[This Week's Books] On the Imperfection That Makes Us Human and More

It is not only ignorance of how to make a profit that causes investors to fail even in bull markets. The bigger problem lies in mistaking lucky gains for skill, and interpreting losses as failures or matters of pride. The experience of Jim Paul, who climbed to the top of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange through commodity futures trading and then lost over one million dollars in just 75 days, is not simply a story of downfall; it is a psychological dissection of how investors deceive themselves and collapse before the market.

The key is not so much about 'how to earn well,' but 'how to lose well.' The author points out recurring patterns of failure such as herd mentality, the desire for recognition, revenge trading, and denial of losses, and argues that losses in the market should be seen as costs, not failures. More important than the psychological reward of being right is the financial outcome of protecting your capital. Rather than trying to eliminate emotion, the survival strategy is to minimize the room for emotions with plans and stop-loss rules set before entering a trade. The more exuberant the market, the more important it is not to be certain, but to have the attitude of losing small and surviving when you are wrong. (Written by Jim Paul and Brendan Moynihan, translated by Shin Yekyung | Medici Media)

The impact of generative AI is no longer just an issue of chatbots or work assistant tools. As 'vertical AI' specialized for specific industries enters work sites in fields such as customer support, marketing, sales, HR, robotics, security, healthcare, and fintech, the very way companies operate is changing. Repetitive inquiries are handled by AI, sales meetings are analyzed down to voice and facial expressions, and in medical settings, diagnostic assistance and clinical Q&A are being automated. Author Naoki Shibata, drawing on examples from Silicon Valley AI startups, demonstrates that AI is evolving beyond merely lessening human workloads to becoming an agent that judges and acts.

The key is not whether you "use AI," but whether you have "redesigned your work based on AI." As simple and standardized work is increasingly handled by AI, the remaining human strengths are creativity, strategic judgement, field intuition, and the ability to read context. While one year of technological change is often exaggerated, ten years of change is often underestimated. Only companies and individuals who prepare during periods of disillusionment and fatigue will reap the fruits of the next order. The future of work after AI is not just about the fear of disappearing jobs, but about posing the question of how humans will continue to create value. (Written by Naoki Shibata, translated by Park Soohyun | RH Korea)

The era's obsession with perfection actually makes us more vulnerable. As algorithms curate news, apps optimize schedules, and automation systems make decisions for us, we lose the ability to endure ambiguity and respond spontaneously. Tim Harford traces the value of human capabilities that cannot be explained solely by order and efficiency—ranging from autopilot accidents in aviation, London Underground strikes, Benjamin Franklin's obsession with tidiness, to the irregular working patterns of creators.

Chaos and disorder are not merely flaws to be eliminated. Sometimes they lead us off familiar paths, introduce us to new people and ideas, and open up possibilities that cannot be captured by numbers and rules. In an era where automation and optimization have become everyday standards, what is needed is not perfect control but the ability to handle imperfection. The skills to endure ambiguity, recover from mistakes, and make judgments amid unexpected variables are convincingly shown to be what truly make us human. (Written by Tim Harford, translated by Yoon Youngsam | Wilma)

The life of Doug Tompkins, who built The North Face and Esprit, raises the question of how one can redesign life after achieving success. Although he was an entrepreneur who created global brands, he liquidated his assets at the peak of his success and headed to the remote wilderness of Patagonia. Instead of pursuing more money and bigger companies, he turned toward preserving the wild places he loved. That choice was not a romantic retirement, but a relentless practice—buying land, fighting with the government, enduring conspiracy theories and distrust, and working to restore nature as national parks.

