Trust by Hernan DiazMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
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Sunday, November 10, 2024
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Friday, September 27, 2024
Wednesday, September 11, 2024
Review: Seeing Things
Seeing Things by Seamus HeaneyMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Delicious and Delightful
Four stars
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Sunday, September 8, 2024
Monday, August 19, 2024
Review: Then I Am Myself the World: What Consciousness Is and How to Expand It
Then I Am Myself the World: What Consciousness Is and How to Expand It by Christof KochMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
Christof Koch’s latest book gives a good overview of his work in neuroscience spanning several decades. Koch always likes a bet, and talks about settling his 25 year wager with David Chalmers: in June 2023 he handed over a case of fine Madeira wine for failing to have identified the neural correlates of consciousness in the preceding 25 years. He thinks he is closer in the elusive search for the seat of consciousness, with the hunt narrowing towards the back of the neocortex, and reckons the next 25 years or so should see it pinned down further. In terms of ‘how’ consciousness works, he is now a fervent advocate of the ambitious Integrated Information Theory (IIT) of Giuilio Tononi, a theory that more than 100 consciouness researchers have branded pseudoscience.
The chapter on IIT is, unsurprisingly, the most dense. The rest of the book is an engaging read. Christof Koch is an elegant writer, and this book starts with a very open description about one of his experiments with Psilocybin to engage the deeper parts of his conscious experiments. His later discussions on the use of this psychedelic substance provide a fascinating glance into how altered states of consciousness can offer insights into the brain’s mechanisms and the nature of subjective experience.
Koch sets out his lifelong journey of discovery. He is a materialist and reductionist, but as a supporter of IIT his views contrast with philosophers like Daniel Dennett, who were skeptical of many of the qualia of conscious experience and dismiss them as mere illusion.
Given his many decades of work in the field he is well place to stand at the crossroads of where rigorous scientific inquiry meets deeply personal reflection. Koch navigates the complexities of how consciousness emerges from the brain, offering readers an accessible yet intellectually rich exploration.
In addition to his scientific rigor, Koch opens up on his personal journey—from Catholic altar boy, to agnostic materialist, to someone who accepts the world in all its glorious qualia. This infuses the narrative with a sense of intellectual humility and openness. Koch’s ability to weave complex theories with philosophical musings and personal insights makes Then I Am Myself the World a standout contribution. The book is not just a scientific treatise but also a meditation on the profound mysteries of existence.
I have read several of his books, and rate him highly as a scientist and thinker. He appears to have much more humility than many of his contemporaries in the field, and although I don’t agree with all his conclusions, he is certainly someone I would love to spend an evening drinking beer with. This book is highly recommended for anyone seeking a deeper understanding of consciousness.
I gave it five stars.
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Saturday, August 10, 2024
Review: The Sound of Waves
The Sound of Waves by Yukio MishimaMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Mishima must have been uncharacteristically cheerful when he wrote this delightful short novel about a fishing island in 1950s Japan.
Boy meets girl. Girl meets boy. The girl's father thinks he has no prospects and prohibits her from meeting the boy. The boy proves himself a hero, and the father gives his blessing—the end.
Shinji has just turned 18, and other than his daily work on a fishing vessel, he has never left town. He falls innocently for the new girl in town, Hatsue, and his interest in her sparks the gossip of their tight-knit community fueled by the jealousy of his peers.
Fourteen hundred people live on Song Island, Uta-Jima, within its three-mile coastal universe. The island is steeped in ancient myths and appears to have escaped much of the effects of war and industrialization, with its residents living their lives as if the Meiji Restoration had never happened. The women swim bare-chested for abalone, and the men venture out to collect octopus and squid from their designated fishing grounds, occasionally trawling illicitly for other fish.
Mishima’s detailed yet uncomplicated prose immerses us in the salt-soaked fishing ropes and octopus pots and takes us through the lush undergrowth of the island to its few viewing points. The writing here is more straightforward than in the Meiji and Taisho-set Spring Snow, and the love story is thankfully not as doomed. There is only a fleeting reference to suicide, a hallmark of Mishima’s writing and life.
Shinji's character, with his simple desires and a keen sense of duty, reflects the island itself—pure, unspoiled, and steadfast in its purpose. His relationship with Hatsue is one of semi-innocence and genuine affection, contrasting with the more cynical and materialistic world emerging beyond the island. The soft struggle against gossip adds depth to the narrative, subtly exploring honour, purity, and tradition.
