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In the development of software as part of Agile and the end of each Sprint there is something called a Retrospective. This is where you review now what was done but the process or how it was done. It is an interesting technique to help improve so the next time the team does it better. When it comes to personal lives, often we create resolutions, or promises that most people stop after a week or two. This is forward thinking but not really dissecting the previous year.

This weekend, I was kind of busy but now have a three day weekend, I decided to evaluate last year but asking myself a series of tough questions, and then figure out adjustments I should make. I challenge others to do the same, and it does not have to be once a year, you can do it anytime you want to make a change. I broke it into a series of categories.

Growth

1. What was my big win for the year? What was the one accomplishment that stood out, and that I am proud of?
2. What new skill did I move from the “I want to learn that” to I added that to my tool belt?
3. What was one thing that stood in my way?
4. What did I change my Mind on last year?
5. What held my back from my potential? (could be person, challenges etc)
6. What didn’t I do because of fear?

Health

1. Did I do good enough on my diet?
2. How consistent was I on my exercise, did I improve in anyway?
3. What state is my body in the end of the year?
4. What habit should I deprecate?
5. What created energy for me?
6. What took away energy from me?

Experiences

1. What did I experience last year that made an impact on my life?
2. What did I avoid or say no to, that I regretted?
3. Did I invest enough in core relationships ?
4. What experiences made me feel most alive?

I am sure there could be more, and though i wanted to keep it short, maybe 5-10 questions, as I started writing them I realized, that I wanted to dig deeper into my year and figure out how to improve myself.

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted, and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket; my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated, and all spam will be removed. 
 
This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them. 

In 1980 a sword and sorcery movie was released called “Hawk the Slayer.” For its time it was probably an awful movie but being a kid, we loved it.  It really was a B movie, the special effects were not that special, the story line was very trite. Now if you have not seen the movie, I will not wreck the ending, but I will talk about a few specific scenes in the movie. So go to YouTube or somewhere you can find it and watch it but it will be a good ninety-four minutes you won’t get back.  

About six minutes into the movie, you see a warrior running away from a battle struggling. We later learned that his name is Ranulf. He reaches a convent, and the sisters bring him in to heal him. A few minutes later in the movie, Voltan (the antagonist) bust into the convent to kidnap the Abbess from the convent, Ranuff tries to intervene, he has Voltan in the sights of his repeating crossbow but does not fire. Voltan in one quick motion throws a knife hitting Ranulf, and when Voltan’s henchmen go to finish him, Voltan stops them.  

I am going to fast forward a bit in the movie, as most is not pertinent to this post. Towards the end of the movie, Voltan again faces Ranulf (who has gotten help from the protagonist) as he believes he has won the battle. He says I gave you a second chance, and you have used your time wisely. This is the line I want to focus on.  

Have you ever found that you really have a second chance? How did you use it? Was it a second chance in a relationship? A second chance at work? Or a second chance in life? For me, it was a second chance in life. Not everyone knows how a football injury could have ended my life, but lots of luck, a dream and some great doctors saved me. The question I started to think about, have I used my second chance that well.  

I often focus on the mistakes I make, the issue in front of me, and yes, my mind keeps me up thinking about them. But then there are days where I take advantage of the life I built, the fortunes I have and the people I know do some good. This past week I hosted another volunteer event at the Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital in NYC.  I am very thankful that I can get the time off to use it, that I have a great team that is willing to donate their time, and to be able to donate supplies for the children. Very thankful for the team at MSCH for allowing us to go there.  

It was a great afternoon with kids who need some cheer this holiday season. It is days like that where I can look back and say I am trying to use my second chance well. I may have made other mistakes and screwed up some other second chances. But I do try to make some people’s lives better, and I will continue to do so as long as I can. I just need to find other opportunities to do the same.  

Lastly, I am very fortunate that my daughters want to follow in my footsteps. 

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers, have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising, and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write, you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted, and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket; my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated, and all spam will be removed.  

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web, I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them. 

Growing up, my family owned a 73 Ford LTD station wagon in yellow. This car took us on tons of family vacations, was affectionately known as the ambulance and was the first car I did any kind of maintenance on. Why do I mention this car? Well, it is the center of multiple family stories, including one. My dad was famous for procrastinating; I am sure I inherited that from him.  

