The Future of Humanity

Michio Kaku is a physicist better know as a popularizer of science after his multiple TV shows, digital media presence and nine books. The Future of Humanity is his latest work (2018) and is a futuristic effort placed way ahead in the future.

With such long time frame, Kaku can speculate anything, but he cleverly connects it with the ideas of the present. This is the main take away from the book.

On one side The Future of Humanity is about unthinkable dreams, on the other the challenges that the laws of physics impose. "there is one thing that even alien civilizations will have to obey, and that is the laws of physics." 

With these yes-but and what-if games Kaku takes the reader to the farthest spots in the universe while explaining why leaving Earth is not as easy as Hollywood makes it seem.

The starting point of The Future of Humanity is that our species "sooner or later will face global crises that threaten our very existence", and hence we have the incentives to migrate to outer worlds. Despite the hazards that we may face, Kaku consideres the drive to adventure and exploration part of the human nature. Is it? maybe not but we can't ignore that we don't need the whole species to agree. with just a few entrepreneurs (i.e. Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson) suffice. How difficult interplanetary transportation really is? How soon will it occur? How can it be, physically or just pure information? It is almost impossible to speculate about these questions without entering into more philosophical questions like what is consciousness  "Consciousness, I claim, is the process of creating a model of yourself using multiple feedback loops—for example, in space, in society, or in time—in order to carry out a goal."

For Kaku the Future of Humanity depends on our own civilization evolution. Unless we reach at least a Type I Kardashev civilization level intergalactic travel is only a dream. A Type I civilization will require new organizational rules. Our current models are incapable of such challenges. Kaku concurs with Elon Musk when he said:

"Elon Musk has speculated that, as civilizations master advanced technology, they develop the power to destroy themselves and that the biggest threat facing a Type I civilization may be a self-inflicted one."

The Future of Humanity has an optimistic tone. The broad range of innovations in healthcare, communications, energy, etc. that we see today are the seeds of a future that is still only possible in the minds of these futurists and entrepreneurs. Are we going beyond the limite of how much resources we can dedicate to a single quest? Kaku doesn't answer key questions like who will coordinate the necessary efforts? A global government? Who will pay of it? Not even the ultrarich have enough, is tax-payers money involved? What about other day to day priorities like deseases, poverty, etc. Who is going and who is staying? Who is up to decide? Is it wise to spend huge amounts of resources and energy in these endeavors?

Is The Future of Humanity to please the masses or is it a book to take seriously? Time will tell. 

Unschooled

Reading Kerry McDonald's Unschooled reminded me my early years as a parent. Despite not being satisfied with the educational system, we accepted with resignation that we had no option for our kids. We tried to choose the "best" school, however mostly the differences were the quality of the people leading the schools and their teachers. Even a friend tried to convince us to home-school our kids but we felt it was the same (school at home) minus the "socialization". Years later we were invited by another friend to join an alternative school, an off-the-system project. It was a challenge because people around us opposed and voiced their opinions with comments like "you are going to ruin your kids lives", and so. The project was worth, not because of pure opposition to the mainstream, but being off-the-system allowed them to offer a truly student center project with mixed ages, learners community, no-grades, no-homework, etc.

All this process was scary because we had no reference beyond the myth of schooling, the same myth we grew up with and we have survived!!! Was this our tantrum against the system and our kids were going to pay the price? The problems with the traditional schooling and the benefits of these new projects are well supported by theory and scholars yet little evidence was available to confirm that it works in practice. And this is where Unschooled fills the void. Using Kerry's own words 

"Schooling has become so engrained in our culture and conversation that disentangling it from learning takes time and though. Not only do we need to unschool our own thinking but also we need to help others do the same."

