Status
Available
Call number
Publication
Knopf (2017), 384 pages
Language
Original language
English
Description
Business. Science. Technology. Nonfiction. HTML:New York Times Best Seller How will Artificial Intelligence affect crime, war, justice, jobs, society and our very sense of being human? The rise of AI has the potential to transform our future more than any other technology??and there??s nobody better qualified or situated to explore that future than Max Tegmark, an MIT professor who??s helped mainstream research on how to keep AI beneficial. How can we grow our prosperity through automation without leaving people lacking income or purpose? What career advice should we give today??s kids? How can we make future AI systems more robust, so that they do what we want without crashing, malfunctioning or getting hacked? Should we fear an arms race in lethal autonomous weapons? Will machines eventually outsmart us at all tasks, replacing humans on the job market and perhaps altogether? Will AI help life flourish like never before or give us more power than we can handle? What sort of future do you want? This book empowers you to join what may be the most important conversation of our time. It doesn??t shy away from the full range of viewpoints or from the most controversial issues??from superintelligence to meaning, consciousness and the ultimate physical limits on l… (more)
User reviews
LibraryThing member fpagan
Ultra-imaginative physicist Tegmark lays out many of the concerns on the plate of his Future of Life Institute (FLI) at MIT, especially those raised by the prospect of superhuman AGI. He rightly pays some attention to privacy and other aspects of freedom, and that accounts for some of the scariness
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I perceive in many of his scenarios for the coming millennia and megamillennia. He summarizes some of Nick Bostrom's _Superintelligence_ book. On consciousness, he cogently discusses mind uploading, Tononi's integrated information theory, and his own concept of a state of matter ("sentronium") beyond "computronium". He urges positivity and optimism, but I think the great wrongness (privacy destruction, etc) of tech development so far indicates a need for some nonviolent luddism in the short term.. A must read.in any case. Show Less
LibraryThing member antao
“Life 3.0, which can design not only its software but also its hardware. In other words, Life 3.0 is the master of its own destiny, finally fully free from its evolutionary shackles.”
In “Life 3.0 - Being Human in the Age of Artificial Intelligence” by Max Tegmark
See how good your PC is as
If you're into stuff like this, you can read the full review on my blog.
In “Life 3.0 - Being Human in the Age of Artificial Intelligence” by Max Tegmark
See how good your PC is as
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it ages or you want to install a better graphics card, does the driver play nice with everything? Are you competent enough to sort it out or are you the sort of person who offloads that to IT? The guys in IT are like ducks or swans, all seems serene on the surface but underneath they are paddling hard to stay afloat. They are one badly written security update away from disaster. Do they install the latest security patch or wait for others to see what happens? Also, the more complex a system becomes the more subject it is to critical failures from minor changes, the more they become like having 100 spinning plates on the go at once. If your bank's computer goes belly up just as the proceeds from your house sale are sailing through the system from one solicitor to another is there enough of a data trail to prove it existed? Do you feel lucky? In this day and age, when the state-of-affairs is like the one I’m describing above, can we still talk about AI?If you're into stuff like this, you can read the full review on my blog.
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LibraryThing member nmarun
This book speaks extensively about AGI - Artificial General Intelligence. It starts with the fundamental concepts like memory, intelligence, moves on to the progress made till now and then discusses the real challenges that lie ahead the AGI path.
The author debates about the various possible
The author holds a very interesting and unique (so far, for me) outlook to the Insatiably curious question "Are we alone?". He remains humble about his perspective on it even though he provides mathematical results for the same.
The chapter on Consciousness claims that the greatest challenge in creating superintelligence lies in understanding ourselves better - what is Consciousness, what are feelings, and where in our brain do we "feel" those feelings.
While reading the book, I could get many ideas for the next Hollywood movie. That is a testament to the author's imagination and creativity to write a futuristic book like this.
The author debates about the various possible
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aftermaths of AGI becoming a reality - from whether we would cohabit peacefully with our silicon-based siblings, to being exterminated by them, to super-intelligence being never created itself due to self-extinction.The author holds a very interesting and unique (so far, for me) outlook to the Insatiably curious question "Are we alone?". He remains humble about his perspective on it even though he provides mathematical results for the same.
The chapter on Consciousness claims that the greatest challenge in creating superintelligence lies in understanding ourselves better - what is Consciousness, what are feelings, and where in our brain do we "feel" those feelings.
