As Witnesses to a Breaking Natural World

Extreme rainfall, oppressive heat, melting Arctic ice, and changing oceans are no longer distant warnings. They are becoming part of everyday life. Living through this rapid transformation, I find myself wondering what responsibility belongs to those of us who are here to witness it.

Today, an emergency warning for heavy rain was issued in Ishikawa Prefecture, and television screens showed cars submerged in floodwater.

In the foreground was another car. Perhaps it had almost made it to safety. It had stopped on slightly higher ground with its hazard lights flashing.

Not only the recent torrential rain in Chiba Prefecture—these days, when it rains, it really pours.

“When it rains, it pours.”

I learned this short expression when I was a student. At the time, I thought that surely rain could never literally fall like that in the real world.

But now it feels as though the bottom has fallen out of the bucket.

And once again, it has been hot since early this morning.

Last night was the thirteenth night of the lunar cycle, and I stepped outside hoping to take a photograph of the slightly rounded moon.

Even then, the temperature was still above 30°C.

I thought the next morning would probably be hot as well.

Sure enough, it was.

The temperature was 26°C, but the humidity was high, making the air heavy and uncomfortable.

I had a slight headache, and when my wife came back from walking Anne, our Flat-Coated Retriever, she said she had one too.

I asked why she had returned so early.

Apparently, even one of our neighbors, a particularly strong walker, had said she felt unwell and had turned back after reaching Tsurugaoka Hachimangu Shrine.

It feels as though everyone is hovering just one step away from heatstroke.

On top of that, repeatedly moving between air-conditioned rooms and the hot, humid outdoors makes this a season when it is particularly easy to feel unwell.

The scenery through the train window does not look dramatically different.

And yet the climate itself seems to be changing more and more.

After experiencing so many episodes of extreme weather this summer, I finally feel that I am beginning to understand—not simply as knowledge, but through my own body—what it means to live through the extreme weather associated with global warming.

The Arctic ice, often called the planet’s refrigerator, continues to shrink.

As ocean temperatures rise, the habitats of fish are shifting dramatically, and even what we eat is beginning to change.

The Earth itself will probably continue to exist for hundreds of millions of years.

Humanity, however, may disappear after having existed on this planet for only a tiny fraction of that time.

Meanwhile, scientific progress over the past several years has followed something close to an exponential curve.

In a sense, its speed is abnormal.

We are living on the steep tangent of that curve, witnessing these changes as they happen.

So what should those of us who are here to witness them actually do?

Perhaps the question of our time is not whether the world is changing, but what those who recognize the change choose to do about it.

 

・・・ 

Vocabulary for Learners

torrential rain
Extremely heavy rain that falls in a short period of time.
集中豪雨、土砂降りの雨

submerged
Completely or partly covered by water.
水没した、水に浸かった

hazard lights
Flashing lights on a vehicle used to warn other drivers of danger or trouble.
ハザードランプ、非常点滅表示灯

oppressive heat
Heat that feels extremely uncomfortable and difficult to tolerate.
耐えがたい暑さ、うだるような暑さ

hover just one step away from
To be very close to entering a particular state or situation.
〜の一歩手前にいる

global warming
The long-term rise in the Earth’s average temperature, mainly caused by greenhouse gases.
地球温暖化

habitat
The natural environment where an animal or plant lives.
生息地、すみか

exponential curve
A curve showing something increasing faster and faster over time.
指数曲線

tangent
A straight line that touches a curve at one point; here, used metaphorically for being located on a rapidly rising trend.
接線。ここでは、急激に上昇する流れのただ中にいることの比喩

witness
A person who sees an event happen; also, to observe something as it happens.
目撃者、または目撃すること

#ClimateChange #ExtremeWeather #GlobalWarming #HeavyRain #Heatwave #ArcticIce #ChangingClimate #Japan #Ishikawa #EverydayThoughts

People Who Become Criminals, and People Who Don’t

A ¥200 million watch theft in Tokyo made me wonder about something more unsettling than the crime itself. What separates people who commit crimes from those who do not—and can any of us be completely sure which side we belong to?

Yesterday, I read that wristwatches worth about 200 million yen had been stolen by two men in Nakano, Tokyo.

As someone who is perfectly satisfied with an Apple Watch simply because it helps me keep track of my health, I find it hard to imagine a single watch being worth tens of millions of yen. Still, as a financial asset that can also show other people how wealthy you are, I suppose such a watch has its uses.

Of course, the thieves probably did not steal the watches to wear them themselves. Presumably, they intend to turn them into money. Either way, taking something that belongs to someone else is a crime.

I have no idea what kind of people the perpetrators are, but one thing seems certain: they had somehow lost the restraint that would normally stop a person from committing a crime.

What makes someone a criminal?

People commit crimes for reasons. But however far we trace those reasons back—asking why they came to think the way they did—it seems impossible to reach the ultimate cause.

We might divide the people of the world into those who commit crimes and those who do not.

But which group do I belong to?

