Reading for Treasure: Scamdemic!

Reading for Treasure is my list of articles (and other readings) that are worth your attention. Click here for an introduction!

I have written about scams before and my most recent post deals with some thinking strategies to help us sift through the overwhelming mounds of information (and disinformation) in order to evaluate them well. However, the evil fraudsters are taking advantage of the current crisis to trick people into giving away their money, information, or more; thus here are some articles to help you protect yourself and your loved ones from the evildoers who would trick you. 

CNN’s article, “6 coronavirus vaccine scams that target your money and personal information - and what to do about them” is a short and very clear listing of possible scenarios. It is worth sharing with family-  especially elders! 

Wired has a good review of “How to Avoid Phishing Emails and Scams.” I have also written about this issue, but the fraudsters are getting more and more sophisticated. I also want to note that this article recommends the use of a password manager – and so do I (see below). 

Scamming can pop up in all sorts of places. Lifehacker’s article “Beware of These Creative Online Dating Scams” reminds us that people are trying to trick you even when love is what you are searching for! 

Another way to foil scammers is to improve your security. You must have a password manager if you are going to use complex effective passwords. Since LassPass changed its options, Bitwarden is a good choice if you want a free option. Lifehacker’s article about Bitwarden is worth a read if you want to taste test a password manager: “Bitwarden is Now the Best Free Alternative to LassPass.”

One more Lifehacker article reminds us, “Don't Trust Phone Calls From 'Venmo' or Any Other Service.” When your bank, utility, or other service calls, hang up and call back using the number you would regularly use to reach them – not the number from which the possible fraudster called you! 

Google has created a new feature to help you figure out if the sources that appears in your search are credible and trustworthy. Engadget lays out how to use this feature so you can evaluate sources and be sure you are getting the best information possible: “Google search results can tell you more about a site before you visit it.”

Currently, I am rereading Foundation by Isaac Asimov

A Crisis of Critical Thinking

As a toddler, my son loved trains. We sat by the crossing and waited for hours for trains. Once, as we waited, he proposed a way to make a train arrive: activate the gate. If we turned on the flashing lights and brought down the safety bar, he thought, the train would arrive. From his point of view, it made complete sense: the lights came first, the train came second. When I tried to explain it to him, he was incredulous: I just didn’t want to wait with him any longer. I didn’t know how to turn on the lights and I wasn’t willing to admit it. He WANTED that train to come and my rational (and correct) explanation did not satisfy him. I was powerless to do an experiment. 

I call this toddler logic. It makes its own kind of sense. Toddlers want what they want and they want it now! They are good at figuring out how to get it, even when their methods defy logic, reason, or common sense. 

P.T. Barnum said that there is a sucker born every minute. Like Barnum, there are people who have made the exploitation of toddler logic into a business plan. They are growing rich and powerful making people believe that all it will take for their train to come is to turn on the signal. 

Robocalls, phone scams, phish emails, and other schemes are flourishing. I have written about strategies to prevent falling victim to this kind of nefarious traps. It is a sad statement that being trusting and open can be used for harm. 

It is more than falling victim to fraud. We live in the age of alternative facts and false news. Conspiracy theories and misinformation are so prevalent that it is understandable that some even bright well-meaning folks are deceived, duped, and deluded – because other people make it very difficult to distinguish toddler logic from reasonable, rational thought. This is a crisis of critical thinking. 

What are the barriers to critical thinking? What habits of mind must we practice so we and the people we love do not fall down the skunk hole of toddler logic or worse? 

Critical thinking takes effort and time. Sometimes we don’t want to work that hard. We are not willing to do the heavy thinking that is almost always required to sift through the cacophony of misinformation. It is quicker, easier, and more satisfying to grab the first reasonable or appealing idea and not ponder further. Critical thinking requires intellectual patience and power.  

We must not confuse what we wish to be true with the verifiable facts. My son was invested in a train coming. He wanted to see a train. He was aware that, if we waited too long, I’d take us home and he wouldn’t get what he wanted.  Often, it is not our logic that drives our thinking, but our desires. We aren’t thinking; we are feeling. Because we want a specific answer or conclusion, we rationalize a way to get it. We know the sum of the problem and we fudge the numbers so they add up. 

Complexity is unavoidable, frightening, and not as attractive as simplicity. When the problem is too big, when we are overwhelmed by the complexity of the issue, we are tempted to simplify it. We reduce the problem and thus eliminate the pieces that are getting in the way of solving it – or getting us what we want. How many times have people framed issues with something like, “this seems complicated, but is really simple.” Few important issues are really cut and dried, and while we may argue over them, the problems that are likely to turn us into suckers are usually ones that, when simplified turn us into simpletons. 

