Geekery

Whatever I’m geeking out about at the time.

The Edge of Space-Time by Chanda Prescod-Weinstein

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Book 27 of 2026: The Edge of Space-Time: Particles, Poetry, and the Cosmic Dream Boogie by Chanda Prescod-Weinstein.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️: A neat exploration of quantum physics and the nature of the universe through lenses of Black perspectives, queer theory, and pop culture. Mostly really good, but for me, with one significant flaw. While I will happily accept the author’s expertise in physics, there is one specific sentence that is simply, surprisingly, and significantly wrong.

Lewis Carroll’s “Alice” books are referenced multiple times, and on page 232, the poem “Jabberwocky” is mentioned: “It’s a poem that doesn’t make any sense, composed primarily with words that Lewis Carroll made up.” I’m baffled by the claim that “Jabberwocky” “doesn’t make sense” — yes, many of the words are invented nonsense words, but that’s precisely the beauty and brilliance of the poem, because it absolutely makes sense! The reader knows what is going on; the words may be unfamiliar, but where and how they are used, along with the fun-to-read onomatopoeic nature of them, conveys a very clear story. Honestly, it’s good that this claim showed up a little over two-thirds of the way into the book, due to how severely it threw me out of the book and shook my trust in the author. Any earlier and I might have struggled to keep going.

Still, all in all, a very good book — except for that one sentence.

Me holding The Edge of Space-Time.

The AI Compass

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This “AI Compass” test was interesting. As with most such tests, it’s not perfect, and I have some quibbles with some of the questions and answers, particularly some where I think it falls into the usual trap of using “AI” for everything, and not adequately distinguishing between genAI and machine learning (ML), but still, not bad.

My result:

Four-quadrant scatter plot. The vertical axis is good / bad, the horizontal axis is overhyped / transformative. My result is a point slightly on the "overhyped" side of the horizaontal axis and about two-thirds of the way towards the "bad" extreme of the vertical axis.
I’m the glowy orange dot. Looks like I’m right on the border, almost ending up classified as “The Skeptic” (full description below). (Side note: Pity about the poor and very inaccessible color design.)

YOU ARE…
The Union Organizer
patron saint: Cory Doctorow.
AI is a real tool being used to extract real labor value from real people without paying them. You don’t care about the singularity — you care about the artists, writers, and workers getting strip-mined by capital. You’re not anti-technology. You’re anti-theft.

Looking at the full list of possible outcomes, I’d self-identify as one of the following. I think it’s my hedging slightly on some of the answers because of the genAI/ML confusion that pushed me into the result I got. They’re all in the same general “don’t like it, don’t trust it, don’t want it” quadrant, though.

The Luddite (Affectionate)
patron saint: Emily Bender
It doesn’t work the way they claim, it’s making everything worse, and you’d like your internet back, please. You can explain in precise technical detail why it’s a stochastic parrot, and you will, whether or not anyone asked. You’re funnier about this than people give you credit for.

The Digital Hermit
patron saint: Jaron Lanier
You’ve been saying the framing is wrong since before most people had heard of any of this. AI is less a technology than a story Silicon Valley tells to consolidate power, and the story is bad. You read physical books and you don’t need a language model to tell you what they mean.

The Skeptic
patron saint: Ed Zitron
It’s oversold, it’s losing staggering amounts of money, and the harms are arriving faster than the value. You’ve done the math on the unit economics and it doesn’t close. You are loud about this, prolific about this, and you suspect history will vindicate you.

Infiltrator by W.R. Thompson

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Book 27 of 2026: Infiltrator by W.R. Thompson.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️: Descendants of Khan and his compatriots face off against the Federation. I found this one to be above average, with much of it being something of an early take on the same issues explored by Strange New Worlds with Number One’s status as an Illyrian in hiding, expanded to explore how a society of genetically engineered humans might deal with how they’d be perceived by the Federation. As often happens with any eugenics storyline, it would be improved if the Federation was more honest and introspective about how initial fear and caution has developed into long-standing systemic bigotry, but as Star Trek has yet to really tackle that aspect of the universe, I wouldn’t really have expected it from a thirty-year-old novel.

Me holding Infiltrator.

