We have a new episode of the Algorithmic Futures Podcast out, and it has me thinking back to my earlier post on objectivity, and the challenges of figuring out what we know — and how we know it. In the podcast episode, our guest, Lyndon Llewellyn from AIMS, presents the kind of scenario that keeps…
Tag: experiments
Apps, kids, and addiction: A parent’s view
I’m supposed to work on creating better technology, but mostly I find myself banishing it from our house. Not all of it — I clearly benefit from access to knowledge via the internet, and have a fascination with wellness tech (and what it does and doesn’t help me achieve), but the rest? I more often…
The wandering mind
I’ve marked the birth of each of my children with extended visits with a psychologist. There’s nothing surprising about this — each birth is a process of transformation, both for the mother and child, and for me, these particular journeys have been fraught with the realisation that I have work to do before I can…
Sabbatical
I listen to a lot of podcasts, and stumbled on this one the other day, which I found fitting for this time of year. In it, podcast host Tim Ferriss and Jerry Colonna (CEO of Reboot.io) spend a good amount of time talking about a two-month sabbatical Jerry takes every year, and more broadly about…
Habit forming
It’s late and I did all the things I wanted to today — my first day of freedom. It was glorious. And also not that exciting in the grand scheme of things, so I’ll spare you the details. Instead, I’ll note that I created this blog to help me build a habit of writing regularly,…
When objectivity is not an option
In physics, I was trained to design and conduct experiments that were repeatable — that anyone could, with careful scrutiny of my papers, the right equipment, and some hard work, reproduce at another facility somewhere. The observers, by this logic, were important only in the sense that they were needed to do the work. If…