It’s normal to resist change. When cars were first introduced, many people thought they were a dangerous and unnecessary replacement for horses. And the English resisted using umbrellas at first because they thought that rain made them hearty and strong. (Seems crazy now, right?) Being too nostalgic can make us blind to future opportunities. How […]
Unmasking high-tech threats
The world’s most famous hacker died a few months ago. Of course, by the time Kevin Mitnick passed away, he had pivoted to become a security consultant. (As it turns out, becoming famous as a hacker is a professional liability.) Written after he spent five years in prison, Mitnick’s essential text on tech security is […]
Can TikTok fix your life?
Some influencers use their social media channels to sell makeup, supplements, or shapewear. Dr. Julie Smith has a higher purpose: she creates TikTok videos to make mental health education accessible to everyone. Her mission has earned her more than 4 million followers on that platform. In our latest Instaread, we look at her practical advice […]
Are robots going to be evil or not?
Here’s a sobering statistic: artificial intelligence is expected to surpass the most intelligent human by a billion times by 2049. To put this in perspective, your IQ, compared to AI, will be analogous to the IQ of a fly and Albert Einstein. The future gets shaky to forecasters at that point because by then, technological […]
This system will change your life
Unread emails, disorganized files, and random photos can pile up and make your workflow feel chaotic. But at the end of the day, all those pieces of digital clutter fall into one of four categories: projects, areas, resources, and archives. This PARA system is a simple and flexible way to get organized across your devices. […]
Why do we have generation gaps?
Anyone who’s gathered with extended family for a holiday meal knows that relationships between the generations can be tense. The same is true for intergenerational workplaces, where bosses may be much older than their employees—or vice versa. How can we have better conversations with people from a different age bracket? Winds of Change Technology is […]
Why is it so hard to focus?
Doomscrolling is bad for your soul. Now researchers know that it’s also bad for your attention span. The constant availability of browser tabs, apps, and social media platforms triggers our minds to jump from one topic to another. How can we reclaim our valuable cognitive resources? How to Find Peace The constant influx of emails, […]
The birth of AI
Artificial intelligence was born at one of the most boring-sounding places in the world: the US Weather Bureau in Washington, D.C. The year was earlier than you might think—1958. And Cornell University professor Frank Rosenblatt had something to show people. It was a machine connected to a computer, and its name was Perceptron. No, Perceptron […]
Let’s avoid another arms race
Max Tegmark is a professor of physics at MIT. He’s also the president of the somewhat sinister sounding Future of Life Institute, the group that authored the letter asking for a six-month pause on the development of advanced artificial intelligence. You know, to preserve the future of humanity. What Needs Sorting? It’s easy to get […]
Will AI Outsmart Us?
Artificial intelligence has changed a lot since it was invented in 1955. One of the biggest shifts happened in the 1990s, when neural networks were implemented. They allowed AIs to encode information or “learn” just like the human brain, absorbing data, gathering observations, and making inferences. Neural networks are the reason why AI image generators […]