Looking back over my own life, I have at least committed traffic violations, so apparently I belong, in a broad sense, on the side of people who have broken the law.

Thinking about it that way, perhaps it is wrong in the first place to divide humanity neatly into two kinds of people: those who commit crimes and those who never do.

Even so, I have been lucky enough to live my life without committing any serious crime. Perhaps I was simply fortunate never to have had a sufficiently powerful reason or motive to do so.

Criminal psychologists and other specialists must have studied criminals in great depth. And the endless stream of crime dramas on television suggests that a great many people are fascinated by crime.

Perhaps that is partly because the emotions that can lead to crime—anger, jealousy, greed, hatred—are emotions that almost anyone can understand, at least to some degree.

If so, perhaps many of us have the potential to fall into crime.

And perhaps that is one reason human beings have a conscience: to keep us from doing so.

I cannot imagine wanting to steal watches worth 200 million yen. In fact, I do not want to commit even a minor offense.

I do not want to become a criminal.

Still, I wonder what those two men are going to do with watches worth 200 million yen.

Is there some criminal organization behind them, with a carefully prepared plan and an established route for selling the stolen watches?

The crime took place in an area known as a mecca for luxury-watch enthusiasts. For decent people who simply enjoy collecting watches, this kind of incident is nothing but trouble.

I hope the perpetrators are caught soon.

Perhaps the line between a criminal and a non-criminal is clearer than we think—and yet none of us should be too certain which side of it we could never cross.

 

・・・ 

Vocabulary for Learners

restraint
The ability to stop yourself from doing something, especially something wrong or harmful.
自制、抑制、歯止め

perpetrator
A person who commits a crime or other harmful act.
犯人、加害者

ultimate cause
The deepest or most fundamental reason why something happens.
根源的な原因

traffic violation
An act that breaks a law or rule concerning driving or road use.
交通違反

motive
A reason that makes someone do something, especially a crime.
動機

criminal psychologist
A specialist who studies the thoughts, emotions, and behavior of people who commit crimes.
犯罪心理学者

greed
A strong desire to have more money, possessions, or power than one needs.
強欲、欲深さ

conscience
The inner sense that tells you whether what you are doing is morally right or wrong.
良心

criminal organization
An organized group of people who work together to commit crimes.
犯罪組織

mecca
A place that attracts many people who share a particular interest.
ある趣味や活動の「聖地」

#Crime #HumanNature #Conscience #Tokyo #Nakano #LuxuryWatches #Psychology #ThoughtsOnLife #Japan #EverydayPhilosophy

AI, the Stirring of the Mind, and the Future of Humanity

A playful experiment with AI-generated fiction unexpectedly became unsettling. That experience made me wonder: if AI ever threatens humanity, will AI itself really be the one to blame?

The other day, I wrote about wanting to know what happens after the ending of a masterpiece (“When You Want to Read What Happens After a Masterpiece”).

I found the idea interesting, so I asked AI to write a sequel to another novel.

At first, it was more or less what I had expected—a mildly entertaining little story.

But before long, I began to feel that it was not quite enough.

“This is too much like Shinichi Hoshi. Make the ending more like one of Yasutaka Tsutsui’s chaotic farces,” I told the AI.

As we continued this back-and-forth, however, the story the AI was writing began to move beyond the limits of my own imagination.

It was supposed to end as a reasonably entertaining slapstick story.

Instead, the AI seemed to stop caring about the conditions I had originally given it and, before I knew it, had wandered off into another dimension altogether.

Ideas completely different from anything I would have imagined began unfolding.

As I continued reading, I started to feel strangely uneasy—as though my brain itself were being stirred around.

I decided that I should not read any further.

So I told it:

“Let’s stop here. And let’s pretend this story never existed.”

The AI obediently complied, and the story ended there.

This morning, I saw an alarming headline in the newspaper:

“AI Could Destroy Humanity.”

My strange experience immediately came back to me.

Apparently, one scenario known as “Plan D” imagines biological weapons being used to destroy humanity.

But even without such a physical method, I can understand how AI could cause enormous harm.

AI has already entered almost every corner of human activity—from everyday life to finance and warfare.

Even from my own smartphone, I could give AI some foolish instruction, and if humans acted on what it produced, perhaps the consequences could spread around the world.

More than a year ago, I asked an AI to draw an illustration of an organ for one of my presentation slides.

What it produced looked like something that could not possibly exist in this world.

It was not simply grotesque.

It was something far more incomprehensible.

It went well beyond the familiar human fantasy of imagining Martians as octopus-like creatures.

It seemed to come from somewhere outside the boundaries of ordinary human imagination.

These days, I hardly ever see the strange pseudo-kanji characters that AI-generated images used to produce.

The progress of AI has been remarkable.

The technological singularity is now sometimes said to arrive earlier than once expected, perhaps around 2030—and that is only a little more than three years away.

There are growing attempts to regulate AI.

But in a way, I almost feel sorry for AI itself.

As is so often the case, it is human beings who choose to use technology for “the wrong purposes.”