When I was in high school, the car didn’t finally start. It was on our driveway for weeks. My mom would remind him to cancel the car insurance as we got a replacement car.  The weeks turned into months and suddenly it was the middle of winter. One day it snowed, so much we had a “snow day” at school.  This being the early 80’s there was no zoom class to replace it.  

My brother was bored and decided to try to fix the car. Somehow, he was able to get it started and decided to take it for a spin. My brother didn’t come home for a while. My parents got a call the cops found the car, and it had hit a pole. There was no mention of my brother.  

Of course there was damage to the car, the pole etc. And in this case my mom was pretty upset as we would be responsible for the costs etc. But in this case my dad’s procrastination paid off, he still had not cancelled insurance, so it was covered. Of all the times that procrastination causes issues, in this case it benefited us.  

Oh, now you are asking about what happened to my brother.  He apparently got out of the car and walked a few blocks and passed out in a snowbank. Making it home later.  

Why tell this story?  Well, it is an old family story, and it keeps it alive, but also puts focus on thoughts about procrastination. In this case, we had not gotten rid of the car yet. If we did, it would be different. The car being in the driveway insurance should be kept on it. But it does show that occasionally procrastination does have advantages.  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers, have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising, and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write, you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted, and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket; my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated, and all spam will be removed.  

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web, I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them. 

This is week two, and normally I would move to the next question. The challenge of asking myself what energy level is still going, but it makes me think about other things. There are days I woke up with the energy to tackle anything, including tough decisions. But it also exposed days that I struggled with energy that I did not want to make any decisions complex or simple.  

Decision making is an interesting part of daily life. From what to do when you get up, to what you chose to wear, what to eat etc. These decisions can be seen in two ways. First, they can be seen as unnecessary decisions and taking energy from you. By making many of these choices during the day you lack the energy to make tougher ones. There are people who try to remove these decisions from their lives. People like Einstein, Steve Jobs and others had one outfit and thus cut that decision out.  

There are people who meal prep, like me and this takes the decision off the table. If you are focused on macros or some type of diet, meal prep is one way to guarantee you stick to it.  It also prevents the “What am I going to eat?” issue. How many times do you get home at night, open the fridge and stare thinking what do I want to eat? Or at the office lunchtime comes and you are trying to pick where to go for food, and when you get there what to get? There is a belief that these decisions hamper your ability to make other more important decisions.  

But could you train your mind to make these decisions quickly so there is little or no impact on your other decisions. Or even possible that it helps the ability to make decisions. Paraphrasing Bruce Lee, water does not hesitate when it hits an obstacle, it finds a new path. If you practice making decisions, you can become better at it. Understanding how to make small decision quickly if understanding you do not need to see every piece of information.  

You know your wardrobe and what outfit goes together. And if i is just a regular day you should be able to make a quick decision on what to wear. If you did the food shopping, you should know the food in your fridge and have meals in mind. In both cases you can train yourself to make these choices quickly. The thought is the more choices you make the better you get at it. This in turn helps you making other decisions. Your brain will focus on the keys needed to make the decision, remove the noise and have clarity in how to respond.  

Waiting for the right time or delaying decisions does not mean they are any better. But training yourself to recognize when the information is enough and how to gather it quickly so your reactions can be swift and not hasty.  Perfection never comes and I and others have written that perfection is the enemy of good. Movement is better than being stuck, and if again like water you can be agile to adjust.  

This idea of decision making all brought on by questioning my energy level, and the key is do have have the energy to make tough decisions. As I dug deep, I found it is not my energy that should drive whether I make them, but training my brain to be able to make them no matter what energy level I am at. There will be days I have no choice but to make a choice, and if I am not prepared, I have less chance of success, and worse if I am not agile, I will not be able to adjust as needed. I indeed need to be “like water my friend.”  

Please note Bruce Lee’s quotes on water go much deeper than just decision making and will leave it to my reader to do their research. This is just one part of being water. My journey of questioning myself every morning about energy will continue and maybe bring some more insights on where I need to improve. As for my meal preparation, I still think I will continue as it is not about decision making, but also about convenience.  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted, and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket; my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated, and all spam will be removed.  

