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International Specialized Symposium “Space and the Global Security of Mankind”. Limassol, Republic of Cyprus
Speech of
Chairman, CIS Interstate Committee on Knowledge Dissemination and Adult Education,
President of the International Association Znanie
Full member of the International Academy of Astronautics,
Academician of the Russian Academy of Astronautics named after K.E. Tsiolkovsky Chairman of the CIS Interstate Committee for the dissemination of knowledge and education of adults,
President of the International Association “Znanie”
Efim Malitikov
International specialized symposium
“Space and the global security of mankind
(2-4 November 2009, Limassol, Republic of Cyprus)
Personnel training for the International Aerospace System for Monitoring Global Geophysical Phenomena and Forecasting Natural and Man-made Disasters (IGMASS).
The process of mental changes is the most complex and long-lasting process in our human life. Despite the tendencies and desire of people to erect and redraw borders, humanity remains a single organism of the planet. The classroom-lesson form of education, or rather learning, has exhausted its resources in our information age and has become counterproductive, because its performance does not meet the requirements of global governance processes. It is necessary to free our consciousness from worldview stereotypes and standard arguments. The great scientist Vernadsky said: “Humanity is a totally unique variety of earthly resources, possessing a very specific nature of energy replenishment – through knowledge!” However, today we have a digital abyss of a billion absolutely illiterate people who cannot read or write, and in addition a 5-billion-year-old civilization lagging behind the necessary modern knowledge.
Precisely, illiteracy and the resulting lack of competitiveness have led to more than 2 billion people on the planet living on less than one dollar a day, more than 3 billion – more than half – on two dollars a day. Closing this digital divide with the current form of education is impossible. Many in the world put their trust in the Internet. But the poorest billion people on Earth live in places where the Internet is too expensive or simply cannot be accommodated because of the landscape and harsh natural conditions. These are the mountainous regions, the Arctic Circle and the Far North. Today billions of people do not have access to modern education. Billions of people cannot compete, have jobs, adequately participate in scientific and technological progress and cultural life. And so, poverty and destitution accompany their lives. This is where the drug mafia, criminal structures, criminal clans and terrorism draw their reserves from…But humanity already has at its disposal the real global potential of satellite communications, which in mass use are a hundred times cheaper than cable Internet.
The problems of equality of access to learning apply to the tens of millions of people in prison, to the entire elderly population of the world, and many other categories of people. They are all a red balance and a heavy burden on the shoulders of the world economy, and with access to education it is a positive balance.Only a learning system with the latest means of delivering knowledge to the consumer based on modern satellite communications can cope with this challenge. IGMASS can play a role in this.
The productivity of higher school, university, college, faculty, department, professor and ordinary teacher plays an important role today. “Knowledge for export!” – this is the new theory of success we are putting forward, its social and economic component.
A modern professor needs not a 40-seat auditorium, not a classroom, but an army of half a million listeners. Especially since 15 million of the world’s 60 million teachers are in short supply. The digital divide with this teacher ratio to the planetary ballast of illiteracy will widen even further.
When the number of illiterate non-competitive people on Earth exceeds a critical mass, they can bury not only tranquility, but also the very Sustainability of Mankind.
Planetary values are constantly changing. The export of knowledge and learning is becoming a serious business, and intellectual property is becoming the most expensive and profitable type of property.
The CIS Interstate Committee on Knowledge Dissemination and Adult Education and the International Association “Znanie”, have a super modern educational basic structure. It is an Academy, University and Institute, which at the same time is a university, one of the largest television companies and digital library, exceeding the volume of the U.S. Library of Congress.
It has its own space teleport, covering more than 400 cities in 14 countries.
2,500 professors provide training in 68 specialties for 175,000 students.
It is one of the three largest universities in the world.
The financial cost of educating 175,000 students using satellite technology is $5 per person per year, and more than $500 via the Internet;
Its virtual classroom is 4,000 times larger than the classical classroom;
Its students in distant poor villages and highland settlements have access to Cambridge instruction without the expense of leaving their village.
