Identity - The True Power of Change

  The Youngest Noble Peace Laureate The Noble Peace Prize has drawn polarized praises and criticism as this award is often conferred upon politicians. Some have argued the name of the Prize should be Political, not Peace, as some of the recipients, at the time of being awarded, either had barely any contributions to impactful peace or later turned out to be anti-peace in their actions following their awards. Among the very few non-politicians who became the laureates, Malala Yousafzai was not only the handful of Middle Eastern recipients, but the youngest so far and a true non-politicians.  Yousafzai is a human rights advocate for the  education of women  and children in her native homeland,  Swat , where the  Pakistani Taliban  had at times banned girls from attending school.  On October 9 in 2012, Malala was shot in the head on a bus by a Taliban gunman in an assassination attempt for her activism. She was in a coma while she remained a fighter who did not give up. The incident cause

Peacemakers Needed Each semester this blog focuses on a theme. Last semester's theme was focused on identity. For the Fall 2023 semester, the theme will be "PEACEMAKERS." The draft for this entry was started on 9/11/23, which marked 22nd years since the devastating events in New York City and near the Pentagon. I reflected on the ultimate cause of such terrible acts and believe that the world then and now needs more peacemakers. On  August 28, 1963 , Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. imagined a world " that one day. . . the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood." If in 2001 there were peacemakers who could reach across the gulf between some extreme religious factions and the US, the tragedies of 9/11 might have been prevented. Many would assume that history should have taught us to be more understanding of one another regardless of our differences. Contrary to that assumption, the world

Is ChatGPT Harmful or Helpful to Business Professionals? Part 2 The Bad B. The Bad As ChatGPT was trained by both human and machine trainers prior to its public release, given the immense amount of misinformation on the web, it can provide erroneous answers. For instance, when asked a simple question about a book, it may offer a mix of correct and incorrect content - and different wrong answers each time the response is generated. Although ChatGPT knows its limitations and offers a disclaimer warning to the users about potential inaccuracies, the potential that users could become overly reliant on the chatbot’s answers without verifying their accuracy. Indeed, one of the major concerns is that ChatGPT can provide a partially correct answer with a very authoritative-sounding explanation or reasoning behind it. Thus, to rely on the chatbot to provide a completely accurate answer each time, or to even believe that it could do so is a significant issue that users must be aware of. Another

Is ChatGPT Harmful or Helpful to Business Professionals? Part 1.2 The Good A. The Good, continues Traditional AI programs such as SAP or Enterprise Systems that were designed to assist accountants in their decision-making process can only generate mechanical suggestions according to guidelines set by human users. In comparison, rather than the formulaic computer program language produced by these older AIs, ChatGPT, without the aid of the internet, answers a wide array of questions and requests as if it has been studying and accumulating a wide spectrum of knowledge for years. ChatGPT can also learn and improve its accuracy from ongoing interactions with users in its constant evolution. That is, ChatGPT can anticipate users’ needs and questions to provide the assistance they seek. It remembers its answers to previous questions and can reference answers previously generated from ongoing interactions with users. ChatGPT draws its functionality from the massive text data accumulated in it

"Not Nice" is the Way to Find Your Identity The blog posts on 1/25/23 and 2/5/23 discussed the first two steps of finding one's true identity: (1) Small and consistent steps of change and (2) unconditional self-love. This week's post will discuss step three: "Not Nice." Society has conditioned us from a young age to "play nice." Many of us hope that being "nice" will earn people's approval and a favorable view of ourselves. We have been told that only "nice" boys and girls receive gifts from Santa. Conventional wisdom believes that if one is not "nice" then one must be "naughty." However, "not nice" is not naughty, but being authentic to oneself. When one is forced to go against one's true identity in order to "play nice," one is regressing on the path of finding one's true identity. The emphasis is on being authentic, not selfish. They are two distinct characteristics. A s

  Is ChatGPT Harmful or Helpful to Business Professionals? Part 1.1 The Good I. What Is ChatGPT? ChatGPT has taken the world by storm and  become a ubiquitous hot topic since its debut  about four months ago. More than 566 articles  (averaging nearly 188 each month, with as many  as 42 on January 31 alone) have discussed  ChatGPT and its impact. As an artificial  intelligence-infused chatbot released to the public  November 30, 2022, by the research company OpenAI, the GPT in ChatGPT stands for  “generative pre-trained transformer” and refers  to the type of language model that powers it. This  unique language model was designed by Sam  Altman, the main programmer and CEO of  OpenAI, to interact with users in a conversational  manner that mimics human response.  ChatGPT  reached one million users within only five days of its  release. By comparison, it took Netflix three and a  half years, Facebook 10 months, and Instagram  two and a half months to achieve the same feat.  When asked “W

  How to Find One's Sustainable Joy, Part 3 The blog so far discussed Walter Orthman of Brazil as an example of being happy in one company for more than 85 years and Colonel Sanders of KFC, searching for his true identity for the majority of his life until he finally found it in his 60s. This week, the focus is on three Hungarian sisters and their amazing achievements with their search for their identities. Benjamin Franklin said "You can do anything if you set your mind to it." This belief manifested in the three sisters from a very young age. László Polgár believed that early and intensive specialization can produce a prodigy in nearly any subject. He proposed to his wife, Klára, with the intent to test his hypothesis on his own children. Klára was intrigued and went along with this experiment on their three daughters: Susan, Sofia, and Judit. They were home-schooled. Besides the regular subjects, the three sisters played chess in their spare time as their primary enter

How to Find One's Sustainable Joy, Part 2 Two weeks ago, the blog discussed Walter Orthman of Brazil as an example of being happy in one company for more than 85 years. This week, the focus is on Harland David Sanders of Henryville, Indiana, USA. Harland's father passed away when he was five years old. He had to cook for his siblings at the age of seven and became skilled in making food from the ingredients foraged in the wild. By age 10, Harland started working as a farmhand. He worked various jobs throughout the majority of his life such as painting horse carriages, a streetcar conductor, a soldier in the Army, a blacksmith's helper, and a steam engine stoker. He earned his law degree by correspondence courses and started practicing law. His career as an attorney ended when he had a brawl with his client in the courtroom. Harland then worked as a life insurance salesman. In between all these jobs, he always knew that he wanted to be his own boss for his own business. Harl

  I am NOT a TWIN! Andrew and Kyle Godfrey are students at Central Connecticut State University (CCSU). Andrew majors in computer science and Kyle is in accounting. You will probably run into them either having lunch with friends or at the CCSU gym working out. At the first glimpse, their outer appearances are nearly identical. However, they cringe whenever others refer to them as twins. Andrew, despite the relatively mallow attitude, dislikes when people would comment about them by saying, "The twins... ." In fact, both of them insist that they prefer being recognized as Andrew and Kyle, not the Godfrey twins. Kyle performed exceptionally well in one of my very challenging courses. He was quiet in class, but often ready to contribute learning. Kyle exhibited the traits of a deep thinker and was not afraid of telling facts without worrying how his peers viewed him. On the other hand, I got to know Andrew from our overlapped time at the campus gym. He often worked out in the m