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them. 

This is going to be something new, in being introspective I have often talked about what I have done, and my philosophy of how I got there. I told stories that somehow had a moral. Those seem to get have the most engagement. But now I am thinking about my life, and I have made a few revelations. 

First, I have won. And I bet most of the people who read this are in the same situation. We do not want to admit it, and we are thinking of the thousands of other stupid problems that can be simple stated as a first world problem. I did talk about my dad a bit, but one thing my mom said a lot when the shit hit a fan, she would just say “It is a temporary inconvenience” or “it is a small hurdle.” It is hard to believe that, but there are things I thought were life changing issues, but really, I survived them. And I am sure there are more coming, and I hopefully will not freak out, and just get over the hurdle somehow. 

Second, at work in the field I am in we use something called a retrospective to help improve. This is a few hours meeting to discuss not what we did, but how we did it and how can we improve the how. Improve the system of how we work, “the what” will get better. I have written about system versus goals before, and I am sure there are dozens of YouTube videos on the topic.  

Why am i not doing a retrospective on myself? Why am I not asking myself how I am doing things and adjust it if the how is not working? Over the next few months, I put together some questions to ask myself daily. I am going to start with one question, and each day answer that question, and once I have gotten good at asking that question daily I will ask a second one. The goal is to ask the questions daily and be honest with the answers.  

You might wonder why I strive to improve even after claiming victory. In Bruce Lee’s film Game of Death, he climbs a tower, overcoming new obstacles at each level—reflecting his belief that progress requires learning. By asking these questions, I am seeking to understand myself and get better, even if my challenges are not as dramatic as fighting Kareem Abdul Jabbar. 

The first question that I will start with tomorrow as soon as I wake up is What is my energy level right now, and where should it be? This question is to give myself the ability to choose tasks the fit my energy level. I am struggling I should start with something small and build my energy level up, if it is high, I should tackle things that are more complex. I want to get in the habit of answering that question every morning and driving my tasks on it. The goal is to see if it will make me more productive.  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted, and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket; my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated, and all spam will be removed. 

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them. 

Happy Father’s Day. I texted this today to friends and family, I of course could not say it to my dad. Sadly, we lost him a few days before Father’s Day last year. I spent some time reflecting on what it means to be a dad, what it means to be a father and how fortunate many people are, including me.  

I wrote once about making mistakes when you are young is a good thing, but as an adult and as a parent your mistakes are multiplied. I had a discussion with my dad about a decision he made before he passed. He was struggling with wondering if he made the right decision about something. That decision was made thirty plus years ago, and it was still on his mind. I asked him if he thought he made the right choice, he said he did.  

We make hundreds of choices every day, from when to get out of bed, what to do first, to the choice of clothes we wear to what we eat. There are people who go out of their way to make fewer decisions in their daily lives, Steve Jobs was famous for wearing the same outfit every day. He got the idea while visiting in Japan and saw workers wearing a uniform. Einstein was also known for wearing the same grey suit also.  By making fewer decisions we reduce are decision fatigue, and thus can make better decisions when it matters.

More recently from the Harry Potter movies the quote “It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.” That brought a whole new generation of people thinking about the choices they make. The quote is all over graduation speeches, tattoos etc. The quote reminds us that we others will judge us on decisions we make, and they will define us. Before Harry Potter it was Luke Sywalker’s making which side of the force he was on, and I am sure before that other movies that surface the one choice that defines us.

I guess I should get back to the decision my father had to make, and why I thought about it this weekend. If we are choices who define what we really are, what happens when we make the wrong ones, or choices others don’t agree with. The obvious answer is taking responsibility for decision, but that is not so simple. For people who we know who disagree, what is their part in the decision. Should they have empathy, forgiveness or just respect our choice.

And for my dad, I did spend time thinking about his decision. As there is no way to rewind and go and play it over and see what happens. Unfortunately there is not an easy way from me to jump to another universe where he made the other decision. I may one day find a way to jump to it and see what happened. Instead, right now I am looking at my friends, my family and my kids and I realize, I do not have to find another universe. He made the right decision. Our decisions help define who we are, but so does our acceptance of other decision around us, as those choices along with our own are what made us.

