Welcome to the third episode of our series, 'A Carbon, a Silicon, and a Cell walk into a Bar...', part of the 'Redefining Society' podcast. I'm Marco Ciappelli, and Dr. Bruce Y. Lee joins me as we explore the intriguing blend of technology, health, and society that we delve into once a month.
Guest: Dr. Bruce Y Lee, Executive Director of PHICOR (Public Health Informatics, Computational, and Operations Research) [@PHICORteam]
On LinkedIn | https://www.linkedin.com/in/bruce-y-lee-68a6834/
On Twitter | https://twitter.com/bruce_y_lee
Website | https://www.bruceylee.com/
On Forbes | https://www.forbes.com/sites/brucelee/
On Psychology Today | https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/contributors/bruce-y-lee-md-mba
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Host: Marco Ciappelli, Co-Founder at ITSPmagazine [@ITSPmagazine] and Host of Redefining Society Podcast
On ITSPmagazine | https://www.itspmagazine.com/itspmagazine-podcast-radio-hosts/marco-ciappelli
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Episode Introduction
Greetings, explorers of the intertwined worlds of technology, health, and society. I am Marco Ciappelli, your inquisitive host, steering the thoughtful ship of the 'Redefining Society Podcast.' Today, we find ourselves traversing the intricate narratives in our monthly sojourn titled 'A Carbon, a Silicon, and a Cell walk into a Bar...'. Dr. Bruce Y. Lee accompanies me as we ponder over the fervid topics of our time, endeavoring to unravel the intricacies at the cusp of technology and humanity’s well-being.
In today’s episodic exploration, we commence with a heart-heavy yet candid dialogue on the prevailing environmental calamities - events that don’t just shake our geographies but stir our collective consciousness, urging us to look deeper, to understand further, and to act responsibly. I share the platform with the meticulous Dr. Bruce Y. Lee, as we meander through tragic trails of wildfires that have scorched lands and imprinted irreparable marks on human and ecological landscapes. We intertwine this with reflections on the state of healthcare, questioning if advancements like telemedicine could stand tall as beacons of assistance in such times of distress.
Together, we embark on a philosophical excavation, delving into the paradox of technology - the creator and the potential solver of modern dilemmas. Can technology extricate us from the predicaments it inadvertently puts us in? This inquisition takes us down paths less traveled as we analyze whether technology truly meets our essential needs, or if it merely burgeons unasked, sometimes unneeded, promising solutions to non-existent problems while turning a blind eye to pressing matters of the heart and earth.
As we steer deeper, we find ourselves grappling with the overarching dilemma - the push and pull of technology. Dr. Lee urges us to discern between technology that spontaneously proliferates, inundating us with options we never asked for, and technology that emerges as a responsive force to existing issues. The dialogue doesn't shy away from holding a mirror to our society, asking if we are, indeed, nurturing innovations that genuinely tend to the wounds of the environment, health, and society.
Listeners, as we venture forth, discerning the interplay of wildfires, environmental health, and the role technology plays in this grand tapestry, we invite you to muse with us. How can technology, an entity so pervasive in our lives, be channeled to not only remediate the consequences of calamities but to foresee, prevent, and safeguard the sanctity of life and environment?
We thread this intricate discourse with a desire for solutions, not just in the face of wildfires but in addressing the ubiquity of microplastics, the imperatives of environmental health, and the latent opportunities residing in technology’s prudent application.
Join us, as we muse on the pulsating realities of today’s world, teetering between despair and hope, chaos and order, urging you to ponder – where do we stand in this era of technological prowess? What priorities must guide our hand, and how do we chart a course that respects the delicate balance between humanity and the force of nature?
Listen in as we meander through the captivating stories “At The Intersection Of Technology, Cybersecurity, and Society,” unraveling threads that bind our fate with that of technology. We invite you to engage, to share, and to be a part of this pivotal conversation that seeks not just to redefine society but to shape a future that harmonizes technology, health, and the vibrant canvas of human experience.
Dive deep with us in this enriching episode, where musings aren’t just contemplations but a clarion call for reflection, understanding, and action. Join this intricate dance of ideas, where we are all explorers seeking paths of enlightenment, today on the 'Redefining Society Podcast.' Welcome to the intersection of contemplation and reality.
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Resources
PHICOR: https://www.phicor.org/
AIMINGS: https://www.phicor.org/aimings
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To see and hear more Redefining Society stories on ITSPmagazine, visit:
https://www.itspmagazine.com/redefining-society-podcast
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Please note that this transcript was created using AI technology and may contain inaccuracies or deviations from the original audio file. The transcript is provided for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as a substitute for the original recording, as errors may exist. At this time, we provide it “as it is,” and we hope it can be helpful for our audience.
