Risk reading for the holidays is on! We’ve coalesced around Human Compatible: Artificial Intelligence and the Problem of Control by Stuart Russell and Humankind: A Hopeful History by Rutger Bregman. (No pressure to read both or any! If you want to participate and read just one or part of one, that’s cool too.) I’ll send out information about a Substack chat later in December.
Love this. I would say that at 60 I am in my prime because of the wisdom I’ve attained. I do recognize a Neuro plasticity difference from when I was younger but as long as I can retain information I know that my experiential insights will continue to grow.
What a great topic! When I get to enjoy Paul McCartney, Bruce Springsteen and the Rolling Stones these days, it is something to consider how important it is to not stop doing the things you love until you must.
I have uttered to many people over the years "there is no future in getting old."
As for my 'Prime' this is a word I do not normally use. However, I would most likely have been able to use it for every decade of my existence. It really is the case that every passing decade has offered more opportunity to nuance my current, and better than the last, prime so as to plan for my next prime. Would you recognise my prime? Could anyone? No, I very much doubt it. I, like so many others, go about my business, day in day out, year upon year, decade after decade, hopefully existence upon existence, unseen, unnoticed, simply doing. Yet the pursuance of my 'Prime' is, I now think, what helps me to stay young in spirit, whilst the laws of human entropy get to work on my being.
The hazards, threats, and failure modes we encounter through life and therefore the miracle of our existence as you often write, are truly the Musings of the Risks we must monitor. Better to keep working harder in in slowing entropy and creating plasticity, striving to get your next Prime, than not, allowing older to creep in, and watching your future shrink before your eyes.
(( if anyone is wondering, yes, I see all the ironies in the logic of my little eulogy ;) ))
The older I have gotten the more I recognise this is, possibly, one of your more important articles Stephanie Losi (name in full due to my deference to this important wordage).
Love this. I would say that at 60 I am in my prime because of the wisdom I’ve attained. I do recognize a Neuro plasticity difference from when I was younger but as long as I can retain information I know that my experiential insights will continue to grow.
What a great topic! When I get to enjoy Paul McCartney, Bruce Springsteen and the Rolling Stones these days, it is something to consider how important it is to not stop doing the things you love until you must.
The recognition that ruts are temporary conditions that can be consciously addressed is a valuable insight. Thank you for sharing Stephanie!
I have uttered to many people over the years "there is no future in getting old."
As for my 'Prime' this is a word I do not normally use. However, I would most likely have been able to use it for every decade of my existence. It really is the case that every passing decade has offered more opportunity to nuance my current, and better than the last, prime so as to plan for my next prime. Would you recognise my prime? Could anyone? No, I very much doubt it. I, like so many others, go about my business, day in day out, year upon year, decade after decade, hopefully existence upon existence, unseen, unnoticed, simply doing. Yet the pursuance of my 'Prime' is, I now think, what helps me to stay young in spirit, whilst the laws of human entropy get to work on my being.
The hazards, threats, and failure modes we encounter through life and therefore the miracle of our existence as you often write, are truly the Musings of the Risks we must monitor. Better to keep working harder in in slowing entropy and creating plasticity, striving to get your next Prime, than not, allowing older to creep in, and watching your future shrink before your eyes.
(( if anyone is wondering, yes, I see all the ironies in the logic of my little eulogy ;) ))
The older I have gotten the more I recognise this is, possibly, one of your more important articles Stephanie Losi (name in full due to my deference to this important wordage).