The Vulnerable Fortress by James R. Taylor and Elizabeth J. Van Every

Taylor, James R., and Elizabeth J. Van Every. The Vulnerable Fortress. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993.
ISBN 0-8020-7773-0

Taylor and Van Every explore the traditional model of organization as machine and the difficulties discovered in attempts to map real organizations into machines (computers and information technology). They conclude that the machine model is inadequate and offer as an alternative the model of the organization as conversation and text.



Perhaps the most useful thing is the book is the demonstration of the inadequacies of the machine model; the authors show it is necessary to look elsewhere. The alternative model is perhaps too new and theoretical to be of immediate use, but the authors introduce some interesting concepts as they develop their model. These concepts are frames and scripts. Frames are templates or archetypes that we overlay onto situations and give us perspective on how the elements of a situation are related. Scripts are similar to frames, but specify behaviors or sequences of events. It is interesting to think of learning as the reframing of a situation that allows one to examine the old frame.

The book is a lot to take in at once. The concepts and arguments are sometimes so abstract that they become difficult to follow. While I think it has merit, the model of conversation and text does not readily illuminate or simplify understanding of organizations because conversation and text themselves are difficult to understand. It is difficult to put a frame around, learn about, language, conversation and text because these form a frame that encompasses most human activity. The authors are right to say that conversation and text cannot be ignored and cannot be reconciled to the machine model, but they ask the reader to make a large conceptual leap to say that the organization is conversation and text.

Ada's Algorithm by James Essinger

Ada Lovelace, daughter of poet Lord Byron, is arguably one of the first computer scientists in history. She wrote what some considered the first computer program about a century before any computer was built, especially anything we would recognize as computer. James Essinger presents a summary of her life, and particularly a defense of her accomplishments, in Ada’s Algorithm.

In any discussion relating to the Byrons, it’s easy to get distracted by Lovelace’s father. In addition to being a famous poet, he lived a high life (often on the money of others) and had many lovers. Lady Byron, who separated from Byron and preserved her family wealth from his extravagances, made sure their only daughter had minimal contact with him. Lovelace had an education in math and science very unlike other women of her time because Lady Byron hoped it might counterbalance any of the excesses the girl may have inherited from the wild Byrons.

Lovelace took to math quite well. In a later age, she might have become a professional mathematician. In her own 1800s, her tutors sometimes complained that she reached too far for a woman, and strove to grasp at realms of math that only men had the stamina to explore. Fortunately her mother, and later her husband, William, Lord King, Baron of Ockham (later elevated to Earl of Lovelace), did not let such foolishness restrain her mathematical education.

She was still quite young, only 17, when she met the much older Charles Babbage, inventor of the partly build Difference Engine and never built Analytical Engine. The Analytical Engine was a calculating machine that could be programmed using punch cards. Though it was a mechanical device, not an electronic computer, Babbage’s structure (processor, memory, input and output) is the same structure of modern computers. Not only did Babbage conceive of computers a century before one was built, he drew plans for substantially completing such a machine, though the manufacturing technology of the time could not have made the parts required.

Lovelace was a friend of Babbage for many years. In 1843, about 10 years after they met, Lovelace published a paper explaining the operation and capabilities of Babbage’s machine. She had an even larger vision of it than the inventor. He saw the Analytical Engine as a tool for performing complex calculations accurately. She saw that it could do more than mathematical calculations; it could manipulate any symbols in almost any way instructed, so it might “compose” music by manipulating notes according so some rules, or perform logical functions, or handle any other information that might be digitized. She foresaw that what we now call computer science would become a discipline distinct from math.

She thought the paper might be better received if it was unsigned, but at the encouragement of her husband she published it under her initials. It was quickly discovered that “A. A. L.” was a woman, and almost a quickly dismissed as irrelevant. It wasn’t until the 20^th Century, when people were actually building digital computers, that the work of Babbage and Lovelace received some respect. Though modern computers do not have a technological connection to the Analytical Engine that was never built, it certainly has a strong conceptual connection.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

A Little History of Science by William Bynum

How to Build and Android by David F. Dufty

Miss Leavitt's Stars by George Johnson

Essinger, James. Ada’s Algorithm: How Lord Byron’s Daughter Ada Lovelace Launched the Digital Age. 2013. Brooklyn: Melville House, 2014.