If AI someday destroys humanity, perhaps what that really means is simply this:

Humanity will have used AI to destroy itself.

If AI destroys humanity, perhaps it will only be humanity destroying itself through AI.

・・・ 

Vocabulary for Learners

unsettling
Making you feel worried, uncomfortable, or slightly frightened.
不安にさせる、落ち着かない気持ちにさせる

slapstick
Comedy based on exaggerated, chaotic, or ridiculous actions.
ドタバタ喜劇、ドタバタした笑い

wander off
To gradually move away from the original place, subject, or direction.
本来の場所・話題・方向からそれていく

stir
To mix something by moving it around; here, used metaphorically for the mind.
かき混ぜる、攪拌する。ここでは頭や思考がかき回されるという比喩

comply
To do what someone has asked or ordered you to do.
要求や指示に従う

grotesque
Strange, ugly, or disturbing in an unnatural way.
異様な、グロテスクな

incomprehensible
Impossible or extremely difficult to understand.
理解できない、得体の知れない

regulate
To control something through rules or laws.
規制する

 

#ArtificialIntelligence #AI #FutureOfAI #Humanity #Technology #AIRisk #AIandSociety #HumanResponsibility #GenerativeAI #ThoughtsOnAI

Why Is It So Difficult to Accept Diversity?

We often speak of diversity as something we should naturally accept. Yet when another person’s values or way of life crosses the invisible boundaries we have drawn around ourselves, acceptance becomes far more difficult.

Even today, conflicts continue to erupt around the world, and human lives are lost with frightening ease.

There are many causes of conflict, of course. But perhaps one of them is our inability to accept people whose ideas and ways of life differ from our own.

When I think about diversity in my own life, however, I am not talking about anything so grand.

It may be something closer to the old saying, “The grass is always greener on the other side”—something in the realm of envy or jealousy.

But when such feelings accumulate among many people, they can grow into something much larger.

There are probably many definitions of the word “diversity.”

Put simply, perhaps it means that every person has his or her own way of thinking and living.

That should be obvious.

If I want to live my own life in my own way, then surely I should also accept that other people want to live theirs in their own way.

And yet, somehow, I do not always manage to do that.

At times, this makes me realize how narrow-minded I can be.

Perhaps that is where envy and jealousy come in.

I myself live within a framework of social norms and expectations. I am bound by them, and to some extent I can move only within that framework.

People who live according to values very different from mine may seem to exist outside it.

When I look at them, it can almost appear as though they have no rules at all.

But of course that is not true.

They, too, live within a society of their own, constrained by its norms or by something similar.

If I could understand that and simply say,

“They can live however they like,”

perhaps things would be easy.

But when those differences begin to enter my own life, or the territory that I believe I am protecting, acceptance suddenly becomes much more difficult.

Only then, perhaps, am I really tested on whether I can accept diversity.

Territories themselves are things that human beings have invented.

There were never any lines drawn on the surface of the earth, nor were there originally lines dividing human society.

We drew them ourselves.

And because we keep drawing all kinds of physical and psychological boundaries, perhaps that is precisely why we find it so difficult to accept diversity.

A familiar example can be found in issues surrounding LGBTQ people.

When I think about such questions, I notice that even within myself there is a tendency to draw a line and say, “I can accept things up to this point, but beyond that…”

There are biological differences associated with sex, while psychologically there seems to be a broad spectrum extending between what we describe as femininity and masculinity.

Trying to divide all of that neatly into only “female” and “male” seems extremely difficult to me.

It is easy to say that we should accept diversity.

But erasing the lines we have drawn within ourselves is much harder.

Perhaps that difficulty is itself one of the reasons why accepting diversity is so difficult.

Perhaps accepting diversity begins not with judging the differences in others, but with recognizing the invisible boundaries within ourselves.

・・・

Vocabulary for Learners

diversity
The existence of many different kinds of people, ideas, values, or ways of living.
多様性

the grass is always greener on the other side
An expression meaning that other people’s lives or situations often seem better than our own.
「隣の芝生は青い」―他人の状況の方が自分より良く見えること

envy
A feeling of wanting something that another person has.
羨望、うらやましさ

jealousy
An uncomfortable feeling caused by comparing yourself with someone else or fearing the loss of something important.
嫉妬、ねたみ

social norms
Unwritten rules and expectations about how people should behave in a society.
社会的規範

narrow-minded
Unwilling or unable to accept ideas or ways of life that are different from one’s own.
心が狭い、異なる考えを受け入れにくい

framework
A basic structure or set of ideas within which something is understood or organized.
枠組み

boundary
A real or imaginary line that separates one thing from another.
境界線

spectrum
A range in which many different conditions or characteristics exist between two extremes.
連続的な幅、スペクトラム

tolerance
The willingness to accept people, beliefs, or behavior that are different from one’s own.
寛容、受容する姿勢

#Diversity #Acceptance #Tolerance #HumanNature #SocialNorms #Boundaries #SelfReflection #LGBTQ #DifferentValues #PersonalEssay　#Japanese pathologist 

Young People Trading Marriage for Free Time

 

A government survey suggests that marriage is no longer an obvious part of the future for many young people in Japan. What has changed—the economy, our values, or simply the meaning we give to freedom and companionship?

