"Palaces for the people" is the title of a recent book I have read, probably one of my favorites in 2019, is a phrase used by Andrew Carnegie describing some of his libraries. Mr. Carnegie was known as a titan of the Gilded Age in America and one of the most affluent of his time. Andrew Carnegie was also very cruel as a capitalist. He was famous for strike-braking and using tactics that promoted inequality in his factories and in many other parts of the world. He was also a first-generation immigrant. He really believed that the US was a country where people could get ahead in life. He also spent time and investment, helping to build a social establishment that would promote that first-generation immigrant attitude.
During his lifetime, Andrew Carnegie supported the funding and building of thousands of public libraries around the world, most of them located in the US. He called the greatest of them "palaces for people." (If you haven't seen these palaces, visit the one in Pittsburgh on Forbes Ave, located in Oakland or the one in the Northside of the City, now home to Children's Museum Lab) The great Carnegie libraries, of course, had high ceilings, big windows, very spacious halls where people can read, think, learn, and "achieve something that they felt proud of." Although these places were not always for everyone, many of the great Carnegie libraries remained racially segregated throughout the early 20th century, but later became battlegrounds in the civil rights movement in America. In the book "Palaces for the People: How Social Infrastructure Can Help Fight Inequality, Polarization and the Decline of Civic Life" Eric Klinenberg tells us a captivating narrative about Social Infrastructure and importance of them in our contemporary societies. When we think about infrastructure, we tend to think about water, roads, railway, power or communication, but the social infrastructure is the glue that ties communities together, and it is just as real and valuable as hard infrastructure. The author argues when we invest in social infrastructures such as libraries, parks, or schools, we draw all kinds of benefits. What kind of benefits? Think about it, we become more likely to interact with people around us, and therefore connected to the broader public, not through virtual platforms like Instagram or Twitter. If we neglect social infrastructures, we tend to grow more isolated, which can have severe consequences for our collective society. The book examines the terrible heat wave that took place in Chicago in the mid-90s to explain the importance of social infrastructure and how the horrifying heatwave in the city that killed more than 700 people. It looks at various neighborhoods in Chicago that had very high death rates and realized a drastic difference in Social Infrastructure. There were severely depleted. Think about it; it means there were a lot of abandoned properties, empty blocks, and vacated houses. Many sidewalks were damaged and broken, and there was minimal commercial life on the streets. This virtually all meant that people were likely to stay home, and this was a deadly thing to do during a heatwave. It is hard to believe that Mr. Carnegie envisioned the role his libraries would play in the very social fabrics of our time. Just look at Carnegie libraries in Pittsburgh, these are places where lots of early literacy development happens every day. These libraries have also now become the places where formerly incarcerated people come more to search for jobs or obtain help on their job search and resumes building. Mr. Carnegie probably would not have anticipated that these libraries are the proper places where there are more classes for English as a second language or more citizenship classes than any other public institutions in America. He wouldn't have imagined all the kids coming to the library after the school day to play games, or just because it's the safest and warmest or just to play games, or learn about computers and maybe one-day ReadyAI can develop a free class ecosystem for the community about Artificial Intelligence. Carnegie libraries in Pittsburgh and elsewhere have surely reinvented themselves in recent years, and one of the things that is so striking about the ones I have seen in Pittsburgh is that the local staff has built the capacity and means to develop programming that works for the community that they're in (i.e., Homewood, Braddock, East Liberty, and Edgewood neighborhoods). Today these libraries are lending tools for learning, and they give clothes to people who need better clothes for a job interview. There are also doing programs in all kinds of languages (in the East Liberty neighborhood of Pittsburgh, we have Swahili classes). Building social infrastructure such as libraries and parks are costly, so how are we going to pay for them? In the 20th century, Mr. Carnegie - the greatest philanthropist of his time, and his philanthropic dollars went into building libraries. However, how should be address building social Infrastructure in the 21st Century? Today's billionaires, like a Facebook founder - have made billions of dollars of social media and computing but haven't made contributions to our physical, social infrastructure in a meaningful way. These tech titans of the information age, utilize the concept of social infrastructure furthermore have been promoting the platform Facebook as social infrastructure. He believes that these platforms like Facebook are where people should go for meaningful social interactions. The jury is still out on that. "Palaces for the People" makes me think more about our parks and libraries. Perhaps we need more philanthropists of our time to spend more money on things like libraries and parks. But philanthropic funding is ultimately incomplete and mostly distributed to the places where these billionaires spend their own time living or visiting. To make it work, I believe we need real public commitment, such as a major public works program. Leave your phone at home and visit your local library, get a copy of a "palaces for the People" or any other book that you'd like to read and sit in your local park and turn those pages...
