NORTHFIELD, Illinois: The students — most with gray hair, some with canes, all at least in their 60s — couldn’t believe what they were hearing.
“Oh, my God,” whispered a retired college professor.
“Does it come with viruses?” wondered a bewildered woman scribbling notes in the second row.
A 79-year-old in a black-and-white floral shirt then asked the question on many minds: “How do you know if it is fake or not?”
This is how older adults — many of whom lived through the advent of refrigeration, the transition from radio to television and the invention of the Internet — are grappling with artificial intelligence: taking a class. Sitting in a classroom in an airy senior center in a Chicago suburb, the dozen students were learning about the latest — and possibly greatest — technological leap in their lives.
And they are not alone. Across the country, scores of such classes have sprung up to teach seniors about AI’s ability to transform their lives and the threats the technology poses.
“I saw ice boxes turn into refrigerators, that is how long I have been around,” said Barbara Winston, 89, who paid to attend the class put on at the North Shore Senior Center in Northfield. “And I think this is probably the greatest technical revolution that I will see in my lifetime.”
Older adults find themselves in a unique moment with technology. Artificial intelligence offers significant benefits for seniors, from the ability to curb loneliness to making it easier for them to get to medical appointments.
But it also has drawbacks that are uniquely threatening to this older group of Americans: A series of studies have found that senior citizens are more susceptible to both scams perpetrated using artificial intelligence and believing the types of misinformation that are being supercharged by the technology. Experts are particularly concerned about the role deepfakes and other AI-produced misinformation could play in politics.
Winston left the class to start her own AI journey, even if others remained skeptical. When she got home, the retired professor downloaded books on the technology, researched the platforms she wanted to use from her kitchen table and eventually queried ChatGPT about how to treat a personal medical ailment.
“This is the beginning of my education,” she said, her floral cup of coffee nearby. “I’m not worried about protecting myself. I’m too old to worry about that.”
Classes like these aim to familiarize aging early adopters with the myriad ways the technology could better their lives but also encourage skepticism about how artificial intelligence can distort the truth.
Balanced skepticism, say experts on the technology, is critical for seniors who plan to interact with AI.
“It’s tricky,” said Michael Gershbein, the instructor of the class in Northfield. “Overall, the suspicion that is there on the part of seniors is good but I don’t want them to become paralyzed from their fears and not be willing to do anything online.”
The questions in his class outside Chicago ranged from the absurd to the practical to the academic. Why are so many new shoes no longer including shoelaces? Can AI create a multiday itinerary for a visit to Charleston, South Carolina? What are the geopolitical implications of artificial intelligence?
Gershbein, who teaches classes on a range of technological topics, said interest in AI has ballooned in the last nine months. The 52-year-old teaches an AI course once or twice a week, he said, and aims to create a “safe space where (seniors) can come in and we can discuss all the issues they may be hearing bits and pieces of but we can put it all together and they can ask questions.”
During a 90-minute-long session on a June Thursday, Gershbein discussed deepfakes — videos that use generative AI to make it appear someone said something they did not. When he played a few deepfakes, the seniors sat agog. They could not believe how real the fakes seemed. There are widespread concerns that such videos could be used to trick voters, especially seniors.
The threats to seniors go beyond politics, however, and range from basic misinformation on social media sites to scams that use voice-cloning technology to trick them. An AARP report published last year said that Americans over 60 lose $28.3 billion annually to financial extortion schemes, some assisted by AI.
Experts from the National Council on Aging, an organization established in 1950 to advocate for seniors, said classes on AI at senior centers have increased in recent years and are at the forefront of digital literacy efforts.
“There’s a myth out there that older adults don’t use technology. We know that that’s not true,” said Dianne Stone, associate director at the National Council on Aging who ran a senior center in Connecticut for over two decades. Such courses, she said, are meant to foster a “healthy skepticism” in what the technology can do, arming older Americans with the knowledge “that not everything you hear is true, it’s good to get the information, but you have to kind of sort it out for yourself.”
Striking that balance, said Siwei Lyu, a University at Buffalo professor, can be difficult, and classes tend to either promote AI’s benefits or focus on its dangers.
“We need this kind of education for seniors, but the approach we take has to be very balanced and well-designed,” said Lyu, who has lectured to seniors and other groups.
Seniors who have taken such AI classes said they came away with a clear understanding of AI’s benefits and pitfalls.