Unschooled is McDonald's "personal views and experiences related to unscholling and self-directed education" nonetheless it is very well documented. From John Locke to Peter Gray the breadth of references is a proof of the seriousness of her work. Along the theoretical references Unschooled offers a mosaic of real people's experiences doing what they believe is best for the kids. Unschooling is a movement that has its roots in the progressive reforms of the 1960's, it has reborn with a core difference "one refreshing change with today's unschooling movement is that it is being driven not by philosophers but by parents"

The book covers the history of unschooling, gives a definition and contrast it with schooling, and tackles some myths like; the curriculum, freedom is not license, appropriate ages to learn math or reading, and more. Also the book has a good diagnosis of the problems of the mainstream system and how it has worsen over the years despite efforts to fix it. Kerry McDonald is straight and honest in this respect "what we need conventional public schools to become if they are to truly move from a schooling paradigm to a learning one. They need to be built entirely from scratch."

In a later part of Unschooled, is a section with resources for unschoolers. From technology, resource centers, fab labs, maker spaces, libraries, revolutionary schools, apprenticeships, adventure playgrounds, and more. In summary this section is a window of options and an invitation to join and start a resource for our own communities. 

The last chapter is an outlook of the future of unschooling, which can be summarized in Kerry's call to action: 

"It all comes down to parents. It will be parents who decide whether or not we move toward an unschooled future. It will be parents who determine whether or not to reclaim their child's education."

The only subject I think the Unschooled is missing is the labor markets. As long as companies keep hiring by degree (the sheepskin effect that Brian Caplan describes in his book The Case Against Education) the unschooled future is riskier, specially for lower income families who can't rely on friends, connections, or family safety nets. There is some hope in this regard after some tech giants are dropping the diploma from their hiring process, but it is far from generalized practice. 

If you want to learn more about Kerry McDonald check her blog Whole family learning

Deep Thinking

In a world of pessimism a word of optimism is always welcome. This is what Garry Kasparov has to tell in his new book, "Deep Thinking, where machine intelligence ends and human creativity begins".

Garry Kasparov is a Russian born chess world champion and maybe the best grand master in history. After living in the soviet Azerbaijan he and his family escaped during the collapse of the Soviet Union. A democratic leader and opponent to the Putin regime he had to move to the US in 2013. He is the chairman of the Human Rights Foundation and has worked in defense of human rights and freedom for a long time.

This combination of chess master, computer geek and freedom lover permeates in his new book. He is a believer in the potential of humanity under a free systems despite its natural paradoxes.

"Even the most disciplined human mind wanders in the heat of competition. This is both a weakness and a strength of human cognition. Sometimes these undisciplined wanderings only weaken your analysis. Other times they lead to inspiration, to beautiful or paradoxical moves that were not on your initial list of candidates."

In Deep Thinking, Kasparov narrates his experience loosing against Deep Blue, IBM's supercomputer in a chess match in 1997. When a computer beat the world chess champion it became a tipping point for media and the public in the race of machine against humans.  Beyond a historic recollection of the events and some inside details that were not made public back then, Kasparov's book is a call for hope. Having experienced in person the overwhelming brute power of a computer he is not naïve in being optimist.

"Few people in the world know better than I do what it’s like to have your life’s work threatened by a machine. No one was sure what would happen if and when a chess machine beat the world champion."

The main thesis of Kasparov is that we can't know what is going to happen in the future but we should start from accepting that progress is unstoppable and desirable, therefore we shouldn't pretend to defend ourselves by holding it back.

"We don’t get to pick and choose when technological progress stops, or where. Companies are globalized and labor is becoming nearly as fluid as capital. People whose jobs are on the chopping block of automation are afraid that the current wave of tech will impoverish them, but they also depend on the next wave of technology to generate the economic growth that is the only way to create sustainable new jobs. Even if it were possible to mandate slowing down the development and implementation of intelligent machines (how?), it would only ease the pain for a few for a little while and make the situations worse for everyone in the long run."

Instead we should embrace change and formulate tougher and deeper questions. The combination of human creativity and machine brute power is super powerful, instead of fear of Artificial Intelligence - AI (machines replacing humans) we need Intelligence Amplification - IA (machines enhancing humans)

"We aren’t competing against our machines, no matter how many human jobs they can do. We are competing with ourselves to create new challenges and to extend our capabilities and to improve our lives. In turn, these challenges will require even more capable machines and people to build them and train them and maintain them—until we can make machines that do those things too, and the cycle continues. If we feel like we are being surpassed by our own technology it’s because we aren’t pushing ourselves hard enough, aren’t being ambitious enough in our goals and dreams. Instead of worrying about what machines can do, we should worry more about what they still cannot do." 

