The AI Organization

AI Hero: Cristian

Cristian was a teenager with many passions, but he needed a push to help him enjoy them to the fullest. Oddly, that push came when he was 18 years old and was involved in a car accident that caused full and permanent blindness. When he talks about the accident, you won’t hear any complaints. Actually, it’s just the opposite. He sees that accident as having created a new opportunity for him to find joy in things he was taking for granted and motivation to pursue those passions.

Cristian was energized by the accident, and saw it as a chance to learn things again and feel that sense of accomplishment that other people usually have just once in their lives. How many of us can remember how amazing it was to learn how to read? You probably weren’t even conscious of the world of possibilities that opened up to you in that moment in your life. Cristian was fortunate enough to reexperience that moment when he learned how to read Braille at age 19. He still remembers the sense of accomplishment and his joy at the possibilities that would bring to him, like being able to choose the music he wanted to listen to from his collection of vinyl records.

Learning to read again was just the beginning. Everything that Cristian had liked to do as a teenager was now more exciting because he had to learn it again. Like many of the AI heroes in this book, Cristian also had a personal computer, on which he learned to program (parents of today: think about that for your kids!). In his ...