American Nerd by Benjamin Nugent

What makes a nerd a nerd? In American Nerd, Benjamin Nugent doesn’t try to put aside nerdy stereotypes. He gives them a context.

Nerds are people who seem to others to be like machines.  They are often passionate about a technical interest, they use jargon, they avoid confrontation, they favor logic over emotion, and they enjoy working with machines.

One of the interesting things about the book is that Nugent provides examples of machine-like nerds from literature.  The prototypical nerd is Victor Frankenstein of the Mary Shelley masterpiece.  Frankenstein has a powerful intellect and technical skill.  After all he makes a body from corpses and brings it to life.  On the other hand, he lacks emotional depth and the ability to connect.  Shelley shows this in his withdrawal from family and in his inability to cope with his creation when it is a living being.

Of course, nerds are not machines.  One thing that makes them nerd is their passion for their interests.  No machine is passionate.  Even though nerds are passionate, they generally aren’t comfortable with emotionalism.  People send out a mass of confusing and contradictory signals.  Nerds prefer lower-noise communication that is direct, rational, formal, and rule bound.

In this regard, Nugent compares nerds to people with Asperger’s syndrome.  Asperger’s involves difficulty in reading the emotional cues of others and in affecting appropriate responses.  It a result of their neurological makeup; Asperger’s has a physiological basis.  Because of this, people with the condition share with nerd’s preference for formalized communication, social discomfort, and attraction to scientific and technical fields where logic and rules prevail.  Nerds don’t necessarily have Asperger’s, but people with Asperger’s might often end up becoming nerds.

While I’m on that subject, I thought it was interesting that Nugent cited research about Asperger’s and engineering, my own profession.  There is evidence that suggests that autism spectrum disorders appear in engineers more than in the rest of the population.  Also, 15 percent of people with Asperger’s have an engineer in their family, about three times the typical frequency.

In many ways, engineering is a profession of logic and rules.  It also calls for creativity and social skills.  A project of any size is the work of several people.  Engineers have to work with their peers and often with people from other fields:  CADD operators, equipment operators, architects, surveyors, contractors, skilled laborers, craftsmen, lawyers, accountants, and government regulators just to name a few.  The social aspect of practicing engineering, and the inherently social mission of the profession, is greatly underplayed.

Nugent points out that the dichotomy between head and heart, thinking and feeling, drawn by Romantic authors and popular teenagers to distinguish the machine-like from the genuinely human, the in crowd from the nerds, is not necessarily a true one.  To support this argument, he calls on T. S. Eliot’s critique of Romanticism and defense of metaphysical poets.  The Romantics appealed to the heart, but the metaphysical poets used heart and head together, little distinguishing between thoughts and feelings, and produced affecting poems that were also full of ideas.  We don’t have to choose between following our hearts and using our heads; if we’re wise we’ll do both.

If you’re looking to understand what nerds are into, you probably won’t find much in this book that you don’t already know.  If you’d like a look at the origins of the idea of nerdiness and a thoughtful theory of what makes nerds nerds, Nugent’s book will fill the bill.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Arthur & George by Julian Barnes

The Essential Engineer by Henry Petroski

How to Build an Android by David F. Dufty

Men of Tomorrow by Gerard Jones

Quiet by Susan Cain

Nugent, Benjamin.  American Nerd: The Story of My People.  New York: Scribner, 2008.

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Dr. Horrible, the Hamlet of Nerds

Okay, comparing Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog to Hamlet, one of the greatest plays in the English language, is the type of hyperbole writers, especially on the Internet, use to draw in a reader.  I presume it worked on you.

There are points of comparison. Both are tragedies. Both feature lead characters giving themselves over to being people they might not really have wanted to become, at least not at the beginning. Both carry a sense of terrifying inevitability.