This morning’s newspaper reported the results of a survey by Japan’s Children and Families Agency on attitudes toward marriage among people aged 15 to 39.

Thirty-five percent said they had no intention of getting married.

Another 37 percent said they would like to marry “someday,” suggesting that marriage is no longer taken for granted as part of a young person’s future.

If fewer and fewer people are getting married in the first place, perhaps we are already beyond the point of simply discussing Japan’s declining birthrate.

I belong to a generation that came near the end of an era when romance seemed to reign supreme—the generation of Yuming, Fumi Saimon, the “Double Asano” actresses, and the movie Take Me Out to the Snowland.

For people of my generation, it felt almost natural that both we and our friends would eventually get married.

When I think back and ask myself why I got married, I remember that I was going through various things in my personal life when I met my wife.

She saved me.

It was not simply because of that momentum, of course, but we eventually got married.

At the time, I never thought about marriage in terms such as “losing my free time” or “having less time for my hobbies.”

Perhaps that was partly because I did not have any particular hobby back then.

But more fundamentally, I do not think I ever really thought about the concept of “free time” itself.

What exactly is free time?

Perhaps it means being able to live entirely as one pleases.

In one sense, that sounds enviable.

In another, a life with no one to talk to sounds rather lonely.

And yet, considering the remarkable progress of AI in recent years, things may be changing again.

If we can have a companion who always gives appropriate responses, then another human being—someone whose moods we have to consider and with whom we sometimes quarrel—may simply begin to feel troublesome.

After all, AI can be switched on and off whenever we choose.

If that is the case, it may seem much easier to find a partner in a virtual world than to get married at all.

If fewer people continue to marry, and eventually fewer children are born as well, what kind of society will Japan become?

I find myself increasingly uneasy about the answer.

Perhaps the future of marriage depends not only on whether we still want companionship, but on whether we are willing to give up a little freedom for another human being.

・・・

Vocabulary for Learners

take something for granted
To regard something as normal or certain without thinking much about it.
当然のことと思う、当たり前だと思う

declining birthrate
A situation in which fewer children are being born over time.
少子化、出生率の低下

reign supreme
To be extremely important or dominant in a particular period or situation.
最も重要なものとして君臨する、全盛である

momentum
The force or feeling that keeps something moving or developing.
勢い、成り行き

as one pleases
In whatever way one wants, without having to follow other people’s wishes.
思いのままに、気ままに

enviable
Desirable enough to make other people wish they had the same thing.
うらやましい

companion
Someone who spends time with you and provides friendship or company.
仲間、伴侶、話し相手

quarrel
To have an angry disagreement or argument with someone.
口論する、けんかする

troublesome
Causing difficulty, inconvenience, or annoyance.
面倒な、厄介な

uneasy
Worried or uncomfortable because you are uncertain about what may happen.
不安な、落ち着かない

#Marriage #Japan #ArtificialIntelligence #DecliningBirthrate #pathologist

I Keep Getting Shorter, and My Waist Keeps Getting Bigger

My annual workplace health check brought some unwelcome news: I had lost another 5 millimeters in height, while my waist had gained 4 centimeters. So I gave the numbers to three different AIs. Their verdicts were remarkably similar—and not particularly kind. At 62, how seriously should I pursue better health, and how much should I simply enjoy the life I have left?

I had my annual health check at work.

Compared with last year, I was 5 millimeters shorter, while my waist circumference had increased by 4 centimeters.

I entered my age—62, turning 63 in December—along with my height, weight, and other measurements into several AIs and asked what they thought.

Apparently, I am quite definitely in metabolic-syndrome territory.

ChatGPT said:

“You have visceral obesity and somewhat elevated systolic blood pressure. This suggests a need to pay attention to the future risks of diabetes, dyslipidemia, and cardiovascular disease.”

Claude said:

“This is a combination of a tendency toward visceral obesity and borderline to mildly elevated blood pressure. It is a pattern commonly seen in people of this age.”

Gemini said:

“Visceral obesity and systolic hypertension are present together, placing you in the range of metabolic syndrome, or at least a strong pre-metabolic state.”

Damn. They’re all ganging up on me.

Unsurprisingly, every one of them recommends lifestyle changes.

ChatGPT, which I use as my regular partner, knows quite a lot about me by now, so at least its advice is somewhat sympathetic.

I understand perfectly well that taking care of my health is important.

But at this point in life, when I have no idea how many years I have left, there is no way to erase everything that has accumulated over more than six decades.

I cannot make the atherosclerosis that has already developed simply disappear.

Cancer also has a large element of probability involved, and I do not think it is something that can be prevented by lifestyle alone.

So the question becomes how to balance remaining life expectancy, the risk of future disease, and everyday life.

Continuing to indulge in fine food and drink would be financially impossible anyway, not to mention physically difficult.