“It’s only as good as the people who program it, and the users need to understand that. You really have to question it,” said Linda Chipko, a 70-year-old who attended an AI class in June in suburban Atlanta.
Chipko said she took the class because she wanted to “understand” AI, but on her way out said, “It’s not for me.”
Others have even embraced it. Ruth Schneiderman, 77, used AI to help illustrate a children’s book she was writing, and that experience sparked her interest in taking the Northfield class to learn more about the technology.
“My mother lived until she was 90,” Schneiderman said, “and I learned from her if you want to survive in this world, you have to adjust to the change. Otherwise you are left behind.”
Older Americans prepare themselves for a world altered by artificial intelligence
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Older Americans prepare themselves for a world altered by artificial intelligence
- Artificial intelligence offers significant benefits for seniors, from the ability to curb loneliness to making it easier for them to get to medical appointments
‘No more fear’: Stand-up comedy returns to post-Assad Syria
DAMASCUS: In post-Assad Syria, stand-up comedians are re-emerging to challenge taboos, mocking the former president and his regime and even testing the waters with Damascus’s new rulers.
Melki Mardini, a performer in the Syrian capital’s stand-up scene, is among those embracing newfound freedoms.
“The regime has fallen,” he declares from the stage, referring to Bashar Assad’s abrupt departure earlier this month, ending more than half a century of his family’s rule.
The audience at an art gallery hosting the show remains silent.
“What’s the matter? Are you still scared?” Mardini says, triggering a mix of awkward laughter and applause.
“We’ve been doing stand-up for two years,” says the 29-year-old. “We never imagined a day would come when we could speak so freely.”
Now, his performances are “safe spaces,” he says.
“We can express our views without bothering anyone, except Bashar.”
Under the old regime, jokes about elections, the dollar or even mentioning the president’s name could mean arrest or worse.
Chatting with the audience during his set, Mardini learns one man is a psychiatrist.
“A lord in the new Syria!” he exclaims, imagining crowds rushing into therapy after five decades of dictatorship.
For two hours, 13 comedians — including one woman — from the collective Styria (a play on the words Syria and hysteria) take the stage, sharing personal stories: an arrest, how they dodged compulsory military service, how they sourced dollars on the black market.
“Syria wants freedom!” declares Rami Jabr as he takes the stage.
“This is our first show without the mukhabarat in the room,” he quips, referring to the feared intelligence agents.
He reflects on his experience in Homs, dubbed the “capital of the revolution” in March of 2011 when anti-government protests broke out in the wake of the Arab Spring, followed by brutal repression.
A commercial representative for a foreign company, Jabr recalls being detained for a month by various security services, beaten, and tortured with a taser, under the accusation that he was an “infiltrator” sent to sow chaos in Syria.
Like him, comedians from across the country share their journeys, united by the same fear that has suffocated Syrians for decades living under an iron fist.
Hussein Al-Rawi tells the audience how he never gives out his address, a vestige of the paranoia of the past.
“I’m always afraid he’ll come back,” he says, referring to Assad. “But I hope for a better Syria, one that belongs to all of us.”
Said Al-Yakhchi, attending the show, notes that free speech is flourishing.
“During the last performance before the regime fell, there were restrictions,” says the 32-year-old shopkeeper.
“Now, there are no restrictions, no one has to answer to anyone. There’s no fear of anyone.”
Not even Syria’s new rulers — a diverse mix of rebel groups, including Islamists and former jihadists, who quickly marched on Damascus and toppled Assad’s government.
“We didn’t live through a revolution for 13 or 14 years... just to have a new power tell us, ‘You can’t speak,’” Mardini says.
When not performing on stage, Mary Obaid, 23, is a dentist.
“We unload everything we’ve been holding inside — we do it for all Syrians,” she says.
“Each person shares their own experience. The audience reacts as if each story has happened to them too.”
Of the country’s new leaders, Obaid says she will wait to see “what they will do, then we’ll judge.”
“Right now, we feel freedom,” she says. “We hope we won’t be targets of harassment.”
“We’re at a pivotal moment, transitioning from one era to another,” she adds.
“Now we are the country of freedom, and we can put forward all our demands. From now on, never again fear.”
Zelensky hails Usyk victory over Fury
RIYADH: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky hailed Oleksandr Usyk’s victory over Tyson Fury in their heavyweight world championship rematch on Saturday, calling it proof that Ukraine “will not give up what’s ours.”
“Victory!” Zelensky said in a post on Telegram. “So important and so necessary for all of us now.”