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[00:00:00] Marco Ciappelli: And here we are. I think we are at the same bar. Uh, Bruce, I, I recognize it. It's, uh, it's a habit.
[00:00:09] Bruce Y Lee: Yeah. Yeah. Um, the problem is there's aren't too many other customers here. I know. I noticed that. I'm wondering if it's something that I said or, you know, maybe the clothes I'm wearing or something like that because they don't seem to be coming in.
[00:00:22] Marco Ciappelli: Right. Right. I know. I, uh, my, my question is, is there a silicon, a carbon and a cell in there? Cause, uh, that's the joke.
[00:00:32] Bruce Y Lee: Yeah. You know, I don't know if they're in the bathroom right now. You know, maybe the carbons in the bathroom, the silicons. Waiting outside. Um, the cell might be, I don't know, passed out somewhere.
Who knows? Who
[00:00:46] Marco Ciappelli: knows? Who knows? Well, you know, that's, uh, that's who we, who we like to have at this, uh, at this bar, which in my case is not even the bar. And I don't even have a coffee today. So I broke that, that tradition. Uh, but, uh, I do have some water, so I'm, I'm copying you. I'm having the same, which is water.
[00:01:07] Bruce Y Lee: I think I got my water here too.
[00:01:10] Marco Ciappelli: There you go. Mine is in a bottle, but it's still water. So, again, this is a Redefining Society podcast. It's a series that... I already gave it away. It's, it's called a carbon, a silicon, and a cell walks into a bar. Sometimes one walk before the other, I figure I mix it up, but it doesn't matter.
It's still the three of them. And the point is that it's because we talk about technology, healthcare, and society, and that's why I talk about society and technology and your background for those that haven't seen. Another one of the episode that we've done before is and here's where you introduce yourself.
[00:01:51] Bruce Y Lee: Yeah. Well, uh, yeah, I'm Bruce Wiley and I wear multiple hats. I cover health healthcare and science for Forbes Uh, I also am professor at CUNY and where we, I run a center that does a lot of ai, artificial intelligence research. Uh, we do computer modeling. Uh, so, uh, broad interests in how different types of computational technology can help health and healthcare.
And I also write a lot about health. I'm a, I'm a health journalist in science journalist, so there's no shortage of things to talk about. Um, there are plenty of cells, carbons and silicons and all those different types of things. Um, and one of the things that we do is, is we, I guess we talk about some of the key news items over the past years and, and how they might apply to Your health in general and how they might apply to technology in general.
[00:02:43] Marco Ciappelli: That's correct. And sometimes, uh, we, we can find some good news. I don't know, good discoveries and improvement in, uh, in the, in the, in the healthcare and technology. And, you know, there's always then the other perspective that you can turn it. Always turn something good in bed. And sometimes you can turn something bad in good, but that's tough.
You know, that's tough. So we were chatting before the starting the recording that, uh, you know, one of the big news. Right now, it's what's been going on in Hawaii and with a big fire and I mean, it's pretty tragic, but we're thinking maybe to connect this conversation with that and maybe with the role of technology, either in environmental change or in disaster recovery.
And of course, I was thinking on telemedicine and accessibility. Um, Could be a help as well. I just throw it out there just because you did. So, uh, did you actually write something about it on Forbes? Yeah.
[00:03:50] Bruce Y Lee: So, you know, unfortunately one of the topics that's been, uh, that I've, I've, uh, written about, you know, on multiple occasions, the past few months have been wildfires.
Uh, so as, as all of you know, probably know, uh, you know, throughout a lot of the summer, we've dealt with the wildfires. Um, when we say we in the United States, uh, the wildfire smoke coming from Canada, and of course, Canada have been dealing with it more directly. Um, but that's been a continuing issue, and it's a reminder that, you know, a lot of stuff is going on in our environment.
You know, we've, uh, we're having an increased, um, uh, I guess, breadth of, um, wildfires occurring each year, if you look at the data, um, and, you know, the severity of wildfires may be increasing. Uh, and then most recently, you know, the, the really, really, really unfortunate situation in Maui, Hawaii, uh, where, um, you know, now you've, you've had, uh, more deaths from that wildfire.
