I think maybe the funniest thing about following the lineage of modern popular computing is how the commercial side of things really wrecked a lot of good intentions and dare I say we can look at that for most anything invented in the last 200 years that we have collectively just incorporated into our culture. The commercial interests are consistently absolutely at odds with the ideals of folks without commercial interests and so seeing the tech developed with ideals then stripped of them and recontextualized as commodity has really been an educational period of history to look in general at what is likely to happen with future inventions and what will happen when the commercial world gets it's hands on it...
Alan I have found so much value in your talks. I love your essay on learning difficult to learn things. You have really helped me to feel more connected with your endless . I have learned so much from you, from your off-the-cuff use of the word/idea atavism in a quora post to your willingness to build organs, along with learning to play it slightly later in life, it has all opened and inspired me. I adore your lines about the hardest thing to do as you move on later in life is change your identity and you have no idea how much I enjoyed hearing you say what Von Neumann’s definition of mathematics is (I adore him also). I’d love to hear your thoughts on longevity and the hardware designed for machine learning. Listening to a conversation between you and John Vervaeke, Cedric Villani, Edward Thorpe or Arthur Benjamin would be incredible, personally. Also, if you would ever like to build a roulette computer like Thorpe did with Claude Shannon please let me know 😄 Anyways, I know you have a RU-vid channel and I think you live in London, as I do, so I hope you are doing well and continue to learn and live. Sincerely, Charlie