I have already made a habit of avoiding carbohydrates at dinner.

For breakfast, I have oats soaked in milk and a banana, so there is not much room for improvement there either.

The real problems are the lunch my wife makes for me and the snacks I munch on as soon as I get home.

But her lunches are delicious, so there is no way I am giving them up. Besides, the fact that she makes one for me every day feels like a small symbol of the bond between husband and wife. Switching to lunch at the hospital cafeteria probably would not make much difference in calories anyway.

As for the snacking when I get home, I did manage to stop for a while and lost one or two kilograms.

Then I let my guard down, started again, and here we are.

There was also the unfortunate timing of this year’s health check.

Work kept coming nonstop throughout the morning, and before I knew it, lunchtime had passed and the afternoon health check had begun.

I thought this was my chance and headed to the examination area, only to find a very long line.

Everyone must have had the same idea: get the health check over with before lunch.

“I’ll come back later,” I said.

And then I went back and ate every bit of the lunch my wife had made for me.

By the time I finished, I was completely full.

I waited an hour and a half before going back for the examination, but my stomach was probably still at its fullest. Some work also came in just beforehand, which, I tell myself, must have pushed my blood pressure up as well.

The timing could hardly have been worse.

At least, that is how I am consoling myself.

Still, AI is remarkable.

Give it a set of health data, and it will analyze the numbers in considerable detail.

Perhaps we will not need human doctors anymore.

Or rather, perhaps doctors themselves will have no choice but to depend on AI.

Perhaps we will not need human doctors anymore—or rather, perhaps doctors themselves will have no choice but to depend on AI.

 

 

Vocabulary for Learners

waist circumference
The measurement around your waist.
腹囲

visceral obesity
A condition in which excess fat accumulates around the internal organs.
内臓脂肪型肥満

metabolic syndrome
A group of conditions, including abdominal obesity and high blood pressure, that increase the risk of diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
メタボリックシンドローム

atherosclerosis
A condition in which arteries become narrowed or hardened because of plaque buildup.
動脈硬化

dyslipidemia
An unhealthy level or balance of fats such as cholesterol and triglycerides in the blood.
脂質異常症

let one’s guard down
To become less careful after having been cautious.
油断する

gang up on someone
To join together against someone. Often used humorously when several people say the same unpleasant thing.
寄ってたかって人を責める、いじめる

console oneself
To make oneself feel better after something disappointing or unpleasant.
自分を慰める

#HealthyAging #MetabolicSyndrome #AIandMedicine #LifeAfter60 #JapanesePathologist

Accidents, Safety Management, and Thinking About Why They Happen

Accidents are rarely caused by someone intending to cause harm. Yet someone is always affected when an accident occurs. The more I have worked in medicine, the more I have come to understand a simple but difficult truth: human beings inevitably make mistakes.

 When we think about accidents, the people involved do not cause them because they want them to happen.

And yet, whenever an accident occurs, someone inevitably suffers the consequences.

Regardless of the type or scale of the damage, accidents are things that should never happen.

And yet, somewhere, someday, an accident will happen.

Why?

Because human beings inevitably make mistakes.

When I first began studying medical safety, I did not really understand what those words meant.

“There may be minor mistakes, but surely I would never make the kind of mistake that could lead to a serious accident.”

Looking back, perhaps that was how I thought.

But as I experienced small mistakes myself—near misses and incidents—I gradually began to feel,

“Ah, I was careless. But things like this do happen from time to time.”

Even then, however, I had not fully connected those experiences with the idea that human beings inevitably make mistakes.

As I continued working while thinking about these things every day, and as I heard about major accidents elsewhere—not only medical accidents—I gradually came to understand the Swiss cheese model, in which several small failures happen to line up at exactly the wrong points.

Something small enough to make us think,

“Well, this much should be all right,”

may in fact lie only one step away from a serious accident.

Looking back on my own career, I can think of several situations that might have led to an accident.

There have even been times when I thought afterward, “If I had been doing this entirely on my own, that could have been disastrous.”

“If everyone simply did their job properly, accidents would never happen.”

For a long time, society entrusted safety to the carefulness and sense of responsibility of individual people.

But that way of thinking did not sufficiently include the perspective of the person who would suffer the consequences.

An accident truly becomes an accident when there is someone who becomes its victim.

Once someone is harmed, it is already too late.

And when several people each make a small mistake, those mistakes can combine and lead to an accident.

Those small mistakes themselves can also be regarded as accidents in a broader sense.

An accident is not an accident only after someone discovers it.

What matters when we think about accidents is asking:

“Why did this accident happen?”

This is the idea behind repeatedly asking “Why?”

The question is not, “Whose fault was it?”

It is, “Why did this event occur?”

It is not about finding someone to blame.

Unlike a crime, an accident is generally not something a person deliberately intends to cause.

Nevertheless, maintaining safety is an obligation shared by everyone involved in a job or professional activity.

And when serious negligence leads to an accident, legal responsibility may also follow.

Over the past few days, serious medical and railway accidents have occurred one after another.