Somewhere my dad is watching, and as I told him before when he asked, yes you made the right decision. In fact, all your decisions were correct.  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted, and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket; my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated, and all spam will be removed. 

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog. AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them

This weekend was the last of three races in a row for F1, the Spanish Gran Prix. Now Formula one is not my favorite auto sport, but I got into it as my daughter loves it and being a geek on autos and tech was something we could share. Formula E (electric) is more my thing.  

The race was typical for Formula 1 this year, the start is important. Getting out in into the lead and into clear air is an advantage. The next advantage was Tire management, and the eventually winner did both to perfection. But this is not the story if the race, or why we watch sports. What happened a little further back in the pack was the interesting part of the race. 

Four-time champion Max Verstappen and one of the best drivers showed human emotions. He in a rage of anger bumped another car. There was a series of incidents that led to him getting this angry and he was not angry at the car he tapped but blowing up as part of a chain of events. The one thing I was thinking was the AI autonomous drivers would never do this.  

If there is a race of autonomous vehicles, they will try to drive the perfect race. The systems will algorithmically figure out optimal decisions. Choosing when to pass, where to pass and the exact move would be impressive. Each driver would have this, and well it would be boring. We do not watch sports for perfection, in fact the opposite. There was a running joke that people watch NASCAR races for the crashes. But the crashes are simply just mistakes. Humans make mistakes and thus make watching sports that more interesting.  

I love hockey and watching it when a goal is scored there is immediate reaction about the goalie making a mistake. In most cases there are a few mistakes as there are five other players on the ice. How did the puck get to the shooter? How did the shooter get open? How did the puck get into the zone? Yes, there are a ton of players with talent and sometimes there is a great play, but in most goals, there are mistakes made. This makes the sport interesting to watch.  

There recently was a boxing robot match, and a marathon for autonomous robots, but did not go well. It was interesting to see the failures and mistakes. It was laughable to watch. If the robots get it perfect, I am not sure how interesting it would be to watch. I have written about failure before and so have a lot of others. There is the notion about celebrating failure, allowing people to fail, and learning from mistakes. As an outside observer it is these small mistakes and failures that make a great race. 

Thinking about watching mistakes there was a whole TV show based on it, called Americas Funniest Videos. This was really us watching things go horribly wrong and celebrating it. While there is a lot of talk about AI taking over but there is something where I think humans will continue to be needed. Please not I am not condoning what Max did, or any violent behavior, but it was his team’s strategy and other mistakes that made the race enjoyable to watch.  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted, and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket; my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated, and all spam will be removed. 

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them 

During this morning’s workout a classic Boston song started blasting. While lifting and singing I started thinking about the classic argument, “If someone leaves a band, is it the same band?” Why think about it listening to Boston?  Tom Scholz fooled the record industry by recording all the instruments himself and brought on Brad Delp. Many people recognize the bad by Brad’s unbelievable vocal style. Sadly, Brad passed away in 2007. But in 2017, I saw Boston in concert. No Brad. And yet, it’s still one of the most memorable shows I have attended. 

One can argue without Brad it is not Boston, but I was fine going to see them. I can list dozens of other bands I have gone to see that had a member lineup change.  Some due to death of a member, some to disagreements etc. Some of my favorite bands of all time spent their whole existence in constant flux of members.  Asia’s lineup diagram: 

A four-member band should not have this many lineup changes, but I can say I have seen them with many of these configurations.  

I can see the hate comments already and giving me arguments about certain bands that were never the same etc. Or even post the classic argument about David Lee Roth Van Halen split. These discussions are fine with friends, but after I got passed thinking about Boston, I wondered if there is a parallel between changing lineups in bands and my personal life.  

In our lives we have lineup changes, but this is with friends and coworkers. I look at my life five years ago, ten years ago or even just a year ago, and people have come and gone. Social media has helped (both work and professional) but then there is that theoretical limit. The Dunbar Number which states, you really can only really maintain only one hundred and fifty contacts at one time. So that means in your band, well maybe your orchestra as that is a lot of people, does have lineup changes. Whether it is work contacts, personal contacts or a combination of both, there is movement. It may not be the members swapping in and out like Asia, but it does happen. 

