Supremacy Book Review

Supremacy – Parmy Olson

by Artificial IntelligenceBook ReviewsDigital Future

AI seems to be everywhere at the moment. The media machine and the echo chamber of social media algorithms have bathed my feeds in news, white papers, and academic articles about the latest digital revolution. I have to admit here that before reading Supremacy, my knowledge of AI and the large language models that drove the algorithms and machine learning behind them was a bit of a foreign concept.

Although Supremacy sets out a history of just two AI companies (ChatGPT and DeepMind) and the personalities that shaped and invested in them and subsequently bought them, Parmy Olson does a great job of explaining throughout what drives AI tools—at least the ones that are competing head-on with search engines.

If you want a history of AI and a glance at the potential future, this is a great book to start with. It is surprisingly entertaining and deeply fascinating while still being very ‘quaffable’. Having recently finished the book, I am about to flip back to Page 1 and start again – as I am sure I will get a few more golden nuggets of insights I didn’t pick up the first time.

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Unlocked Pete Etchells Book Review

Unlocked – Pete Etchells

by Book ReviewsCyberPsychology

Cyberpsychology / media-based psychological research is both under-funded and under-resourced. This is because, along with many other reasons,

  • CyberPsychology and media/digital technology-based psychological research is such a new field,
  • there are not enough academics conducting research across each area of digital and human interaction,
  • research results can be contradictory (for a number of reasons),
  • not enough of this research is leaking out into the public domain
  • digital technology is being invented and upgraded faster than research can be conducted and disseminated, and
  • it is relatively easy for journalists to pick up on research headlines and sensationalise the results to gain clicks, 

There are also not enough books or publicity about the findings from the research that is being conducted that are easy for the general public to consume. 

This is one of those books that every adult should read if they are interested in understanding more about their own and their children’s technology use.

It demystifies a number of concepts and debunks a lot of current debates, along with showcasing how a few recently released books (relating to human-technology interaction) have missed the mark and caused some unnecessary moral panic.

There are a number of academic concepts that Pete Etchells covers throughout the book and he refers to a number of research methodologies and results outcomes that can be slightly overwhelming and difficult to follow. But if you press through these explanations, there is a wealth of insights that are very worth absorbing. 

His last few chapters provide great practical ways to both view and engage with technology. He proposes that we use technology as tools that we have mastery over, rather than as masters that we have no personal agency over, or inherent ability to manage. 

He also provides an interesting perspective for parents around their children’s technology use and suggests some research-based strategies for a more effective way of managing a healthier relationship with technology. 

My only criticism of the Audible book is that the narration is very difficult to listen to. For me, it came across as tedious and patronising and distracted too much from the insights of the book. It’s highly unlikely I will build up enough motivation to listen to the Audible book again, and would recommend buying the physical book instead.

About Pete Etchells:

Pete is a professor of psychology and science communication at Bath Spa University. His research looks at the behavioural and well-being effects of playing video games. He is also interested in metascientific issues regarding best practices in digital technology effects research.

Adapted from his website: https://www.peteetchells.com/

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The Anxious Generation Page Header

The Anxious Generation – Jonathan Haidt

by Book ReviewsChildren, Teens and DigiTech

Jonathan Haidt is a social psychologist.

This is different from a CyberPsychologist, in that social psychology takes a broader view of issues (including digital technology) that may or may not affect a collective group of similar people within an environment or context.

A CyberPsychologist will focus more on the individual level of how a person (who has specific traits that are similar to traits others have) interacts with and is impacted by various types of digital technology. 

There are likely to be a number of CyberPsychologists who will disagree with a lot of the concepts, propositions and conclusions within this book. I would suggest that this is partly because the worldview and direction of study differs quite substantially, but also partly because he has not focussed on Digital Technology as his primary psychology speciality.

For those who do disagree with his approach to, and misreading of, the data the suggestion is that he is cherry picking research that fits his theories while ignoring research that contradicts it. Correlation does not imply causation.

Being a relatively new research area, there are many nuances, subtleties and new findings in CyberPsychology that a social scientist may not take into account when diving into these topics. 