Uh, when I wrote, um, an article for Forbes, it was at 93 and it's, it's increased since then. And even at 93, it was really the deadliest wildfire in the U S history over the past century. I think you have to go back to 1918, uh, for a deadlier wildfire. Um, and this one actually surpassed the 2018 campfire, uh, which is actually a sort of an unfortunate name because, you know, this is not just a campfire, but it's a campfire that affected Northern California.
Uh, so it exceeded that death toll. Um, so we're really at, at, uh, you know, record, uh, record death toll, um, with this Maui. Set of wildfires and it's probably going to continue to grow. Um, so that's, that's one thing I covered, uh, this, uh, past weekend and, and the death toll is only part of it, right? You've got, you've got the, um, I don't want to say only part of it.
It's a major. You also have to look at things like for every death that occurred, there's tons of people who got injured and people who got burned or people who, um, you know, things fell on them. Um, or they had, uh, heart attacks or strokes and all those different types of things. And then there's the destruction that occurred.
millions, billions of dollars of destruction. Uh, you're really messing up the entire ecosystem. There's plants and animals. So, so huge disaster. Um, so I covered that. I also, um, covered, uh, something about microplastics where they actually found, uh, microplastics in people who are undergoing cardiac surgery.
So we've got microplastics in your heart. And your blood, not from the surgery itself, but obviously from all the stuff in the environment, um, you know, you have microplastics everywhere. So I think those are sort of two key news items that I covered this, this week. Um, and they're both connected because they're environmental health stuff, right?
They're, um, you know, the status of the environment. Uh, and so you've got to really sit back and say, you know, what are we going to do about these things? What are we going to do about these problems? Um, and technology. You know, technology can solve a lot of problems if used correctly. Uh, so there's lots of potential opportunities for that.
Um, so that's one of the things that come to mind. Um,
[00:07:21] Marco Ciappelli: yeah, it's also come to mind that. And I had a few episodes about this where we kind of get philosophical with other guests, experts in environment and, you know, the way we can use technology. It's kind of like technology caused the problem and technology is going to resolve the problem.
So I actually wrote a piece about a paradox of this, right? So we use something and then more of that to To get back to where we were, maybe without technology, but then the question is, is it's going to be a net gain or we're still like under what, what's that going to be?
[00:08:02] Bruce Y Lee: Well, yeah, I think the, one of the things to keep in mind is there's, there's, there's two general ways to let technology flourish.
Uh, and I'm using that term florist in quotes, because that's not necessarily positive or negative thing for us means it's just basically because all over the place. So one is sort of this push technology where you essentially say, okay, you're just develop stuff and then see what happens. You just push it out there.
People don't necessarily say I need this, but it just comes out there. So, you know, we see this all the time. People didn't sit there and say, I really need Facebook, like people weren't saying, they're saying, I really need Facebook.
[00:08:44] Marco Ciappelli: I wish somebody would invent Facebook.
[00:08:47] Bruce Y Lee: Yes. Yes. You didn't sit there. I mean, I, you know, people in the 1990s didn't sit there and say, you know, my life is sort of incomplete.
I've got all these things, but I really don't have a place where I can post all these photos and read what people are saying, you know, all the time. Right. It's just sort of happened. So that's example, push technology. Example, pull technology is you sit there and say, I have a problem and you know, it needs to be solved.
Can we develop some technology to actually address this? Um, and so the way I see it is, you know, yeah, you're seeing these technology come out and then you sort of say, okay, what can we use it for? That's more push. And then we have all these problems. And are we actually developing technology to actually address these problems or adapting technology that we're really already have?
I don't think we're doing such a great job with that latter thing. We're doing it to some degree, but not to the degree that we could be doing it. Um, because there are, there are so many health problems. Yeah. I just mentioned a couple of these problems and these aren't just two problems, right? When it comes to like pollution or like wildfires or, you know, there's so many parts of it, like, can you develop technology?
Can better predict when it's going to happen and prevent it, you know, like surveillance technology or prevention technology. Can you develop technology? Can actually better deal with or warn people about it? Um, you know, or deal with the consequences like, you know, healthcare and taking care of destruction and, you know, trying to mitigate destruction, those things like that.
So, um. So yeah, we have to ask ourselves, are we actually doing enough of that?
[00:10:30] Marco Ciappelli: That's a really important point and then we can talk a little bit more in depth of you know What's been going on with the fire and and what is still going on. I mean I live in LA so You know You just look around you know that It's going to happen.
It's that season. You know, you look at Malibu, you look at, and you're afraid because you know, you know, it's going to happen. But when you start seeing these things happening in Canada or in Hawaii or in places that are not so well known historically for that, that's got to be something going on. But what I was going to take a stab at is, is this thing about, you know, I call it the blinking lights and funny noises, like technology.
