Dear PiePie,
I was watching at an interview of Jensen Huang earlier today, as he describes the changes afoot in the computing space and how that will change, in the nearer term, how we interact with any digital application. I suspect in the future, it too will change how we interact in the physical world as well. I was watching it in part for work, to understand the trends and position investments accordingly, but halfway through, there was a meta-cognition as I stepped away from thinking about the contents of the video as an input for work, to thinking about the contents of the video as strides that an entire humanity is undertaking.
Perhaps I speak only for myself, but it seems we often forget to take a step back from the active experience of what we are seeing and hearing, to consider the broader implications and second-order effects of those same things. We get desensitized.
On the positive side, an example is planes. Flying is so commonplace now that we hardly bat an eyelid. We take it as a time to snooze or catch up on a show, or simply as a chore that stands in the way between us and our destination. But what a marvel or engineering. We are flying! There are tons of micro-optimizations that made flying as safe as it is today – from the engine design to materials usage of the airplane body, to systems design of airports and communications infrastructure etc. This is what AI will eventually be as well. So embedded in the norms of our lives that we cease to be amazed by the intellect and usefulness of the machines, but it is made possible by genuinely astounding engineering that is occurring all throughout the semiconductor supply chain.
On the negative side, we get desensitized to tragedies after a while too. Imagine you’re a reporter that’s covering yet-another war-torn country. It could have been Ukraine 2 years ago, and Gaza last year. You write story after story of the horrors of war, trying to meet the deadlines of your editors. Your subjects come and go; you’d never see them again. Are they simply yet another story, another blip in the statistics, a means to our ends, or do we see that as what they are, a tragedy?
I am reminded of you saying “It’s amazing” when talking about the new playground downstairs that has a mini ‘treetop walk’ and monkey bars. I’d never think of that playground as amazing, ‘adulted’ human that I am. But I hope you never cease to be amazed, or be able to experience amazement or sadness in things that might otherwise be commonplace.
I hope you remember, from time to time, to be human.
Love, Dad