Briefing No. 43
What we’re reading
On the Greenwood Place Bedside Table
The Coming Wave
Our Christmas reading is Mustafa Suleyman’s guide to the AI revolution that is just beginning, and the transformed world it will create. Suleyman outlines the opportunities and challenges ahead and establishes “the containment problem” - the task of maintaining control over powerful technologies - as the essential challenge of our age.
Open AIo1
We’ve had a mind-blowing experience testing OpenAI’s latest model, o1 (nicknamed Strawberry). It suddenly feels like the coming wave that Suleyman discusses is a lot closer. The game-changer is the new version’s reasoning ability - it shows its train of thought and tries different strategies to reach a solution. It can solve Maths Olympiad questions as well as PhD level physics, chemistry and biology problems.
Join or Die
Just as a nation couldn't function with half its roads gone, Robert Putnam - author of Bowling Alone and the Upswing - argues our society cannot thrive when the pathways connecting people to one another have disappeared.
Persuasion and the Power of Storytelling
When people think of advocating for their ideas, they think of convincing arguments based on data, facts, and figures. Professor Jennifer Aaker’s animated film discusses how, if you share a story, rather than statistics, people are often more likely to be persuaded. And when data and story are used together, audiences are moved both intellectually and emotionally.
George Mitchell: War and Peace in Northern Ireland and the Middle East
Diplomat, lawyer, former Senate Majority Leader and nonagenarian George Mitchell discusses a long life in public service in a fascinating conversation with Rory Stewart and Alastair Campbell.
Secret Life of Prisons
For insights into the UK criminal justice system, the Prisons Radio Association’s podcast is well worth listening to. This episode features a lecture delivered by Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who was imprisoned in 2016 at the end of a family visit to Iran. She vehemently denied the charges made against her but remained in prison until 2022. She talks about what she learnt from the experience and explains her passion for penal reform.
Maria Popova’s Life-Learnings
Somewhere along the way, you realise that no one will teach you how to live your own life - but here are a few things that Maria Popova, writer and thinker, has learned over the years.
Winter Stories
Rebecca has a friend who reads Bleak House by Charles Dickens every winter. Rebecca herself is re-reading A Winter Book by Tove Jansson - a collection of short stories that Ali Smith describes as “pieces of shattered light.” We’d love to hear the books that you turn to for replenishment when the days are short and the world feels difficult and complicated.
UPCOMING EVENTS
We are planning our 2025 roundtable series, a community trip to Skoll in April and the 2025 Pathways to Change programme. We’ll share more detail in the New Year but, in the mean time, it was lovely to see some of you at our Christmas drinks this week and we wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy and Peaceful New Year.
HOW CAN WE HELP YOU?
Greenwood Place provides philanthropy support, advice and execution for a small group of strategic philanthropists. We take an entrepreneurial approach to tackling tough social and environmental problems. We work closely with our clients to find the places where they can make the most difference, we support their learning and we partner with them to achieve real, lasting change.
The Greenwood is the place in Shakespeare's plays where characters go to grow, change and learn.