I don’t agree with everything he lays out in this book. He seems to veer off the main topic on several occasions, creating a few tenuous links back to his topic or argument. Additionally, some of his explanations are based on his very specific worldview that does not necessarily link back to other research. It seems a one-sided argument, that does not consider or weigh up other contradictory evidence.

However, he does present a number of compelling arguments and data to the reader that showcases a correlation between the launch of smartphones / social media and the increase in mental health conditions amongst teens in the last few decades. 

  • He talks through how the role ‘helicopter parenting’ has delayed the development of a sense of independence amongst teens and how the fear of real-world dangers has played into parents giving their children smartphones at a younger and younger age. 
  • He includes how Big Tech exploits very specific developmental stages and present the case of how different online elements affect teenage girls and teenage boys differently. 
  • He finishes by providing a number of suggested solutions for parents, schools and institutions and how we may be able to reverse the social trends we are witnessing amongst younger children.

Although the book is written for a USA audience, and based a mostly on data and research from the US, the theories and solutions he presents are still mostly relevant for other English speaking Western audiences.

Whether you agree or disagree with Mr Haidt on the issues and solutions he presents in his book, it is still worth a read. But, like any argument, it is always worth balancing it with those who have an alternative perspective on the same issues around how Big Tech, smartphones and social media may be influencing us and our teens.

We still have so much to learn about the longer-term impact of Digital Technology on human behaviour and psychology, especially amongst children, but we also know more than we did a decade ago. 

You can read a review in favour of his book in The Atlantic here, and a critique of his theories, research and book in The Daily Beast here.

Below are a few interviews Jonathan Haidt has conducted explaining more about the theories, concepts and solutions he presents throughout his book.

You can find out more about his book The Anxious Generation here.

About Jonathan Haidt:

Jonathan Haidt is a social psychologist and the Thomas Cooley Professor of Ethical Leadership at New York University’s Stern School of Business.

He is the author of The Happiness Hypothesis, The Righteous Mind and co-author of The Coddling of the American Mind.

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Slow Productivity – Cal Newport

by Book ReviewsWorkplace Norms, Expectations and Responsibilities

In his book Slow Productivity, Cal Newport makes a convincing argument that we need to slow down, rather than speed up if we are to become more usefully productive. 

He does a deep-dive into how we got to the place of what he refers to as ‘pseudo-productivity – The use of visible activity as the primary means of approximating actual productive effort‘ in a knowledge-work context and how this is leading to burnout. 

This is especially relevant in the context of remote and hybrid workers, where productivity signalling is needed to showcase levels of busyness and relevance within a job role. 

The premise of this book is for knowledge workers to be less focused on producing lower-value knowledge widgets – juggling emails, messages, etc to feel more ‘productive’ and get more items ticked off the To-Do List. He suggests we spend more time engaging in deeper work that produces greater value knowledge products and output over an extended period. 

This logic is counter-intuitive for today’s fast-paced DigiTech-driven transaction-based business culture; where employees are mostly just a number and an individual career is more about transferable professional skills than staying with one company for extended periods. 

Maybe it’s time to shift our business culture to a more sustainable, more value-driven one of Slow Productivity.

Cal’s logic is sound and this way of operating within a business environment (whether employed or self-employed) along with the skills we should develop from his previous book Deep Work will give those who embrace these philosophies a strategic and tactical advantage over the prevailing shallower focussed skillset of the majority of knowledge workers.

About Cal Newport:

Cal Newport is an associate professor of computer science at Georgetown University, USA. He has published a number of non-fiction books and conducts a lot of research on the interaction of humans and technology. 

You can find out more about him on his website.

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The Habit Revolution

The Habit Revolution – Dr Gina Cleo

by Book ReviewsDigital Health & Wellbeing

The Habit Revolution is a science-backed approach to how habits are formed, how less desirable habits can be changed and how positive habits can be reinforced. 

The book summary talks about it being ‘Beyond Atomic Habits’. Atomic Habits is a bit more case-study based. The Habit Revolution is more science-based. It is a deeper-dive version of how to change habitual behaviour that takes you into the how and why – helping to reduce the blame and guilt that comes from unhealthy habitual behaviour and providing many more psychological and behavioural tools and techniques to help with positive change.