The setting of Uta-Jima plays a crucial role in the novel, almost becoming a character. Mishima’s portrayal of the island’s timelessness and the residents’ connection to the sea highlights a way of life that is rapidly disappearing in post-war Japan. The novel hints briefly at the encroachment of modernity and even acknowledges the inevitability of change, with a peddler's plastic bag being more prized than the material to make a kimono.
The love story’s resolution, with Shinji’s heroic deeds winning over Hatsue’s father, might seem conventional, but it feels earned. It’s a rare optimistic note in Mishima’s oeuvre, offering a glimpse of hope and continuity amidst the inevitable passage of time.
I was transported to Song Island, an innocent escape from the modern world, and appreciated the simplicity and purity of both the setting and the story.
I liked the book and gave it four stars.
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Friday, August 9, 2024
Review: A Thousand Brains: A New Theory of Intelligence
A Thousand Brains: A New Theory of Intelligence by Jeff HawkinsMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
The book offers an intriguing exploration into an alternate architecture of intelligence, drawing from Hawkin's extensive background in neuroscience and computing (he helped design the Palm Pilot). The book is divided into three parts, each tackling a distinct aspect of brain function and its implications for artificial intelligence and beyond.
The book's first part is a compelling dive into the world of cortical columns. It focuses on the importance of the brain's cortex (the crumpled outer layer), which is thought to have evolved later than the older 'reptilian brain', which the author dismisses throughout the book (despite the fact it keeps him and other humans alive). Hawkins suggests that if you spread the brain's 'newer' neocortex out on a table into its 2.5mm thick extra-large pizza size, you would be looking at 150,000 similar 'columns' that extend through the six layers of the cortex. He builds on the ideas of Vernon Mountcastle, who, in 1978, put forth a hypothesis that a single unifying computational principle might be operating across the entire cortex. There are anatomical similarities across cortical areas, and some experiments have shown that these can be repurposed. If inputs from the optic nerve are diverted via the auditory thalamus to the auditory cortex, the auditory cortex can develop the properties associated with the visual receptive field.
Hawkins presents a detailed and engaging description of these structures, proposing that they function as self-contained predictive processing components in the brain. He further hangs his theory on the idea that each column has the equivalent of 'place' and 'grid' cells, thought to exist in the 'older' brain structures, that can help create a reference model for part of the external world. His explanation of how these columns work together to form a model of the world is both accessible and thought-provoking. This section alone makes the book a worthwhile read for anyone interested in the mechanics of the brain and the nature of intelligence. There are some areas of overlap and agreement with work done by Rajesh Rao, Karl Friston and Andy Clark - legends in the field.
However, the second part, which delves into artificial intelligence, falls short of the high standard set by the initial chapters. While informed by his understanding of brain function, Hawkins' insights into AI seem neither groundbreaking nor remarkably cohesive. The discussion meanders, lacking the clarity and depth that characterize the book's opening.
The final part of A Thousand Brains unexpectedly turns philosophical, and Hawkins' tone becomes markedly more strident. His alignment with Richard Dawkins (who wrote the fawning introduction) and the other New Atheists (Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett and Christopher Hitchens) is evident as he dismisses with unnecessary arrogance the faith of billions as a "viral false belief." This sweeping generalization feels out of place in a book grounded in scientific inquiry. Hawkins' approach here may alienate readers who hold religious beliefs or seek a more nuanced discussion of faith and reason.
A Thousand Brains is a book of mixed strengths. Its first part shines with insightful analysis and accessible explanations of complex neuroscience concepts. In my opinion Hawkins should have stopped here. The subsequent sections lack the same rigour and coherence, with the third part straying into an unexpectedly dismissive and dogmatic critique of religion. He also skips lightly over consciousness, clearly taking a dig at both Koch (Christof Koch) and David Chalmers and echoing the 'there is no hard problem of consciousness' akin to Anil Seth (Being You: A New Science of Consciousness).
Despite these shortcomings, Hawkins' exploration of cortical columns offers valuable food for thought, making the book a worthwhile, if uneven, read.
I gave the book three stars.
