Klara and the Sun
Kazuo Ishiguro has a knack for digging deep into what makes us human. In this book, he uses Klara an AF (Artificial Friend) to create a layered narrative on what a sentient AI could tell us about ourselves.
Month: May 2022
Artificial Culture
The influence of AI now goes far beyond daily transactions and into the construction of our daily lives and decisions. It is impacting culture. What could this mean for the species’ future?
The Rules of Civility
To describe the book, I’d apply the author’s own words, which he used for Manhattan – ‘you wanted to approach it for the rest of your life without ever quite arriving.’ Through a flashback triggered by a photograph, we see the journey of a woman, the society she was part of, and the different shades of Manhattan. A vivid, glorious, and poignant ride.
Designing my desires
Mimetic desire, compounded by algorithms, are increasingly determining what we desire, without us having any idea it’s happening. This is how I am making my own ‘red pill’.
How will you measure your life?
The book doesn’t answer the question – the authors make that obvious right at the start. But what it does offer is framing and perspectives, delivered with interesting anecdotes. An engaging read, though having been written in 2012, it doesn’t factor in the implications of social media.