If you want advice on how to make tiny, manageable, realistic changes that compound into large life-changing habits and behaviour, this book really is a revolution.

Dr Gina Cleo has a number of videos that you can watch on her YouTube channel, which can be found here.

Below is her showreel that gives you a flavour of the information she reveals in the book.

About Dr Gina Cleo:

Dr Ceelo is a leading expert in habit change. You can read more about her and what she does on her website. 

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Dopamine Nation

Dopamine Nation – Anna Lembke

by Book ReviewsDigital Brain

In her book, Dopamine Nation, Dr Anna Lembke explores how our dopamine system works and how, in our search for happiness and the pursuit of pleasure and quick fixes, we can unwittingly head into a state of chronic dopamine deficiency that drives and exacerbates our reliance on our ‘happiness fix’ that leads to addictive behaviours and substances.

She tells stories of both her own and her clients addictive behaviours, showcasing how this hedonic pursuit for moments of happiness can be the very thing that undoes us.

She then provides a 3-step process of how to emerge from this state, and clearly explains why they are the solution to our dopamine-deprived behaviours. These solutions are summed up in one of her talks as: 

  1. Abstain
  2. Maintain
  3. Seek our Pain

Summing up the third principle is: “The reason that we are all so miserable is that we are working so hard to avoid being miserable”. 

Underlying this is “The Plenty Paradox: Overabundance is itself a stressor caused by the mismatch between our primitive wiring and our modern dopamine-rich ecosystem”. 

The best way to capture the essence of her book is her own introduction to it – one of the best descriptions I’ve come across to clarify the dopamine indulgence of our current generations:

“This book is about pleasure, It’s also about pain. Most importantly, it’s about the relationship between pleasure and pain and how understanding that relationship has become essential for a life well lived. Why? Because we’ve transformed the world from a place of scarcity to a place of overwhelming abundance: drugs, food, news, gambling, shopping, gaming, texting, sexting, facebooking, Instagramming, YouTubing, Tweeting. The increased numbers and potency of highly rewarding stimuli today is staggering. The smartphone is the modern-day hypodermic needle delivering digital dopamine 24/7to a wired generation. If you haven’t met your drug of choice yet, it’s coming soon to a website near you. “

In the above video, Dr Lembke explains the role of dopamine as a motivational agent and the role it plays in addiction.

In the below video, she talks about the relationship dopamine plays in smartphone addiction – including why teenagers engage in and are impacted by social media. She talks about technology as being a ‘spectrum disorder’ and what that looks like. 

A small selection of additional videos and interviews by Dr Lembke on this subject can be viewed below. More can be found by searching for her on YouTube.

Cambridge Core provides a great summation of Dopamine Nation written by Amer Raheemullah. You can read it here. 

About Anna Lembke:

Anna Lembke is a professor of psychiatry at Stanford University School of Medicine and chief of the Stanford Addiction Medicine Dual Diagnosis Clinic.

You can read more about her at her website: https://www.annalembke.com

Other Book Reviews
How to Break Up Article Header

How To Break Up With Your Phone – Catherine Price

by Book ReviewsDigital Diet

The book starts with an anecdotal account of an ongoing relationship Catherine has with her phone. It is an insightful look into how most of us are with our devices.

Catherine uses the analogue of a human relationship to aptly describe and talk through how we pour our time, attention and energy into our digital devices. An apt analogy – as for many of us, a smartphone has mostly replaced the physical, human relationships we have with others. 

Part 1 of the book outlines many reasons why you should spend less time on your phone.

It also helps you understand what is going on with your brain, hormones and sleep when you use your phone regularly and consistently. 

It is a great set-up for Part 2 that takes you through a day-by-day plan to help break that constant phone habit. 

I regularly advocate that a Digital Detox is normally as effective as another resolution or life goal. It’s all good intentions – and then life gets in the way. 

Catherine Price makes a good point about a Digital Detox giving you an insight into how much our phone is impacting our lives. By stepping away from it for a period of time, we can look up and notice what we’ve given up by looking down at a screen.