Oh, that's cool. Let's do it. Right? Oh, yeah, it's an arcade. Let me play. Let me put 50, you know, whatever it costs now to play at the arcade. I don't know. People play at home, I guess. Uh, but that's that's the thing like do we just do it because we can or do we just Stumbling in some technology like let's face the problems.
Let's make a list and I was talking to a futurist the other day. I just published the episode. He he has a funny game called. Uh, end of the world, 2075. He is, he works at Stanford as a researcher and they, they, they study kind of like what you do, but with like risk model, very complex risk model. And, and, and we were talking about the fact of how, you know, it's, it's almost impossible to put stuff together when complexity arise.
But there is also this idea of. Try to minimize, you know, maybe focus on the most important things. Maybe AI is not necessarily big, should be the big problem now, but there are other things that you give priority. So I'm simplifying the conversation. I invite people to listen to it, but you know, it's like when you look at this model that you do, I mean, you got to decide, well, maybe I can go in a lot of different way.
How do you pick? Where priority is, which also bring us to what are really the priority in our in our environment right now. I mean, extreme weather. It seems to me it's it's pretty pretty big problem.
[00:12:53] Bruce Y Lee: Yeah, I mean, I think the way there's no shortage of issues or problems when it comes to health, health care, public health and those things like that.
Um, what was that? I can't remember what movie this is from, but someone someone said, Don't give me problems. Give me solutions. Uh, it's some famous movie. Thank you. With some famous actor, and I know that provides absolutely no context, but yeah, I still remember. Ask, ask it to AI. Yeah, we can ask, uh, CHAT GPT to just tell us what.
But, um, but basically, uh, yeah, so there's all these different problems. And the key thing to remember is that these aren't disparate problems. Many times they're actually connected, um, because a lot of things in health and, um, population health and all these different areas are actually, actually connected.
Um, and so there is a shortage of solutions out there and there are things that can be used, you know, even including things that are existing out there to, uh, to address some of these questions. And, you know, I, I like problem solving, uh, because I think when you actually problem, you know, you have a problem, you try to address it and you try to come up with a solution.
So I think we do need more of that, um, because sure, like coming up with neat, interesting things.
Um, so when it comes to, uh, things like, for instance, uh, changes in temperature, you know, uh, global warming, um, changes in the climate, uh, you know, wildfire risk, those things like that, uh, we have some just very general ideas of what's, you know, measurements of what's actually going on, but like we can get a lot more specific in terms of, you know, where can we start preventing some of these things?
Um, you know, where are the real danger zones? Uh, how should people be prepared as a result?
[00:14:45] Marco Ciappelli: Um, but how, how do you, not only how do you pick a list of priority, but I feel like the problem is how do you put everybody in agreement on that? Because, I mean, we all know the pollution, we all know the, the carbon in the atmosphere, but then you go talk with the oil company and tell them no.
It's not a big deal. We're losing jobs. We can't go into all electric because, you know, there's a lot of job in the car industry with the, with the engine. And you're like, okay, but it seems to me that we really need to address this problem. How do we get together?
[00:15:28] Bruce Y Lee: Yeah, so this is one thing that, one of the things that we've actually done a fair amount in some of our work, which is helping people understand the magnitude and impact of the problem.
Not just from an immediate term, but like a short term, midterm, longer term and much longer term. Um, so if you think about it, I've many times used this example of like, you know, a weather map, right? So you watch a weather map and you sit there and say, okay, weather map will show you what's been happening, what's happening right now and what's going to happen in the next day.
Three days, five days, 10 days, et cetera. So you get some forewarning and some understanding of the impact. And, you know, the weather map shows you what happens because you've combined, you know, you combine parametric pressure and temperature and all these things like that. And this is what happens. Cloud formation is going to rain or other things like that.
Uh, so one of the things is helping people understand, uh, what's the impact of a problem. Uh, because many times people don't, don't realize that, you know, we did that with, um, we did that with COVID 19 for instance. So when. When, um, uh, back in 2020, uh, we wanted to give people a sense of, okay, here's the impact of COVID 19.
Here's what's going to happen. Not just, not just the, um, impact in terms of cases and those things like that, but here's a potential impact when it comes to costs, productivity losses, uh, direct medical costs, those things like that, you know, then you really kind of tying economics with. Health measures, and then you can also tie things like, you know, what's going to be happening with jobs and all these, there's, there's ways to do all these things.