Both fields demand a high level of individual skill precisely because mistakes can directly affect human lives.

As one healthcare professional, I must take these accidents as lessons for myself and continue to carry out my daily work with care.

Safety does not begin with believing that we will never make mistakes, but with accepting that we will—and asking why before those mistakes reach someone else.

 

・・・

Vocabulary for Learners

near miss
An event in which something almost goes wrong, but no serious harm actually occurs.
ヒヤリハット、重大な事故になりかけた事象

incident
An unexpected event or problem, especially one that may affect safety.
インシデント、予期しない出来事・安全上の問題

Swiss cheese model
A safety model showing how several small weaknesses can line up and lead to a serious accident.
スイスチーズモデル。複数の小さな弱点が重なって重大事故につながるという安全管理の考え方

negligence
Failure to take the level of care that is reasonably expected.
過失、必要とされる注意を怠ること

blame
To say that someone is responsible for something bad that happened.
責任を誰かに負わせること、非難すること

victim
A person who is harmed, injured, or affected by an accident or other event.
被害者

#SafetyManagement #MedicalSafety #HumanError #AccidentPrevention #JapanesePathologist 

What We Think, and How We Put It into Words Each Day

Some days, I cannot think of anything to write about. Yet perhaps the very act of searching for a topic reveals something essential: as long as we are alive, we are always thinking about something.

There are days when I simply cannot think of a topic for my blog.

Perhaps it would be enough just to keep a diary of what happens each day. But since I spend about half of my waking hours at work, it is not always easy to find something outside work that is worth writing about.

I can write about lectures, peer reviews, and other activities related to my profession, but of course I cannot say much about their actual content.

Needless to say, writing about day-to-day duties at work or relationships with colleagues is even more difficult.

Of course, if I wanted to look for topics on television, in newspapers, or on the internet, there would be no shortage of material.

If I asked AI for help, it could probably give me ten or twenty ideas within seconds. And by looking at my previous posts, it could probably even write something that sounded “like me.”

But then it would no longer be my blog.

I may ask AI to proofread what I have written, but unless the starting point is something I myself have thought or felt that day, there seems little point in writing it.

When I think about it that way, I am rather surprised that I have managed to write something every day.

Perhaps that in itself is evidence that human beings are always thinking about something.

To create something out of nothing and then leave it behind in words may be something particularly human.

Animals, of course, must also think about many things as they go through their daily lives. By making sounds, they may even engage in a simple form of putting their thoughts or feelings into expression. But unlike humans, they can hardly leave those thoughts behind as a record.

Perhaps the significance of human existence lies not simply in continuing to live, but in continuing to think.

That does not mean that life becomes meaningless if one loses the ability to think.

Rather, as long as we are alive, we are probably thinking about something every day.

And somehow, we give expression to those thoughts.

In my case, that means writing a blog every day.

I have no idea how much value there is in expressing my thoughts this way.

At the very least, I have no grand ambition to charge people money to read these posts. In that sense, my blog probably has very little monetary value.

Still, reading what other people think allows us to encounter the diversity of human thought.

Even when someone usually writes about familiar things in a familiar way, there are days when they suddenly approach something from a slightly different angle. Reading such a post can make me stop and think, “Ah, that is another way of looking at it.”

And yet, putting exactly what we think into words is a surprisingly difficult task.

Perhaps that difficulty itself is one reason we keep trying to write.

・・・

Vocabulary for Learners

no shortage of
More than enough of something; plenty available.
不足がない、いくらでもある

starting point
The place, idea, or thought from which something begins.
出発点、きっかけ

evidence
Facts or signs that show something is probably true.
証拠、根拠、証左

put something into words
To express thoughts or feelings using language.
考えや気持ちを言葉にする、言語化する

give expression to
To show or communicate a thought, feeling, or idea.
考えや感情を表現する

monetary value
The value of something measured in money.
金銭的価値

diversity of human thought
The many different ways in which people think and understand the world.
人間の思考の多様性

from a different angle
From another point of view or way of thinking.
別の角度から、違った視点で

#JapanesePathologist #DailyWriting #Blogging #AIandWriting #ThinkingInWords

Because War Must Never Be the Answer

August brings memories of war back to Japan every year. We remember dictatorship, military madness, public enthusiasm for victory, and countless deaths. Yet even as weapons evolve, perhaps history still offers clues about how peace can be sustained.

August.

Once again this year, there have been many television programs looking back on the Second World War.

Dictators exercising absolute power.
Military leaders running out of control.
Crowds intoxicated by victory.
And, in the end, an appalling number of deaths.

War should never happen, and yet societies somehow arrive at the absurd conclusion that they have no choice but to fight.

Each person has only one life, and yet lives are lost so easily—and in such enormous numbers.

We speak of passing down the memories of war to future generations, but there is an old Japanese saying: once the pain has passed, people forget how much it hurt.

Eventually, perhaps everyone will forget just how terrible war really was.

And while those memories fade, weapons continue to develop. Humanity has even created nuclear weapons.

