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Germany

German TV Explores Sex Among Seniors

Curious about the sex lives of the over-70 crowd? Even intimate relations among 50-somethings is usually not talked about. And teens? Now all is revealed on German television.

Laying it bare on German prime time
Laying it bare on German prime time

BERLIN — What’s sex like for couples over 50? How about for those 70 or older? Do they have sex regularly? Is the experience pretty much as it was when they were 20, except that their bodies are older? Or do hormonal changes mean that sex becomes a wholly different experience?

These and other questions about sexuality in older age are the subject of the the German docu-series Make Love, whose second installment is being planned. The successful TV program has just been nominated for 2014's Grimme Online Award, and many people have read the accompanying book by Danish sexologist Ann-Marlene Henning, the driving force behind the series.

The cross-media format asserts that "making love is something you can learn," and it deals with subjects like "good arguments, bad arguments" and "advertising to find personal happiness." It has attracted a great many fans.

"For the next docu-series Make Love, we're looking for retirees to tell us what sex is like for older people and what it's like to discover late in life that you have homoerotic feelings," Henning recently posted on her Facebook page. "If you're between 40 and 100 and would like to be a part of this, contact us."

In a video accompanying the message, Henning tries to defuse any fears potential participants may have. "Your clothes stay on … and your privacy is respected," she says. "That's very, very important to me."

Henning asks what others won't

The reason for these reassuring remarks may be because previous episodes featured naked partners having real sex. But the series got as much attention as it did because, though the video was realistic and the content graphic, the effect was never sensational or sleazy.

Along with older heterosexual couples, Henning is also looking for older, same-sex couples for the new Make Love series — or anyone who in later life discovered new aspects to their sexuality, or are planning to "come out." "It could, for example, be that past the age of 40 or 50 you discover that you actually prefer sex with same-sex partners," she says in another video.

The new episodes will also feature very young adults and explore what sex is like for them. In her sympathetic Danish accent, Henning says she wants to find out not only how notions of bodily perfection have influenced young people, but also how they've been influenced by pornography, which is much more accessible now than it used to be.

The new documentary will be filmed soon and broadcast serially next fall. Given the huge success of the first series, there is little doubt that Henning and the Make Love producers will find the protagonists they need.


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Future

AI Is Good For Education — And Bad For Teachers Who Teach Like Machines

Despite fears of AI upending the education and the teaching profession, artificial education will be an extremely valuable tool to free up teachers from rote exercises to focus on the uniquely humanistic part of learning.

Journalism teacher and his students in University of Barcelona.

Journalism students at the Blanquerna University of Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain.

© Sergi Reboredo via ZUMA press
Julián de Zubiría Samper

-Analysis-

BOGOTÁ - Early in 2023, Microsoft tycoon Bill Gates included teaching among the professions most threatened by Artificial Intelligence (AI), arguing that a robot could, in principle, instruct as well as any school-teacher. While Gates is an undoubted expert in his field, one wonders how much he knows about teaching.

As an avowed believer in using technology to improve student results, Gates has argued for teachers to use more tech in classrooms, and to cut class sizes. But schools and countries that have followed his advice, pumping money into technology at school, or students who completed secondary schooling with the backing of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation have not attained the superlative results expected of the Gates recipe.

Thankfully, he had enough sense to add some nuance to his views, instead suggesting changes to teacher training that he believes could improve school results.

I agree with his view that AI can be a big and positive contributor to schooling. Certainly, technological changes prompt unease and today, something tremendous must be afoot if a leading AI developer, Geoffrey Hinton, has warned of its threat to people and society.

But this isn't the first innovation to upset people. Over 2,000 years ago, the philosopher Socrates wondered, in the Platonic dialogue Phaedrus, whether reading and writing wouldn't curb people's ability to reflect and remember. Writing might lead them to despise memory, he observed. In the 18th and 19th centuries, English craftsmen feared the machines of the Industrial Revolution would destroy their professions, producing lesser-quality items faster, and cheaper.

Their fears were not entirely unfounded, but it did not happen quite as they predicted. Many jobs disappeared, but others emerged and the majority of jobs evolved. Machines caused a fundamental restructuring of labor at the time, and today, AI will likely do the same with the modern workplace.

Many predicted that television, computers and online teaching would replace teachers, which has yet to happen. In recent decades, teachers have banned students from using calculators to do sums, insisting on teaching arithmetic the old way. It is the same dry and mechanical approach to teaching which now wants to keep AI out of the classroom.

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