From now until midnight Eastern time (UTC-4) on July 31st, Manning’s books and videos on software development and technology are selling at greatly reduced prices:
Check the out at Manning.com.
(I’m not affiliated with Manning in any way, other than I own some Manning books and get their announcement emails, which is how I found out about this.)
If your curiosity about artificial intelligence goes beyond bookmarking those incessant “10 ChatGPT prompts you need to know” posts that are all over LinkedIn, you should set aside some time to read Douglas’ Hofstadter’s Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid and watch his new interview.
I might never have read it, if not for Dr. David Alex Lamb’s software engineering course at Queen’s University, whose curriculum included reading a book from a predetermined list and writing a report on it. I’ll admit that I first rolled my eyes at having to write a book report, but then noticed that one of the books had both “Escher” and “Bach” in the title. I had no idea who “Gödel” was, but I figured they were in good company, so I signed up to write the report on the book I would later come to know as “GEB.”
I’ll write more about why I think the book is important later. In the meantime, you should just know that it:
Yes, this is one of those books that many people buy, read a chapter or two, and then put on their bookshelf, never to touch it again. Do not make that mistake. This book will reward your patience and perseverance by either exposing you to some great ideas, or validate some concepts that you may have already internalized.
At the very least, if you want to understand “classical” AI — that is AI based on symbol manipulation instead of the connectionist, “algebra, calculus, and stats in a trench coat” model of modern AI — you should Gödel, Escher, Bach.
Posted a mere three days ago at the time of writing, the video above is a conversation between Douglas Hofstadter and Amy Jo Kim. It’s worth watching, not only for Hofstadter’s stories about how GEB came to be, but also for his take on current-era large language models and other generative AI as well as the fact that he’s being interviewed by game designer Amy Jo Kim. Among other things, Kim was a systems designer on the team that made the game Rock Band and worked on the in-game social systems for The Sims.
Watch the video — I’ll write more about it later.
There’s a Humble Bundle deal going on for the next nine days at the time of writing: the Popular Programming Languages book bundle, featuring books by O’Reilly. There’s a “15 books for $25” version of the deal and a “10 books for $18” version.
If you’re still iffy about parting with that much money, you might be interested in the $1 deal, which gets you these five books:
Once again, the deal is here, and it’s good for the next nine days at the time of writing.
The latest interesting book bundle from Humble Bundle is the Cybersecurity and Forensics Bundle, which gets you 19 cybersecurity and cyberforensics books by CRC Press for a mere $25 — that’s just $1.32 per book!
As I write this, you have 17 days before this deal disappears. If you need books on cybersecurity and forensics, get these now!
Click here to go to Humble Bundle’s Cybersecurity and Forensics bundle page.
Made in Tampa is a site all about the unexpected, thriving tech and startup scene here in “The Other Bay Area, on The Other West Coast.” It’s been growing for the past decade, and that growth has only accelerated in the post-COVID, highly-networked, increasingly work-from-anywhere world, and Made in Tampa is here to cover it.
Their latest installment is about an accordion-playing techie whom you might know, but you should make sure to check out their other pieces, including:
Keep an eye on not just Tampa Bay, but also Made in Tampa!
My thanks to Amanda Kern for the wonderful interview and write-up, and to Jason Allen for setting this up!
I love No Starch Press’ Python books. They’re the textbooks I use when teaching the Python course at Computer Coach because they’re easy to read, explain things clearly, and have useful examples.
And now you can get 18 of their Python ebooks for $36 — that’s $2 each, or the cost of just one of their ebook, Python Crash Course, Third Edition!
Check out the deal at Humble Bundle, and get ready to get good at Python! At the time of writing, the bundle will be available for 20 more days.
Consider these books recommended reading for the Tampa Artificial Intelligence Meetup, which is now under my management, and holding a meeting later this month!
How did I not know this book existed? Exploring GPT-3, published by Packt and written by Tampa Bay’s own Steve Tingiris, is a great introduction to GPT-3 and natural language processing that doesn’t require you to have a technical background. All you need are basic computer skills to try out the exercises in this book.
Exploring GPT-3 is but one of twelve books, shown below…
… and you can get all o them for as little as $18 in the Ultimate Guide to ChatGPT and AI Chat Bots ebook package from Humble Bundle (pictured above).
🚨 At the time of writing, this Humble Bundle will expire in 17 days.
Also worth checking out: the Machine Learning and AI: Zero to Hero Humble Bundle, which gives you 21 courses from Packt on various aspects of ML and AI:
🚨 At the time of writing, this Humble Bundle will expire in 13 days.