Active Recall!

Podcasts, videos, and iPad art

Podcast Notes: Eric Schmidt & Tim Ferriss

  • Podcast
    The Tim Ferriss Show
  • Episode Title
    #541: Eric Schmidt — The Promises and Perils of AI, the Future of Warfare, Profound Revolutions on the Horizon, and Exploring the Meaning of Life
  • Episode links
    Apple Podcasts • Spotify

Good podcast about where AI might be going. They talk about how general AI might be a thing that requires so much computing power that only a few of them exist in the world, how science fiction is not always an accurate prediction but good for thinking about where we might be headed, and how NFTs and related blockchain technology will become more important as authenticity becomes more and more fuzzy.

With the progress of technology, it’s important to balance augmentation and replacement. Humans can augment themselves and unlock more productivity and creativity. But if all human work was replaced (rather than just augmented) by machines, then it could lead to a population of purposeless people.

Not everyone is going to say “oh cool, I don’t have to work anymore, I’ve always wanted to be an artist”.

Connecting it to some things in the info diet lately—aka connecting it to Dune somehow as I’ve made it my mission to tell everyone to go watch Dune—there’s a part in the book (which I’ve only started reading) mentioning that super computers were banned at some point.

“Once, men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them.”

“‘Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of a man’s mind,’”

— Dune

Which I imagine has crossed Tim Ferriss’s mind because he’s quoted the “Fear is the mind killer” passage in his 5-bullet Friday newsletter a couple times.

They also discuss some of the trolley problems that will become more and more relevant as fully autonomous vehicles come closer to reality and the mainstream.

One example that doesn’t involve weighing the value of a baby’s life against old people’s: If your car speeds and gets a ticket, do you get the ticket or does the car manufacturer get it or…

2021 MacBook Pro M1 Pro 16-inch 16GB 1TB: Very quick impressions

The MBPM1P? 

Anyway, just writing some things down before heading to bed. These are very very quick impressions—I picked it up a couple hours ago and just finished with Migration Assistant. (Such a pleasure to use now, though I do miss some of the “starting fresh” feeling when it was a better path to just start from scratch and reinstall everything.)

My configuration: Impatience driven

Initially (while in a very very very long line to ride Rise of the Resistance) I ordered a 14-inch M1 Max, 32GB, 2TB to have something portable and close to the top specs. Then I canceled and ordered a 16-inch M1 Pro, 32GB, 2TB thinking that I’d rather have the larger screen instead of the faster processor.

Over the past week, I’d use my MacBook Air M1 and never really thought “this is too slow”. So if the Pro is ~ double the speed then that’s probably good enough.

Over the past week, I also kept looking at my order in case it miraculously shipped early.

And in the corner of my eye I’d see the $3850 final price after tax each time. Maybe I don’t need to spend that much without a concrete use for the power in mind.

Then today came and I talked myself into one of the configurations they keep in stock at the Apple Store.

  • M1 Pro 10-Core
  • 16GB RAM
  • 1TB Storage

Of the compromises, I think it’s the RAM I’ll kick myself for down the line.

For storage, I’ve had the MacBook Air for most of the year and still have 350 GB free and a handful of external SSDs. And the storage management utility works well. I’ll manage.

For CPU/GPU, I don’t do a ton of video and basically no 3D or gaming on the laptop. (I have my PS5 as the reigning device-I-don’t-use champ in the household.)

But RAM might come in handy when I’m, I don’t know, using Figma and have Descript open for recording a podcast and have a bunch of tabs open for research. 

Why 16-inch over 14-inch

I also might kick myself down the line for this. But I like the larger screen so far. You know, like 30 minutes into using the thing and not testing portability out at all.

In the hours of configuring and reconfiguring different builds, I did some reflecting. The most creative periods in the last, say, 7 years were when I had a 15-inch MacBook Pro (the first, beautiful retina model) and when I had a 27-inch iMac and didn’t have a second laptop.

Other than that, I’ve had a bunch of different 13-inch MacBooks but don’t remember any of them or the work I did with them quite as fondly as the work I did with the 15-inch or 27-inch.

So now it’s the impatience + nostalgia build.