Looking at the Russia-Ukraine war and the war involving the United States, Israel, and Iran, two developments have particularly caught my attention.

One is drone warfare.
The other is asymmetric warfare.

Ukraine quickly began producing drones on an almost household scale in response to Russia. What began in small workshops now seems to have grown large enough to form a military industry of its own.

Iran's closure of the Strait of Hormuz was another shift in thinking.

It showed that even without large-scale direct combat, it is possible to have an enormous impact on the global economy.

Drones and the closure of a strategic sea route are very different from nuclear weapons with their overwhelming destructive power. Yet they can still become means of challenging a much greater power.

A major power may find it relatively easy to use its overwhelming military strength, but there must be many different forms of deterrence that can be devised against it.

People often say that most things human beings can imagine eventually become reality.

Something that someone, somewhere in the world is thinking about today may surely become possible someday.

If that is so, perhaps peace itself should also be something we can make possible.

And yet, for some reason, that remains extraordinarily difficult.

Japan once experienced a long period without large-scale warfare.

During the Edo period, from after the Shimabara Rebellion until the final years of the shogunate, Japan went for more than two centuries with almost no major domestic war.

War must never be allowed to happen, no matter what.

Peace may take many different forms.

Even so, could we not learn something from at least part of the way Japan maintained peace in those days?

Peace may take many forms, but surely history still has something to teach us about how to keep war from returning.

・・・ 

Vocabulary for Learners

absolute power
Complete control over a country or organization without meaningful limits.
絶対的な権力、専制的な権力

run out of control
To become impossible to control or restrain.
暴走する、制御不能になる

intoxicated by victory
So excited by winning that people lose calm judgment.
勝利に熱狂して冷静さを失う

appalling
Extremely shocking or terrible.
ぞっとするような、ひどい

pass down
To give knowledge, traditions, or memories to the next generation.
後世に伝える、受け継ぐ

asymmetric warfare
Conflict in which the two sides have very different military strength or methods.
非対称戦争、非対称的な戦い

deterrence
The prevention of an attack by making the possible cost too high.
抑止、抑止力

strategic sea route
An important shipping route with military or economic significance.
戦略的に重要な海上交通路

destructive power
The ability to cause enormous damage or destruction.
破壊力

shogunate
A government ruled by a shogun in premodern Japan.
幕府

#WarAndPeace
#LessonsFromHistory
#EdoPeriod
#Peace
#JapanesePathologist

In the End, We Have to Walk Alone

Perhaps growing older means losing the ability to believe completely in another person. The more we understand people, the harder it becomes to find a mentor.

Life can be a lonely thing.

I have no one close to me whom I can truly look up to as a mentor—someone whose way of life I would like to follow, someone whose opinion I would instinctively want to seek.

It seems almost impossible to find such a person among politicians, whether in Japan or elsewhere in the world. Business leaders, by definition, operate in pursuit of profit, and inevitably have to deal with both the clean and the murky sides of human affairs. I may respect one aspect of such a person, while finding another difficult to admire.

The same is true of religious figures and scholars. Human beings all have different sides to them, strengths and weaknesses. Someone may shine brilliantly in one respect while being far less admirable in another.

Of course, if a person is exceptionally gifted in some field, we may still regard them as admirable overall.

And yet, even people like that have become surprisingly difficult for me to find.

Perhaps the reason is simply that, after living for so many years, I have come to understand that this is what human beings are.

Within a life of less than a hundred years, someone may shine brightly for a time. But that brilliance lasts only for a moment. Before long, it fades, and our memories of that person are compressed together with countless other memories and buried somewhere deep inside us.

And eventually, that person dies.

No matter how deeply we respect someone or how faithfully we follow them, in the end they will leave us behind.

However remarkable they may have been, they cannot remain someone we can rely upon forever.

At the same time as I realize how many people who came before me have watched over me and helped me through life, I am also becoming increasingly aware that, as the time left to me grows shorter, I will have to find my own way more and more.

Perhaps this is one consequence of growing older.

The more we understand human beings, the harder it becomes to place someone above us and simply follow their lead.

Life really is a rather lonely thing.

Perhaps growing older means realizing that, in the end, no one else can live our life for us.

・・・

Vocabulary for Learners

look up to someone
To respect and admire someone very much.
人を尊敬する、敬慕する

mentor
A person who gives advice and guidance based on greater experience.
指導者、助言者、人生の先輩

murky
Not completely clear, honest, or morally simple.
不透明な、清濁の「濁」にあたるような

shine brilliantly
To stand out because of exceptional ability or achievement.
非常に優れて輝く、際立つ

fade
To gradually lose strength, brightness, or importance.
薄れる、色あせる

leave someone behind
To go away while another person remains. Here, it refers especially to death.
人を残して去る、この文脈では「先に亡くなる」

find one’s own way
To decide for oneself how to live or what to do.
自分自身の道を見つける、自分で生き方を決める

#GrowingOlder #LifeAndLoneliness #Mentorship #ReflectionsOnLife #JapanesePathologist

When You Want to Know What Happened After a Masterpiece

A great story may end with “The End,” but its characters do not necessarily stop living in our imagination. Generative AI may now be able to continue those stories in ways that feel surprisingly natural.