Having hooked you with Hamlet, I’m going to carry on about Dr. Horrible.  The film plays on concepts of nerdiness, jocks, and what is the potential tragedy of a world in which nerds can’t find a place for themselves (though they seem to be everywhere). It does so in the nerdy context of superhero films and musicals, the mash up of these genres being geeky itself.

About the Film

Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog was produced as a serial for the Internet.  The film was written by Joss Whedon, his brothers Zack and Jed, and Maurissa Tancharoen to produce something during the 2007-2008 strike by the Writer’s Guild.  It appeared on the Dr. Horrible Web site in three parts in July 2008 and is now available on DVD.

The familiar star of the film is Neil Patrick Harris, who plays Barney on How I Met Your Mother. I don’t enjoy that show much, but fortunately Harris has found other outlets for his performing talent. It is unfair to say Dr. Horrible launched her career, but I think it helped Felicia Day achieve a new level, especially on the Internet.  She is everywhere now and produces the Geek & Sundry YouTube channel.

Plot Summary

Dr. Horrible (Harris) is an aspiring supervillain.  He is seeking entry into the Evil League of Evil, but his prospects are threatened by superhero Captain Hammer (Nathan Fillion).

The pursuit of supervillainy is complicated by Dr. Horrible’s double-mindedness even more than his nemesis.  As his alter ego Billy, the doctor is smitten with Penny (Day), a girl he meets at the Laundromat.  She meets and begins to date Captain Hammer. Hammer recognizes his enemy and flaunts the affair.

Dr. Horrible retreats from the situation and focuses on the League.  They are not impressed with his recent failures, but he can prove himself by killing someone in one of his capers.  He plans to kill Hammer. Things go wrong when Horrible sees Penny at the event where he plans to exact his revenge and begins to experience a change of heart.  Hammer gains control of Horrible’s death ray, which is overloading. In spite of Horrible’s warning, Hammer uses the weapon, which explodes, causing him pain but no apparent injury. Fragments of the death ray hit the crowd and kill Penny.

In one stroke, Horrible loses his love and gains his dead victim.  He is admitted to the League. He abandons hope and embraces evil.  It’s dark stuff for a musical comedy.

Dr. Horrible: Protagonist, Villain, Nerd

Dr. Horrible is a nerd.  As support of this notion, if it isn’t readily apparent, I turn to the characteristics of nerds identified by Benjamin Nugent in American Nerd.  He suggests that people associated nerds with machine like qualities. Nerds seem machine like in that they

• like working with machines, having interest in technical subjects or complex hobbies, and
• prefer direct, logical, rule-bound communication to indirect, emotional communication.

In his first appearance, Dr. Horrible is recording a vlog entry in his lab. Throughout the film, he talks about his inventions and uses them. He is clearly at home in the realm of technology. Not only that, he identifies himself with science and technology with his costume: long white (lab) coat, long rubber gloves, and goggles.

While comfortable with technology and talking about it, he is uncomfortable with emotional communication. He has trouble expressing his feelings to Penny, and he has trouble reading the signs that she might be attracted to him. In light of this, he is oddly eloquent on his vlog.  In Quiet, Susan Cain noted that introverts often communicate a lot through social media, and rise to leadership in online communities.  They communicate very well when relieved of the pressures and distractions of face-to-face communications. Nerdiness and introversion aren’t synonymous, but I think it strengthens the case for Dr. Horrible’s nerdiness in his preference for technologically mediated communication that is formalized through a script (an unscripted vlog would not be eloquent) and music (with rules for rhythm, pitch, and rhyme).

Captain Hammer: Antagonist, Hero, Jock

Captain Hammer is the antithesis of a nerd: a jock.  I turn again to American Nerd to help make this diagnosis. Nugent notes that the nerd image was at one time associated with immigrant communities that were rising in population and status. Immigrant pursuit of New World opportunities was shaped by their Old World perspective, so they sought upward mobility in artistic and intellectual professions.

The established upper class wanted to both maintain its dominance and distinguish itself from lower classes, especially immigrants. They adopted a preference for athleticism and a suspicion of excessive intellectualism. Book-learning had its place, but a boy who would take his place as active leader in business, political, and military affairs needed to learn how to win. Sporting fields and athletic competitions were seen as the classroom for these skills. Athleticism as associated with a certain class (because such vigorous leisure required time and resources).  This magnified the upper class sense of superiority.

