What I'm reading ...

I have started Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies by Nick Bostrom. Bill Gates said everyone should read this book. Elon Musk was so impressed that he made a huge investment in the author’s research. Who am I to argue? Here’s the blurb:

The human brain has some capabilities that the brains of other animals lack. It is to these distinctive capabilities that our species owes its dominant position. Other animals have stronger muscles or sharper claws, but we have cleverer brains.
If machine brains one day come to surpass human brains in general intelligence, then this new superintelligence could become very powerful. As the fate of the gorillas now depends more on us humans than on the gorillas themselves, so the fate of our species then would come to depend on the actions of the machine superintelligence.
But we have one advantage: we get to make the first move. Will it be possible to construct a seed AI or otherwise to engineer initial conditions so as to make an intelligence explosion survivable? How could one achieve a controlled detonation?
To get closer to an answer to this question, we must make our way through a fascinating landscape of topics and considerations. Read the book and learn about oracles, genies, singletons; about boxing methods, tripwires, and mind crime; about humanity's cosmic endowment and differential technological development; indirect normativity, instrumental convergence, whole brain emulation and technology couplings; Malthusian economics and dystopian evolution; artificial intelligence, and biological
cognitive enhancement, and collective intelligence.
This profoundly ambitious and original book picks its way carefully through a vast tract of forbiddingly difficult intellectual terrain. Yet the writing is so lucid that it somehow makes it all seem easy. After an utterly engrossing journey that takes us to the frontiers of thinking about the human condition and the future of intelligent life, we find in Nick Bostrom's work nothing less than a reconceptualization of the essential task of our time.

The Mandibles: A Family, 2029-2047 - by Lionel Shriver

When I read a novel, I always hope that I will learn something as well as be entertained. In this respect, the book delivered. I have a new perspective and understanding of how economies work. I have sufficient respect for the author’s integrity that I am confident in my new knowledge.

The book is very well written. Although it is set in the future, it is not science fiction, as I would understand it. The technology, like the language, is a modest extrapolation of the current world and I felt that it was very credible. The story takes place over quite a few years, but is told in detail for the beginning period and a later one. The book also has a reasonable ending, which pleased me as I dislike books that just sort of fade out. The story is serious and credible and rather chilling as a result, but there is the odd touch of humour that I enjoyed.

Once again, Shriver has persuaded me that reading more of her work will be a worthwhile way to spend time.

What I'm reading ...

I have started The Mandibles: A Family, 2029-2047 by Lionel Shriver. I was very impressed when I last read a book by this author that, when I saw the publication of this new book, I decided to treat myself to it as a holiday read, despite the higher cost of a new book. As my holiday starts in a couple of days, I look forward to some good reading time. Here’s the blurb:

It is 2029.
The Mandibles have been counting on a sizable fortune filtering down when their 97-year-old patriarch dies. Yet America’s soaring national debt has grown so enormous that it can never be repaid. Under siege from an upstart international currency, the dollar is in meltdown. A bloodless world war will wipe out the savings of millions of American families.
Their inheritance turned to ash, each family member must contend with disappointment, but also — as the effects of the downturn start to hit — the challenge of sheer survival.
Recently affluent Avery is petulant that she can’t buy olive oil, while her sister Florence is forced to absorb strays into her increasingly cramped household. As their father Carter fumes at having to care for his demented stepmother now that a nursing home is too expensive, his sister Nollie, an expat author, returns from abroad at 73 to a country that’s unrecognizable.
Perhaps only Florence’s oddball teenage son Willing, an economics autodidact, can save this formerly august American family from the streets.
This is not science fiction. This is a frightening, fascinating, scabrously funny glimpse into the decline that may await the United States all too soon, from the pen of perhaps the most consistently perceptive and topical author of our times.

Mothering Sunday - by Graham Swift

This was a short book and I read it even faster than I had expected. On the one hand, it is the story of Jane’s life - she lived through almost all of the 20th century. But it is focussed on the events of a single day in 1924. On a certain level it might be said that not a lot happened, but the description of what did happen is used as a vehicle to consider the wider aspects of her life. I have heard the book described as erotic, but I think that term would set the wrong expectations; intimate would be a better description. Overall, it is well written and an enjoyable read.

What I'm reading ...

I have started Mothering Sunday by Graham Swift. I have a few days before I start my holiday and I wanted something short to fill in the time before I can make a start on my holiday reading. This book was recommended and is short enough to fit the bill. Here’s the blurb:

How will Jane Fairchild, orphan and housemaid, occupy her time when she has no mother to visit? How, shaped by the events of this never to be forgotten day, will her future unfold?
Beginning with an intimate assignation and opening to embrace decades, Mothering Sunday has at its heart both the story of a life and the life that stories can magically contain. Constantly surprising, joyously sensual and deeply moving, it is Graham Swift at his thrilling best.

The Code Book: The Secret History of Codes and Code-breaking - by Simon Singh

This book was an excellent read. It is written at a very good level. There is plenty of detail, but it is presented so that the general reader does not get bogged down in it, but someone after the nitty gritty will still be satisfied. His descriptions are very lucid, using some very effective analogies. I learned numerous historical details, many of which are interesting well beyond the field of cryptography. For example, the US used members of the Navaho tribe to perform military communications in their somewhat intractable language during WW2.

My only disappointment is that the book is slightly out of date, as it was published in 1999. It would be really interesting to see a similar discussion of the events of the last few years, like the whistle-blowing on the NSA’s behaviour and particularly the very recent controversies about iPhone unlocking. However, there is coverage of the potential role of quantum computers and the like, which is explained very clearly.

What I'm reading ...

I have started The Code Book: The Secret History of Codes and Code-breaking by Simon Singh. It was time for non-fiction and this was recommended. Here's the blurb:

Since humans began writing, they have been communicating in code. This obsession with secrecy has had dramatic effects on the outcome of wars, monarchies and individual lives.

With clear mathematical, linguistic and technological demonstrations of many of the codes, as well as illustrations of some of the remarkable personalities behind them – many courageous, some villainous – The Code Book traces the fascinating development of codes and code-breaking from military espionage in Ancient Greece to modern computer ciphers, to reveal how the remarkable science of cryptography has often changed the course of history.

Amongst many extraordinary examples, Simon Singh relates in detail the story of Mary, Queen of Scots, trapped by her own code and put to death by Elizabeth I; the strange history of the Beale Ciphers, describing the hidden location of a fortune in gold, buried somewhere in Virginia in the nineteenth century and still not found; and the monumental efforts in code-making and code-breaking that influenced the outcomes of the First and Second World Wars.

Now, with the Information Age bringing the possibility of a truly unbreakable code ever nearer, and cryptography one of the major debates of our times, Singh investigates the challenge that technology has brought to personal privacy today.

Dramatic, compelling and remarkably far-reaching, The Code Book will forever alter your view of history, what drives it and how private your last e-mail really was.

Elizabeth is Missing - by Emma Healey

Being written in the first person, I really felt that this book gave me some insight into how it must feel to be suffering dementia. I was particularly impressed by the way that her confusion was conveyed with the rather chaotic text - interleaving the two timelines - but I never got lost.

Overall, I felt the book was beautifully written, with the story well paced. Because of the viewpoint, I am not sure I could say the characters in the contemporaneous timeline are well drawn, but a good impression of them is there. Those in the post-war period were, to me, very clear.

Being rather picky, I was disconcerted by this text: "And that does put another spin on things. Him being wanted.", which occurs in the post-war period. The word "spin" was not used in this sense until the 1970s.