And I think one of the things that we struggle as a society is understanding, like, for instance, if I sat there and say, uh, I'm Mark Kongos puts, puts this chair, I have plenty of chairs back here to push back here, I guess, but I push the chair, you know, you know, it's going to move and I can see it move simple, straight cause and effect.
All right. But if you start getting more and more complex after that. People start to struggle, right? I don't care how smart you are. I don't care how much experience you are. When you have to think sort of several degrees beyond what you immediately see, it's hard to do that without help, right? You need help to figure out the consequences of these actions.
That's why we as humans do many stupid stuff every day, right? We do stupid stuff. We, we are rude to people accidentally, you know, we say the wrong things. Uh, we put people, like even people that we really care about, that we really like, we, we will say the wrong thing and then, you know, it will kind of sometimes mushroom.
It's like, because, because we just don't anticipate, we can't see what's going to happen, but this is a way where you can actually, you know, you can get computer models to help you see what's going to happen. Um, because, you know, that's been done in many cases, we've done it many times in health, uh, and that provides significant value because then you can make better decisions.
You can see, Oh, here's the consequence. So you talk, you know, you talk about jobs. Well, you're not gonna have the same set of jobs in five years than you do now, or even in two years, right? I mean, who could have predicted that some of these job descriptions that are popular and in some cases really high paying now would have even been jobs in the 1980s or 1990s.
[00:19:01] Marco Ciappelli: But this is history that repeats itself. Because there were jobs before, you know, the car, before other technology that didn't exist. Cameraman. What's a cameraman? Go tell that to somebody in the 1800s. Cameraman?
[00:19:19] Bruce Y Lee: Exactly. I mean, if you went, if you went to like the 1920s and say you're going to do a podcast, they'd be like, what?
Peapods? What are you talking about? You're going to cast away peapods? So, um, so society is always moving forward. Things are going to be different. And this is where you can actually... Just get a sense of what might happen. And you know, what are the potential effects if you do certain things?
[00:19:47] Marco Ciappelli: And I think that's the key to connect with what you said.
Like, can we drive this technology thing and this evolution, not our future? You know, not our natural evolution, but the societal evolution, knowing and predicting, because we have the instrument now to do so, and we should have the brain to do so. And so, change the curse. According to what we are able to predict.
I mean, let's reconnect here, you know, uh, weather model. I mean, we can tell when a hurricane it's, uh, it's coming, I'm going to not tell you when a hearthquake it's coming yet, but you know, we're trying and that would be a good thing or volcano eruption or whatever it is. In a way, I think that if you put enough variables into to be pretty cool.
You couldn't see that and we kind of know, look, the fire is really a big risk in the next, in this period of time. And you can look back in history and say, statistically, historically, this is going to happen. But it seems to me that we never really do enough. We kind of wait for stuff to happen. And then, damn it, I should have.
No, we're very reactive. We can be very reactive as humans, right? We do things after it actually occurs. Uh, you know, it's sort of the classic analogy is, you know, after a breakup, someone says, okay, I'll take out the trash. Yeah. I shouldn't have done that. Or, yeah, or I, yeah, I should have done, you know, all the 50 things that, uh, you know, because you didn't recognize it.
During the, when the relationship was actually occurring. Right. That's just a symptom of, um, how we collectively as humans are, we're very reactive. We're not proactive. We don't think in advance. Um, so, you know, as you mentioned, you know, with meteorology, that's, that's how people are forced to think in advance.
You see the forecast every day, right? You turn on the TV or you go on the internet or you open your app and you can see what's going to happen over the next five days in theory. Uh, you know, the joke is that, you know, it can be wrong, but actually, for the most part, It's getting pretty accurate. They're more right than wrong.
So, right, so, yeah. So, if you think about it, years ago, decades ago, Uh, a hurricane would just happen, right? You know, you're somewhere and it's just like, Oh my goodness, the hurricane's happening. But now, like you said, there are, there's advanced notice, you know, that's actually out there. Like there's a storm brewing out somewhere in the Atlantic and then, you know, it's creating, it's getting, picking up steam and it's moving towards, you know, the Gulf coast or something like that.
You know, in advance that that's a big difference. Um, that's a big difference in terms of lives saved and destruction saved and those things like that.
So what's your take about these and, and, and the fire? Because of course, the fire, you can predict if the weather is dry, if there has been, you know, I was listening actually today on NPR and how, yes, there has been a lot more wet environment here in California.
