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Turkey

Erdogan Calls On Turkish Families To Have At Least Three Children

HÜRRIYET(Turkey)

Worldcrunch

ISTANBUL - Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has called on his nation's families to have at least three children, Turkey's daily Hurriyet reports.

Erdogan used a speech to declare that the strength of a nation lies within its families, which must be fortified with more children.

One or two children means bankruptcy,” Erdogan said speaking at this week's International Family and Social Policies Summit. “Three children gives families a chance of improvement and it helps the population which currently risks aging.”

Erdogan noted that many countries in the West face the problem of an aging population, and stressed that it is an issue that should not be taken lightly in Turkey.

Erdogan also underlined that the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) centers its policies on strong families with solid values.

“It is extremely dangerous if a family loses its values and therefore we are working on projects to protect these values and carry them through the generations,” he said in the Wednesday remarks.

[rebelmouse-image 27086122 alt="""" original_size="640x480" expand=1]

An Erdogan poster in Istanbul (myrat)

The AKP has distributed 108 billion Turkish Liras ($610 million) in social aid to ensure family unity is not jeopardized by economic burdens. “If we gave aid to the fathers they would buy cigarettes, but we gave aid to the women of the households so it benefits their children,” Erdogan said.

This is not the first time Erdogan addressed the nation about the size of families. Speaking at a Women’s summit in March, he said that women should not believe in “television propaganda that suggests Turkey’s population is too large.”

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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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