Category Archives: artificial intelligence

BOOK: “AI for Good” by Josh Tyrangiel

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AI for Good: How Real People Are Using Artificial Intelligence to Fix Things That MatterAI for Good: How Real People Are Using Artificial Intelligence to Fix Things That Matter by Josh Tyrangiel
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Publisher Site – Simon & Schuster

— Out Now —

There’re a lot of books out about artificial intelligence (AI) these days. There are how-to manuals. There are books about the making of billionaires on the back of AI-centric business models. There are books that consider how AI will destroy the human economy (and possibly humanity as we know it.) Josh Tyrangiel’s book seeks to carve out a niche by taking a positive view towards AI but focusing not so much on how it produces more billionaire tech executives, but rather on how it can help fix persistent social problems in education, healthcare, governance, and human communication and connectedness. Of course, this isn’t a completely separate topic from business use of AI (e.g. healthcare is one of the biggest businesses in America [which is no doubt emblematic of America’s unrelentingly shitty healthcare;]) however, these are areas that each feature their own unique challenges, problems for which the lessons of the business sector, broadly, are often of limited value.

I found this book to be illuminating. It introduced several fascinating characters from various domains. Among the most intriguing discussions were those with a short-lived DOGE employee and one with a Hoosier high school principal. It was also interesting to learn about the evolution of AI language translators.

If you are interested in how AI is being applied beyond hardcore business uses like supply chain optimization and computer programming, you may want to give this book a look.

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PROMPT: Underrated

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Daily writing prompt
Who are some underrated people in history?
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Alfred Krupa, Bernard Sadow, and Robert Plath, men whose inventions over thirty-three years during the late twentieth-century ushered in a new epoch in human history — the era of the wheeled suitcase.

Now, the fact that we didn’t figure out putting wheels on a suitcase until the late 20th century (and that when we did it took several long-fought permutations before wheeled suitcases were worth a damn) is a chilling testimony to how quickly General Artificial Intelligence will leave our species in the dust.

PROMPT: Technology

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Daily writing prompt
How has technology changed your job?
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Like everyone who has taken to using AI, I’m training my replacement. So, that’s always an awkward time.

PROMPT: Uninvent

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Daily writing prompt
If you could un-invent something, what would it be?
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As nuclear weapons may yet be the death of us all, they would be a sound candidate. But I think it’s utter fantasy to think that a possible technology can be anything more than delayed. Besides, once GAI (general artificial intelligence) starts freeballing it’ll inevitably stumble onto a mode of death that makes the H-bomb look like a caveman’s campfire by comparison.

PROMPT: Alternative Career Path

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What alternative career paths have you considered or are interested in?

At this point, it would need to be something AI / robots won’t possibly be able to do better, faster, cheaper in the near term. This leaves jobs for which one’s humanity is a central part of the job. Unfortunately, I suck at many aspects of being a human. Maybe I’ll become a robot and beat them at their own game.

PROMPT: Without a Computer

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Your life without a computer:
what does it look like?

I imagine like it does when I go on long hikes, and have no access to computer or internet. i.e. Mostly blissful with the occasional bleak thought that the world might be ending without one’s awareness.

PROMPT: Topics

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Daily writing prompt
Which topics would you like to be more informed about?
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I’d like to know more about the capabilities and limitations of AI, a rabbit-hole that I have only recently stumbled upon, but which I am tumbling down hard. Particularly, how to best use it for language acquisition as I am currently learning Chinese and would like to increase my literacy so I can open myself up to a whole new world of books.

I’m also curious about pratfalls and physical comedy all of a sudden.

PROMPT: Searched for Online

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Daily writing prompt
What was the last thing you searched for online? Why were you looking for it?
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I ask AI what kind of economic system can work when machines / AI do virtually all productive tasks better than humans — such that humans can no longer sell their labor for money to buy goods and other services. (i.e. the backbone of economies as we’ve known them.) I ask because it’s an extremely important question whose answer is completely without precedent. Those who say it’ll be like a new, bigger, better Industrial Revolution are full of shit. It was not hard to imagine the work domain left to humans during the Industrial Revolution- unless you were a proper Luddite. When we hit the aforementioned inflection point, however distant it may or may not be, it will be an entirely different matter.

It’s a little like asking a real estate developer what will happen to you and your neighbors when they tear down your subdivision to build a golf course, but the AI is a little less defensive. When the AI is equally defensive, we’ll know we’re screwed.