It is in the proper combination of humans and machines that we can reach our full potential.

"A clever process beat superior knowledge and superior technology. It didn’t render knowledge and technology obsolete, of course, but it illustrated the power of efficiency and coordination to dramatically improve results. I represented my conclusion like this: weak human + machine + better process was superior to a strong computer alone and, more remarkably, superior to a strong human + machine + inferior process."

But Kasparov positive vision has a caveat. It won't occur unless we have ambitious projects to pursuit and make important changes in politics, R&D, international cooperation and education.

"America still possesses the unique potential to innovate on a scale that can push the entire world economy forward. A world in which America is content with mediocrity is, literally, a much poorer world. 

R&D budgets have been slashed over the years as investors take a skeptical view of anything that doesn't feed the bottom line. Government-backed research tends to favor specific budgets to fit an existing need, not ambitious, open-ended mission to answer big questions. 

Trade wars and restrictive immigration regulations will limit America’s ability to attract the best and brightest minds, minds needed for this and every forthcoming Sputnik moment.

That our classrooms still mostly look like they did a hundred years ago isn’t quaint; it’s absurd. How can a teacher or even a stack of books be the sole source of information for kids who can access the sum of all human knowledge in seconds from a device in their pockets."

Kasparov's book is recommended to those worried about the future. I rate 4 stars because the book is a little repetitive and circular which makes the message less powerful and the reading a little weary.

As an additional reference, Tyler Cowen made an interesting interview to Garry Kasparov short ago(see transcript here) here is the audio.

Unleash Your Inner Company

As times turn harder more and more people are considering starting their own businesses, Unleash Your Inner Company is a timely contribution and a required read for those serious about it.

In Unleash your Inner Company the successful entrepreneur John Chisholm (@johndchisholm) shares his experience to all those who want to be entrepreneurs as well.

John's book is easy to read, fun to follow and provides very useful training. He lays out a 10 step process to think, organize and make your ideas coherent. Beginning from the more simple but fundamental question of what you love and what you are good for, up to creating a full strategy with pricing, differentiation, escalation, financials, etc. The road map works like a blueprint, to build from the ground up, from the basics to the complex. In addition to the framework itself, John takes the reader by the hand clarifying his ideas with examples (some from his personal experience, others are made up yet very concise), suggesting exercises to put the concepts into practice, and FAQ's sections that expand each step further. At the end of each step a short recap becomes a cheat sheet of lessons learned.

In addition to his model, John introduces basic but powerful economic concepts to the entrepreneur. Sort of a reality check for the entrepreneur to be aware of non-business related challenges. Among these ideas we find the importance of institutions to create the environment for ideas to flourish, the damaging effects of centrally controlled regulations on innovation, and the ethics of entrepreneurship as a value creating endeavor.

In the last sections of the book, John adds some useful tools such as 101 accounting, and the relationship of his 10-step model and the popular Business Model Canvas.

John explains that he took the challenge of writing this book after he presented at TEDxUFM in 2011. It is a satisfaction to see an idea materialize. Bellow is an interview given during his visit to Universidad Francisco Marroquin for the event.

My rating 5 stars

Future Perfect

Since I found out about Steven Johnson in his TED talk about Where good ideas come from I started reading his work. His book about the TED talk is great and his recent show in PBS "How we got to now" is great. I had great expectations about Future Perfect. His core ideas are very interesting especially the value of networks (part of his work on how ideas come up) and how what is know as "peer-economy" is invigorating the power of networks.