Foundling Fathers by Meg Elison

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Book 26 of 2026: Foundling Fathers by Meg Ellison.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️: Conservative techbros clone America’s founding fathers and raise them in isolation as if it were the 18th century, training them to bring America back to its former glory…until one of them finds a stray iPhone. A very funny and incisive sci-fi political satire; highly recommended.

Me holding Foundling Fathers.

The Yiddish Policemen’s Union by Michael Chabon

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Book 25 of 2026: The Yiddish Policemen’s Union by Michael Chabon. 2008 Hugo Best Novel winner.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️: Hard-boiled noir detective fiction set in an alternate present where Sitka, Alaska is home to resettled Jews after Israel failed to become its own nation after WWII. In addition to being a fun and incredibly well-written noir, the Alaskan setting is great. I grew up in Alaska, and though I pretty much stayed in Anchorage and have only been to Sitka once on a cruise long after I’d moved south, Chabon’s descriptions of Alaskan locales, weather, and people feel oh so familiar. At least the secular bits; as a lapsed Episcopalian, I can’t speak to the Jewishness of it all. Excellent book.

Me holding The Yiddish Policemen's Union.

The AI Con by Emily M. Bender and Alex Hanna

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Book 23 of 2026: The AI Con: How to Fight Big Tech’s Hype and Create the Future We Want by Emily M. Bender and Alex Hanna.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️: Okay, yes — it could be argued that this book is simply reinforcing my existing biases. But it does a damn good job of that! For anyone less than enthusiastic about the AI invasion, and for some who are too enthusiastic but could perhaps be convinced to question their stance, this is an excellent and accessible takedown of the overhyped and existentially problematic push for “AI”.

I only had two issues:

One, that the this area is simply moving so fast that even though the book was just published within the past year (and so written probably mostly in 2024, so even the most current research available while writing would have been from 2023 or 2024), parts of it already feel out of date. Of particular note to me as someone working in education was the “Listen Up, Class” section (in chapter 4, starting on page 93), which begins with a couple paragraphs citing 2023 research claiming that ChatGPT hadn’t made many inroads into student cheating. In 2026 — anecdotally, at least, from what I see and hear about at the college where I work — that is definitely not the current state of things. Students submitting content created by ChatGPT and other genAI systems is a constant battle that teachers are trying to fight and causing serious problems in nearly, if not entirely, every academic department.

Two, that for some reason (apparently a publisher’s requirement, according to a LinkedIn post from Ms. Bender I found), none of the copious endnote references are numbered in the text. The endnotes include notes so that they can be connected back to the main text, but it’s a very odd choice for the publisher to have made. If, as suspected, this was done to make the book more accessible to a mass audience, I kind of wish there was a second edition available for readers not turned off by footnote/endnote notations.

Me holding The AI Con

Zombies of the Gene Pool by Sharyn McCrumb

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Book 22 of 2026: Zombies of the Gene Pool by Sharyn McCrumb.

⭐️⭐️⭐️: Apparently I’d read this one 15 years ago and entirely forgotten. A sequel to the somewhat notorious Bimbos of the Death Sun, it’s a bit more reserved, swapping snarking on ‘80s SF fandom to looking back on ‘50s Golden Age fandom. It has much of the same obvious mix of affection for and exasperation with the SF scene, but also has many of the same drawbacks as Bimbos, particularly where women characters are concerned. As with Bimbos, it’s an enjoyable but definitely flawed bit of fluff that would be better if it spent more time laughing with its subjects (as Galaxy Quest does for Star Trek) instead of at them.

Me holding Zombies of the Gene Pool.

Rainbows End by Vernor Vinge

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Book 21 of 2026: Rainbows End by Vernor Vinge (2007 Hugo Best Novel)

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️: Reading this for the first time in 2026, twenty years after it was published, when it’s set in 2025, it’s fascinating to see where we’re heading towards what Vinge envisioned and where we’re not. Similarities to Stephenson’s Snow Crash in the ubiquitous virtual worlds, but using augmented reality rather than full VR. Privacy and security are greater considerations as well. Overall, a pretty fascinating take on what’s now an alternate present day.

Me holding Rainbows End