Maroc - NEWSDAY.CO.TT - A la Une - 28/12/2025 04:27

The year that was 2025

How to describe one of the most defining 12 months in our collective lives is a bit of a challenge. There is the personal, the societal, the economic, the political and more; but there were also seismic changes to many of the fundamental ways in which we have been living and thinking for the last 70 years at least. Some of it is good and some of it requires accommodation, or time for assimilation. Perhaps for many of us, the strangest of all to process is the seemingly sudden and ubiquitous appearance of AI, or artificial intelligence. The use of sophisticated non-human (not yet inhumane) helpers to assist with day-to-day living has been growing steadily, but in 2025 it seemed to explode. I do not use Alexa, so I am always a little taken aback when she replies or responds to a command from her human boss. I often wonder if she might get cheeky or simply refuse to comply, but so far no rebellion has been on display, apparently. As with the arrival of mobile phones in the 1990s and the reluctance many had owing to their intrusiveness, we will eventually get used to the new life-altering inventions, and as their sophistication increases they will become less alien and more indispensable. Although the need for a driverless car beats me, I must say some new inventions have their attractions. A robot to garden and sweep up the messy yard is appealing, and might also help solve social/racial profiling. We know that race and class are colour-coded in TT, but I had underestimated how entrenched it remains and how little our access to information has achieved in educating us out of it. Alexa and CHATgpt knock me sideways, but to be described last week as “a white lady” by a girl who in 2025 equates skin colour with the capacity to hire home help was a knockout blow. In her mind, “only white people” can do that. I wonder what modern history and stories are being taught in schools. I know the reading lists have been updated since the 1950s, so what is going on? Clearly, the “us and them” understanding of society persists, either through learning, family influence or experience. Despite the presence of an array of ethnicities working at all levels in diverse jobs, the absence of some ethnic groups in ordinary points of contact, such as state schools, the security forces or educational, emergency and social services means no interaction between a cross-section of Trinis and Tobagonians. The child’s notion of TT society and a person’s place in it was both revealing and worryingly backward. On the political front, the coming of America first, Russia first, Israel first, India first, China first and even TT first, the demise of the old code of ethics, the triumph of force and injustice over reason and mercy, and the deliberate ignorance of history is taking us back to the politics of isolation and nativism. We have been rocked by a value system that we are still figuring out. Clearly, we are into a period of militarism. The current 61 armed conflicts are the most since WWII, as is the number of displaced people, of whom 250 million depend on aid to live, at the same time as that aid is being cut – 83 per cent by the US – according to the International Research Committee. That will reverse the 52 per cent drop since 2020 in global mortality rates for under-fives reported by Unicef. We rarely equate wars with environmental damage, but that is wilful blindness, while the arms industry coins it in and nations’ GDPs are consumed by armaments. And as for the cost to human beings, well, we know that drones don’t render us surplus to needs. Humans matter because our creative genius is behind all invention, and in the area of the arts the human spirit soars. The good news is that in the literary arts, TT writers have been excelling. In 2025, for the first time, a TT woman – Claire Adam – made it onto the stellar Booker Prize longlist with her second novel. Another TT writer – Celeste Mohammed – released her highly praised second novel in the Caribbean before the US and UK. Now that is progress in what might seem a parallel universe. And in the Jekyll-and-Hyde world of scientific discovery, a new gel made from our own saliva could repair and regenerate damaged tooth enamel and revolutionise dentistry and oral healthcare. By 2030, virus-free, universally compatible, long-lasting artificial blood could be used in transfusions and reduce deaths caused by supply shortages. Finally, a powerful new antibiotic against superbugs has been found. It’s promising, but requires us to be as patient and perhaps philosophical as the critically endangered pair of giant tortoises that became the sub-species’ oldest first-time parents, aged 97. Wishing you an uplifting 2026. The post The year that was 2025 appeared first on Trinidad and Tobago Newsday.