Saying we are going to spend less time on our phones is a different concept from going through a structured plan that gives you a step-by-step guide that walks you through the process and helps keep you on track. 

If you have ever thought about doing a ‘Digital Detox’, this book is worth a) reading and b) following the 30-day plan. 

However, my suggestion is to use this as a stepping-stone, not a one-off, into a healthier relationship with your technology. Use it as a way to train yourself on how to manage your day in a more focused, present way – kind of like 30 days of spa treatment for your mind and attention.  

You can get a glimpse into the book through these YouTube videos. 

Her point in the first video, which I also speak about often, is that if we do not pay for the product, we are the product. 

Social media business models are about making money from what you see in the advertising space they sell to the highest bidder. 

By stepping out of that world more often, we become less of a commodity to BigTech and more present in the real world.

About Catherine Price:

Catherine Price is a journalist and author. You can read more about her on her official website here. 

Her book How to Break Up with Your Phone is one of two she has authored including The Power of Fun. 

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Technopoly Article Header

Technopoly – Neil Postman

by Book ReviewsCyberPsychology

In this book, Neil Postman  suggests that we are surrendering our culture to technology. 

If you have an interest in studying CyberPsychology or any media studies, this book should be a foundational text. Although the book is published in 1993. This is before the mobile phone became ubiquitous and computers were desktop-based – connected to a landline. The internet was unheard of by the average person. 

The majority of his arguments were therefore based on the widespread consumption of television in the West. However, his points set in place the foundations of how society started the shift from a non-digital technology environment that paved the way to the compounded acceptance of all future digital tech. It helps us to understand (psychologically) how we got here. 

These two lectures give a taste into the essence of Neil Postman’s arguments within the book. 

His overall summary of the book is: 

“The tendency in American culture to turn over to technology, [the] sovereignty, command, control [of] all of our social institutions. In other words, the book is about how America has developed a new religion – as it were. And the religion is its faith that human progress and technological innovation are the same thing. And that paradise can be achieved through greater and greater commitment to technology”. 

Click on the image below to be redirected to the YouTube video. 

About Neil Postman:

The late Neil Postman was a professor in Media Ecology at NYU’s Steinhardt School of Education.

Although some may refer to him as a ‘luddite’ as he comes across as being rather negative towards technology. However, it would be more accurate to say that he was an observer and commentator on the historical changes technology made to society and cultural identity – i.e. the ecology (and probably the anthropology) of new media.

What he would have made of smartphones, smartphones and social media would have been a rather interesting guess.

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Atomic Habits – James Clear

by Book ReviewsDigital Health & Wellbeing

Updated: 20 December 2023 

A book that flies in the face of ‘quick fix’ solutions, and probably one of the most insightful books on how we build and how we can change our habits. 

We all have habits we’ve picked up[ from those around us, life circumstances, coping mechanisms and self-limiting beliefs. Some of thse are useful and others range from not useful to downright bad for us. Some habits help us and some inhibit us. 

If you can’t seem to make a break-through in areas you really want to amend or improve, this may well be the one book you need to change that cycle or spiral. 

May 2019 Interview at London Real

In an interview with Brian Rose at London Real, James talks through some of the insights he spent 6 years researching. Although he covers a number of elements within his book, there is a lot of detail (including actionable steps to take in building strong habits) that he does not cover.  

Reading/listening to his book is essential for gaining a depth of insight into habits and how to change undesirable automatic behaviour that could be detrimental to your health and life goals.  

A few insights covered in this interview:

  • A habit is: a behaviour that has been repeated enough time to be more or less automatic – so things you can do without really thinking about it.
  • It’s not just luck / natural predisposition and not just habits that determine success in life. However, one of these things you have control over. The most reasonable strategy to take in order to achieve what you want is to focus on controlling your habits.
  • Your outcomes in life are a lagging measure of your habits. The things that most need to change are the habits that proceed the outcomes you want to achieve.
  • Small habits don’t transform you overnight, but every action you take is a vote for the type of person you want to become.
  • Your habits reinforce a particular identity – either positively or negatively.
  • True behaviour change is identity change. The goal, therefore, is not the outcome you require, but a skillset that enables you to be the type of person you desire to be.
  • The things that often separates you is not your physical gifts, but your ability to practice, to get out of your own way, your mental approach etc.
  • In automating behaviour, you can do regular tasks more quickly while using less mental energy, and also save time, to do so.
  • Bad habits often involved immediate gratification, the rewards of good habits are often only seen in the future – the cost of your good habits is in the present and the cost of your bad habits is in the future.
  • Good habits become easy habits when you can find joy in delaying gratification.
  • If you learn the right (credible) story to tell yourself, it becomes easier to maintain that over the long run.
2023 Fast Forward Conference Presentation Summary

If you do not want to sign up to London Real so you can watch the interview, the presentation at the Fast Forward Conference is a more recent (and shorter) version of the same information delivered by James on (some of the) Atomic Habits.  

A few of the key messages are expounded more fully in the book, but here are some topline take-aways that may help you start thinking about the digital habits you currently have, and how to start making some ‘small win changes’ that can lead to bigger life goals wins as the habits embed.  

  • The aggregation of marginal gains: you don’t need to make sweeping major changes in order to win big. By making small, compounded (1%) improvements on a daily basis, you can change the overall trajectory of your future in a positive way. Resulting in “The Compound Interest of Self-Improvement…time will magnify whatever you feed it”. 
  • “If you are struggling to improve, the problem isn’t you. The problem is your system”. We struggle to change if we have the wrong system to be able to change. Setting a desired goal is easy. The hard part is building a system of behaviours, that you then execute, to carry you towards achieving the goal. Your system is the collection of daily habits that you follow that are designed to deliver results. If you want to change your results you need to change your systems (i.e. daily habits). 
  • Your only rational/reasonable approach in life is to focus on the elements that are within your control. It’s up to you to build the habits that can get you to the goal you wish to achieve.  

A habit can be broken into 4 different stages:  

  1. Cue: Trigger that tells your brain to initiate the habit – something that gets your attention. 
  2. Craving: Your brain then starts to make a prediction (automatically) of what may happen in response to that cue. 
  3. Response: The favourable meaning that you give towards the engagement in that behaviour. 
  4. Reward: The satisfying element/the cost of engaging in the behaviour  

 The 4 Laws of Desired Behaviour Change. Make it: 

  1. Obvious – the cues of your good habits need to be visible, available, or get your attention. 
  2. Attractive – the more appealing/enticing it is, the more likely you will feel compelled to do it.  
  3. Easy – the more frictionless/easy a habit is to do, the more likely it is to be performed. 
  4. Satisfying – the more rewarding it is, the more likely you will do it again in the future.  

 If you want to break a bad habit, then reverse these laws. 

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ADHD 2.0

ADHD 2.0 – Edward M. Hallowell, MD and John J. Ratey, MD

by AttentionBook Reviews

Although this book is not, technically, a cyberpsychology-related book, it’s included here as ADHD is commonly linked to online addictions.

As the doctors explain, those with ADHD are 5 to 10 times more likely to have some sort of addiction. 

If you, or your child, has ADHD or is suspected of having ADHD, then this is a book that is worth reading. 

As both authors are psychiatrists who have ADHD and treat those with the same condition, they write from both personal experience and from a scientific therapeutic perspective.

Their perspective on what ADHD is – how it is a super-power, rather than a pathology can help to reframe how you view and optimise the strengths of the condition while minimising the tougher sides of living with the condition.

CBT, narrative psychology NLP and positive psychology are all therapeutic interventions that have their basis in changing how we view and talk about our lived experience.

That is what this book can do for you.

By explaining what is going on in your brain and giving you a new vocabulary to understand what it means for you, you will have more tools to help empower you to take back control of your habits and pitfalls that seem to be a constant stumbling block for you. 

So, this is why this book is included with other recommended books. 

Below are a number of videos of the authors explaining more about their book and their specialities.

Find out more about Edward M. Hallowell, MD

You can visit his website here and his YouTube channel here.

Find out more about John J. Ratey, MD

You can visit his website here and find out more about his research.

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