0 Comments
I first heard about the "technological singularity" from a friend living in Singapore. The essence of the idea is what would mean if ordinary human intelligence were developed or perhaps overtaken by AI.
Since the early days of ReadyAI, I have been thinking more about this concept. This idea that human history is approaching a "singularity" - that we will someday in the future be overtaken by artificial intelligence robots or cognitively enhanced biological intelligence or maybe a mixture of both has moved from science fiction books and Hollywood movies to serious debate in our communities. Since first introduced to the idea, I have been reading a few books on this topic that I found truly fascinating. I have read authors and theorist that predict that if the field of AI continues to expand at its current rate, the singularity could even come about in the middle of this very century - nonetheless, I don't see it happening this quickly. In a brief but insightful book published by the MIT Press Essential Knowledge Series (I highly recommend reading at other titles of Essential Knowledge Series) - The Technological Singularity - by Murray Shanahan; he offers an introduction to the idea and looks at the consequences of such potentials happening. The book is very informative as the author aim is not to make a prediction but rather to examine a variety of scenarios. Regardless if we believe that singularity is imminent or distant, likely or unlikely, apocalypse or utopia, the very idea suggests critical philosophical and practical question forcing all of us to think seriously about what we want as a species. The book does a great job describing technological advances in AI, focusing on biologically inspired as well as engineered from scratch. Once human-level AI - theoretically possible, but very challenging to accomplish. - has been achieved, Shanahan explains, that shift to superintelligent AI could, in fact, be very fast. The book does a good job considering what the existence of superintelligent machines could even mean for matters like personhood, rights, identity, and responsibility. Just think about it, some superhuman AI agents might be created to benefit us - humankind: some might go rogue. (If you find this topic interesting, take a look at the book, Life 3.0 by Max Tegmark) The concept of singularity presents both an existential threat to humanity and an existential opportunity for the collective humanity to transcend its limitations. The book is a great introduction that makes si clear that we need to think and debate both alternatives if we desire to bring about the better outcome collectively. I grew up in a region of the world - the Middle East- that nations are more inclined to destructive crises: revolutions, political chaos, economic calamities due to corruption, sanctions and mismanagement, long civil wars, natural disasters, pandemics, etc. to only name the few. Just look at Syria, Yemen, Iran, Venezuela, Afghanistan, Congo, and countless other countries that we hear about in headline news.
Crises are complicated and mostly multifaceted. Crises also happen in more prosperous countries, like European countries and the United States. Just look at Britan, as they struggle with Brexit. Or in Spain, there are open-ended frictions for Catalonia's independence. Don't' forget that the global financial crisis that engulfed the world happened just a decade ago. Even here in America, it seems that we are stumbling over a threat to our long-lasting democratic values. In his recent book "Upheaval: Turning Points for Nations in Crisis" Jared Dimond, does a beautiful job of showing us that national crises are very much like personal ones. I adore how the book goes to great lengths to show that, despite the tremendous differences between individuals and countries, his approach can be usefully utilized to diagnose and even solve national crises. We all had the personal experience that in moments of crisis like the death of a loved one or a personal disaster pose a fundamental question about who we are and how we want to live, while others work their way through the process and end up better off. If you ask crisis therapists, they tell you in details why many people often do (or don't) navigate the crisis successfully. I have especially noticed friends that acknowledge they have a problem and take responsibility for dealing with it, the separate core values that won't change from bad habits that need to change and they seek help from those who have dealt with similar difficulties. In the book, Jared Dimond boils down these insights into twelve factors. The author also adapts them and applies them to build a series of fascinating case studies about how countries (Finland, Chile, German, Australia, Indonesia, and Japan) have managed these existential difficulties like a foreign invasion, civil war or general despair. I found the book's approach a bit unique; to borrow from a model of people's emotional turbulence to explain the progression of entire societies. It is, in fact, very revealing. The book looks at may comparative examples. But I found the Finland case and how it coped with sharing a 1000-mile-longboarder with the former Soviet Union very engaging. Soviet Union attacked Finland during World War II, but, as a student of history, it never occurred