But it also means more vegetation. So by the time that it dries, there may actually be more risk. So you don't think that way. You're like, Oh, with all the water, with all the rain that we had. And then all of a sudden, you know, it may have the opposite result. But when the fire happened. I mean, obviously, from what I was following there, and you may have been following more than me, it's that, for example, they were talking about there is a very complex, uh, alert, alarm system, like sirens and stuff in the island, and, uh, they didn't go, they didn't go on, they didn't go, you know, and...
I don't know. They're looking now why the reason for it, but I have a feeling that even if how much would have helped your don't have those five days ahead that you know that the hurricane is coming to Naples, Florida. I used to live there, so I just use that as an example. You know, so I have a feeling that there are certain things that you just the only thing you have available is to be reactive.
[00:24:15] Bruce Y Lee: Potentially, potentially. I, but I do think that there is more information that can actually come out. So, I mean, if you ask people, if you start mentioning the word, you know, wildfires in Maui, maybe about a month and a half ago, uh, I'm not sure how many people would have made that association, right? So people, people think of Northern California, they think of Southern California because it's already happened there.
They think of Canada because it's already happened there. Um, now people are going to start associating. Wildfires with Maui because it's happened, but before that, how much talk was there about it? Um, because we do know that, uh, wildfire risk increases, um, you know, through time because the, the, the more there's, uh, drier underbrush, the more that, uh, you know, this is, can be related to like, uh, warmer, warmer winters, uh, longer kind of dry season, longer warm season, those things like that.
So there's not a necessary guarantee that you'll sit there and say, okay, you can predict to a T that there's going to be a wildfire here or there, but you can always use more information and then you have to ask yourself, what are some of the indirect signs of that? Something's actually going on. Um, and so, you know, there's been creativity in terms of that in some health fields, like for instance, you know, uh, people will use what's called syndromic surveillance, uh, to help identify if there is some type of outbreak of some infectious disease.
And syndromic surveillance is a term that's used to describe a syndrome of things, not a very, not a specific disease, not a specific pathogen, but you have a syndrome, like for instance, you have like a syndrome that is like flu like illness. You have like respiratory diseases, you have respiratory symptoms, you know, you have cough, maybe shortness of breath, fever, congestion, those things like that.
That could be so many, that could be so many different things. So you know that happens. all the time, but syndromic surveillance is where they kind of survey and say, okay, um, you know, typically we, in the ER, we have this many people coming because they have respiratory symptoms, but then there's a bump and that bump is going above normal and it's a sustained bump.
Well, that tells people that you might want to investigate that more closely because That's unusual. Something else is going on. That's not what you would normally expect around this time of the year. So for instance, I remember, you know, the, the, if you go to, for instance, the Taiwan CDC, they have these monitors up there and then they have these syndromic surveillance, um, algorithms where the monitors show each of the different emissions that are going on in all the different hospitals.
They have a, they have a really, uh, very, um, well done, like, uh, EHR and health records there and those things like that. So they do that and then they immediately know, Oh, you know, look, there's a bump that requires further investigation. Um, so that's a way of sort of an indirect measure that something might be going on.
So that's another way to think about these things when it comes to say wildfires and those things. What are some of the indirect measures that might give you a tip off that, that you need to look more closely? Um, you know, we don't know yet, but we shouldn't rule out that possibility. So,
[00:27:47] Marco Ciappelli: you would think it's connected to, again, you know, dry, dry weather, dry vegetation, but then the problem is that unless I don't know about somebody very powerful that can create out of the blue and hurricane or storm, um, well, some people may have other beliefs than me, so they may say, yes, there is one, but for the fire, you have that.
Idiot that go and throw a lighter or, or a match or a cigarette, or even worse, and make it on purpose that the fire start. So you can predict as much as you want there, but then there is the human factor, which is kind of like, uh, something that makes me think about the things that we do on purpose and the things that we do because we just don't think about it, like.
Maybe plastic in the body. I don't know. Has there ever been plastic? A good idea? No,
[00:28:50] Bruce Y Lee: you typically don't want plastic inside you. That's that's usually a good general rule
[00:28:54] Marco Ciappelli: Well, what I'm saying is could have we predicted that that wasn't like I don't know I mean, I know it was a great invention, but let's define great invention.
I mean
[00:29:08] Bruce Y Lee: Yeah. So, so the question he asks is interesting because it's an interesting question that's always asked in surveillance, in bio surveillance. So, you know, some of our work has crossed the area of bio surveillance, where you're trying to look for different, um, events that may occur and try to predict what may happen and prepare what will happen.