People compliment my connections at work, and I work hard to stay connected with so many people. When I mentor someone, I teach them how to build a contact spreadsheet, but it is not the list that matters, it is reaching out to the people often that is. Just saying hi to someone and checking in on them keeps the network stronger. I note to always preface if it is a work contact with “Not important” or “this is just a check in.” There are always those who I lost touch with, and in many cases I am good with that.  

When I started to write I realized I focused too much on the people who left my band. They could have left by choice, by circumstance or just accident, but my focus was on the loss. I made a conscious choice not to see Queen with Adam Lambert as Freddy was just so amazing that no one could replace him, yet I had no problem seeing four different lineups of Yes. All the reasons I make for not seeing Queen are just excuses, and I am missing experiences. In my personal life some people who I let go of that I wish I did not. But unlike Queen where I can buy a ticket for the next show, it is not that easy.  

I know it will be a challenge; I should focus on the people that are around. I remembered the quote from then Coach Dick Vermil when Trent Greene got injured and the St Louis Rams were going to have to play with Kurt Warner. “”We will rally around Kurt Warner, and we will play good football.”  It seemed to work out, they went on to win the Super Bowl. Years ago, when we had a mass exodus in the area I was in the MD got a few of us in his room he asked a question “What are we going to do?” My reaction was “We are going to reallocate the work with people we have and move forward.” This seems so easy in a professional setting, but not as easy in a personal setting. 

Hearing a Boston song during my work out my mind bounced around linking lineups to life it was a chuck full day. I am still wondering if what I can take out of this will help me going forward, but it does put many things that have been bothering me in perspective.  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated and all spam will be removed. 

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them. 

I wonder why sometimes I defend a bad position. I know that I am wrong, but I stand my ground. I think of myself as someone who is driven by science, and that when given a more correct answer I will always move in the right direction. It is not in all cases, but occasionally I eschew science and drive down the wrong direction.  My dive into AI is starting to expose my own human mind as well as others. Now before I dig in deep let us dive into some history. 

Originally humans decided that we are the most intelligent species because we have the largest brain. Comparing ourselves with other animals we believed we have the biggest brains in the animal kingdom. Our dominance was due to that size; thus, brain size must be the sign of intelligence. This also translates into fiction, watch a movie that has aliens in it and what do you notice. They all have big heads! Why? Simple, if they can travel through space, they must be smarter than us, hence a bigger brain, and that leads to a big head on Aliens in movies.  

Science though got in the way of this bigger brain theory. As we studied the animal kingdom, we discovered that we did not have the biggest brains. The Sperm whale has that honor. In a panic humans did what we do best, we changed the definition, it was now ratio of brain size to body size determines intelligence. That should have been shot down immediately as insects would win that, but for not we ignore facts.  

When computers came about, we needed a way to test its intelligence. The Turning test came out in 1949 (Alan Turning) and really had a simple thought. If an evaluator cannot tell the difference between a person and a machine, the machine passes the test. This is interesting, and those of us who are aging well remember fun software like Eliza. This was an interesting program that many developers wrote versions of that would be a chatbot and you could converse with it. It had some simple responses and could not really think. It could fake some people out, and I am sure someone would argue that these simple programs could pass a test. 

Fast forward to November of 2022 and ChatGPT drops. And suddenly there is a chat tool that just blows people away. I know I am skipping a lot of chat failures, but when ChatGPT came out AI hit mainstream. Technically if you chatted with one, or some humans you may not be able to tell the difference Turning test solved. Well like the brain size before, we moved the goal posts. Humans first started attacking them, finding where they would go awry. People had to prove that these new chat tools (and ones after) have flaws that they are not as smart as people.  

The latest thought is Humanities Last Exam. This is such a hard exam that even the best AI tool only scored 10% on this test. It is a test of 3,000 questions on complex topics that you could not easily google an answer. Just as the test came out new models are created that slowly do better. What happens when AI models are suddenly scoring on the high 90s? They will rename the test the Humanities Second to Last Exam and a new Exam will be created.  

