Category: Storytelling
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Happiness
Having a big home doesn’t make me happy. Don’t get me wrong. I love the house we live in. It’s so much better than the dorm rooms I had in college. But nice accommodations are not the primary lever for my happiness. My happiness revolves around feelings of contribution. I want to work on meaningful…
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A.I. is Better than You
You used to only have to compete with other humans. Oh, the good old days! Now, you need to compete with A.I. And it’s not a fair fight. A.I. can do many things that you could never hope to do. It can solve math problems that have stumped our best human mathematicians for decades. While…
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Dream Jobs in the Age of A.I.
Finding your dream job has never been easy. When we add A.I. to the mix, it gets even harder. Many people have suggested using the “Ikigai” framework. This article describes how you can use this idea to find fulfillment. Consider what you love, what the world needs, what you are good at, and what you…
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What is the Value of a Math Problem?
Today, I learned that OpenAI has solved over 375 advanced math problems. While we may eventually find mistakes in the AI solutions, this is definitely a “brave new world”. My guess is that most of the solutions are probably correct. Just as AI has learned how to vanquish chess grandmasters, now AI has learned how…
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Risk
At my day job, we spend a lot of time trying to mitigate risks. This is important work. It matters; in fact, it can potentially save lives. Here’s the question: How do we best address risks while still making progress? There’s no easy answer. Risk would be minimized if no airplanes ever flew or if…
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Telluride Film Festival
Yesterday marked the beginning of the 53rd annual Telluride Film Festival. I’ve known for several months that I wasn’t going to go to this one. Not because I didn’t want to. Not because I don’t love going. This year, I chose to go to the American Film Market instead. Because I’ve never done that before.…
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Art is Not Life
As much as an artist may want to recreate scenes from our daily lives, that’s not what art is all about. Art takes a stance. Art says that the real world is something like THIS. The artist knows that the real world is not at all like THIS. And that’s okay. The artist asks the…
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Daniel
One of my favorite songs by Elton John and Bernie Taupin is Daniel. Here’s my attempt to sing and play it. I love that there remains a bit of ambiguity in the song. It seems that Bernie Taupin originally wrote an extra verse that never made it into the final version. Here’s what I’ve found…
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Taste
I don’t think most people want to acknowledge the importance of taste. Most people are content to consume whatever shows up. I’ve been guilty of watching LOTS of movies that don’t make the cut. But here’s the thing: we can learn from people who do not agree with us! We can learn from people who…
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Flash Boys
Today, I finished reading the book Flash Boys, by Michael Lewis. It’s one of my favorites! We all know that our financial system is susceptible to undue influence by “bad actors”. There are many reasons we feel like things are stacked against us. And sometimes, they are. Michael Lewis identifies a fascinating time in the…