My thoughts didn’t form in a vacuum. My thoughts are shaped by the thoughts of others and observations of the world around me. Here are some of the thinkers, authors and doers who provided the ideas and inspiration behind my current outlook:
Dan Roam: I’ve always been interested in how the mind operates. I picked up Dan Roam’s book Back of the Napkin while working on a Senior Military Staff, which entailed A LOT of PowerPoint presentations. Presentations are all about illustrating associations, Dan’s book does an outstanding job explaning the illustration of associations in ways that work with peoples brains. Dan’s book introduced me to the work of Jeff Hawkins.
Jeff Hawkins: After inventing the Palm Pilot, Jeff Hawkins turned his attention to developing an overarching theory of mind. Jeff’s book On Intelligence introduced me to the concept of hierarchal organization in the cortex, where relatively simple information is bundled together to form complex concepts.
Ray Kurzweil: Ray Kurzeweil provided two lessons for me. Lesson 1 was in chapter 3 of his book How To Create a Mind. It’s a helpful picture of how excitatory input and inhibitory input might influence the output of a neuron. Lesson 2 was provided in chapter 1 of his book The Singularity is Near. Ray has a chart that shows the time between innovations approaching zero – meaning humans are learning faster than ever before. The implications are exciting and scary at the same time.
V.S. Ramachandran – The image I have in my mind of the structure of the cortex was formed by the work of V.S. Ramachandran and Sebastian Seung. In his book The Tell Tale Brain, Professor Ramachandran shares his observations of brains which are not functioning normally and explains what those differences tell us about how the brain functions and how it is organized. The most valuable chapters were chapter 1 and the evidence phantom limb phenomena provides for a predefined overarching structure and chapter 2, where Professor Ramachandran discusses visual pathways 1,2 and 3. The simultaneous flow of information along parallel paths explains a lot about our reactions to stimuli.
Sebastian Seung – In his book Connectome and TED talk, Professor Seung outlines his theory of how the connections between neurons make us who we are. In his TED talk, Professor Seung shows a computer rendition of a single neuron and it’s connections to adjacent neurons. The image illustrates the density of neural networks and a possible mechanism for how memories (links between neurons) are grown.
RSA Animate – RSA Animate demonstrates the power of simplicity in conveying new ideas. Whiteboard animations are used to emphasize concepts from world class presentations. The videos are all excellent and worth watching. Recommended starting points: Iain McGhilcrist on The Divided Brain (although the Left Brain / Right Brain theory is falling by the wayside, this is still a thought inspiring presentation if you view the split as conscious / subconscious vs left/right), Sir Ken Robinson on Paradigm Shifts in education, Dan Pink on Drive (motivation to work).
Chip & Dan Heath – The Heath brothers are talented authors who do an outstanding job communicating difficult subjects. Switch got me thinking of the roles of the conscious and subconscious and how to leverage their strengths and avoid their weaknesses to change behavior. Made to Stick provided helpful insights into sharing ideas.
Charles Duhigg – Charles Duhigg in The Power of Habit, explains habits and how to improve them for both individuals and organizations. An easy read with lots of examples and illustrative stories.
Daniel Kahneman – Professor Kahneman was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics for his work on the psychology of decision making. Thinking, Fast and Slow is an insightful book that discusses his work. I was most impressed with the method of problem solving he and his research partner, Amos Tversky used – they went for walks and talked it out.
Tim Ferriss – Tim Ferriss is focused on lifestyle design and continuous learning. He and his partner won the World Tango Championships in Argentina after practicing together for only 5 months and he won the Chinese National Kickboxing Championships after practicing for four weeks and hacking the contest. Tim is a master of deconstructing a skill to find the best place to leverage effort. His third book, The 4-Hour Chef, uses cooking to explore his learning methods.
Josh Waitzkin – Josh Waitzkin spent 8 years as the number one ranked chess player in his age groups before walking away from chess and becoming the World Champion in T’ai Chi Ch’aun, the martial form of T’ai Chi. His book, The Art Of Learning, is an entertaining and well written presentation of five years of thinking on the skill of learning. Josh is the one of the best in the world at optimizing mental performance. You can get an update on his thinking from a April 2014 podcast he did with Tim Ferris.
Ken Robinson – Ken Robinson’s books and TED talks highlight the importance of education and why education is more than just reading, writing and math.
Ed Catmull – The two biggest challenges for groups of people working together are accurately sharing ideas (getting the thoughts from my head into your head) and generating cohesion (keeping the whole group pulling together in the same direction). With 14 straight top rated animated features, Pixar has developed a process to repeat success in both areas. Ed Catmull is brilliant and humbly describes how he and his amazing team do it in Creativity, Inc.
My son. My son has taught me much more than I’ve taught him. We are born with very little capability. Witnessing the exponential growth and compounding effects of learning new skills during the first years of life has been an incredible gift.
The Top Four Recommendations:
Dan Coyle, The Talent Code. The concept is simple (repitition improves connections), the implication are huge. The brain operates by associations. The Talent Code is an entertaining explanation of how the connections are formed and strengthened and how the concepts can be applied to learning new skills.
Peter M. Vishton, Understanding the Secrets of Human Perception – This Teaching Company course provides a fascinating insight into the richness and complexity of human senses. Habits link cues to actions – The Talent Code explains how to build links, Secrets of Perception provides insight into all the sources of information that are available to you. (Wait for the course to go on sale).
Joshua Foer, Moonwalking With Einstein. The best book on memorization. Ever. Josh went from a regular guy to the US Memory Champion in a year. Moonwalking with Einstein tells the story and explains the techniques. Easy to read and entertaining.
Peter Schwartz, The Art of the Long View. I spent 10 years on Senior Military Staffs doing long term strategic planning. The Military Decision Making Process is as tedious and painful as it sounds. The Art of the Long View provides an intuitive process that facilitates better planning and better decisions. With today’s rapidly changing world, the process is more useful than ever.