Ukraine remains locked in war nearly three years after Russia invaded, but Zelensky said Usyk’s triumph was a mark of Ukrainian resiliency and determination.
“Having retained the championship belts, Oleksandr proves: we are Ukrainians and we will not give up what’s ours. And no matter how difficult it is — we will win.
“Be it the ring, battlefield or diplomatic arena — we fight and we will not give up what’s ours.
“Congrats on the victory, Cossack! Congrats on the victory Ukraine! Glory to Ukraine.”
Usyk’s victory — seven months after his first triumph over Britain’s Fury to become the first undisputed heavyweight world champion of the four-belt era — took his record to 23-0 with 14 knockouts.
Weightlifting Taiwan granny, 90, garners cheers, health benefits at gym
TAIPEI: Cheng Chen Chin-Mei beamed broadly as she hoisted a 35-kg weightlifting bar to her waist, dropped it and waved confidently to the enthusiastic crowd in a competition in Taipei. Cheng Chen, 90, has been pumping iron since last year, encouraged by her granddaughter to take up the sport after she was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease. She credits the regimen with helping to fix her posture.
Three generations of her family were among a couple of hundred people watching Cheng Chen and 44 others aged 70 or over in a weightlifting competition on Saturday. In the three-round competition, Cheng Chen lifted as much as 45kg using a hexagonal-shaped bar that is said to allow the lifter more stability and options for gripping.
“I want to tell all the old people to join the workout,” Cheng Chen told Reuters after the competition. “You don’t need to work extremely hard, but this is to stay healthy.”
Cheng Chen was not the only nonagenarian in the competition. The oldest participant is 92.
Taiwan is projected to become a “super-aged society” next year, with 20 percent or more of its 23 million people aged 65 or older, according to National Development Council data.
The government has set up fitness centers across the island with equipment suitable for older people, to encourage them to train, according to the Health Promotion Administration, which encourages healthy lifestyles.
Santa and Mrs. Claus use military transports to bring Christmas to an Alaska Native village
- Operation Santa started in 1956 when flooding severely curtailed subsistence hunting for residents of St. Mary’s, in western Alaska
YAKUTAT, Alaska: Forget the open-air sleigh overloaded with gifts and powered by flying reindeer.
Santa and Mrs. Claus this week took supersized rides to southeast Alaska in a C-17 military cargo plane and a camouflaged Humvee, as they delivered toys to the Tlingit village of Yakutat, northwest of Juneau.
The visit was part of this year’s Operation Santa Claus, an outreach program of the Alaska National Guard to largely Indigenous communities in the nation’s largest state. Each year, the Guard picks a village that has suffered recent hardship — in Yakutat’s case, a massive snowfall that threatened to buckle buildings in 2022.
“This is one of the funnest things we get to do, and this is a proud moment for the National Guard,” Maj. Gen. Torrence Saxe, adjutant general of the Alaska National Guard, said Wednesday.
Saxe wore a Guard uniform and a Santa hat that stretched his unit’s dress regulations.
The Humvee caused a stir when it entered the school parking lot, and a buzz of “It’s Santa! It’s Santa!” pierced the cold air as dozens of elementary school children gathered outside.
In the school, Mrs. Claus read a Christmas story about the reindeer Dasher. The couple in red then sat for photos with nearly all of the 75 or so students and handed out new backpacks filled with gifts, books, snacks and school supplies donated by the Salvation Army. The school provided lunch, and a local restaurant provided the ice cream and toppings for a sundae bar.
Student Thomas Henry, 10, said while the contents of the backpack were “pretty good,” his favorite item was a plastic dinosaur.
Another, 9-year-old Mackenzie Ross, held her new plush seal toy as she walked around the school gym.
“I think it’s special that I have this opportunity to be here today because I’ve never experienced this before,” she said.
Yakutat, a Tlingit village of about 600 residents, is in the lowlands of the Gulf of Alaska, at the top of Alaska’s panhandle. Nearby is the Hubbard Glacier, a frequent stop for cruise ships.
Some of the National Guard members who visited Yakutat on Wednesday were also there in January 2022, when storms dumped about 6 feet (1.8 meters) of snow in a matter of days, damaging buildings.
Operation Santa started in 1956 when flooding severely curtailed subsistence hunting for residents of St. Mary’s, in western Alaska. Having to spend their money on food, they had little left for Christmas presents, so the military stepped in.
