. They have many uncontrollable habits. Between touching a surface and washing hands may pass an hour, and there is a study that shows that a person can touch his/her face up to twenty times in one hour. That is why it is handy to have gloves, or tissues and use them when needed. Gloves or tissues may already be out of stock, but a zip bag or a plastic bag may work as well (one may get a roll of plastic bags, similar to bags in stores).

The problem is to keep in mind what you just did. If you used a tissue and your eye is itching, do not rub it with that tissue. On the contrary, if you used your hand to turn a doorknob, and your eye is itching, take a tissue and rub an eye with it (or use another hand – if it is clean).

To minimize a risk of getting a virus we all now have to be in a constant control of all our feelings and actions.

And that is NOT what we used to do every day.

Self-observation and self-control do not come naturally with genes by birth. When born, we all just have a set of various predispositions. But those predispositions evolve into habits and skills only as the result of the cultural influence on us during our first ten to fifteen years. No doubt Albert Einstein had good genes. But if he would have been left in a jungle with monkeys, he would become a monkey – a very smart one, but still a monkey. Without his family, books, and friends he would never be able to create any of his theories.

Nowadays, parents with children experience a huge stress because children do not have yet a developed sense of self-control, they can touch anything and then lick their fingers. But there are also many grownups who due to lack of right culture (good education) still often act like children and also do not have much of self-control. Those people have a higher probability of picking up a virus and transmitting it to others.

This is why poor education of some is a danger for all.

Now, let’s move on to cleaning surfaces.

Many sources repeat the same list of products that kill a virus.

And there are many videos showing how cleaning is happening. But in many publications and videos we cannot see how exactly the cleaning process was organized. All we can see is people rubbing doorknobs, switches, remote controls, phones, rails, counters, etc.  Sometimes in the news you can see people spraying a solution on a surface and then wiping it up …

… immediately, like in this video (at t = 1 min 18 s).

I myself saw the other day an employee at a supermarket who was doing exactly the same while cleaning up the carts.

It is very uncommon that a news person would also tell us that the CDC list also provides how much time one or another solution needs to act on a virus to kill it.

For example, if you spray Ultra Clorox, wait for 4 minutes and 30 seconds and then clear it up, it still will be not enough to kill the virus, because CDC says this solution needs 5 minutes to do that.

People who are ignorant of the time requirement put us all (including themselves) at risk. But they do that because people who had to provide them with good instructions – managers – did not do their job.

Since 2016, I’ve been writing about the decline in the quality of management in America (the full list in Appendix I), for example:

Why Did Russian Cyber Forces Beat Their U.S. Adversaries in 2016?

In politics thinking makes all the difference.

Greed - the American cancer that killed good management.

The Biggest Fakes and Breakthroughs of The Next Decade.

The Degradation of The White Male American Elite

Confessions of a Creative Brain

The COVID_19 pandemic only strengthens all those arguments.

Finally, let’s talk about lowering health risks in general.

One can find on the internet statements that garlic does not kill a virus, or a vitamin C does not kill the virus. And that is correct. But that does NOT mean garlic and vitamins are useless. The best remedy against any virus is a good healthy strong immune system. Anything that is good for an immune system is good, and anything that is bad for it is bad. Simple as that. When I travel to Russia I always buy there some immune boosters. Some of them recommended by a doctor, some by a pharmacist. They have been around for decades. Just as an example, one of the oldest is Interferon, or its newer version Виферон or Viferon.

But there are other, too. Many of those drugs, actually the vast majority of them, have been developed and produced by European companies and brought to the Russian market. But no American physician has ever mentioned to me any of them. Because American pharmaceutical market is one of the closest markets in the world. Pharmaceutical companies use FDA as a gate keeper, to keep competitors out. This is just one example of how greed of a few negatively affects the wellbeing of many.

In the end, I want to share my personal method to boost my immune system when I feel it is under attack.

