Week Commencing 12 June 2023
Blog Post - The UFO craze was created by government nepotism and incompetent journalism (The Intrinsic Perspective)
Erik Hoel is an insta-read for me, even when he's giving me a hard dose of reality after getting irrationally excited about disclosure. As much as I desperately want to believe everything that Grusch says, it's pretty clearly total bullshit without a shred of evidence.
Podcast - Lex Fridman - Daniel Negreanu (Youtube)
This is an older one that I only just got around to watching. Always amazing to see masters of their craft waxing philosophical. I would recommend watching this back to back with the Magnus Carlsen episode. I don't follow poker all that much so was super interested to learn how much modern engines have infiltrated the game. Surprised that it's this significant in an imperfect information game.
Article - India’s diaspora is bigger and more influential than any in history (The Economist)
While this makes me happy, I am concerned for the future of India when 36% of the 1,000 top IIT performers migrate abroad. It doesn’t bode well when the best the country has to offer is leaving, particularly if India wants to position itself to be a leader in technology - “Another study looked at the top 20% of researchers in artificial intelligence (defined as those who had papers accepted for a competitive conference in 2019). It found that 8% did their undergraduate degree in India. But the share of top researchers that now work in India is so small that the researchers did not even record it.”
Podcast - The Always Sunny in Philadelphia Podcast (Youtube)
‘Paddy's Pub: Home of the Original Kitten Mittens’ is one of my top 5 Sunny episodes so this was great, even though they barely spoke about it... From the first two episodes of season 16 it looks like the guys have their mojo back and have rediscovered what made the early episodes so great. This show is a masterclass on how not to jump the shark.
Book - The AI Revolution in Medicine (Amazon)
A broad and accessible introduction to the promise and peril of generative AI in medicine, but I kept feeling like it only scratched the surface of some really interesting topics before jumping onto the next one. I guess it is to be expected when the technology has only been out for a limited time, but I was hoping for more given the backgrounds of the authors. Felt quite superficial and dumbed down at times which was disappointing, though if you look at it as a primer to start the conversation about gen AI in medicine, which will no doubt be a long and complicated one, it sets the scene quite nicely. I also think that aiming this book at less techy doctors who are coming to grips with what AI might mean for their lives would be beneficial. The main takeaway for me was that at least in the near-term, the big win will be in alleviating the paperwork and admin burden that healthcare professionals spend an inordinate amount of time on, but there is a danger that money gets poured into systems that clinicians don’t actually use. Something tells me that bureaucracy and over-regulation is going to limit the scope of what AI can do in medicine for at least a couple of years.
Blog Post - Your Book Review: Man's Search for Meaning (Astral Codex Ten)
I've been meaning to write a review of Man’s Search for Meaning for a long time as it's one of the very few books that have had a profound effect on my life. This review is better than anything I could have written so instead I'll just recommend it (if you can get past the constant ‘dear reader’). I've tried CBT a number of times and it never clicked for me, I think GPs should start prescribing this book instead.
Article - WTC final: Why has India stopped winning ICC tournaments? (BBC News)
Pain.
Show - Penn and Teller at the Eventim Apollo
I’ve wanted to see Penn and Teller live for so long and they did not disappoint. Would recommend this to absolutely everyone. I’m astounded by their ability to do this for fifty years and still be at the top of their game.
Blog Post - The Canal Papers (Astral Codex Ten)
It’s cheating to post Scott Alexander here, but he knocks it out the park every time. I’ve always found the concept of a general factor of psychopathology (a potential commonality across different mental health conditions) enticing and canalisation seems like an interesting lens, as is overfitting and underfitting.
TV Show - Black Mirror Season 6 (Netflix)
Been waiting forever for this one. I’ve only watched the first episode, and while I get what it was going for, something about it fell flat with me. I normally like when shows get meta and the concept is one that I’m glad we saw Charlie Brooker’s take on because deepfakes and AI generated content will no doubt become a part of our lives, but this felt a like it missed the mark.
—- SPOILER ALERT —-
Joan is Awful - The almost-children’s-TV-show ridiculous hijinkery of Salma Hayek and Annie Murphy sneaking into Streamberry’s offices and destroying a quantum computer with an axe (I mean come on, really?) cheapened what could have been a pretty unique exploration of the theme. Having said that, Annie Murphy and Michael Cera were fantastic. The highlight was seeing this comment on Reddit - “I hate to say this but a man of Indian descent cooking bland food was the most unbelievable thing in a black mirror episode”
Update:
Loch Henry - Exceptional, one of the best episodes in a while. Didn’t feel like a typical Black Mirror episode at all, which wasn’t a bad thing. I loved everything about it. The final scenes really hit home the callousness of the true crime genre and how we all excitedly devour entertainment at the expense of the very real victims. Charlie Brooker is not holding back in his not-so-thinly-veiled criticism of Netflix in these first two episodes.
Beyond the Sea - Another great episode. Probably top 10 in the whole catalogue. It’s one of the only episodes this season that felt like it stuck to the original premise of Black Mirror. One of my favourite things about this show is the way it presents ideas that fill you with a sense of existential dread when you think about them for too long (e.g. White Christmas). This does a good job of doing exactly that, particularly when you have to fill in the blanks of what happens next after the ending. I forgot how brilliant Aaron Paul is.
Mazey Day - Utter garbage. “Wouldn’t it be so random if we made a really shitty version of Nightcrawler and chucked in a werewolf out of nowhere???”
Demon 79 - I liked this one overall. It proved that having some sort of supernatural element wasn’t the reason I hated Mazey Day, because it can be done in an entertaining way that doesn’t take away from the story. Again, it doesn’t have the standard Black Mirror elements but I guess by now Charlie Brooker is trying to move a little bit away from the now overdone “WHAT IF TECHNOLOGY WENT TOO FAR” trope while still telling unique stories.