Is there one link, story, picture or thought that you saw online this week that you think somebody you know must see?
My friends: Alistair Croll (Just Evil Enough, Solve for Interesting, Tilt the Windmill, Interesting Bits, HBS, chair of Strata, Startupfest, FWD50, and Scaletechconf; author of Lean Analytics and some other books), Hugh McGuire (Rebus Foundation, PressBooks, LibriVox) and I decided that every week the three of us are going to share one link for one another (for a total of six links) that each individual feels the other person “must see.”
Check out these six links that we’re recommending to one another:
- Will The Humanities Survive Artificial Intelligence? – D. Graham Burnett – The New Yorker. “A great, long-form piece on how AI is changing teaching and the liberal arts. While the tech is widely banned on campuses – and students are terrified of accidentally using it in assignments – this teacher set students a task of debating with an AI and reporting back. The results were surprising.” (Alistair for Hugh).
- The Lebowski Theorem Of Machine Superintelligence – Jaaon Kottke. “Some days, I’m mad at myself for posting links about AI. Other days, I think it might be the defining topic of the century, and perhaps our species, and capitulate. Today’s a capitulation day, but at least it’s one that includes The Dude. The inimitable Jason Kottke quotes Joscha Back: ‘No superintelligent AI is going to bother with a task that is harder than hacking its reward function.'” (Alistair for Mitch).
- Experts Alarmed By China’s Enormous Army Of Robots – Joe Wilkins – Futurism. “Starting in 2015 China has pursued an industrial policy of developing industrial robotics (in part to address demographic problems). In 2022-23 China installed half the global industrial robots deployment, with ~276,000 robots. More, surely in 2024 and 2025. Chinese products will get cheaper as the US tries to rebuild its human factory workforce.” (Hugh for Alistair).
- The Eternal Thrift Store – Paul Ford – Aboard. “On the messy world of software, AI and the chaos coming down the pipes for us all.” (Hugh for Mitch).
- The Death Of “I Don’t Know” – John Nosta – Psychology Today. “There’s something romantic and nostalgic in this article. The kind of writing that might both make you worried about our future and put human thinking on a pedastal. Ultimately, I don’t agree with this argument. ‘I don’t know’ isn’t dying… it’s evolving. In a world saturated with information and accelerated by AI, the real result of AI isn’t in people not knowing anything anymore, it’s in knowing how to ask better questions. Curiosity isn’t about withholding answers – it’s about using tools (yes, even chatbots) to go deeper, faster. The romanticism of not knowing might feel noble, but it risks glorifying intellectual paralysis. Today, inquiry has a partner, not a replacement. The smartest people aren’t avoiding AI or using it to do the work – they’re using it as cognitive scaffolding. It’s not the death of ‘I don’t know.’ It’s the birth of ‘What if?’ and ‘What else?’.” (Mitch for Alistair).
- Reading Books Is Not Just A Pleasure: It Helps Our Minds To Heal – Peter Leyland – Psyche. “Books don’t just teach us… they tend to us. Peter Leyland’s essay makes a beautifully quiet case for something I’ve always believed: that reading is more than escapism, it’s restoration. Not every page heals, but the right words at the right moment? That’s soul-level triage. Still, let’s not romanticize the act too much… reading isn’t a substitute for therapy, but it is a form of self-leadership. It slows the scroll, sharpens the mind, and reintroduces nuance in a world hooked on hot takes. Attention is currency and algorithms dictate what we see, so choosing to read… to sit with complexity, contradiction, and craft… is a small act of rebellion (to me). So yes, books help us heal… ” (Mitch for Hugh).
Feel free to share these links and add your picks on X, Facebook, in the comments below or wherever you play.
Before you go… ThinkersOne is a new way for organizations to buy bite-sized and personalized thought leadership video content (live and recorded) from the best Thinkers in the world. If you’re looking to add excitement and big smarts to your meetings, corporate events, company off-sites, “lunch & learns” and beyond, check it out.
Mitch Joel Mitch Joel lives at the intersection of technology, business transformation and consumer culture. He is the Executive Director of Next Era Institute, a strategic intelligence platform helping leaders understand the forces reshaping business, technology, culture and society. The Institute identifies which shifts matter, explores their wider significance and translates them into strategic direction and momentum. Mitch is also a globally recognized keynote speaker. He has delivered thousands of presentations across both B2B and B2C industries to organizations including Google, Walmart, LEGO, Shopify, Microsoft, Procter & Gamble and Unilever. Strategy Magazine has called him “one of North America’s leading visionaries.” Mitch built his career by working directly inside the waves of change that reshaped modern business. He founded and built a digital marketing agency that worked with some of the world’s largest brands and was later acquired by WPP, where he served as President of a firm operating in 25 countries with almost 3,000 employees. Mitch is the bestselling author of Six Pixels of Separation and CTRL ALT Delete, and the host of Thinking With Mitch Joel, one of the longest-running business podcasts in the world. His writing and commentary appear in outlets including Harvard Business Review, Fast Company and Inc. Magazine. He is a member of Dr. Marshall Goldsmith’s 100 Coaches and was named to the Thinkers50 Radar. Mitch also hosts Groove – The No Treble Podcast, documenting the oral history of electric bass players. Mitch is also Co-Founder of ThinkersOne, a platform that enables companies to bring personalized thought leadership from world-class experts into meetings, events and off-sites in focused 15-minute bursts.