Kevin J Moriarity

The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race by Walter Isaacson My rating: 4 of 5 stars This is the second book I've read in the last few weeks by Walter Isaacson. He knows how to tell a story. I was surprised how much competition there is in the academic world. There is a lot of pressure to get a paper published first. It is all bound up with patents and the money inherent in cures for diseases. However, there was also cooperation when it came to detection, a vaccine, and perhaps a cure for Covid-19. The book pointed out more than one example where the accomplishments of women were overlooked. Though, Doudna and Charpentier both won a Nobel, so perhaps things are changing. Lastly, the author pointed out that college majors in the life sciences are up 17% since the start of Covid. That is a great thing - it would be wonderful if more people worked in that field! View all my reviews

The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution by Walter Isaacson My rating: 4 of 5 stars I really enjoyed this book. We tend to glorify the big names: Gates, Bezos, Zuckerberg -- but this book includes the people that worked with them and that sometimes provided more value! I liked the parts stressing how the computer should augment human abilities rather than replace humans. I joined the bandwagon in the early 80s and thought the computer would unleash a creative storm, and ultimately make us smarter. I was only partly right.  The book was written in 2014, so it's a bit dated in one respect. He thought social media would connect people, create community. He was right to an extent of course, but I think he didn't foresee how much our data would be used to market to us, to manipulate us, and in a political / cultural sense -- separate us. I find it unfortunate that the original idea of computing and the internet (discussed nicely in t