Episode · EconTalk · 2025-11-17
Books mentioned on The Wonder of the Emergent Mind (with Gaurav Suri)
How is your brain like an ant colony? They both use simple parts following simple rules which allows the whole to be so much more than the sum of the parts.
Books mentioned, in the order they came up
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The Emergent Mind: How Intelligence Arises in People and Machines
Discussed“He's the co-author with Jay Mlullen of the book The Emergent Mind: How Intelligence Arises in People and Machines, which is our topic for today.”
Where to get it
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The Wisdom of Insecurity
The Wisdom of Insecurity by Alan Watts is a philosophical examination of human anxiety, the illusion of control, and how individuals can find peace by fully embracing the present moment amidst a chaotic world.
Recommended“Or uh there's I love this one. I got Alan Watts in the wisdom of insecurity which is a a book I kind of love and kind of it's a book it's fascinating book. I'll mention it for a second. It was written in 1951 or 52. I think it could have been written yesterday. It's all about how the”
Where to get it
Other mentions in this episode (1) — ad reads, self-promotion and passing references, never counted
Own book A Certain Ambiguity
“Before this I uh before the emerging mind I I wrote a mathematical novel called a certain ambiguity. And a certain ambiguity is really a conversation between a a secular non-religious mathematician and um a judge who's religious who um is seeing whether this guy committed blasphemy or not. And the the whole book is this guy saying look you”