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Saturday, May 25, 2024
Review: The World: A Family History
The World: A Family History by Simon Sebag MontefioreMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
The World - Simon Sebag Montefiore
"A world historian, wrote al-Masudi in ninth-century Baghdad, is like ‘a man who, having found pearls of all kinds and colours, gathers them together into a necklace and makes them into an ornament that its possessor guards with great care’."
Simon Sebag Montefiore’s "The World" is an ambitious and exhaustive chronicle that spans the vast expanse of human history, from the dawn of modern human civilization to the recent conflict in Ukraine. While Montefiore himself concedes that "there is such a thing as too much history," this hefty tome is packed with fascinating and delightful historical pearls that make the lengthy read worthwhile. Some of the connections are surprising, and some of the chance events have resulted in the Geo-political map we use today.
The book is full of etymology - from how writing developed to how words formed around the objects we manipulate, and the people we become:
‘Around 3100, the people of Uruk.. may have invented writing, initially pictograms, but then took to marking clay with wedge-end of a reed, a process that we call cuneiform, which means wedge-shaped. The first named people in history are an accountant, a slave master and two enslaved persons.’
‘Soon, the wheel was developed in Ukraine/Russia, where the first linguistic references to wheels appear’
‘They prided themselves on manners and control, and were so curt that the word laconic comes from Laconia, the Spartan homeland’
‘In 621, a nobleman Drakon drafted the first laws in his own blood… draconian code’
‘..voters could secretly write a politician’s name on a pottery shard (ostrakon) to sentence him to exile - ostracism - for ten years’
‘..candidate, from candidatus, meaning a man who wore the white toga of election campaigns’.
‘the word cabal derives from the ministry led by [the Duke of] Buckingham (an acronym from the names Clifford, Arlington, Buckingham, Ashley and Lauderdale).’
The book's sweeping narrative is underpinned by the recurring themes of families and tribes, reflecting on how the preservation of genes through hereditary lines - particularly in progenitor royal families - have shaped our world. Some lights flash only briefly - after all for most of the history, at least eight thousand years, life expectancy was around thirty years. The influence of others, like the deformed-chin Habsburg’s and the Khans, illuminate the world over many centuries. Montefiore takes pride in introducing us subtly to the ancestors of his own family, intertwined with the influential Rothschilds, which adds a personal touch to the grand historical tapestry.
A darker undercurrent runs through the book, exploring man's inhumanity to man, a grim reminder of the savagery that has marred our past. Montefiore meticulously records how hatred and enmity have led to horrific acts of mass violence and atrocities, whether through wars, purges, slavery, or the persecution of religious groups. No-one escapes, Jew, Christian, Moslem alike are all mutilated, cut into pieces and burnt. The visceral, relentless brutality that has plagued humanity is a stark, sobering theme that permeates the narrative.
Despite its weight, both in physical heft and subject matter, "The World" is a rewarding read. It is not a book to be rushed; rather, it demands and deserves a patient and thoughtful engagement. Over the course of its pages, I found myself making over 200 notes, a testament to the wealth of knowledge and insight it offers.
Montefiore's work is a remarkable journey through history, one that educates and engages. For those willing to invest the time, it is a profoundly enriching experience that sheds light on the complexities and continuities of human existence.
I gave it five stars.
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Wednesday, May 1, 2024
Review: The Sympathizer
The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh NguyenMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Of the many motifs and themes running through this book, two stand out at the beginning: exclusion and friendship.
Exclusion quickly turns to friendship, as three Vietnamese boys pledge their loyalty in a blood pact. One boy, our narrator, is an outsider as he is the product of the Church, the French, and Vietnam. He is ‘Bui Do’ - the dust of the earth (a phrase later encapsulated in the heart-wrenching song in Cameron Mackintosh’s Miss Saigon.) The other two boys sympathize and rescue him from bullying at school, and they become fast and firm friends. However, the scars of adolescent unity never seem to heal in the humidity of 1970s Vietnam.
Sympathy is a title theme bleached throughout the book, yet it is unclear who the sympathizer is and with whom we should sympathize the most. The defeated French, sipping Ricard and sticking to the old names of Saigon’s streets? The defeated Americans, seeking to eliminate communism abroad and at home? The defeated South Vietnamese, trying to establish lives in whichever country would welcome them? The victorious North Vietnamese, who, despite being on the brink of starvation and bombed to near extinction by ‘Du Pont’, rallied behind the ideals of Ho Chi Minh against the Americans, as they did twenty years before against the French. Or the unlucky refugees, escaping from Troy, yet not headed to Ithaca or Italy - the collateral damage in the fog of war?
