One thing that the COVID pandemic changed fundamentally was the way we meet each other. Before 2020, a meeting was generally understood to be something you did in person, not on-line.
Now that has been flipped. In many industries, people meet on-line via Zoom far more often than they meet in person.
And in a way, that is partially saving us, since our current federal administration is acting much like a second pandemic.
For one thing, the administration is doing everything possible to destroy scientific research in the United States. And by extension, its inane policies are rapidly destroying our nation’s ability to compete in the ever evolving technological space of the global economy.
In many cases, my international graduate students don’t dare to go to leading conferences outside the U.S. these days, because they don’t know whether they will be allowed back in to continue their studies at NYU. But because science has now widely adopted Zoom, those students are still able to participate, although not nearly to the same extent.
Of course they won’t get the same opportunities to meet colleagues in person, to find new professional friends and mentors, and in general to advance their careers and their ability to contribute to scientific progress in the way that one would hope.
But because we had the first pandemic, we now have the tools to limp along until this second pandemic is over.