However I found disappointing his misrepresentation of many "libertarian" ideas and the Austrian School of Economics. As many other political camps there are multiple flavors and variations however Johnson personifies it in a "scarecrow fallacy". His ideas of Peer-Progressive are closer to many libertarian thinkers than what he is willing to admit. One of the key authors of libertarianism is Murray Rothbard who in his book For a New Liberty: The Libertarian Manifesto, defines libertarianism in terms completely different from Johnson's misconception.

Some concepts that are misrepresented in Future Perfect are.

The Market itself. For Johnson the market is only about commercial transaction, however as Ludwing Von Mises defines it in his book Human Action, "The market is not a place, a thing, or a collective entity. The market is a process, actuated by the interplay of the actions of the various individuals cooperating under the division of labor. The forces determining the — continually changing — state of the market are the value judgments of these individuals and their actions as directed by these value judgments". What Johnson see as a market failures (peer to peer) are actually pure market transactions, people make value judgments to enter freely into these transactions. In a market individuals exchange values by values, money is just a mean to barter not the end in itself. Johnson mistakenly considered a non-monetary transaction a non-market exchange. There are no such thing as market failures because only people make mistakes. The idea of perfect markets are not part of the Austrian Tradition.

Role of Government. He as many libertarians are skeptical about big government and big corporations. What Johnson misses is that many times big corporations are the result of cronyism, a mercantilist protection of the incumbents by the governments, not capitalism and markets. On the flip side, he shows some examples of great achievements in the realm of government (i.e. ARPANet) but misses the fact that these developments were indeed exceptional given the nature of governments; power and control, force. The Lagrand Star model is what governments do best. Common Core, Obamacare, etc. are in the nature of Government. In the name of equality of results, governments try to eliminate diversity by evening out the differences by enforcing redistribution of wealth. The problem of campaign funding is caused by the epidemic growth of governments. If government plays a bigger and bigger role in the economy and the lives of the people, who doesn't want to fight for a piece of the pie? Libertarians reject any form of initiation of force and therefore are suspicious (from minarchism to anarchism) of any government intervention since its main tool is the use of force against individuals. Diversity is what makes social interaction rich, and all we need is sound institutions that provide common rules to everybody. We are not equal in the Net, as Johnson implies. Indeed, as he also points out, few people make lots of money from YouTube videos. What is even indeed are the rules of the game, we all play under the same rules and some succeed and some not.

The other subject that Johnson falls short is his understanding of the ideas of Frederick Hayek. When Hayek talked about the role of prices in his essay The use of knowledge in society he was explaining how they are a spontaneous solution to the problem of knowledge in society as a counterargument against socialistic ideas of central planners of the economy. If Johnson goes further in Hayek's ideas he would find that in Law, Legislation and Liberty he explains the difference of a Taxis, an order created by men, and Cosmos, an order that emerged spontaneously without the direction of anyone in specific. The problem of knowledge is superior than prices, the later are just one of the solutions that have emerge from human interaction. What Johnson value of peer networks is exactly what Hayek explained in these concepts. 

Hayek didn't have a theory of the firm as Johnson attributes when he talks about big corporations. To understand a theory of the firm in the Austrian tradition check Ronald Coase Nature of the Firm essay and later contributions by other authors. Coase was puzzled by the same problem as Johnson. Why firms are inside centrally planned but interact in a spontaneous order? What defines the size of the firm? The examples presented by Johnson are instances of the same question. Why Whole Foods is more decentralize than WalMart?

Recent developments in peer-to-peer and shared economy are celebrated by libertarians (see Jeffrey Tucker book Bit by Bit: How P2P Is Freeing the World.) Companies like AirBNB or Uber that face opposition from the incumbents like medallion holders of taxi services and hotels, or the rejection from car dealers about Tesla's direct sales business model, are just some notorious examples of disruptive initiative that are changing the market process as Kickstarter does. These are not a market failure, but market expansions and shifts. Libertarians support with enthusiasm these pioneers as well as Bitcoins and other challenges of the State Force, while empowering the people.

In summary, Johnson book adds to the new era of entrepreneurship where networks and collaboration are giving form to new markets and new institutions. His ideas could be more powerful if he reconciliates his political framework with the Classical Liberal tradition and departs from the Progressives who see the government as an active player in the betterment of society.