For a second opinion, I showed my wife the laptop: “It’s huge!”

How’s the notch?

It’s fine. It’s really really fine. It takes up space in the toolbar but with the resolution set to “More Space” (2056 x 1329) …

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… the menu items don’t need to cross over:

Frame1

That’s Figma, MarsEdit, and Descript.

I think most people will just get used to it and fairly quickly.

One other thing: in full screen with MacOS Monterey, you can turn off “Automatically hide and show…” so the menu bar is always visible.

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And in full-screen, the menu bar is black so the notch just blends right in:

full screen menu bar

That said… I don’t use apps in full screen all that often. But I just might now that you can always show the menu bar.

What was I coming from?

My main stuff…

  • MacBook Air M1
  • iPad Pro 12.9″

I also have the newer iPad Mini and other stuff but this MacBook Pro will mostly be taking time away from the Air and 12.9” iPad.

Okay I spent longer than this than I expected. Last question.

Does it play Starcraft?

Yes. (This might seem like a joke question and sort of is but it crashed every time I opened it on my MacBook Air M1.)

macbook m1 pro starcraft

Some book quotes on simplifying creativity

I took Ali Abdaal’s PTYA course and one of the video assignments is called “Quick & Dirty”. If you want to stay on a consistent weekly schedule, sometimes you might need to whip a video together without doing a ton of scripting, shooting a bunch of B-roll, etc.

[footnote]One of the best things in the course was watching him film a video live with mistakes and everything and then seeing that video published in the next couple days. And you’d have to look closely to know that it took less time than some of his other videos.[/footnote]

For this blog, my quick & dirty can be grabbing some quotes and sharing some thoughts.

Process vs. Ideas

From Insanely Simple by Ken Segall:

It boils down to this: When process is king, ideas will never be. It takes only Common Sense to recognize that the more layers you add to a process, the more watered down the final work will become.

Reversing this: when ideas are king, process will never be. That said, without process, I pretty much have a pile of ideas that are in some form from single-line notes to somewhat fleshed out outlines. Way too much in-progress work and way too little finished work.

Last year I was reading The Goal and realized I have way too much work in progress.

Intermediate Packets

Tiago Forte talks about intermediate packets as something successful creatives create whether they’re conscious of it or not. It’s worth looking at your process to see where you might be able to deliberately create intermediate packets.

I use the term “intermediate” because it conveys that any piece of work – a slide, a paragraph, a diagram, a quote – can always become a component in a larger work. And not just one larger work, but multiple ones. 

I might be making too many intermediate packets. I have too many unused packets that are a little too unrefined to be “intermediate”.

  • Books that are highlighted but the highlights are never reviewed
  • Podcast clips that are transcribed but never used
  • Topic and sub-topic outlines that are never reviewed and expanded on

Which, for the millionth time, reminds me of just about the only rule that’s always effective for me…

…Write in the editor

On the Tim Ferriss Show, Seth Godin talks about writing in the editor

If I am in the Typepad editor, I know exactly what my brain needs to feel like and then the writing happens.

He does use WordPress now, but I’m guessing he still writes directly into WordPress.

My current writing setup:

  • MarsEdit
  • RH Timer

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Time’s up.

“The Extended Mind” Twitter thread

Check out the full notes for “The Extended Mind: The Power of Thinking Outside the Brain” by Annie Murphy Paul

Started a Twitter thread here with some notes:

Not sure of the best way to re-post Twitter threads to the blog but I’ll just start simple. I don’t think I’ll post all the tweets in the thread here. They should be notes that could be expanded into individual book notes posts.

In any case, I really enjoyed it. I learned about it through Bookworm (ep 129) a podcast that reviews one non-fiction book each week. They gave it the coveted double 5-star rating, so that got me really interested. Especially because they read (like, really deep read) a lot of non-fiction books.

How-tos laying the path toward individual sovereignity

Check out the full notes for “The Sovereign Individual: How to Survive and Thrive during the Collapse of the Welfare State” by James Dale Davidson and Lord William Rees-Mogg

I’ve spent more and more on online courses each year. Not that I’m a sovereign individual, but I might be an early adopter (along with anyone else familiar with weighing whether they should opt-in to the upsell of access to all future cohorts).

