The Fuzzy and the Techie: Why the Liberal Arts Will Rule the Digital World

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(as of Oct 15,2024 14:23:12 UTC – Details)


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Customers find the book enjoyable, engaging, and fun. They appreciate the thought-provoking examples and ideas that make them think about technology.

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  1. Must-read book for any entrepreneur or academic
    This book could lead to new paradigm shifts in how we think about technology–and its role in education. Hartley’s clear writing reminds us that even during this era of major tech transformation, we still need the human spirit to guide technology. Only through liberal arts-educated students can we make the best use of technology through the “soft skills” which Hartley explains through visits to the schools the tech execs themselves send their kids. Tech and education need to blend. One sees this in Hartley’s example of innovative blended learning–likely secondary education’s future–where students go further than lecture-based teaching models. I can see interest in leading education technology companies like AltSchool and Knowledge Platform rising because of this book.Overall, a clear, fun, insightful read. Enjoyed it very much. Educators, students, parents, policy makers, and entrepreneurs will want to read it.

  2. Highly recommended for any of the worried and/or skeptical techies (or fuzzies!) out there about the impact of automation
    As a techie who has obsessed, worried, and generally just been quite skeptical over the chance non-techies have in surviving the potential automation explosion that could soon come, I found myself relieved to FINALLY find such a convincing argument that the future may be bright after all for both “fuzzies” and techies alike. Prior to reading this, I had come across the Oxford study (that is also discussed in the book) which estimated some 47% of jobs would be automated in the next one to two decades. This study initially rang true to my intuition, as I had been involved in programming several products which were responsible for automating away many manual, repetitive jobs. Having done these jobs, I really couldn’t see any end in sight to the potential automation wave that could really create a dire future for any non-techies.But, Hartley presents many studies in the book which contradict these findings – the most prominent of which I found to be the Mckinsey study -which states the number is probably closer to about 5%. More importantly, though, throughout the book he gives several explanatory models explaining WHY many jobs will survive automation, as well as why many “fuzzy” jobs will need to be created and even why these fuzzy jobs will be complex, high skilled and high value jobs. These models further *qualitatively* distinguish what jobs are ripe for automation, and what jobs (or potential jobs) are best served by “fuzzy” skills. The core concept that governs these models is complexity. By looking at a given job, these models highlight both the *magnitude* of complexity, as well as the *type* of complexity. For example, Hartley uses the Cynefin framework to distinguish between tasks that are simple, complicated, complex, chaotic, or disordered. Each of these categories are governed by the structure of the cause and effect relationships which dictate the required action of the person (or job/role) in effectively carrying out a required task. I found models like this to give me an incredibly simple and useful way for organizing and making sense of this topic, where previously I could feel myself floundering to pull together the essential governing laws of the debate.Besides this, the book is filled with a really nice blend of hard data and entertaining stories, that allows for a convincing argument in an entertaining way. I had one or two disagreements, where I thought the role of a “fuzzie” was slightly over-exaggerated – or at the very least was likely to be more valuable supplementally rather than critically. But, on the whole, I found myself mostly nodding in agreement with my own experience, where I have personally found many of the tech claims – especially those involving machine learning, AI, neural nets, etc – to be highly over-exaggerated, as well as the many times in my own work-life experience I have seen just how invaluable fuzzies can be in the right domains. The one benefit I did not expect to get from this book was just how much it could help me to not only appreciate more what “fuzzies” do in the current workplace, but also how to help and support their future in the workplace as we create more meaningful, cooperative, and fun environments where more people feel valued and important in these collective, creative engagements (that we so boringly call jobs) as we humans march forward into the totally unknown and exciting future that lays ahead of us

  3. A guide for bringing two seemingly disparate disciplines together
    Looking over Scott Hartley’s resume, you could be forgiven for thinking he’s a techie. Stanford, Google, Facebook and venture capital all have prominent places in his biography. But Hartley is an admitted “fuzzy” — a former liberal arts major who is seeking to close the often artificial gap between the two disciplines.Accordingly, Hartley has written a thoughtful book about the pros and cons of a world increasingly dominated by technology. There is something for everyone here — an exploration of the effect of big data on discrimination, the pros and cons of virtual reality and the new frontier of cyber security.Hartley has done an admirable job of weaving the stories of real people into his exploration of fairly abstract concepts such as artificial intelligence and, as a result, the book provides an engaging read. This is perhaps Hartley’s greatest strength — his ability to get people to open up about their experiences and use them to illustrate the advantages of a more holistic approach to technological innovation.Most people, myself included, are probably used to the narrative that innovation is driven primarily by computer scientists who are solely focused on the problems embedded deep in lines of code. Hartley argues that technological innovation has always been driven by fuzzies and techies alike — that it is the marriage of these two disciplines that has often yielded the most fruitful results.We seem to be approaching an inflection point at which we can no longer afford to keep these two worlds apart. Hartley’s book may serve as a guide for how to bring them together.

  4. To be clear – I was already sold on the idea that it is absolutely necessary for “techies” (those from STEM) disciplines and “fuzzies” (those from humanities and the social sciences) to work together in full partnership to deal with the most pressing problems facing humanity and to create new opportunities for tech to be mobilized for the betterment of the human condition. This book makes that case. While seemingly addressed to people with a humanities background, I think that this is essential reading for those in the STEM fields as well. We all have a lot to learn from each other and it is time to break down these contrived barriers between the disciplines that hamper our ability to develop and deploy technologies for the benefit of all. I highly recommend this book – perhaps most to those youth who are still pursuing their studies. Take advantage of the many disciplines that are at your doorstep while in college/university. I also recommend this to educators and government officials who reinforce mistaken perceptions about the value of an education in the humanities and social sciences.

  5. In today’s polarized world of left vs right, us vs them, Hartley coherently lays out a nuanced argument for partnership between fuzzies and techies to advance society forward. As a purpose-driven entrepreneur with engineering, social science and business degreess, a found this to be a refreshing take. It’s well written and researched with engaging stories. Highly recommended!

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