scholarly journals Using COVID-19 Pandemic as an Opportunities for Technology Usage Inspiration and Innovation for African Countries

In developing nations, and on the African continent in particular, the uptake and impact of technological and other developments is often slower than in other parts of the world. While pockets of development exist on the continent as a source of work, education and access much of Africa remains trapped in a cycle of poverty.In this worldwide health crisis, the medical industry is looking for new technologies to monitor and controls the spread of COVID19 (Coronavirus) pandemic. AI is one of such technology which can easily track the spread of this virus, identifies the high-risk patients, and is useful in controlling this infection in real-time. Educators have created online classrooms in a matter of days. Information resources to educate the public and track the spread of the virus using big data sprang up seemingly overnight. Finally, those of us fortunate enough to have jobs that allow us to work from home are learning the full potential of the communication technologies that the 21stcentury has bestowed upon us. None of these tasks have been easy, but individuals and organizations have demonstrated the motivation and mind shifts needed to research, innovate, and act quickly.AI embodies the field of knowledge that seeks to create machines (computers) thatcan emulate human cognitive functions such as learning, reasoning, understanding, vision, perception, recognition, and problem solving to a reasonable level. Computers that have AI capabilities are currently being used in severalreal-worlddomains to solve problems. AI has already played a significant role in each stage of fighting the COVID-19 pandemic. Some areas where we saw immediate applications include the processing of large amounts of data to find patterns that could lead to the discovery of potential treatment drugs; as well astreating infected people.The novel aspect of this pandemic involves several unknowns and is likely to have a lingering impact for years to come. However, despite the current climate, I am somewhat comforted that the history of past pandemics and crises suggests an eventual recovery plan for the world. After all, necessity is the mother of all invention. New creations arise out of disruption.

2007 ◽  
Vol 38 ◽  
pp. 1-12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Herwig Wolfram

Throughout the world, historians expand the history of their nations and states into periods when these polities did not yet exist. The French speak of their first dynasty and mean the Frankish Merovingians. Until recently French history textbooks even for students in the French overseas territories started with “Nos ancêtres, les Gaulois.” In the German Kaiserreich between 1871 and 1918, let us say, little Jan Kowalski in Poznan had to accept the Germanic peoples as his forefathers, as every textbook on German history dealt with them at length. Needless to say, not only German medievalists speak of Germans long before theodiscus or teutonicus came to mean deutsch. All over the world people search for the roots of their identity. Take, for instance, the present preoccupation with Celtic ancestors. Not only the Irish, Welsh, Scots, and Bretons, but a great many other Europeans also want to be Celts by origin. “Their successors in Brittany, Wales, or Ireland do not threaten anybody with Anschluss or war. The Celtic origins, therefore, fit the Austrian neutrality perfectly well,” as Erich Zöllner ironically put it in 1976 after Chancellor Bruno Kreisky had openly declared that the Celts and not the Germans were our forefathers.


Infolib ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 2-8
Author(s):  
Umida Teshabaeva ◽  

The article is devoted to the history of the Tashkent Public Library, at the origins of which were prominent scientists of that time, to the present day of the National Library of Uzbekistan. The library fund has more than 7.5 million items in 75 languages of the world. The National Library is the main methodological center of information and library institutions of the Republic. Creation of favorable conditions for readers is one of the priority tasks of the library, which is improved every year by the introduction of new technologies for obtaining information in an operational way. Thanks to membership in the International Consortium «eIFL», users have access to 38 foreign educational databases, 12 of which are licensed. Also, library readers get access to national and world educational collections in different languages of the world.


2021 ◽  
Vol 20 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 77-99
Author(s):  
Moorosi Leshoele

Abstract The United States of America invests heavily on their military capability and it is estimated that it spends, alone, approximately 40 per cent of what the whole world spends on military. Four of the other super powers that make up the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council (UN-SC) also spend a significant percentage of their national budgets on military. Chinweizu has for a long time argued that Africa needs a well-resourced African Standby Force (or the Black Africa League) that will protect the interests of the continent so as to prevent the history of Africans enslavement and colonialism repeating itself. This article seeks to analyse Africa’s investment on its military defense capability vis-à-vis the five permanent members of the UN-SC and North Korea, by critiquing two case studies of two of the continent’s economic giants – South Africa and Egypt. Realist and Sankofa perspectives are used as the prisms through which the article was researched. In line with Chinweizu’s observation, the article argues that without serious political will and dedication to building Africa’s nuclear weapons capability and ensuring that Africa is economically self-reliant, diplomatic engagements with the rest of the world as (un)equal partners will remain a pipe dream and the looting of Africa’s mineral wealth will continue unabated. It is clear that given the reality of the African Holocust if African countries fail to collectively defend themselves, Africa will continue to be a political football for the rest of the world.