The coming transformation is both good news and bad. The good news is that the Information Revolution will liberate individuals as never before. For the first time, those who can educate and motivate themselves will be almost entirely free to invent their own work and realize the full benefits of their own productivity.

Earlier today I looked up how to put ear medicine into my dog’s ear. There were two vets demonstrating. I tried to re-create this with Amy and quickly realized that we probably needed to add a “for dummies” to the search query.

And I know that there are at least a handful of videos that would be helpful for us at our skill level.

Actually, I just tried it, and hey…

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One from the official For Dummies account!

In any case, if you have a laptop and internet access, you can learn a skill that will get you paid. You might not get rich quick, but you can find a path that will help you change careers, if that’s your goal.

Many people have taught themselves how to program with online resources. I’d guess that most people who studied computer science or some other major that helped them become a programmer still supplemented that in some way by learning something through a free online resource.

Those educational resources will become available for more and more fields. Online education will continue improving and will replace many aspects of traditional education before everyone’s getting paid in low-tax cryptocurrencies after escaping their dissolving nation state (the book’s larger prediction).

Info Diet: Orlando edition (October 19, 2021)

Currently in line for Avatar: Flight of Passage at Animal Kingdom. I’m alone at the park and will write about that experience separately (summary: going solo is fine but not as great as some say and not as bad as you might imagine if you’re worried it’s a weird thing to do).

On to some recent listens, reads, and watches.

Behind the Ride by David Mumpower

Just bought this while in line—seemed like a good book to jump around in. Each chapter explains some of the design elements of different Disney rides. Pretty fun to read with some of the rides fresh in my mind.

The line I’m currently in can handle a queue of six hours before spilling out into the rest of the park. The bar is so high for these. Hogwarts is hard to beat, especially nailing it with such a beloved franchise.

When Disney announced the Pandora expansion in 2011, they projected huge crowds, especially given what was happening with the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. A few years later, the idea that Avatar would appeal to customers as much as Harry Potter seems a bit silly.

That said, the design for this Avatar ride is pretty nuts. I learned from the book that the queue and ride are set years after the movie events. Which is good to know because it wasn’t obvious at all especially because I’ve almost entirely forgot everything that happens in the movie.

In any case, it’s fun to read about somewhere that you’re traveling in. Especially when every single detail is designed.

Disneyland for Designers podcast: Episode 12 Rise of the Resistance

Really great to listen to this after riding Rise of the Resistance yesterday. The podcast breaks down the experience and also goes into some of the ride’s design details.

  • It’s Disney’s largest ride ever, but it’s hidden away from the rest of the park. You don’t see it from afar, even though elements of it are outdoors. This helps reinforce the idea that you’re starting from a hidden base.
  • The floor is a floating platform once you’re on the First Order ship for some subtle movement
  • The signage ends on the First Order ship—you won’t find a green exit sign anywhere near Kylo Ren

They also discuss the skinning possibilities with the ride. Swap Kylo for Darth, paint over some First Order symbols… good to go! How much effort would be required to create a limited time original trilogy version? How much detail inaccuracy would be acceptable to fans?

The Sovereign Individual

Continuing on with this book, I should be able to finish it this week.

Maybe there are some connections to the Rebellion and The First Order. The Rebellion would be a bunch of freelancers getting paid in cryptocurrency.

Actually, the real connection here is realizing how much obscure taxation details have shaped both the Star Wars universe and earth.

Governments control violence. Usually by being a looming presence that can dish it out better. If you have a weapon that can destroy another planet, it can help with persuasion in interplanetary negotiations.

But the metaverse can’t be targeted by the Death Star or its First Order equivalent. Assuming, of course, that metaverse’s underlying blockchain exists on multiple planets.

Or something.

Okay that’s that for now. Riding Flight of Passage a second time. That makes this my first post written entirely in an amusement park line. Same line but different times. On my first ride, a child nearby yelled “I’m so scared” for the 90 seconds until an adult told them “just close your eyes!” This broke the immersion.

Update after second ride: It was way better.