This is a long quote/excerpt from Adam Robinson I’ve been holding onto for a while, from Tribe of Mentors. But perhaps a feature of these neural interface devices could counteract that, with a command like "tell me this piece of news but suppress my confirmation bias and tribal emotional reactions while I'm taking it in." Today idea-viruses that cause outrage (outrageous?) in today's discourse have been weaponized by algorithms optimizing for engagement, and directly brain-transmitted memes seem especially risky for appealing to our base natures or causing amygdala hijack. It seems likely the neural link would need it own set of abstractions, perhaps even unique per person, similar to how Google Translate AI invented its own meta-language. The essay assumes we'd understand and have more empathy with each other, but that seems like a leap. James Beshara has a really interesting read on how communication will change and evolve in a post-verbal world, namely one where human/brain interfaces like Neuralink can more directly transmit thought between people than the medium of language allows today.Īfter reading the essay I wonder if people's thoughts or the neural pathways they activate, if they could be directly transmitted into another brain, would actually make any sense to someone else with a unique internal set of pathways and framework for parsing and understanding the world. Jung.Ī fairly random selection, and hopefully I can get a few more in next year.
The Lifecycle of Software Objects by Ted Chiang (short story).The Executive’s Compass by James O’Toole.The Upstarts: How Uber, Airbnb, and the Killer Companies of the New Silicon Valley Are Changing the World by Brad Stone.Catching the Big Fish: Meditation, Consciousness, and Creativity by David Lynch (audiobook).Identify: Basic Principles of Identity Design in the Iconic Trademarks by Chermayeff & Geismar.32 Yolks: From My Mother’s Table to Working the Line by Eric Ripert.Widow Basquiat: A Love Story by Jennifer Clement.When Hitler Took Cocaine and Lenin Lost His Brain: History’s Unknown Chapters by Giles Milton.Ikigai: The Japanese Secret to a Long and Happy Life by Héctor García and Francesc Miralles.
Out of Your Mind by Alan Watts (audiobook, really a series of lectures).(I usually have 3-4 books going on at once.) Here’s what I ended up reading this year, in roughly chronological finishing order.