We can see this in reflected Captain Hammer. His superhuman physical superiority seems to be a justification for his overall sense of being superior to others, especially the weaker and physically cowardly Horrible. Even his activities as a do-gooder seem to lack a moral motivation outside a vague noblesse oblige. He seems more interested in establishing and maintaining his status. For instance, his support of Penny’s campaign to end homelessness is motivated by the positive publicity he receives, not by love of his fellow man—he does not perceive value in homeless people.

The Tragedy of Dr. Horrible

Dr. Horrible, then, is a classic conflict between a typical nerd and a typical jock, except they are a supervillain and a superhero in a comic book-style world where such people exist. Where is the tragedy?

We’ve already noted the death of Penny. That is enough to make the film a tragedy, but not necessarily a nerdy one.

The tragedy of the nerd is to be trapped in alienation. Admittedly, nerds seem to be increasingly popular nowadays, but the more traditional image of a nerd is of one alienated from popular society because his machine-like qualities are not valued in a culture that sees emotional display and sensitivity as more worthy and human.

Nerds are not naturally loners, though. They have a long history of building their own communities. Science fiction fandom is a good example. Long before the Internet, sci-fi fans built communities of letter writing and zines around popular magazines. Before long, they began gathering at clubs and conventions. This culture carried over into comic book fandom (for more on this check out Men of Tomorrow by Gerard Jones). Nugent notes how a similar community of nerds, also readers popular magazines, formed around ham radio, where technological skill and rule-bound communication were prized.

We’ve noted that Dr. Horrible also seeks connection to a community. He specifically identifies his desire to be part of the League.  His quest for world domination is also motivated by a desire to connect with the wider community of humanity. He wants to take over the world not because he hates people, but because he longs for a logical meritocracy that would rid the world of all the trouble cause by emotionalism, celebrity culture, and doublespeak. In his fantasy, he would naturally rise to the top of such a society.

Captain Hammer frustrates these efforts at connection. He reinforces a culture of athleticism and emotional communication that Horrible cannot participate in. When he finds a sympathetic soul who may be able to help him make that connection, Hammer sweeps her away. At last, Horrible wins entry into a community, but the League is evil and inhumane, and can only serve to further dehumanize its members. The cost to Horrible to finally belong is high; he must turn his back on the rest of humanity and give up the hope of ever loving or being loved by another. He is completely alienated, cut off from meaningful and fulfilling connections to others.

The Sequel

A sequel is reported in the works and expected to be released this year.  I would expect most of the major characters to return.

I imagine many fans would like to see Day reprise her role as Penny, though the character died in the first film.  Because this is a superhero movie, there are several ways around this: time travel, cloning, robotic or holographic doubleganger (it’s a word, and it doesn’t need an umlaut), or reanimation (no zombies, please).  Maybe Dr. Horrible will try all of these things, each effort going more wrong than the last. He could be forced to team up with Captain Hammer to fend off an army of time-travel replicated, cyborg zombie Pennies, but I probably wouldn’t watch it because I’m creeped out by the walking dead.

Making Your Connection

You may be nerd seeking connection, too.  I’ve provided a little information below where you can find out about the people behind this film and the books I mentioned. They’re involved in other things and you may find that work interesting. Please do not cyberstalk them.  I don’t want that on my conscience.

Susan Cain

Book: Quiet (review)

Facebook: AuthorSusanCain

Twitter: @susancain

Web site: www.thepowerofintroverts.com

Felicia Day

Facebook: Felicia Day

Google+: +Felicia Day

IMDb: Felicia Day

Twitter: @feliciaday

Web site: feliciaday.com

YouTube: Geek & Sundry

Nathan Fillion

IMDb: Nathan Fillion

Twitter: @NathanFillion

Neil Patrick Harris

IBDB: Neil Patrick Harris

IMDb: Neil Patrick Harris

Twitter: @ActuallyNPH

YouTube: Neil’s Puppet Dreams on Nerdist

Gerard Jones

Book: Men of Tomorrow (review)