You're, you're essentially doing surveillance over many different factors. And it's absolutely true that there are random stochastic events that occur that you cannot necessarily predict. But. You know, you'll find in many situations, in many systems, these random events can occur in some systems and nothing happens, but in other systems, something does happen.
So you also have to have a lot of this, you know, kind of preconditions. Things have to be seeded, right? So it's similar, like, you know, you can take, uh, 10 different people and the same random event happens to each of those 10 different people, and they're going to react differently and different things will happen, right?
Why are there some people that can handle? Um, really tough, bad situations better than others, even though it's unpredictable. And so we found in many situations that it's a lot of those underlying circumstances that will then determine what will happen with a stochastic event. So if, for instance, so you mentioned some of the things, you know, someone drops a lighter, someone starts a fire, someone, you know, or there's also lightning strikes, right?
Lightning comes down and starts burning things. But that happened, those things happen in many different places in many different times. But there's some places where it becomes a full blown wildfire. Some places it's more containable. So what is that difference? Again, that's not necessarily going to predict everything.
And yes. There is the test to see just like, you know, there's unfortunate people who do everything right? And then just things just don't work out But it tilts the table a little bit, right? It gives us a better sense of maybe we can do something about it Maybe we can dissipate this better You know, the pandemic is an example You know, there's always these jumps of viruses from other animals Potentially to humans that you worry about right?
So can we get better? Uh, doing surveillance of those things so we can better anticipate and contain jump of a deadly virus. Uh, those, these are the questions that we...
Um, and that probably need to be addressed more, um, because I think there's, there's a lot of opportunity there.
[00:31:49] Marco Ciappelli: Hmm. Yeah, no, I see your point. I mean, when you, when you look at this stochastic of a random, um, act or something that happened, uh, you, you go to the numbers, like, so I'm thinking cybersecurity right now or security in general, you're never going to be a hundred percent safe, right?
But what is that comfort level that say, well, this is, I'm doing enough, I'm spending enough money to defend my company. I'm spending enough money to defend my environment and myself, but I can't avoid everything. Even if you just stay in bed in the morning, you're still not safe 100%.
[00:32:34] Bruce Y Lee: True. Yes. If you were to try to protect yourself a hundred percent, say, wrap yourself in layers of bubble wrap, stay home, kill yourself, watch Netflix all day and do nothing but that, you know, you're actually hurting yourself, right?
You're like muscle mass. You would, you know, you'd not having human contact. Um, you probably wouldn't eat very well. You wouldn't get exercise yet. So absolutely. So yeah, it is a balance. It's true. Um, but information. is helpful, right? So, so, so you don't have to act on all information, but the question is, are we getting enough information?
Um, so, and are we getting from unique different sources and places? So, you know, we're in a sort of society where there's so much surveillance that's going on when it comes to like apps and websites, right? People are collecting data all the time on people. So, so you get those, you know, recommendations on YouTube, like.
I, um, I can't remember if I related the story, but I remember one time... I, uh, had to write an article for Forbes about, uh, farts.
[00:33:45] Marco Ciappelli: Oh, yeah. You told us last time, actually. Oh, yeah. I mentioned it last time. And then there was an inference that they thought that you were interested in that.
[00:33:54] Bruce Y Lee: So just like farts can occur multiple times, I'm telling the story multiple times.
But yeah, so they anticipated that, that, oh, this is what, this is obviously what you like. You obviously like animals farting. So, so it's similar, you know. It's already happening, but the question is, you know, is it really happening in areas where additional information could actually be a lot more valuable?
We can always choose to disregard information. Uh, you know, another thing as another example, I remember prior to the Indian Ocean tsunami that occurred a number of years ago, which was devastating, you know, devastated. Many parts of Thailand and Indonesia, etc. There were reports of animals prior to this tsunami hitting, migrating to higher land, right?
So, some people wondered, you know, did they sense something? You know, did they sense a change in pressure or something of that sort? So can they anticipate something that's going to happen before it actually happens? So if, for instance, you were to gather information on what's happening in animals, maybe that would be some advanced warning.
Maybe it'll tell you nothing. Maybe it'll tell you nothing, but maybe it will tell you, give you some advanced warning. So I think these are things that it's helpful for us to look at more closely. Because doing that already in, in areas in like social media, they're collecting data on people and saying, is this useful?
Maybe, maybe not. So why not do the same thing in health, environmental health in those areas? Um, I, I think some of it's being done, but not nearly enough.
[00:35:28] Marco Ciappelli: You know, I, I love this and I think that's, that's great to, to get the last few minutes and, and close on this because as you're explaining that about the, the animal moving it towards higher ground.
