Mike Bostrom – Superintelligence
More thorough and nuanced than most scary-AI-will-take-over-the-world-books, but it still suffers from the same pitfall: over-estimating the importance of superintelligence for evolutionary success (two random examples: cockroaches and Donald Trump).
Daniel Coyle – The culture code
Rich collection of cases that jointly convey an important message – even if the individual annecdotes may be somewhat over the top.
Contageous enthusiasm of authentic curiosity comes across best in his Jia Jiang’s youtube videos (cf. Olympic rings).
Elegant mix of historic analysis of market dynamics and experiments with natural selection in non-biological context.
Impressive laundry list of neuromarketing applications, ranging from solid science-based insights to intuitively appealing generalities.
Please note the irony in the fact that Amazon does not offer this book as ebook.
Edward Thorp – A man for all markets
Sage advise from the man who beat the dealer at blackjack and outperformed the market as one of the world’s first quants (but feel free to skip the chapters about Edward’s youth as a prodigy).
Compassionately written, but downplaying that uneducated, scared anti-intellectuals are often ruthlessly mean towards anyone who is not part of their clan.
Written in an entertaining laid-back style that more business books could use and – above all – surprisingly relevant over 25 years after first publication in 1991.
While containing valuable advice, the book does not go much beyond the basic market research toolkit I’d expect any strategy consultant to possess.
Enjoyable, yet somewhat theoretical, meandering between fundamental truisms and gross simplicications, leaving the reader with one key question: ‘Where does it pay off to act contrarian?’
The quest of a journalist overcoming his initial scpeticism and transforming from a coach potatoe into a survival adept, who walks up mount Kilimajaro bare-chested and loses his initial stance as an objective observer.
Strongly opiniated view on the future of humanity, mostly valuable due to the emphasis on the role of humans in steering development of technology and AI.
Counting back from 5 to 1 and then ‘go’ is a useful mind trick that helps to bypass inertia.
Entertaining proponent of the emerging trend of ‘self re-programming’ within ‘self help’, leveraging scientific insights from fields such as neuro science and behavioral economics to train the mind.
In order to be successful, ‘givers’ have to be smart about how they direct their giving.
Remarkable how social environment and incentives can shape giving/taking behavior of individuals.
Treasure trove of slightly lugubrious annecdotes on crimes, accidents and government schemes.
Comfortingly desillusional perspective on entrepreneurship, with reassuring insights like: “No one cares.”
Fascinating read about how much progress has been made on the path initiated by Daniel Dennett in “Consciousness explained”.
Recent move of Disney to boycot Netflixs proves that incumbents are starting to realize the new reality.
Refreshing evolutionary perspective, emphasizing the cognitive, agricultural, and industrial revolutions as turning points in human development.