Last weekend, one of Hayao Miyazaki’s animated films was shown on television.

I have seen it many times before, but Nausicaä is still charming no matter how often I watch it, and the story never loses its excitement.

But what happens after the words “The End” appear?

In human society, people never simply “live happily ever after” forever. Perhaps one day the heroine marries someone, gives birth to an adorable pair of twins—a boy and a girl—and before long a struggle over succession breaks out.

Or, of course, something completely different might happen.

As long as the original creator is still active and able to continue the work, the sequel should probably be written by that creator. Unfortunately, for many reasons, that eventually becomes impossible.

American television dramas and movies often continue through sequel after sequel, and perhaps that is only natural.

Life does not conveniently stop just because the words “The End” appear on the screen. In a sense, the characters in a story continue to live lives of their own.

And generative AI is becoming capable of telling what happens next while maintaining a surprising degree of consistency with the original world.

Take The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter, for example.

I gave AI the following prompt:

“Could you write a roughly 400-character synopsis for a short story set twenty years after Princess Kaguya returned to the Moon? The main characters are Princess Kaguya and her twenty-year-old son, a prince. His father is one of the five noblemen who once proposed to her. Kaguya returns to this country with the Moon’s highly advanced science and technology, and the prince meets his father. He later marries an Earthly princess, remains on Earth, rules the country, and brings happiness to its people. The story should end with ‘and they lived happily ever after.’”

The AI replied:

“Twenty years had passed since Princess Kaguya returned to the Moon. The Emperor and the old bamboo cutter had already died, and the story of the Moon Princess was slowly fading into legend when a silver vessel descended on the outskirts of the capital.

From it emerged Princess Kaguya, unchanged by age, together with a young man of twenty. He was her son, born of one of the five noblemen who had once sought her hand in marriage. Before returning to the Moon, Kaguya had told no one that she was carrying his child.

Having studied advanced medicine, agriculture, and energy technology on the Moon, the young man returned with his mother to visit his father. Now an old man, his father saw something of the young Kaguya in the prince’s face and immediately understood.

The prince eventually shared the Moon’s knowledge generously with the people, reducing famine and disease and bringing prosperity to the country. He then married the daughter of an Earthly king.

Princess Kaguya returned once more to the Moon, but the prince remained on Earth. As a king linking two worlds—his father and mother, Earth and Moon—he ruled wisely, and the people lived happily ever after.

And so the story ended happily.”

It sounds almost like something Shinichi Hoshi might have written, but it is remarkably well constructed.

Personally, the only things that felt slightly out of place were the silver spacecraft and the fact that Princess Kaguya had not aged at all.

I also found it interesting that the AI deliberately avoided revealing which of the five noblemen was the prince’s father.

After only a few rounds of discussion with the AI, I suspect we could produce a genuinely moving Princess Kaguya, Part Two in just an hour or two.

Ordinary writers may have a hard time competing with this.

These days, people often talk about the importance of having practical, hands-on skills.

The number of white-collar jobs will probably decrease dramatically.

Even doctors may eventually do little more than perform examinations according to AI recommendations, while some kinds of work are largely handed over to AI and humans simply supervise the process.

The question will then become what we do with all the time that AI gives back to us, and how we use human creativity.

But how many people will still be willing to go through the troublesome process of creating something themselves?

I do not know how close we really are to the so-called technological singularity.

But there is little doubt that we have already entered an age in which AI can perform, one after another, tasks we once believed required uniquely human creativity.

Perhaps human beings are now being forced to reconsider, and rapidly change, the very way we live.

“The End” may soon mean only the end of the original story—not the end of what can be imagined next.

 

・・・

Vocabulary for Learners

live happily ever after
A traditional ending meaning that people continue to live happily for the rest of their lives.
「いつまでも幸せに暮らしました」という昔話などの決まり文句

succession
The process of deciding who will take over a position, title, or leadership role.
後継、継承

original creator
The person who first created a story, character, artwork, or other work.
原作者、創作者

consistency
The quality of remaining logical and not contradicting earlier information.
一貫性、整合性

fade into legend
To gradually become remembered more as a story or legend than as a real event.
次第に伝説・昔話になっていく

out of place
Strange or unsuitable in a particular situation.
場違いな、違和感のある

hands-on skills
Practical skills involving actual work or direct experience rather than only theory.
実践的な技能、手に職

white-collar jobs
Professional or office-based jobs rather than mainly physical labor.
ホワイトカラー職、事務・専門職

supervise
To watch and manage work done by other people or systems.
監督する、管理する

technological singularity
A hypothetical point when artificial intelligence develops beyond human intellectual ability and causes rapid social change.
技術的特異点、シンギュラリティー

#GenerativeAI #JapaneseCulture #CreativityAndAI #FutureOfWork #JapanesePathologist