2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 135-175
Author(s):  
Warseto Freddy Sihombing

AbstractNo one can be justified before God for doing good deeds. No matter how good a man is, if he does not believe in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, he will not be saved from the wrath of God to come. There is no human being who is right before God, and no sinful man can save himself in any way. The only way out is in the way that God has given to the problem of all sinners, by sending Jesus Christ to the world to die for sinners. "And for this he came, so that every man believed in him, who was sent by God" (John 6:29). The Bible teaches that salvation is only obtained because of faith in Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the object of that faith. This salvation is known as the statement "Justified by faith. Paul explained this teaching in each of his writings. This teaching of justification by faith has been repeatedly denied by some people who disagree with Paul's opinion. The history of the church from the early centuries to the present has proven the variety of understandings that have emerged from this teaching, but one important thing is that sinful humans are justified by their faith in Jesus Christ before God.Keywords: Paul;history; justified by faith.AbstrakTidak ada seorang pun yang dapat dibenarkan di hadapan Allah karena telah melakukan perbuatan baik. Sebaik apa pun manusia, jika dia tidak percaya kepada Yesus Kristus, Anak Allah maka ia tidak akan selamat dari murka Allah yang akan datang. Tidak ada seorang pun manusia yang benar di hadapan Allah, dan tidak ada seorang manusia berdosa yang dapat menyelematkan dirinya sendiri dengan cara apa pun. Satu-satunya jalan keluar adalah dengan cara yang Allah telah berikan untuk masalah semua orang berdosa, yaitu dengan mengutus Yesus Kristus ke dunia untuk mati bagi orang berdosa. “Dan untuk itulah Dia datang, yaitu supaya setiap orang percaya kepada Dia, yang telah diutus oleh Allah” (Yohanes 6:29). Alkitab mengajarkan bahwa keselamatan hanya diperoleh karena iman kepada Yesus Kristus. Yesus Kristus adalah obyek iman tersebut. Keselamatan ini dikenal dengan pernyataan “Dibenarkan karena iman. Paulus menjelaskan ajaran ini dalam setiap tulisannya. Ajaran pembenaran oleh iman ini telah berulang kali disangkal oleh beberap orang yang tidak setuju dengan pendapat Paulus. Sejarah gereja mulai dari abad permulaan sampai pada masa sekarang ini telah membuktikan beragamnya pemahaman yang muncul terhadap ajaran ini, namun satu hal yang terpenting adalah bahwa manusia berdosa dibenarkan oleh iman mereka kepada Yesus Kristus di hadapan Allah.Kata Kunci: Paulus; sejarah; iman; dibenarkan oleh iman.


Author(s):  
Dr. Pradipta Mukhopadhyay

Digital Economy refers to an economy which is based on digital computing technologies and can also be referred to as internet economy or web economy as the business activities are conducted through markets based on the internet or the World Wide Web. A Digital Economy also refers to the usage of various digitised information and knowledge to perform various economic activities and uses various new technologies like Internet, Cloud Computing, Big Data Analytics to collect, store and analyse information digitally. This way the modern digital economies are helping the local and regional business organisations to come out of their local boundaries and step into the global scenario to take advantages of the modern liberalisation policies of the governments along with reduced trade barriers throughout the world. This paper will study the importance of digital economy in the modern world along with the difference between the traditional economy and the digital economy and the current state of digital economy in India. This Study has been casual, exploratory and empirical in nature and the data needed for research work has been collected by using both direct and indirect method of data collection.


