If you haven’t watched it, stop now, go and rent it, and watch Steven Spielberg’s “Ready Player One“ (RPO). The movie is set in “the Stacks”, a high density city of container homes situated in Columbus Ohio in 2045. It is a world where everyone spends most of their time online in Virtual Reality world … Continue reading Ready Player One: a vision of the future
As I don’t have time to do full write-ups on everything I get through, here is just a brief few comments on the books I chose to read in 2018 and the key things I want to remember of them. Roughly in the order I would recommend them for general consumption… 1. Man’s search for … Continue reading Books of 2018
The book picks up on several themes that I think are very important for understanding where the world is trending over the coming years. Politics Disillusionment picks up on the rise of anti ellitest autocratic and populist rulers (connections to The Demise of Western Liberalism by Edward Luce). Issues of identity, nationalism clash with global … Continue reading 21 lessons for the 21st century by Yuval Noah Harari
Viktor Frankl was a Jewish pioneer in psychotherapy. He was developing his own insights into psychology in Austria prior to World War 2. In the war he was arrested by the Nazis and transported to Auschwitz. In his book “Man’s search for meaning” he relays the experiences of surviving in a concentration camp and his … Continue reading Book review: Man’s search for meaning by Viktor Frankl
This book covers the rise of computers and AI over the period Kasprov’s chess career. But for me the interesting insights are into the rising impact of technology on our lives, and the roles of psychology in decision making. In my comments I have focused more on the takeaways I think are more widely applicable … Continue reading Deep Thinking by Garry Kasparov
Jason Zweig writes The Intelligent Investor column for the Wall Street Journal and is interviewed here by Shane Parish. Lots of useful stuff, starting for me from about min 26 of the podcast onwards, here are my highlights as well as some of my own complimentary thoughts: Financial advice 1. One of the biggest distorting … Continue reading The emotional side of investment decision making with Jason Zweig
From an Interview between Shane Parish of Farnam Street and Barbara Oakley who has recently written a book on the subject backed by years of academic research. How can we learn new things optimally? (This applies to both abstract ideas like math and physical skills like playing music) The distinction we draw between rote learning … Continue reading Learning how to learn
[The Tim Ferriss Show] Catherine Hoke — The Master of Second Chances This is an inspirational podcast. Catherine runs an organisation called Defy that works with prisoners in the US to give them a second chance through an intensive training program and then, after their release, support. I am not going to try to summarise … Continue reading Catherine Hoke and the need for Second Chances in society
Adam Grant is an organisational psychologist who has published a book on this concept of the way individuals operate and how they then function in organisations. Organisational citizenship behaviour is the field of organisational psychology focused on behaviours that are not relevant to the task at hand but critical to the success of the effectiveness … Continue reading Givers, Takers and Matchers
Here is a facinating conversation between Shane Parish of Farnam Street and Rory Sutherland, the Vice Chairman of Ogilvy & Mather Group, one of the largest advertising companies in the world. Rory started the behavioral insights team at OM and spends his days applying behavioral economics and evolutionary psychology to solve problems for their clients. The conversation … Continue reading Human behavioural motivations and insights with Rory Sutherland
Here's something that inspired me... 