ComicBookDB: Gerard Jones

IMDb: Gerard Jones

Red Room: Gerard Jones

Web site: www.gerardjones.com

Benjamin Nugent

Book: American Nerd (review)

Web site: www.benjaminnugent.com, www.americannerdbook.com

Maurissa Tancharoen

IMDb: Maurissa Tancharoen

Jed Whedon

IMDb: Jed Whedon

Twitter: @jedwhedon

Joss Whedon

IMDb: Joss Whedon

Web site: whedonesque.com

Zack Whedon

IMDb: Zack Whedon

Twitter: @ZDubDub

Google

The Wright Brothers by David McCollough

Brothers Orville and Wilbur Wright rose to fame at the beginning of the 20^th Century by building the first successful manned, powered flying machine. In popular culture, they tend to be presented as geniuses who went out to Kitty Hawk and started flying one day. In his biography of these men, The Wright Brothers, David McCollough does not dispel the notion of genius, but he focuses on their courage, determination, careful study, methodical approach, and persistence in the pursuit of something they believed could be.

As boys, the brothers were inspired by a toy to consider the possibility of flight. As grown men, they made a careful study of it. Before beginning their experiments, they gathered the available information, including contacts with earlier experimenters in flight such as Octave Chanute and Samuel Pierpont Langley (the director of the Smithsonian Institute who’s “aerodrome” was a failed early flyer). When they began conducting their own experiments with kites (and later using a small wind tunnel they made), they found the published data to be lacking in useful or correct information.

Therefore, it was mainly on their own that the brothers invented their flyers and the means of piloting them. They had the practical view that inventing a flying machine included inventing the method for controlling it in flight.

An interesting note is that the Wrights funded their experiments and first airplanes with their own money. Their bicycle shop must have produced a decent income, but they lived modestly. They lived in a modest home together with their father and sister until after they completed built three working airplanes, the third model being the one they demonstrated publicly. Even after they began to make money making airplanes and decided to build a new, larger house, they shared it. Wilbur’s only request for the new house was that he have his own bedroom and bathroom.

McCollough emphasizes how much the success of Wilbur and Orville was a family affair. They were close to their widowed father, who survived Wilbur by two years. Once they began to demonstrate their airplane and make a build a business on it, their sister Katherine became a social manager for them, and she share a house with Orville until she married at the age of 52 (she passed away three year later). Orville had a long life and saw many improvements in aviation after he sold the company, including Charles Lindbergh’s trans-Atlantic flight and the use of bombers in World War II.

The book is fairly brief. McCollough concentrates on the period when the Wrights were most involved in experimenting with, building, and ultimately demonstrating their invention. Even so, one gets a sense of what the brothers and their immediate family and friends were like.

David McCollough also wrote The Great Bridge. 

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Make a Joyful Sound by Helen Elmira Waite

McCullough, David. The Wright Brothers. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2015.

Conspiracy Theory Notes

Computer Crushes Competition on “Jeopardy!”
Eyes in the Skies: Top Secret Spy Planes
Found: Humans Skulls Used as Drinking Goblets 15,000 Years Ago
India, Japan in Talks for $9 Billion Infrastructure Fund
“Jeopardy!”’s Man vs. Machine Match Not Trivial
Man vs. Machine: The Scorecard
More on conspiracy theories
Space Destroying Black Holes
Supercomputer Takes on “Jeopardy” Champs
Why the Kremlin Can’t Fight Terrorism

Enchantress of Numbers by Jennifer Chiaverini

I usually don’t write reviews of fiction books, but occasionally I find a novel so enjoyable, or its subject so interesting or important that I want to write about it. That is the case with Enchantress of Numbers, a novel by Jennifer Chiaverini.

The subject is Ada Lovelace, who I think is interesting and important. She is credited as the author of the first published computer program in 1843. The only thing resembling a computer at the time was in the drawings and notes of mathematician and inventor Charles Babbage, a friend of Lovelace. He called the device, which was never built, an analytical engine.

