NOW REPORTING FROM BALTIMORE. A private, non-commercial blog begun in support of the federal Meaningful Use REC initiative, and Health IT and Heathcare improvement more broadly. Moving now toward important broader STEM and societal/ethics topics. Formerly known as "The REC Blog." NOTE: Comments are moderated, thanks to trolls and bots.
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for a quick rumination regarding our $40.7 trillion U.S. federal debt, crypto hijinks, and nascent AI market bubble burst. So, I watched PBS Newshour tonight, as is my long habit. WaPo journalist David J. Lynch was an interviewee. Intrigued by the discussion, I bought his book. The opening riff: PROLOGUE The swollen, blackened bodies on the tile floor were barely recognizable as human. Just an…
Follow-up. Back on August 6th (scroll down in link) I cited a New Yorker piece written by Evan Osnos . This is a PBS segment discussing it. Who will "rule" AI and global economics going forward?
September/October 2026 Published on August 10, 2026 In This Review Magnifica Humanitas: On Safeguarding the Human Person in the Time of Artificial Intelligence, By Pope Leo XIV The quest for machine superintelligence is not merely a gold rush, motivated by money. In the minds of many of its leaders, the arrival of a new form of cognition has a tingling, existential feel because of the danger and…
I cited this back when the murder took place in December 2024 . THE SINGLE PAYER ZOMBIE EMERGES YET AGAIN Just came across this preprint paper. Will study it. I took a thorough grad school run at Single Payer in 1994 (while employed as a Medicare Peer Review outcomes analyst).
Stay tuned. On deck, I have had my fill of The Singularity for now. Ran into Sam Brown on PBS Newshour. Sam is hilarious. …Obituarists, more than most scriveners, are a special journalistic breed. They never have to come up with story ideas or worry they’ll run out of subjects to write about. Their articles are delivered with ready-made endings that happen to appear in the lede, or first…
The Final Narcissistic Injury of Humankind “Subdue the Earth!” With these resounding words, the divine command of the Old Testament spurred humanity's entrance into the world. For countless generations, people held unwaveringly to the notion that the Earth must be the center of the cosmos. Surely our loving Creator would place humanity—his most cherished creation—on a pivotal planet rather than…
Lots to catch up on. Cheryl and I have quietly been out of town for a week (SF Bay Area, and Las Vegas). I'll be following up topically ASAP on material relevant to my prior David Eagleman "Inner Cosmos" post. Got a good bit of reading down while gone. New book coming shortly, reviewed in Science Magazine . apropos , see " AI Slop and Scientific Publishing ." "Uncertainty?" " Two Cheers for…
What is artificial general intelligence (AGI) and how close are we to getting there? What defines the next step, called artificial superintelligence (ASI), and why might the gap between those two be so dangerous? When machines become smarter than us, what roles are left for humanity? Should we think of AI as software, or as something we’re raising like a child? Will tomorrow’s AI destroy us,…