to me to ask the question before, why is Finland like Scandanavia somewhat of being like Eastern Europe - let's say Poland that has also been invaded by the Soviet Union? The book spends a great deal going through the twelve factors one by one in the case of Finland and every other case study. In the case of Finland; the country has a powerful spirit of its uniqueness and stood firm on maintaining its independence. If you want to learn about Finnish national identity jut take a look at the notably challenging Finnish language. The book takes you on an entertaining journey of Finnish language. Although Finland was super proud, it was also pragmatic. The country understood that if the Russians felt like taking over, they would do so in no time. So, rather than ignoring the Russian presence, which was what it had done before the second World War. , Finland chose to influence the Soviet that they would gain nothing by occupying the country. Pretty clever! Finnish political leaders even entered into trade deals with the Soviets. Their residents even had to drive around in tacky Soviet cars like Lada, but they also had access to Russian oil when the rest of the world was experiencing oil shortages. Finland realized that to stay in the Russian's good blessings required sacrifices, to the extent that their newspapers were mostly quiet on violations to avoid giving offense. Diplomats coined the term "Finlandization" to mean weaker countries are pandering unnecessarily to stronger ones, but the book points out that the countries these diplomats represented never came to Finland's assistant when it was frantically trying to hold off invading Soviet troops during the war. Astonishingly, by taking this approach, Finland not only kept its status as an independent democracy: it further made itself essential to the Soviet as a source of Western technology and innovation and the gates to the West. Ultimately, Finland was much more valuable to the Soviets as a friend that it would have been as just another puppet state. There are many examples in the book that are truly fascinating. However, at the end of the book, the author switches from looking back to looking forward and into the future. He describes some of the most critical challenges confronting our world at this moment - from climate change to political polarization and considers how we might lead the 12 factors to come out better in the end. I am an optimist and believe in a better collective future. In Upheaval, Jared Dimond reminds us that some countries have creatively solved their most significant problems. It is hard to go as far as to predict that we will successfully address in terms of our most pressing challenges, but Upheaval shows that there's a path through the crisis and that we can decide to take it. I have been reading the NYTimes and WSJ for the past decade; usually early in the morning and before my morning coffee. Putting politics aside, I very much enjoy the Opinion section of both papers. One of the columnists that I follow is David Brooks. He has been writing his columns in the Times for over 15 years. He is truly one of America's most influential columnist, very insightful and elegant, not to mention a prolific writer. He has this incredible ability to catalyze debates on very complex and controversial topics by merely writing about them.
I have been following his writings for the past seven years, and I don't believe his politics - he still describes himself as a Burkean conservative - has changed. However, his mission and purpose as a writer have evolved dramatically in recent years. I recently read his new book, The Second Mountain: The Quest for a Moral Life. I truly enjoyed reading it. The book addresses the commitment that defines a life of meaning and purpose, including family and spouse, vocation, and community. I found the title of the book surprising. He argues that life on the first mounting, which is the mountain of personal goals, worldly success, career ambition, and traveling in the right social circles, is transitory and ultimately unsatisfying. But eventually, though, if we are fortunate, we discover ourself on the second mountain, one defined by other centeredness and self-giving. The book made me think a lot about myself and what I really want. Some of us who live on the first mountain may find happiness, but people living on the second mountain find something more profound - joy. I believe there is a fine line between happiness and Joy. Happiness is the victory and expansion of the self. But joy is found in transcending the ego and serving others. I highly recommend the book. Reading it gave me a feeling of a journey with a friend. The book speaks to profound human longings, and to the particular challenges of our time - loneliness, alienation, social isolation, extreme-individualism, and the passive online culture. It helps that the book does so with elegance, thoughtfulness, and a personal touch and sincerity. The Second Mountain was not just an enjoyable read; it helped me in my life at this stage and in a quest for a moral life, but more critical leaving the first mountain that provides a measure of Instagram Happiness, that prioritize time over people, productivity over relationship. |
AuthorRoozbeh, born in Tehran - Iran (March 1984) Archives
December 2024
Categories |