What is interesting is that Tompkins was never a gentle, saint-like environmentalist. He was a perfectionist, tried to control everything, and was sometimes arrogant and intolerant of compromise. The contradiction of being an environmentalist who drove a Ferrari was also part of him. But it was precisely his stubbornness and excess that became the driving force for achieving what seemed impossible. Jonathan Franklin looks at both the flaws and achievements of one individual, showing that great transformations do not always arise from pure good intentions. In the end, the question that remains is this: After climbing the mountain you are on, will you have the courage to climb another? (Written by Jonathan Franklin, translated by Kang Donghyuk | Bokbok Bookshelf)

Even after the dissolution of Daewoo Group, what ultimately remained was not the organization's name but the people who had mastered how to work on the global stage. The 15-year record of GYBM goes beyond restoring Kim Woo-choong's 'global management' as mere nostalgia, tracing how the standards and methods for cultivating talent survive even after a company disappears. This system prioritizes attitude over qualifications, fieldwork over lectures, and judgement over knowledge. It does not simply 'teach' people, but throws them into unfamiliar environments, compelling them to make decisions and take responsibility for themselves.

The key is not the success stories of talented individuals, but the structure of growth that encompasses failure and recovery. It includes scenes such as returning to Korea midway, failing to adapt locally, and business setbacks, yet shows how those experiences become new standards and assets for the next generation. The question GYBM leaves is simple: What endures as a legacy after a company disappears? The answer is people—more precisely, a system that repeatedly produces people who stand their ground and make decisions without running away, no matter the situation. (Written by Daewoo GYBM Mentor Council | Acornon)

Revolutions are often remembered for the shouts in the plaza and moments of explosion, but the seeds of real change grow in smaller, slower places. Gal Beckerman traces how radical ideas that changed the world took shape through secret conversations and persistent connections—from the letters of 17th-century scientists, petitions of 19th-century workers, reader submissions in colonial newspapers, samizdat by Soviet dissidents, to email groups among health experts in the early pandemic. What matters is not the moment of revolution, but the process of maturing ideas that made that moment possible.

This is also the paradox of the social media age. Tools that spread quickly and provoke easy outrage can gather people, but they deprive us of the time for long reflection, consensus-building, and designing new orders. The author argues that what is needed for change is not a louder megaphone, but a vessel where dangerous ideas are not prematurely consumed but can grow. Revolution is not viral, but a skill of patience; world-changing ideas need the quiet time of a burning fuse. (Written by Gal Beckerman, translated by Son Seonghwa | Across)

The more accessible hospitals become, the more our bodies become frequent sources of anxiety. Kim Hyunjung, an active orthopedic surgeon, raises essential questions that are often overlooked amid a medical landscape overflowing with tests, drugs, procedures, and surgeries. Sometimes, what needs to be addressed before a sick body is anxiety itself; health begins not with spending money on products, but with the body's resilience and attitude toward daily life.

As the first female orthopedic surgeon at Severance Hospital and Korea's first female professor of orthopedics, the author insightfully and humorously discusses issues such as overdiagnosis, overtreatment, the flood of health information, and insurance-driven medical consumption. The title is not a declaration to reject medical care, but a suggestion to understand your body and make wise choices before hastily entrusting yourself to treatment. 'Doctors Don’t Get Surgery' is a practical guide to medical care, especially recommended for those who visit hospitals regularly. (Written by Kim Hyunjung | Bookie)

In an era when delivery food and ready-to-eat meals have become the norm, home-cooked meals are now the rarest form of dining. The table that Ms. Jang Geumja, born in 1954, set for over 40 years became, through her daughter Son Habin’s planning, a one-table pop-up restaurant called ‘Ms. Geumja’s Kitchen,’ and now remains as a recipe notebook. The secret of this kitchen, where reservations were instantly booked out, lay not in special techniques but in daily devotion.

With 44 recipes—including mushroom rice, soybean paste rice bowl, stir-fried dried radish greens with soybean paste, stir-fried pollack skin, and stonecrop apple juice—the book proposes home-cooked meals that can be made with familiar ingredients from the fridge in under 30 minutes. The message is that cooking is not about grand gastronomy, but about feeding and caring for oneself. It records the taste of a mother’s hand while also encouraging busy generations to step up to the kitchen once again. 'Ms. Geumja’s Recipes for My Daughter.' (Written by Jang Geumja and Son Habin | Semicolon)