Zero to One

Peter Thiel's book has many valuable ideas for entrepreneurs, however two stood out to me. The concept of Zero to One in itself, and the defense of efficient monopolies. Zero to One is a challenge to the me too culture of entrepreneurship and society. While Entrepreneurship is becoming more and more a buzzword and more people want to be entrepreneurs, schools turn their programs to entrepreneurship, colleges and universities claim that they teach entrepreneurship, most of the initiatives are dull me too projects. In order to keep up growing the world needs more dare initiatives, the ones that are truly disruptive, the Zero to One's.

Tied to this is Thiel's defense of efficient monopolies. In order to be a Zero to One company entrepreneurs have to make outstanding differential products. Once they achieve these they can gain a monopoly because none can compete with them (not as a result of government protection). Thiel claims that in history great innovations were followed by monopolistic dominance in their markets. He doesn't mention the "Robber Barons" who earn bad press from government and inefficient competitors or the Sherman Act enacted to destroy them, but it is a time in history where the efficient monopoly got a bad reputation. Capitalism is about creation of wealth not redistribution, efficient monopolies create wealth, perfect competition is a zero sum game.

Thiel presents an invitation to entrepreneurs to dare to create truly different product, avoid the red blood competition game.

Some chapters of the book are a little hard to follow, probably because the book itself is an edited written version of lecture notes. Yet the book is worth reading and discussing to put the feet on the ground of entrepreneurs.

Make It Stick

Peter Brown brings extensive research in neuroscience and education from the academia to the user. Make it Stick is a comprehensive work on how the brain works and how one can use this new knowledge to excel learning. I highly recommend this book to anyone looking for being better learner.

I felt that Brown play safe not criticizing the current school system. Although the purpose of the book is to summarize all these new ideas about learning/brain-building along suggestions on how to make them work, many of the obstacles he identifies come from the school system. If the ideas of learning as a responsibility of the learner not the teacher, and the teacher's new role as a facilitator don't permeate the system those who choose to be life long learners will have a lot to unlearn to learn.

The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers

This is one of the best Business books ever written. Most books speak of how to run businesses in a near perfect world (peace time). Some autobiographies are honest enough to recognize the struggle of the entrepreneur and not only the glory that made them famous. In The Hard Thing About Hard Things, Ben Horowitz does both things. His nerve wrecking story make you question yourself if you really want to be an entrepreneur or may be enchanted by the legends of the Mark Zuckerberg, the Steve Jobs, the Bill Gates, etc. Reading Ben story is like reading 100 Harvard Business Cases in 1 and making decisions without the information provided.

In the second part Ben presents a detail debrief of his experience. Unlike a classical business book à la Jim Collins, Ben's is not a prescription of how to run a business but a summary of what worked for him. However the underlying principles are applicable to many different settings.

The last part of the book is a short summary of a16z, their VC firm. More than the VC itself this part and the book exposes the need of Ben to share his experience and help founders succeed. 

If you are considering starting an entrepreneurship career The Hard Thing About Hard Things is a must read. 

Only the Paranoid Survive

Andy Grove published Only the Paranoid Survive in 1996, a year before Clayton Christensen's "The Innovators Dilemma". Reading Grove is a description of what it meant to be inside an Strategic Inflection Point (Disruptions) and survive. His advice for entrepreneurs, managers, and professionals is as current as it was almost 20 years ago. 

Another gold mint in the book is Grove's vision of the future. Now that the future was revealed we can appreciate how Intel leadership prepare and succeed. 20 yrs ago lots of people didn't know what the internet was, the iPhone and the smartphone revolution occurred 10 yrs later and the internet of things is in the making. Yet Grove anticipated how this changes will affect the industry.

Finally Grove offers the same advice to individuals to manage their careers. Like Reid Hoffman's recent concept of "Permanent Beta", Grove anticipated the end of the life long employment and the need to look for "Career Inflection Points" adapting the same rules he followed in Intel