The book starts 49 years ago with Saigon's fall, or Saigon's liberation, depending on whose face looks at it. Vietnam was carved in three by the French, then in two, and is on the brink of being united by the forces of the North Vietnamese Army, carrying the torch and words of Ho Chi Minh, who, in the fiercest stage of the war, on 17 July 1966, gave out his call for national resistance against the U.S invaders affirming: “Nothing is more precious than independence and freedom”.
The book reveals much of the surreality of Indochina in the period from 1975 to 1980, which was carefully researched by the author, who was only four years old when the events unfolded. Vietnamese women with ‘a mind like an abacus, the spine of a drill instructor, and the body of a virgin even after five children’. Narrow escapes from the closing jaws on 30th April 1975. Interim refugee camps. Formation of new migrant lives. Nationalism is fanned by memory. Wars and infiltration along borders. Settling of old scores. Ideologies manipulated by the CIA. Ghosts are exorcised through popular films such as Platoon, Full Metal Jacket, Hamburger Hill, and Apocalypse Now. The book has it all, even the sad roulette of the boat people and the reminder that wars last several lifetimes, and their scars never heal.
The novel goes out on a Socratic limb: Is the examined life worth living? The Sympathizer has its doubts. Examination and interrogation can reveal truths that may themselves be empty or nothing. One of the characters he meets in the ‘free’ US is a nihilist. Nothing is the absence of anything or any meaning. Several characters encounter death, which liberates the soul from the tomb of the body (a view that Socrates and Jesus Christ both espoused).
Viet Thanh Nguyen has written a haunting tale set in a period instrumental to my involvement with Southeast Asia. I lived in Cambodia in the 1990s, a country still raw and sometimes numb, Nixon’s ‘sideshow’. I also lived in Vietnam, where the generational impact of the defoliant Agent Orange is a prominent reminder of the war. The Vietnamese don’t talk about the American War; they have made peace with America. Just last year, the Vietnamese government raised its trading status with America to a comprehensive strategic alliance, putting its former wartime foe on the same level as Russia and China. President Biden was given a state welcome, as was Obama several years before. There is even an ‘Obama Bun Cha’ restaurant in Hanoi, celebrating Obama’s famed humble lunch of beer and noodles with the late, great Anthony Bourdain. But there is still a North and a South. Hanoi still rules. And harsh messages are still sent down to re-educate those who have gone astray. Most recently, a southern entrepreneur who misappropriated billions of dollars, including some state money, was handed a death sentence.
I was determined to read The Sympathizer in April, the ‘cruellest of months’ and the period in which the book is set, and before the HBO version was streamed into my consciousness. Having lived in Cambodia and Vietnam, I have my realistic imagery that I wanted to revive and didn’t want to be visually or viscerally tainted by false memories. I know the streets, the cafes, the landmarks, and I have walked past its victims and shared many of their stories and tales over the years.
This novel was a satisfying meal. It is a kind of image soup, gathering several ingredients as one transforms translucent rice noodles into a bowl of steaming Pho—a rich aroma of beef broth and star anise. There were sweet elements of Greene, who wrote his Quiet American in room 214 of the Continental Hotel, on the corner of Lam Son Square, overlooking the narrator’s departure from Saigon (the narrator’s senior thesis had been on “Myth and Symbol in the Literature of Graham Greene.”) Sour tamarinds from shade-giving trees. An ‘appetizing reek of the fresh durian one wept to eat’. Piquant fish sauce from Phu Quoc.
The prose has brilliant touches, humour in dark places, and sadness throughout. The book will divide those who lived through the events described. As Vietnam continues to grow as an essential friendly shore for the US, the serialisation of the events comes at an exciting time. Next April, Vietnam will celebrate 50 years of reunification. Singaporeans play golf in Saigon, and Miss Saigon plays in Singapore. Although Mackintosh’s musical is a pastiche of the madness of the last days of one of America’s many disastrous wars, Nguyen’s Sympathizer is a more profound ‘meditation in green’ on how we form tribes, how we see and judge others, and how we reconcile man’s inhumanity to man.
I gave the book four stars.
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