Even when they deliver bad news, we must both evaluate and embrace authorities. Remember at the beginning of the pandemic when it seemed like everyone was an expert in medicine? I found myself asking “How do you know this?” and “Is there some research to back this up?” all the time! Yet, experts often disagree. We can’t be expert in everything and thus must rely on specialists to help us. It takes work and is highly complex to evaluate the authorities and weigh their opinions. Reading technical journal articles is both time consuming and not nearly as fun as reading novels! Wading through the opinions of specialists and authorities is like, well, root canal sometimes. Dismissing experts because of their expertise is dangerous; we may not like what the doctor tells us, but if we don’t listen to her, we might pay with our lives. 

Humility allows us to use error to our advantage. People like to be right and hate to be wrong. If we stick our neck out and make a statement, it is embarrassing when we make mistakes. Critical thinking requires error. It requires a process where we evaluate, decide, and then apply our thinking. Sometimes, oftentimes, that means we are wrong. Unless we have the humility and resilience to admit our errors, learn from them, and then change our thinking, we will be stuck. We will be like that person who will not take directions on the road trip. It will be very long, not where you want to go, and there will be no bathrooms.

Thinking is hard work. Critical thinking is complex and intricate work. Without it, however, we turn into P.T. Barnum’s suckers trying to lure trains with our signals. Some might come – but we will not have called them, even if we think we did. 

The Pandemic Proceeds: Looking Back at 2020, Part 2- April and May

February and March introduced us to COVID-19. In April, it moved in. I was living in a state of heightened anxiety. After each walk outside, trip to the gas station, store, or anywhere, I scrubbed my hands. I felt like I was being hunted by an invisible foe. 

April felt like the month of cancelations. We canceled our plans to visit our daughter in D.C. I co-teach the Confirmation Class at our congregation. and we canceled the service and prepared to move it online. We had planned a special family trip to Norway and we began taking it apart. We canceled all service people coming into our home. We canceled our plans to attend weddings, which were then canceled. It was a very different version of cancel culture. 

Meanwhile, my book club chose to read The Doomsday Book by Connie Willis. Strangely, a story of duel pandemics was comforting. 

My friends at Deerfield High School were struggling to teach students online. Students were distracted, upset, and often absent. Teachers were trying to balance their own families’ needs and take care of students. Teaching in an online environment was new to everyone! I helped a few teachers map routes through Deerfield so they could drop off gifts, goodies, and greetings at their students’ homes. 

May years ago, I recorded A Tale of Two Cities on audio as a teaching text. I read and taught it. My colleagues were teaching this way all the time, but it only seemed like the worst of times. 

We made trips to grocery stores wearing gloves. We brought my parents groceries and they brought us food, too. Every time we saw toilet paper, we grabbed it! Our prescriptions arrived by mail. 

It looked like we might want masks, so I ordered some from a DHS alumnus whose business made bed linens and was now making masks. I ordered a lot: some for us, some for the rest of the family. 

I set my parents up on Zoom and helped them use it. I found an old lamp in the basement that would give me more face light when I was on a video call. 

We began to meet people on our patio, outside, masked and distanced. We still called, texted, emailed, and video chatted regularly too. We continued our effort to stay in touch and reach out to friends and family. 

I started a group sourced poem called “When This is Over” on Facebook and published it here. The end of this time felt far closer then than it does now.  

My anxiety kept rising. My emotions were very close to the surface and I had to remind myself frequently about what I could or could not control. 

Many of the appliances in the house were running far more than in the past. My wife needed ice on her back several times a day. We ran the dishwasher constantly and it was spitting out strange melted pieces of plastic. I didn’t even want to think about what would occur if the computer broke or we lost our internet connection! 

Before the pandemic, we spent a great deal of time with my parents, and now we feared that these visits might kill them. We met on patios, but it wasn’t enough. They were still not in the same place about the gravity of the situation. My mother would mock my precautions and tell me to hide in the basement when she was coming over. We would call daily and see each other at least once a week outdoors. 

My wife recovered from her surgery, but she was in the same condition as she was before the surgery. We had unsatisfying telehealth visits with the surgeon. My wife tried shots in her spine. No help. New meds. Didn’t work. Her MRIs looked exactly like the ones from January! She started physical therapy. We looked for a new surgeon and talked about a second surgery! 