When my son was very little he was very susceptible to any kind of a flu. Every year he was spending many days being sick. We went through many doctors, and many books searching for the way to make him stronger. My then wife even became a medical student to study pediatrics. Once upon a time we came across a book written by a pediatrician practicing in our city. My wife used her connections to make an appointment. I do not remember the name of that doctor, the title of the book, or anything he told us, except one advice. When we see that our sun may be getting sick, we need to start doing contrast showers. A contrast shower is a very simple thing – you stay for two-three minutes in a very hot water (not burning hot, but as much as you can stand), and then you turn off all hot water and crank up cold one. First time – just for a second, and then you switch water back to hot. Get warmed up again and in a couple of minutes repeat the “cold torture”, but now for a second or two longer. Do it four or five times; the last water before you shut the shower off should be cold (guilty – I do not follow this rule anymore). Repeat the sessions every four hours. During the illness, do it every day for four or five days in a row, even at night. Many years later I learned a term for this method – a healthy stress. The doctor told us that during each contras shower session our body ejects from some organs and injects in our blood some natural ferments or hormones that boost our immunities – don’t remember any details, though. When the time came to do this at home, at first I had to show my son that this was OK, so I did it myself when he was watching. Since then both of us use this method to boost our immune system – as soon as we feel that we may be coming down with a bug (damn you - sneezing-coughing-spitting-handy people). My son grew up strong and healthy (knock on wood), and so far, I have been avoiding any major flu-related issues (knock on wood, spitting over the left shoulder). Sometimes I do eat some garlic (and use in my nostrils some ointment that I got from Russia). And usually, after a shower I take hot tea with a lot of honey – the best sign that it works is if I get all sweaty.

But, maybe this works only for me. Maybe, this is just a placebo effect. I don’t care, as long as it keeps me out of a flu.

In conclusion, the #1 rule to fight an epidemic is - be smart.

Treat yourself like you are at the same time a virus carrier and a healthy guy (sort of like the Schrodinger's cat). 

If you were a virus carrier you would have to do all you can to prevent a virus get from you to others. If you are a healthy guy, you want to do everything you can to keep a virus away. So - THINK!

Today, the emphasis in the fighting coronavirus falls on the social distancing. That would be a perfect strategy if it would be possible to contain everyone for two weeks, preventing everyone from any contact in any form from anyone else. The key word is everyone. Clearly, that is impossible. That is why the government needs to employ creative measures, for example, in addition to cleaning up shopping carts using the proper strategy, greeting every customer with a pair of gloves, and simply do not allow anyone without gloves to shop. In the light of a two trillion dollar relief package, this measure would cost a tiny fraction of it, but would greatly lower the risk of transmitting a virus from one person to another.

Thank you, World for our existence!

Dr. Valentin Voroshilov

A good illustration of the point: during the epidemic wearing a mask on an airplane must be a standard action, but it isn't.

 Appendix I

Why Did Russian Cyber Forces Beat Their U.S. Adversaries in 2016?

Why Didn't Hillary Clinton Win The Race?

The Biggest Fakes and Breakthroughs of The Next Decade.

How is U.S. education reform entangled with U.S.S.R.

How much of the NSF funded fundamental scientific educational research is really fundamental?

“Being Polite” versus “Being Nice”: social implications of both.

“A Convenient Lie” or “What Research University Faculty Tell Themselves About Their Teaching”

What Would Businesses Do if No Foreign Students Could Come In the Country Anymore?

"Backpack Full of Cash": pointing at a problem without offering a solution

Will Artificial Intelligence Save, Replace or even Affect Education Practices? (a venture capitalist’s view)

Will the Yidan Prize Affect the Evolution of Education? Too Soon to Say 

Ignoring sloppiness: a sign of tolerance or mismanagement?

When conforming to conformity leads to a social deterioration.

Seven Reasons Why Rich Philanthropists Fail at Making Systemic Changes in Education

The Beginning of The End of The Chan-Zuckerberg Initiative

The Degradation of The White Male American Elite

Vision v. Imagination: what does a venture capitalist use?

Publicity v. The Mission; a tough decision For The NSF.

 

Why Have Hundreds of Millions of Dollars Been Spent on Development the Common Core Math Standards?

Venting Out About Customer Services

The mission Of Charter Schools

No sign for improving math education soon.  

Why Americans are Starting To Lose the World Race for Prosperity?

A case of a Dumb Decision. How IT Screwed us. Again.

Professional communication: a case study.

In Management Thinking Makes All The Difference

Why does Seth Moulton run for the President and what does it say about the Democrats?

“People have to get over this idea that because the guy is rich he’s that smart”

The Strategy to Curb The Student Loans Debt Crisis.

Congress v. Facebook: A Sad Story About Intelligence.

Monetary Feudalism, State Capitalism, or Why Does Putin Smile?

Confessions of a Creative Brain