The Future of Expertise
Today on Dad Strength
The future of expertise
PNF stretching?
A book, a quote, and a dad joke
Next week, this email will look different. Possibly worse. I’ll be shifting to a different email service – and that means plain-text emails without any bells or whistles. I’m not sure if you care much about how polished these things are (I’m guessing not very much) but I’m also hoping that nothing goes horribly wrong (i.e. check your spam folder if you don’t hear from me).
The future of expertise
The founder of Google’s generative AI teams says that the new generation of students shouldn’t bother getting a degree in either law or medicine. This is much like someone in 2010 saying that books will be useless because the wide proliferation of 3D TVs – and virtual reality will completely upend the way we learn. Sure. Ok. But let’s hedge our bets just a little.
The Lawnmower Man (above), a wonderfully terrible movie about VR, isn’t my only movie reference today. I also have a deeper cut for you: a 1994 movie called To Live (活着) by Chinese director Zhang Yimou. This one covers Chinese history – the 1940s to the 1970s – in huge strides. How accurate was it? Accurate enough to get banned by the Chinese government. The scene I’m going to tell you about was undoubtedly part of that decision.
The central character’s daughter is ready to give birth but she’s haemorrhaging. The problem is that this is midway through the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) and all of the doctors have been sent to the countryside (or beaten to death) for being intellectuals or “reactionaries.” This leaves them left in the medical care of a bunch of untrained Red Guards – qualified primarily by their fervour for the current government.
Since everything went great for everyone and there are absolutely no lessons to learn from this, let’s come back to formal education. In my experience, there are two types of degrees that transfer well into seemingly unrelated work. One is law and the other is engineering. That’s because they both demand critical thinking skills that can be tested against clear standards. On the other hand, maybe we should just let the opportunists who have bet the entire U.S. economy on artificial intelligence dictate what our kids should learn.*
This message was approved by The Great Helmsman
PNF stretching
I’m still waiting for my stretching piece to drop (the Bluejays are taking up space in Canadian news right now – for good reason), so let me drop a supplementary bit of information. Especially because you’re more savvy than the average exerciser, FRIEND.
PNF (proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation) is one of the categories of stretching (along with static, dynamic, and ballistic). It’s also the closest you’ll probably come to a magical spell. Here, you take yourself to end-range. In the straight-leg raise – shown above – you’ll begin with your knee locked out and only go as far as you can without bending it. To take this from static to PNF, you’ll grab your own leg in order to hold it in place. You’ll then start to push down – and away from the stretch – but block any movement with your hands, a belt, the wall, etc. Push down with some force for a three-count and then take a breath before raising your leg even higher. This is most often done three times but you can just keep rinsing and repeating until you stop gaining height.
Why does it work so well? That’s the best part! It doesn’t really matter.
What I’m reading/have written
Against Platforms by Mike Pepi
A quote
“What we think of as health risks associated with being fat may in fact be health risks of experiencing discrimination and internalizing stigma.”
— Aubrey Gordon
A dad joke
I told my son, “There’s only one thing scary about Halloween.”
He said, “Which is…”
I told him, “Exactly.”