We were concerned about our daughter who was working long hours on the Federal Government’s response to COVID in D.C. Our public health expert was going to work herself sick. How do you help someone who is 600 miles away? 

I signed up for an online service that alerted me when disinfecting wipes became available. I was able to buy some once or twice. We shared them with everyone! 

Passover was online. I wondered if it was safe to go to doctor or dental appointments. I was hesitant to go into a building for anything! Although the weather was getting better, the list of people who had died grew longer. Several friends on social media talked about their experience wrestling with COVID. I attended more Zoom funerals and saw postings about the loss of loved ones. 

Throughout the spring, we brought in the mail wearing gloves and then left it on the dining room table for three days before opening it; then we washed our hands. 

Restaurants started doing curbside pick up and we began to order out more. I made signs for the cars that said, “Order for Hirsch, please” on one side and “Thank you” on the other. I participated in a birthday car parade for a friend’s sixtieth. 

The pull of college was still strong for our son. His a capella group wanted to make a video of the concert they planned for the spring. That would mean traveling back to Ohio for several days and staying somewhere – and then singing, an activity that was highly problematic. While he knew it was too dangerous, it was yet another loss. He recorded at home and sent his work in, but it was far from satisfying. 

School was still online. I made a montage for my senior homeroom with the photos I had taken over the years. I sent my former Freshman English students the letters they wrote to themselves on their first day of high school. I emailed my other former students wishing them well. 

Anxiety was growing in the pit of my stomach. I found that tears welled up at surprising times. Our daughter called often. She was working very hard both at her job and with her new puppy. 

My son’s college glee club held a virtual concert using submitted recordings, old video, and recorded material. It was wonderful. It was the first time I sat next to my singer son during one of his concerts. 

My Sunday school students were struggling with Zoom fatigue. Our classes were shorter, so we needed more of them to get ready for an online Confirmation service. 

I continued to be tech support for my parents. They received more than their share of phish and scam emails. We talked, at length, about how to recognize a fraudulent email or text. 

In May, we finally made plans for our daughter to come home. Once her puppy had all his shots, she could make the trek. A long car ride with a four-month-old puppy would not be easy. 

My book clubs met online. I wondered if they would ever meet in person again. I had a reunion with some college friends via Zoom. A friend and her husband did a chamber music concert from their home in Israel via Zoom. The DHS retirees, who usually gathered for lunch in town, had an online get together. All functions of our congregation were on Zoom. The choir met on Zoom to talk about what we would do since we couldn’t sing at High Holiday services. I attended funerals and weddings online. While I have always spent a good deal of time in front of the computer, I was now spending much more time staring into a screen! 

I was still working hard to stay in touch and support my teacher friends. They were barely keeping their eyeballs above water! Yet, the school board berated teachers calling them lazy and said they were shirking their responsibilities. It was shocking and disrespectful. Teachers were working harder than ever! My wife and I wrote a letter to the board expressing our disappointment and outrage. We were not alone. The board apologized. 

I wondered if I had this disease if I coughed or sneezed or caught my breath. Was it my allergies or was it something far worse? 

We became Instacart experts. Many houses were on sale in the neighborhood and they were selling quickly. We waved at people on our walks but crossed the street to avoid them. Not everyone understood the idea of distancing, especially cyclists. Friends started to lose their jobs, get furloughed or reduced. 

At the end of May, my son graduated from college via an online ceremony. There was even a virtual reality component where he was given an avatar and could walk around a virtual campus. It was Minecraft meets Legos. He tried it for a few minutes and then joined us watching the polished video presentation that featured video of my son’s musical groups! I think he liked graduating this way better than all the hubbub of being in a big stadium. The concerts, however, were deeply missed. 

Once he was done with college, the job search began in earnest. He started reaching out to people for informational interviews. By the end of the summer, he had spoken to more than one hundred people in dozens of organizations. He was a networker! 

We had Mother’s Day distanced on my folks’ patio. They still needed quite a bit of technical support but were becoming good Zoomers. I signed them up for Instagram so they could hear a concert by my brother’s daughter. We had several family gatherings in backyards. Thank goodness for nice weather. 

For my birthday, I got Star Trek masks and a tin of Garrett’s caramel corn! I ate it. All of it. I read the nominees for the Hugo awards. All of them. 

Our daughter trekked west over Memorial Day weekend. My son and I met her in Ohio and helped drive her home. We rented a car, sanitized it, planned the logistics, and drove my daughter and her dog to Illinois in the pouring rain. 

Finally, all of us were home and safe. For the first time since this started, I could breathe easier. For the first time, I slept well. We would face the summer together.