The number of classrooms required would have to be increased by a thousand times or more, which is impossible in a real classroom. Modern educational content, gifted and technologically adapted to virtual export-import transportation, should be sent from university television studios via satellite teleporters on target request to anywhere on the planet.We need to consider that to obtain and implement Decent Work we need diversified latest, not yesterday’s, Knowledge and Skills. Today we have a worldwide 26% teacher shortage. Teachers and their personal knowledge are the product of an analog Past.The Digital Divide becomes a Gap if the Teacher with the most modern knowledge does not get a Global Audience and does not have the Global productivity of a Knowledge Free Access Society.We must use the modern technology already available to humanity to disseminate knowledge. Their productivity is many orders of magnitude greater than the technology of knowledge transmission from Man to Man. Direct contact between a Teacher and a Student called Learning is not a luxury, since Knowledge on Earth is not “spread evenly like butter on bread”. What is needed is a modern space distributor – a teleporter – a real World University that will do this work for Mankind.Technically, legally and already in fact, the work of the World University has begun through the efforts of the Commonwealth of Independent States. However, heterogeneous perceptions, inflexible national policies and imperfect international mechanisms reduce its effectiveness by internecine interests.At the same time, the younger generation has long been crossing the borders of civilized countries through the virtual space. We must be turned toward innovation and innovators, bypassing the long bureaucratic mileage.In the face of the destructive role of increasing unemployment, poverty, Poverty and poorly managed migration, the instruments of development and governance must be changed, lest we face even more neglected problems and crises.Again and again I argue: What is needed is mass education of people, with a minimum and only initially based on learning, and then providing them with the opportunity to learn according to their interests and abilities.
I represent here the oldest nongovernmental organization, the International Association (IA) Znanie, which has UNIDO consultative status, UN ECOSOC General Consultative Status, and consultative status with the UN Department of Public Information (DPI).For nearly 60 years, our organization has been engaged in education: 4.5 million of our members have given over 25 million lectures a year. In those years it was enough.For the last 10 years huge experience and technical potential were accumulated, new technologies were mastered, the world’s largest satellite educational centers were created in Moscow, Russian regions, CIS countries and a number of other countries including hard-to-reach, high mountain and far northern regions.Knowledge updating occurs at a rate many times higher than traditional classroom-tutorial educational technologies.Every year up to 20% of knowledge used today is updated. “It is not enough to be a graduate of Oxford, Cambridge, or Stanford. It is not enough to be a Nobel laureate to teach from a university department. What is needed is the talent to popularize the latest achievements of civilization in a wide variety of fields of knowledge, provided with productive technologies of dissemination.
People – must continuously move and interact in the world space according to the principle of communicating vessels.
Knowledge – this is the energy environment of civilization, which is “spilled” among the many universities, educational and scientific centers.
– We need a common center of knowledge distribution – the World University, but not in name, but in essence. It must become an accumulator of global scientific potential.
– We need global action in education, because the problems themselves are global in essence and origin.
– The priorities of teaching are being replaced by the priorities of learning, with, of course, the important role of teachers, but very highly qualified and equipped with the most up-to-date knowledge. Such teachers are needed by a global audience and space needs to take care of technically increasing their global productivity.
– This is where space communications is essential. Modern universities and centers of learning must build and possess their own space teleports to exchange mutually accepted best content.
– There is a need for export-import of knowledge through a single distribution teleport.
The role of education in the sustainable development of mankind is not sufficiently evaluated and not reconsidered for many decades. And here it is appropriate to recall the words of Harvard University President Derek Bock: “If you think education is too expensive, try what ignorance costs. “The traditional education system is based on the formula: “Education for Life,” which was enough when knowledge was renewed every 30 years. Time has demanded a different formula: “Education Through Life”.This should become a priority of state policy, an integral part of laws and constitutions, and then a mental attitude of human civilization. It is necessary to introduce this formula in all the efforts of states to confront the existing problems.
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