This year, visits were planned to two other communities hit by flooding. Santa’s visit to Circle, in northeastern Alaska, went off without a hitch. Severe weather prevented a visit to Crooked Creek, in the southwestern part of the state, but Christmas was saved when the gifts were delivered there Nov. 16.
“We tend to visit rural communities where it is very isolated,” said Jenni Ragland, service extension director with the Salvation Army Alaska Division. “A lot of kids haven’t traveled to big cities where we typically have Santa and big stores with Christmas gifts and Christmas trees, so we kind of bring the Christmas program on the road.”
After the C-17 Globemaster III landed in Yakutat, it quickly returned to Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage, an hour away, because there was nowhere to park it at the village’s tiny airport. Later it returned to pick up the Christmas crew.
Santa and Mrs. Claus, along with their tuckered elves, were seen nodding off on the flight back.
Scientists observe ‘negative time’ in quantum experiments
- The researchers emphasize that these perplexing results highlight a peculiar quirk of quantum mechanics rather than a radical shift in our understanding of time
TORONTO, Canada: Scientists have long known that light can sometimes appear to exit a material before entering it — an effect dismissed as an illusion caused by how waves are distorted by matter.
Now, researchers at the University of Toronto, through innovative quantum experiments, say they have demonstrated that “negative time” isn’t just a theoretical idea — it exists in a tangible, physical sense, deserving closer scrutiny.
The findings, yet to be published in a peer-reviewed journal, have attracted both global attention and skepticism.
The researchers emphasize that these perplexing results highlight a peculiar quirk of quantum mechanics rather than a radical shift in our understanding of time.
“This is tough stuff, even for us to talk about with other physicists. We get misunderstood all the time,” said Aephraim Steinberg, a University of Toronto professor specializing in experimental quantum physics.
While the term “negative time” might sound like a concept lifted from science fiction, Steinberg defends its use, hoping it will spark deeper discussions about the mysteries of quantum physics.
Years ago, the team began exploring interactions between light and matter.
When light particles, or photons, pass through atoms, some are absorbed by the atoms and later re-emitted. This interaction changes the atoms, temporarily putting them in a higher-energy or “excited” state before they return to normal.
In research led by Daniela Angulo, the team set out to measure how long these atoms stayed in their excited state. “That time turned out to be negative,” Steinberg explained — meaning a duration less than zero.
To visualize this concept, imagine cars entering a tunnel: before the experiment, physicists recognized that while the average entry time for a thousand cars might be, for example, noon, the first cars could exit a little sooner, say 11:59 am. This result was previously dismissed as meaningless.
What Angulo and colleagues demonstrated was akin to measuring carbon monoxide levels in the tunnel after the first few cars emerged and finding that the readings had a minus sign in front of them.
The experiments, conducted in a cluttered basement laboratory bristling with wires and aluminum-wrapped devices, took over two years to optimize. The lasers used had to be carefully calibrated to avoid distorting the results.
Still, Steinberg and Angulo are quick to clarify: no one is claiming time travel is a possibility. “We don’t want to say anything traveled backward in time,” Steinberg said. “That’s a misinterpretation.”
The explanation lies in quantum mechanics, where particles like photons behave in fuzzy, probabilistic ways rather than following strict rules.
Instead of adhering to a fixed timeline for absorption and re-emission, these interactions occur across a spectrum of possible durations — some of which defy everyday intuition.
Critically, the researchers say, this doesn’t violate Einstein’s theory of special relativity, which dictates that nothing can travel faster than light. These photons carried no information, sidestepping any cosmic speed limits.
The concept of “negative time” has drawn both fascination and skepticism, particularly from prominent voices in the scientific community.
German theoretical physicist Sabine Hossenfelder, for one, criticized the work in a YouTube video viewed by over 250,000 people, noting, “The negative time in this experiment has nothing to do with the passage of time — it’s just a way to describe how photons travel through a medium and how their phases shift.”
Angulo and Steinberg pushed back, arguing that their research addresses crucial gaps in understanding why light doesn’t always travel at a constant speed.
Steinberg acknowledged the controversy surrounding their paper’s provocative headline but pointed out that no serious scientist has challenged the experimental results.
“We’ve made our choice about what we think is a fruitful way to describe the results,” he said, adding that while practical applications remain elusive, the findings open new avenues for exploring quantum phenomena.
“I’ll be honest, I don’t currently have a path from what we’ve been looking at toward applications,” he admitted. “We’re going to keep thinking about it, but I don’t want to get people’s hopes up.”