Lovelace’s contribution has been debated, but it seems likely that she saw more capability in the analytical engine than even its inventor. As she described in her notes on her translation of a scientific paper on Babbage’s invention, originally printed in French and shorter than her notes were, she imagined the device being able to handle all manner of symbolic and logical functions in addition to solving mathematical equations. Even Babbage himself seemed mainly to see it as an improvement on his difference engine, a programmable calculating machine that was partly built, but never finished.

If she had been a man, her accomplishment would very likely have received much more accolades than it did at the time, or even for more than a century afterward. It was unusual for a woman to be even permitted to study math or science in those days. Her mother encouraged her to take on these fields to discourage her from following in the footsteps of her father, the poet Lord Byron.

Lovelace lived in a period of great change in society and science. She was a contemporary of Charles Darwin. She was a friend of Charles Dickens and Michael Faraday. When Queen Victoria was coronated, her husband was elevated to an earl and the new monarch called her forward to take her hand as the couple, newly made Count and Countess Lovelace, were took their bows. She attended the Great Exhibition of 1851, housed in the Crystal Palace, where the exhibits included the still relatively new telegraph.

I wasn’t sure I would care for a novelization of Lovelace’s life. I was not especially impressed with Arthur and George, Julian Barnes’ novel based on events from the life of Arthur Conan Doyle; I thought I would have preferred a straight nonfiction book on the subject. I found Chiaverini’s novel more compelling, perhaps because it is written as if by Ada Lovelace herself. As with any such fictionalization, there are parts that Chiaverini made up, though she draws on sources I enjoyed such as Benjamin Woolley’s excellent biography Bride of Science and James Essinger’s defense of the countess, Ada’s Algorithm. I realize that there are people who will pick up a novel who would not be attracted to a biography, and if it takes that to get more people to now about Ada Lovelace an her contributions, then Chiaverini’s effort was worthy.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Ada's Algorithm by James Essinger

Empires of Light by Jill Jonnes

How We Got to Now by Steven Johnson

On a Grander Scale by Lisa Jardine

Rust by Jonathan Waldman

Chiaverini, Jennifer. Enchantress of Numbers. New York: Dutton, 2017.

The Dawn of Innovation by Charles R. Morris

Over the course of the 19^th Century, the United States transformed from a frontier nation dependent on trade with former colonizing nations to a leading manufacturer and exporter of goods. Charles R. Morris describes how America accomplished this change in The Dawn of Innovation.

The forces that led to the development of an American system of manufacturing were practical and cultural. There were labor shortages, especially for skilled labor. Americans in every field were interested in mechanizing work to get it done with the people and skills available. Americans were also largely middle class, at least in their way of thinking. They had to have the means to cross the Atlantic, and once here wage pressure and the availability of resources quickly made many people middle class. The middle class valued improvement and economic independence. In the U.S. they were free from the limiting class structures of Europe.

The middle class were also consumers. They were interested in the goods and lifestyle associated with wealth, but at prices they could afford. And there were a lot more of them that the handful of rich people who were the consumers of traditional luxury goods. Americans wanted to produce, market and distribute goods on a mass scale that was hard for Europeans of the time to even imagine.

The cloth-making industry was one of the first to bring together the aspects of modern manufacturing: specialization, organization of work flow, mechanization and automation. American cloth makers took—sometimes stole—these things from the British. A leap that the Americans made, but not the British, was to apply these same concepts to all kinds of production.

The organization of work was especially helpful in the U.S., where the skilled workers needed for precision machine making were few. Morris uses the arms industry as an example of American leadership in the transformation from craft piecework to an organized workflow with uniform standards.

Morris also undertakes some myth busting. Eli Whitney is associated with first rifles—really the first manufactured goods—to have interchangeable parts, which is a hallmark of modern manufacturing. Whitney and others promised interchangeability to win contracts with the Army, but he never achieved it; it took him a while to even become a good gun maker. It took decades of work by others to achieve interchangeable parts. This was both a matter of organizing work and developing more precise machining equipment.

