Post 11. Rory McIIroy, Principles of Neural Design, and Salmon

A Sunday Debrief

I have to begin this post by noting that I failed in my goal of posting every day within just five days. It’s humbling to miss a goal, especially one you publicly declared in front of 61 people.

While it’s frustrating, I’m getting back at it tonight. I’ve got three brief updates:

1. The 2025 Masters. I’ve 100% caught the golf bug today and have been rewatching Rory’s final round all evening. Two double bogeys, a missed putt for the win on 18, then a beautiful shot in the playoff to close it out. His round was all over the place. It was awesome to see how much of a mental game golf is. He had every reason to unravel but stayed grounded. In an interview after the win, he noted that you “have to be the eternal optimist in this game.” I certainly need to learn a little patience and will definitely be at a golf course sometime soon. Davis Greene, it’s time.

2. Principles of Neural Design. I picked up Peter Sterling and Simon Laughlin’s Principles of Neural Design at the bookstore a few days ago and got started tonight. I’ve made my way through about 1/2 of the Introduction section. This book will be a challenge, but I’m ready for it. Here is what I learned tonight:

   The authors begin by asking a basic but important question: What does a brain actually do? To answer that, they walk through a progression of organisms—starting with ones that don’t even have a brain. First is Escherichia coli, a single-celled bacterium that can still navigate its environment by sensing chemical gradients—basically swimming toward food and away from harm. Then they move to Paramecium caudatum, also a single cell, but more complex. It has long-distance signaling along its outer membrane that lets it coordinate movement in response to its surroundings.

   The next step up is Caenorhabditis elegans, a tiny nematode worm with exactly 302 neurons. Despite having such a small nervous system, it can sense touch, respond to odors, and even learn through basic forms of memory. The point Sterling and Laughlin make is that neural systems didn’t emerge fully formed—they evolved incrementally, solving small problems first and gradually becoming more sophisticated. The brain, in their view, is not a general-purpose computer—it’s a highly specialized organ shaped by evolutionary pressure to solve very specific tasks efficiently. I’ll get started with Chapter I tomorrow, I hope.

3. Salmon with Milan. The image below speaks for itself. Milan and I crushed it.

Hope everyone has a great start to the week. Looking forward to tomorrow’s post.

Best,

Jack