Horse: A Novel

Geraldine Brooks is an Australian, horse-loving, history buff. The historical fiction is both a celebration of a great horse and a depiction of the discrimination against black people in America. Her story covers the period surrounding the civil war, a brief story from the 1950's, and a current day discovery and love affair. The book studies the anatomy of the horse and details the art of painting the champion. Lexington is possibly the greatest American horse of all time from a racing and stud perspective. Her story tells the reader about the horse as well as the individuals that helped make him special.

My favorite quote came from the artist Scott when speaking of the southern soldiers. "They were, all of them, lost to a narrative untethered to anything he recognized as true...their complete disregard-denial-of the humanity of the enslaved, their fabulous notions of what evils the Federal government intended for them should their cause fail-all of it was ingrained so deep, beyond the reach of reasonable dialogue or evidence."

Age of AI

The Age of AI is an ambitious undertaking by three older guys to explain the benefits and threats of a broad and hard to define technology. The authors explore three examples of what they classify as artificial intelligence with a chess playing program (AlphaZero), an anti-bacterial drug development program (Halicin), and a language generative program (GPT-3). They identify the development of AI and AGI as a major development in human history and compare it to the introduction of the printing press. They emphasize the dangers of a run away AGI that can threaten our very existence. They call for guardrails and safeguards to be developed to monitor and control the machines. As apposed to the last book that recruited young people to altruistically guide AI, the authors suggest a more top down, philosophical and governmental control. Either way, the potential benefits and risks are monumental.