2021 ◽  

Volume 5 A Cultural History of Color in the Age of Industry covers the period 1800 to 1920, when the world embraced color like never before. Inventions, such as steam power, lithography, photography, electricity, motor cars, aviation, and cheaper color printing, all contributed to a new exuberance about color. Available pigments and colored products – made possible by new technologies, industrial manufacturing, commercialization, and urbanization – also greatly increased, as did illustrated printed literature for the mass market. Color, both literally and metaphorically, was splashed around, and became an expressive tool for artists, designers, and writers. Color shapes an individual’s experience of the world and also how society gives particular spaces, objects, and moments meaning. The 6 volume set of the Cultural History of Color examines how color has been created, traded, used, and interpreted over the last 5000 years. The themes covered in each volume are color philosophy and science; color technology and trade; power and identity; religion and ritual; body and clothing; language and psychology; literature and the performing arts; art; architecture and interiors; and artefacts. Volume 5 in the Cultural History of Color set. General Editors: Carole P. Biggam and Kirsten Wolf


2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (01) ◽  
pp. 87-108
Author(s):  
Santosa Santosa

Looking at the historical flow of Islamic development in Indonesia as such, the author took an analysis that the future prospects of Islam in Indonesia have a great opportunity to continue to develop, be it in the fields of politics, economics, education, social, and culture. This can be seen from the history of Islam in Indonesia that continues to develop until now, this is the early stage of the emergence of awareness of the Indonesian nation of the importance of planting religious values in Indonesian society so that the Indonesian nation can meet the future not only with science and technology but also in the balance by IMTAQ.  The era of globalization in the 21st century that has begun at this time, Islam in Indonesia has apparently exerted a huge influence on the advancement of Islam in the world. Although the existence of Islam today is really faced with a fairly severe challenge that requires the involvement of various parties concerned. With regard to this, strategic efforts need to be made, among others: by providing knowledge, skills, and piety in all fields (religious, political, economic, social, cultural, educational) so as to give birth to creative, innovative, independent and productive people considering the world to come is a competitive world. Keywords: Islam, The Future, Indonesia


The Royal Society was not the first scientific society, or organized academy for the promotion of science, to be founded, since it was preceded by the original Accademia del Cimento, which took its rise in 1657, but lived only ten years. The Royal Society is, then, the oldest corporate body of its kind to have enjoyed continuous existence until today. In a like way the Philosophical Transactions was not the earliest scientific periodical to come forth, since the first number of the Journal des Sçavans appeared, on 5 January 1665, two months before the first number of the Transactions . The Journal , however, while much concerned with scientific matters, including scientific books, dealt with the world of learning in general, including literary, legal and theological matters. Its pronouncements often led to stormy controversy, it had a troubled history and finally ceased to appear in 1790. The Transactions , except for a short break when it was replaced by Hooke’s Philosophical Collections , and for an interruption of three years that followed the landing of William of Orange and the flight of James II, has been published continuously from the issue of the first number dated 6 March 1664/5, the present year thus being the three hundredth anniversary of its beginning. Conspicuously connected with the first appearance of the Philosophical Transactions was Henry Oldenburg, a character very much to the fore in the early history of the Society.


2012 ◽  
Vol 2012 ◽  
pp. 1-9 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Smith ◽  
Matthew Ryan

Authentic, well preserved living organisms are basic elements for research in the life sciences and biotechnology. They are grown and utilized in laboratories around the world and are key to many research programmes, industrial processes and training courses. They are vouchers for publications and must be available for confirmation of results, further study or reinvestigation when new technologies become available. These biological resources must be maintained without change in biological resource collections. In order to achieve best practice in the maintenance and provision of biological materials for industry, research and education the appropriate standards must be followed. Cryopreservation is often the best preservation method available to achieve these aims, allowing long term, stable storage of important microorganisms. To promulgate best practice the Organisation for Economic Development and Co-operation (OECD published the best practice guidelines for BRCs. The OECD best practice consolidated the efforts of the UK National Culture Collections, the European Common Access to Biological Resources and Information (CABRI) project consortium and the World Federation for Culture Collections. The paper discusses quality management options and reviews cryopreservation of fungi, describing how the reproducibility and quality of the technique is maintained in order to retain the full potential of fungi.


Interpreting ◽  
1999 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 81-95 ◽  
Author(s):  
Walter Keiser

This article attempts to cover the history of the International Association of Conference Interpreters (AIIC) from its beginnings in the early fifties to present day challenges and recent developments. As AIIC evolved and its membership increased to about 2500 members around the world, so did its complexity. Its evolution mirrors the coming of age of a profession with the concomitant challenges that every profession and professional organization must face today: safeguarding standards of quality, maintaining and improving working conditions, the forces of deregulation and changes brought about by new technologies. AIIC can look back on solid accomplishments covering most every facet of the profession, its achievements serving professional interpreters around the world, whether they are members of AIIC or not.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document