Red skies, AI, and icebreakers

A smoky morning here as we have smoke from the huge Bear Gulch fire in Washington swirling around the Salish Sea on a southeasterly flow. Skies are clear above the smoke but this morning’s sun was a marischino cherry rising over the mountains.

My friend Kari Boyle is a lawyer and mediator and posts at SLaw, the Canadian Online Law Magazine. This week she has a post on AI and conflict management riffing a bit on a post I shared last month.

It is inconceivable to me at this point that life wasn’t present on Mars at some point. It just feels like everything we are learning about that planet points towards that conclusion. It feels inevitable. Last week some exciting news was published in Nature and then explained by people like David Grinspoon and Neil Tyson DeGrasse. The questions they dive into later in the interview are stunning in their implications. (Bonus points for his whiteboard editorializing).

Two delightful articles about philosophy. Peter Levine on the politics (and philosophy) of nostalgia. And Doug Muir at Crooked Timber has a lovely reflection on ethics.

A decent (but not ultimate) guide to opening activities for group work.