Morris shows how innovations accumulated over time to create American manufacturing leadership. He shows how the culture and natural environment were incubators for such development.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

The Gentleman Scientists by Tom Schachtman

Mayflower by Nathaniel Philbrick

The Power Makers by Maury Klein

The Society for Useful Knowledge by Jonathan Lyons

Waste and Want by Susan Strasser

Morris, Charles R. The Dawn of Innovation: The First American Industrial Revolution. New York: Public Affairs, 2012.

Rock Breaks Scissors by William Poundstone

People are terrible at producing randomness. We are very bad at recognizing it, too. In his book Rock Breaks Scissors, William Poundstone describes the ways we misunderstand randomness. In addition, he shows how knowledge of this blind spot can help us to make better decisions, or at least help us to avoid being duped by fraudster or our own minds.

The early chapters of the book describe how researchers have come to identify our biases related to randomness perception, even if we do not wholly understand it. Poundstone avoids the textbook psychology and pulls examples from interesting sources such as mass experiments in parapsychology (designed to sell radios) and a machine that beats people at a child’s outguessing game using a simple algorithm.

These experiments reveal two important things about our perceptions for randomness. First, we are almost incapable of intuitively recognizing true randomness and prone to identify as random things that aren’t. In addition, we have all manner of unconscious preferences that show themselves when we try to be random, though we’re unaware of their appearing.

The book takes its title from another child’s outguessing game: rock-paper-scissor. I risk angry comments with this description, because some people take the game very seriously. Serious players have strategies for playing the game. These strategies probably provide little advantage over advanced players, but may give you an edge over ordinary players. My own impromptu experiment seemed to confirm it. (This is another trap we fall into: seeing patterns and drawing conclusions from small data sets that may be random.)

Another way our inability to be random is used is in detecting fraud. We can expect certain sets of number to occur in certain distributions of frequency. For instance, Benford’s law describes the frequency of first digits in numbers. The most common first digit is one, and the frequency declines for each digit to nine (leading zeros are ignored for the first digit). If the distribution of first digits is different, and especially if there are thresholds that may be associated with incentives, then there may be some fudging of the number. In other cases, you might expect the frequency of occurrence to be equal, such as the last two digits of numbers. People will avoid digit pairs that don’t seem random and unconsciously favor certain pairs. An uneven distribution of these pairs could be another sign of fraud. Keep this in mind when you’re preparing your taxes.

The utility of Poundstone’s strategies varies widely. The outcome of rock-paper-scissors means little to most of us (I would not risk something I care greatly about on it). On the other hand, a patient, long-term investor might gain an edge on the market that could amount to a lot of money over time. The chapter for homebuyers might also save you a lot of money by helping you avoid an overpriced market. Use caution, though. Poundstone is pointing out how you might outguess people, because people have trouble with randomness. You’re not going to outguess the lottery because truly random things can’t be outguessed.

William Poundstone also wrote Fortune’s Formula.  If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Chance by Amir Aczel

The Drunkard’s Walk by Leonard Mlodinow

The Numbers Game by Michael Blastland & Andrew Dilnot

Poundstone, William. Rock Breaks Scissors: A Practical Guide to Outguessing and Outwitting Almost Everybody. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2014.

The Science of Leonardo by Fritjof Capra

Capra, Fritjof. The Science of Leonardo. New York: Doubleday, 2007.

In the preface to this book, Capra discusses how in each era the Leonardo da Vinci has been reinvented and he will be reinventing the sage, too. Capra presents Leonardo as the first modern scientist. In this book is a picture of a Leonardo who not only anticipated the methods of the modern science established in the 18th century, but the mindset of 21st century science.

Before dealing directly with Leonardo’s scientific studies, Capra provides a short biography of his subject and an introduction to some of the artist’s works. While Leonardo’s science was ahead of it’s time in many ways, it was also shaped by the science of the Renaissance and the rediscovery of ancient texts that occurred. It also was in interplay with his art, his art inspiring his interest in the natural world and his observations informing his art.


Capra presents two major ways in which Leonardo’s science contrasted with his contemporaries and is comparable to modern science. First, Leonardo used a process of observing, hypothesizing and experimenting that is essentially the same as used by modern science. At the time, studying natural philosophy, or science, meant studying the ancient philosophers and scientists. Leonardo tested theory against experience and reformulated theories accordingly.

