We need the HN 2021 list. Fiction and non-fiction:
There used to be monthly(?) threads, but I guess that got shut down because it doesn't really lead to interesting discussions?
Aw, that's a bummer. I'd definitely participate.
Books I loved reading this year
61–70 of 166 posts
Re: Books I loved reading this year
#62I've mislaid my copy of Bill's "How I put a computer on every desk while totally fucking up everyone's idea of what software is, how it could be developed and how it might be used". To be honest, it was a riveting read but I don't really want to get into the sequel "How I became a nice guy and everyone forgot about the terrible things I did in business".
[deleted]
Re: Books I loved reading this year
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
Would you rather Gates just takes his billions and spend it on private planes and yachts, retreated away from the world? I’m glad he’s taking his acumen and treasure to things that are intended to positively benefit the entire world, personally. There’s a lot of great things he can still achieve in this lifetime regardless of his past. Computing has largely moved on from his Microsoft days and it’s control of the wor…
Oh, he's a great guy now (mostly). I fully applaud 99% of everything he's tried do with the Gates Foundation. But what he did to the future of computing lingers on, and will do so for another decade or threee.
You realized his 501c3 gives back less than 1% back to the country that birthed, and coddled him.
As to his contribution to computing--I have no idea other than an added cost (practically a tax) on every PC I bought.
Re: Books I loved reading this year
#64We need the HN 2021 list. Fiction and non-fiction:
Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology.
Incredible work for those interested in "how we know"
Re: Books I loved reading this year
#65- List for the lazy - A Thousand Brains: A New Theory of Intelligence, by Jeff Hawkins. The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race, by Walter Isaacson. Klara and the Sun, by Kazuo Ishiguro. Hamnet, by Maggie O’Farrell. Project Hail Mary, by Andy Weir.
Project Hail Mary was so good. I loved The Martian but Artemis not as much. By that measure Project Hail Mary was a return to form. It was just a fun, breezy read that hit the problem solving part of my brain in just the right way, but with a different angle on things than "The Martian".
I liked a lot of the ideas in PHM. I found the protagonist insufferable throughout, though. Perhaps Weir was going for a more flawed character after Watney? (Never read Artemis, so I can't comment there.)
I still think it's a good book, and well worth the read. But man did that character grate on my nerves.
Re: Books I loved reading this year
#66I'm reading Dune and I just bought a couple of neuroscience and math books. Maybe I'll even have time to read them!
Re: Books I loved reading this year
#67I was disappointed by A Thousand Brains. The last part of the book veered into ... I don't really know. On the other hand, I loved Jeff Hawkins' earlier book on this topic: On Intelligence [1]. It's easily one of the top 5 books that I've read and the first part of A Thousand Brains recaps much of that work, so still relevant today according to the author. [1] https://numenta.com/resources/on-intelligence/
To me, top level, this seemed like a re-discovery of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society_of_Mind but with more detail as to how the actual neocortex works.
I think the most important part of 'kilobrain' was the clear description of a single Functional Unit, that appears to be replicated throughout the neocortex and, ultimately, performs all functions we consider 'higher'. This, in a way, reduces Applied Intelligence to building an actual 'Function Unit' in something other than meatware (e.g. CMOS); and having high-bandwidth ways to hook FU's together to build (at first) sub-parts of the brain (e.g. maybe the auditory system). This would be an "MVP" type proof-of-concept that 'should' allow construction of a Full Brain. Now, exactly how such h/w would be 'programmed' (or trained) to perform said function -- that, I don't understand yet.
Re: Books I loved reading this year
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why? Mojica did important work on CRISPR, yes, but Doudna and Charpentier were the ones who showed how to use it as a DNA editing tool, without which very few people would care about it.
He did not just "do important work". He discovered and described the CRISPR mechanism. Without CRISPR, there is no CRISPR-cas9. > showed how to use it as a DNA editing tool Don't we care about basic research anymore?
The book is great at emphasizing and re-emphasizing the incremental nature of the journey, all the competition and co-discovery and the tiny steps building on each other's work that led up to Doudna and Charpentier's breakthroughs. Including the researchers that concurrently discovered CRISPR. Despite centering around Doudna's life and career, it very firmly gives credit where credit is due.
Re: Books I loved reading this year
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
Project Hail Mary was so good. I loved The Martian but Artemis not as much. By that measure Project Hail Mary was a return to form. It was just a fun, breezy read that hit the problem solving part of my brain in just the right way, but with a different angle on things than "The Martian".
I liked a lot of the ideas in PHM. I found the protagonist insufferable throughout, though. Perhaps Weir was going for a more flawed character after Watney? (Never read Artemis, so I can't comment there.) I still think it's a good book, and well worth the read. But man did that character grate on my nerves.
Yes, I think he was going for someone less likable. Watney was almost too likable.
Re: Books I loved reading this year
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why? Mojica did important work on CRISPR, yes, but Doudna and Charpentier were the ones who showed how to use it as a DNA editing tool, without which very few people would care about it.
He did not just "do important work". He discovered and described the CRISPR mechanism. Without CRISPR, there is no CRISPR-cas9. > showed how to use it as a DNA editing tool Don't we care about basic research anymore?
A general-purpose DNA editing tool is still basic research by most standards.
The Nobel Prizes are awarded for conferring the greatest benefit to humankind. Showing how to use CRISPR as a genome editing tool (Doudna and Charpentier) confers much more benefit to humankind than "just" characterizing CRISPR (Mojica). I don't mean to trivialize Mojica's work, but at the end of the day if not for the later work of Doudna and Charpentier, Mojica's work on CRISPR would be unknown and irrelevant to 99.9999% of the world population.