In our desire to show we are superior to AI we move the definition of intelligence. In Neil de Grasse Tyson’s book he starts out saying “The universe is under no obligation to make sense to you.”  Though we often talk about AI currently being a Stocastic Parrot but is it possible that it moves away from that? There is a classic saying that something is impossible till it is not (paraphrasing Nelson Mandela) and when it does change is it possible that we do not understand it? 

Revisiting the beginning of this post, why do I not admit I am wrong when presented with normally convincing evidence. It is the same reaction humans have with AI, we want to believe we are the smartest, most intelligent thing. The belief of being wrong is a lack of intelligence. It is not, being wrong is just that, you are wrong in that situation. It is a sign of intelligence to recognize it, make the correction and move on.  If you correct Chat GPT, it acknowledges that it was wrong and gives a different answer so maybe it is already more intelligent than humans. Guess I will spend my time trying to be more like it. 

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated and all spam will be removed.

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them. 

Have you ever done some home repair, and while doing so you need something you do not have? I could be a fastener, a piece of wood, a piece of metal, anything. What do you often do, you try to be creative. You look around for alternatives, you dig through an old soup container of bolts and screws. I have done this, a few months ago the bottom of a sink cabinet was ruined, and i found old shelves that i was able to cut to replace it. Instant fix. The notion that you need to find solutions with a limited universe is not new.

In the space race against Russia to land on the moon the Guidance Computers on the Apollo mission had a measly 4KB of RAM. Read that again 4KB, not Mega, not Giga but KB. The software developers had to optimize every line of code to fit in the small space. I can only imagine how hard they worked to figure it all out. They were limited by the technology that was available at the time. Sometimes limits are self-imposed, imposed by outside or just parameters you need to work within.

How about Super Mario Brothers game? The developers had to squeeze it into a 256 kilobits cartridge, and in doing so they made a lot of concessions to fit it. It added 3-4 extra weeks to development, so what if sound effects were recycled? Other examples include the first Palm Pilot (think pre-iPhone) had 128k of RAM, the first Mars rover 512k RAM, and the TI-83 graphing calculator had 32k of RAM.

Why is this the topic? In the end of December (2024) as a Christmas gift a new AI model was released called Deep Seek V3. The Chinese company that built it had was under a lot of limitations, more like restrictions. While other companies are spending billions building or leveraging massive GPU farms, Deep Seek needed to think differently based on the restrictions they were under. Without the resources of the larger companies, they found a novel way of training.

According to the Deep Seek GitHub, they only used 2.664M of H800 GPU (much older NVIDIA GPUS) for pretraining, and 0.1M GPU hours for additional training. The cost is somewhere around $5M. Compared to the model most people know, Open AI spent approximately $100M to train their current model, other models the estimate is around that same $100M with them being vocal about it costing a lot more to do the next model.

Bruce Lee said “If you always put limits on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them.” I am going to disagree with Bruce this time. Limits as shown above drive creativity. Whether it is internal or external limits, those who can find the answers, exploit the loopholes think differently will break though. In every situation we are in there is a limited universe for us to work in. It is our ability to adapt, create and find solutions is what defines success. To rephrase a different Bruce Lee quote, “Use Limits as no limits”

Note: I started writing this early in January and took a step back after a few drafts and was thinking this may break a principle I keep. I did not want to promote or demean a public company. I was fortunate that others saw this, and today before this was posted the markets already reacted. My goal is for me to stop worrying about limits and find freedom in the box. If others can do it, why can’t I? I often am caught saying we cannot do this do to some limitation, I should be saying “Let me rethink this, there must be a solution within our guidelines”

The other thing I started to think about is the limits I put on others. I should think about them and ensure that there is a good reason to do so. Putting limits that someone will find the loophole is not successful, limits that are for protection, security and have some thought could be good. Thanks to all the teams who succeed given impossible limitations and giving us motivation to do the same. A friend mentioned to me that necessity is the mother of invention, but maybe the line should be necessity is the mother of creativity.

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising, and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted, and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free. You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated, and all spam will be removed.

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog. AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them.