Leonardo also had a systematic and ecological worldview that is in keeping with emerging science. In some ways, this put him in the camp of his contemporaries, where and organic view of the world was more prevalent than the mechanical view that would dominate later science. However, combined with this more rigorous methods, he developed an understanding of how things in our world are interconnected that surpassed many of his contemporaries.

In this was, Capra thinks Leonardo could serve as a model for modern scientists. The power of science could be applied to understanding the organic, interconnected systems of a living world of which we are a part instead of approaching the world as a machine to be operated.

Though Leonardo was ahead of his time in some ways, he had almost no impact on science, especially in comparison to his influence on art. He never published his papers and his immediate successor made little headway in organizing them for publication. Within a couple of generations, they fell into indifferent hands that allowed them to be spread across Europe and much of them lost.

Dickhead Roboticists

It appears that the fields of computer science and robotics attract a lot of Dickheads.  By that I mean fans of science fiction author Philip K. Dick.  Psychology researcher David F. Dufty is acquainted with a few of these fans, academics, engineers, and artists, who undertook the strange challenge of building an android simulacrum of their hero.  He tells their story in How to Build an Android.

Dick is possibly the best choice for an author to imitate in robotic form.  He is well known for his story Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, which was the basis of the movie Blade Runner.  The essence of the story is that robots have become so sophisticated, intelligent, and lifelike that it is almost impossible to distinguish them from real humans.  They blow away a Turing test, and the latest models can only be identified through a test that detects their carefully disguised lack of empathy; Dick thought empathy was an essentially human trait that may not be copied by computers.  The hero of Do Androids Dream must track down and destroy these nearly human machines.

Throughout this story and others, Dick explored identity and the shrinking difference between human and machine.  People suspect themselves to be androids, androids are programmed to believe they are human, and both have false memories that they cannot distinguish from reality.  A realistic android that interacted with people in conversation seemed like a natural fit with Dick.

Of course, the project had practical implications.  It required a lifelike interface.  Artist and robot maker David Hanson believes the face is a natural way for people to interact with each other and potentially with technology.  He has made a succession of realistic robotic heads that can imitate human expression.  The PKD robot was backed by artificial intelligence developed by researchers at the University of Memphis, particularly Andrew Olney, that allowed it to understand speech and construct responses based on things Dick had said and written in life.

To top it off, something happened in the brief life of the android that would have been well suited for one of Dick’s stories.  They lost Dick’s head.  Presumably it is still out there.  It may be in some airline warehouse.  It may be on the mantle of some thief, or some flummoxed buyer of a lot of abandoned baggage.  If someone has it, they haven’t been talking about it.

The big question of the book is how do we interact with technology?  What will it look like in the future?  We will be increasingly able to make machines that at least seem intelligent and look human.  Hanson thinks that is the way to go.  The Memphis scientists and engineers, and many other like them, continue to work on interfaces capable of increasingly sophisticated and seamless interactions with people.  Are we on a trajectory from Siri to Jacosta to C-3PO to R. Daneel Olivaw?  Are androids just what we need to make technology what we need or are they too creepy?

Dufty doesn’t pass judgment.  The PKD was an interesting piece of technology with and interesting history that raises a lot of questions about what machines can be.  Even as advance and capable as the PKD android was, it had a lot of limitations.  It could carry on a conversation, in a quiet room with a patient partner, but it did little else and its responses varied from the seemingly real thing to nonsense.

Personally, I don’t think we need, nor do I want, computers with faces.  I would be pleased if I could get my Windows 8 tiles to work.  I do think the way we interact with technology is important, especially that we are able to get feedback and other information from technology in ways that helps us understand what is going on and respond intelligently.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

The Abolition of Man by C. S. Lewis

Blink by Malcolm Gladwell

The Essential Engineer by Henry Petroski

IBM and the Holocaust by Edwin Black

Your Intelligence Makeover by Edward F. Droge, Jr.

Dufty, David F.  How to Build an Android: The True Story of Philip K. Dick’s Robotic Resurrection.  New York: Henry Holt, 2012.

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