I connected to when you were talking about the monitoring in Taiwan, um, of the health system. You see a bump, you see something unusual. You're like, okay, um, something's going on here because you have enough data to know that what is your level. I mean, if, and we can talk about wearables next time and kind of, I would love to talk about that kind of technology and healthcare, but like it kind of gives you like, What is your normal state, right?
If I run with this, I know my heartbeat gets better if I'm trained, if I don't train for a little bit, I get, you know, I get my, my night, maybe it's a rest heartbeat. It's, it's not as good. So, you know, I have a, I have a reference. So as I have it as an individual in medical and you can look back at, I know every year that you do your yearly test, you can go back and say, okay, this is my normal.
This is my cholesterol. This is my, you know, whatever you're looking at. And if something is off, you're like, all right, let's do more tests. So it's kind of like a system that we are already using. Yeah. But is your point, we're not using it enough now that we do have more data, more computational capacity, and we're probably going to have even more and more, so what, what it needs to change?
I mean, I think it would be a great idea if we could monitor about everything, not spy, monitor. Our environment and say, Hey, something's not really working because, again, why are all these whale coming and dying on the coast? Uh, you know, it's not a mass suicide. Maybe it is. I don't know. But something is happening.
Can we can we investigate?
[00:37:43] Bruce Y Lee: Yeah, absolutely. You know, you've heard of these stories from ancient times, too, where people talk about, you know, Some type of herald or something they see in advance, uh, that appears or a certain bird that appears or what have you, you know, and of course, some of this is folk, some of it's folklore, but some of it is actually based on reality.
You can actually see things in advance happening
and, you know, you, you mentioned some of these things, these events, these random events that seem to occur, uh, in the news about, okay, maybe there's more animals appearing somewhere or washing ashore, or you see, uh, animals where you didn't see them before. What does that mean? Um, and there's just not enough of things connecting this when it, when it comes to climate change, we just see all these stories and people are saying warning, warning, warning, of course, overall, you know, from a global standpoint, there's warnings, but also we need to know what's happening sort of at a local level as well.
Uh, and how are all of these things connected? Um, it is remarkable. The number of times when you something happens and something bad happens or disaster happens either, but something bad happens in, you know, your personal life or or something happens at larger scale. And then you walk backwards and you say, what led to this?
And then you square this
[00:39:08] Marco Ciappelli: the time
[00:39:09] Bruce Y Lee: you'd sit back and say, Oh, I see. Oh, that's right. Um, I was talking. to a friend the other day about relationships. And we were talking about someone's relationship that didn't work out. And all the signs were there very early on, but the person got blindsided, right? Um, and so that just happens so many times.
And so, uh, we, as humans, we've proved over and over again, we don't see the signs. We don't see the signs because we don't connect it. So why not try to connect these things?
[00:39:48] Marco Ciappelli: I think that's the lesson, especially now that we can monitor all these, all these things. And, uh, and I think it, the job that you guys do and then other. in the industry are doing in academic level. I mean, again, all that risk assessment and other things. It's, uh, it's incredible, but you know what, as my grandfather used to say, there is no worse deaf than those that don't want to listen.
[00:40:15] Bruce Y Lee: That's a good, good saying. Right. Wise person.
[00:40:19] Marco Ciappelli: Yep. A lot of, uh, old, uh, farmers way to say things that I, I still think about sometimes, and I'm like, you know, there wasn't much of a technology of study, but it's so much common sense, and I think that's what we're lacking. We need, we need to, I want to invent a common sense CHAT GPT. Where if you are stupid, it's just alert. There is a bump on the road.
I think there'd be a constant spike wherever we do. Anyway, Bruce, great chatting with you again. We always go the extra 10 minutes because, you know, we can talk about a lot of things. I hope again that, uh. Our listener are enjoining our rambling and I want to invite again if if there is something that you are interested.
I mean Bruce Uh, it's it's an expert in in a lot of things and also I I know him personally as a humble person that probably will welcome as well as myself to get some tips and topics and answer some questions if you want to leave it down in the comments on our social media, which you can find on the notes for the podcast and we'll meet again in about a month for a podcast.
Probably we'll meet in person before that, but I don't think we're going to record a podcast on that occasion. So, uh, Bruce, thank you so much again for a great conversation.
[00:41:47] Bruce Y Lee: As always, Marco. Likewise.
[00:41:49] Marco Ciappelli: All right. Bye everybody. Stay tuned, subscribe and, uh, tell your friends. Maybe they like what we talk about.
See ya.