Eyes of the Void by Adrian Tchaikovsky

This is the second novel on the Final Architecture series. I read Shards of Earth, the first novel, about a year and a half ago. I'm glad this second book comes with a "Story so far" section at the beginning, including key concepts, humanity factions, and key characters. There is also a complete list of characters, species, worlds, and more at end. And a very useful timeline, too. All these helped refresh my memory without the need to reread the first book. Anyway, the story felt a bit slower than the previous one, took me almost 2 weeks to read, but it wasn't bad. The protagonist is trying to understand the mysteries of unspace, the origins and motivations of the architects so he can save the universe!! So far, the ideas are fine but are not mindblowing. Hope the third book comes with striking revelations. This series is fun, but I don't think it will become a classic.

Artificial Intelligence: A guide for Thinking Humans by Melanie Mitchell

This is a thought-provoking, accessible book. It includes some technical content but it is not difficult to read, maybe intermediate. It definitely requires your attention. This book has clarified some false impressions I had about Artificial Intelligence. The book includes some chapters explaining the history of AI. It provides a useful classification of AI - Symbolic AI, programmed using symbols (words or phrases) which are understandable by human beings, and Subsymbolic AI, which capture the “sometimes unconscious thought processes” underlying human’s fast perception (recognising faces or words). An example of Symbolic AI is Expert Systems. An example of Subsymbolic AI is Machine Learning, of which the most popular are Deep Learning and Deep Neural Networks. There are chapters dealing with various kinds of AI technologies, like visual recognition (e.g., object recognition), games (e.g., Chess, Go), languages (e.g., speech recognition). In all, Mitchell explains the technologies and their potential, focusing on how machines learn and on enquiring on the ethics and trustworthiness of AI. But most importantly, Mitchell highlights the limitations for each approach, first stating that each technology is just a limited, narrow aspect of human intelligence and providing, sometimes funny, examples of failures. My favourite chapters are at the end. Chapter 14: On Understanding, which looks into the mystery of how humans “understand” things, and Chapter 15: Knowledge, Abstraction and Analogy in AI. The conclusion of both chapters, and I think of the book (which was published in 2018), is that AI is far from achieving human intelligence, let alone superhuman intelligence. To be intelligent machines would need to acquire common sense like we do. We are either born with it or we develop it in infancy. Machines would need learn how to abstract concepts from a few examples, identify and use analogies. Because our mental models, those which form the concepts that we use, are created using abstraction and analogy. We are far from understanding how those concepts are created, emerge and or develop in our human brains, so we are even farther from embedding those in a machine. And to end a quote: “only the right kind of machine – one that is embodied and active in the world – would have human-level intelligence in its reach.”

The Collected Toppi. Volume Ten: Future Perfect

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 

 As usual. Beautiful Art. Fantastic stories. My favourite story is the last one, titled Science Fiction. Don't want to say much about each story as they are short and it would be better if you read them.

The Colour Out of Space by H.P. Lovecraft

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 

Great short story. An unnamed narrator uncovers the story of a meteorite crash near the fictional town of Arkham many years before. The meteorite affected plants, animals, and people around the crash site. Sightings were reported of a strange organic thing of some, previously unknown, colour. I also watched a movie adaptation, in German with subtitles, which I found faithful to the original. I liked that it was in black and white, except for "the colour out of space." Recommend 👍🏽 I've been reading this ginormous tome with H.P. Lovecraft's Complete Fiction since 2018. I'm reading it in order. Slowly. No pressure. I'm a bit over 50% now. And getting to Lovecraft's most famous work.

Esperando al Diluvio (Awaiting the flood) by Dolores Redondo.

Super fun, gripping, and addictive read. Could not stop. Literally. It is not a perfect story. I had to suspend my disbelief, but I enjoyed it. I found some incongruencies and some corny scenes but kept reading cos I wanted to know what was going to happen. The novel is very immersive. I was transported to Glasgow and then Bilbao. I forgot I was reading a book!! I guess Redondo is really good with (gross/brutal) crime, suspense, and thriller, but I don't think romance is her thing.

Exterminator 17 written by Dionnet, drawn by Bilal and Baranko

There are 4 stories in the book. The original Exterminator 17 by Dionnet and Bilal and the sequel trilogy by Dionnet and Baranko. I liked the first story, charged with philosophical themes like the meaning/nature of life, mortality and the ethics of the use of technologies. Amazing artwork. Interesting read, but the ending was unsatisfactory. Actually it didn't feel like an ending. The trilogy was a bit of a let down. Not much food for thought but the Exterminator 17 in a boring gangster plot. The art was OK, but not at the level of Bilal's.

Human Society. How Evolution and Psychology shaped our world. New Scientist. Essential Guide No 14.

Includes a variety of articles looking at civilisation and our societies from different perspectives. My favourites were the ones about evolution, social hierarchies, and religion. I'd like to read more about religion. I want to understand why humans tend to and need to belief. Was religion the catalyst for the formation of big societies and our current civilisation? As Steven Pinker says, "belief in God is a kind of belief you hold for its moral benefits, not for its factual accuracy." Three theories explain why we believe: Cognitive by-product theory: "religious belief is a side effect of cognitive skills that evolved for other reasons." Someone who believes that (all) events are caused by agents have more chances of survival than someone who doesn't. Theory of Mind: a mechanism which "evolved so that we could infer the mental states and intentions of others, even if they aren't physically present." This is extended to assign mental states and intentions to inanimate objects or invisible entities. Existential Insecurity - fear of death, randomness, and loss of control can be soothed if we belief there is someone looking after us and that death isn't the end.