While reading the book, I could get many ideas for the next Hollywood movie. That is a testament to the author's imagination and creativity to write a futuristic book like this.
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LibraryThing member Guide2
A good overview of the status of AI research with current challenges and opportunities. Somewhat dry at times.
LibraryThing member ajlewis2
I actually only read about half of the book: the first 3 chapters and the 8th chapter on consciousness. I enjoy the mind expansion that comes with reading Tegmark, but it seems that my mind doesn't expand far enough to get even half of what he says. I'm sorry that I really cannot evaluate it, but I
The book seems designed to evoke thought rather than telling the reader what to think.
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did enjoy looking at things from a different perspective and contemplating what I would like to see in a world with artificial intelligence. I liked the many "wow" things included like the number of calculations per second that the human brain does; the amazing feat of recognizing another person; and contemplating what is consciousness in the mass of quarks that we are. The book seems designed to evoke thought rather than telling the reader what to think.
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LibraryThing member waldhaus1
A thoughtful and erudite review of the state of artificial intelligence as well as the challenges and opportunities it offers humanity.
I found the analysis of consciousness and the question of whether machines will ever be consciousness. The author is marshalling thoughtful people to work together
I found the analysis of consciousness and the question of whether machines will ever be consciousness. The author is marshalling thoughtful people to work together
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to avoid a future where insensitive machines rule the for roost. Show Less
LibraryThing member aadyer
A good readable account of a forthcoming new age in humanity’s history and also an interesting speculation about the future. Interesting for those with a technology background. Good.
LibraryThing member PDCRead
Ask people to describe what they imagine artificial intelligence and a number of their reference points would no doubt be rooted in film and literature. There is the brutal robot from the Terminator films, the benign but deadly HAL9000 from 2001 A Space Odyssey, and the contemplative Deep Thought
The potential benefits of AI for humanity could be enormous, it could be used to run all sorts of systems, search for crimes and maybe be part of the justice process, monitor our health, assist with our jobs, and have the potential to actually do some of the most menial. People are considering using them for warfare too, one step on from what the drone does under human control at the moment.
Whilst AI excites some people who can only see the positives, after all the potential of it is huge; there are others who are very concerned that about the downsides so much so that there are AI systems that are not connected to the world wide web. Using AI for war could backfire spectacularly, bye bye human race; and what happens if the AI managing your house is hacked? Or the one in your car fails at speed. Images of those pods in the matrix come to mind…
The subjects Tegmark covers In Life 3.0 goes some way to addressing these and a lot more issues that are concerning people about the implications of AI. Some of the subjects he writes about were what you'd expect in a book like this, consciousness, intelligence, life and the implications of an AI totalitarian state, would it be a utopia or worse. There were some chapters that I didn't think were totally relevant to the subject; for example, he wanders off into the realms of space-time and goals. Was a little disappointing overall as this is a subject that needs urgent discussion right now.
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that Douglas Adams gave us. AI has a long way to go, but it is becoming something that people are beginning to use on a daily basis when they talk to Siri or Alexa. The potential benefits of AI for humanity could be enormous, it could be used to run all sorts of systems, search for crimes and maybe be part of the justice process, monitor our health, assist with our jobs, and have the potential to actually do some of the most menial. People are considering using them for warfare too, one step on from what the drone does under human control at the moment.
Whilst AI excites some people who can only see the positives, after all the potential of it is huge; there are others who are very concerned that about the downsides so much so that there are AI systems that are not connected to the world wide web. Using AI for war could backfire spectacularly, bye bye human race; and what happens if the AI managing your house is hacked? Or the one in your car fails at speed. Images of those pods in the matrix come to mind…
The subjects Tegmark covers In Life 3.0 goes some way to addressing these and a lot more issues that are concerning people about the implications of AI. Some of the subjects he writes about were what you'd expect in a book like this, consciousness, intelligence, life and the implications of an AI totalitarian state, would it be a utopia or worse. There were some chapters that I didn't think were totally relevant to the subject; for example, he wanders off into the realms of space-time and goals. Was a little disappointing overall as this is a subject that needs urgent discussion right now.
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LibraryThing member tuusannuuska
3,8 stars
Very interesting subject matter. I think it would have been better to read the physical text, rather than listen to the audio, as I'm sure some of the things covered flew past me while I found my thoughts wandering. While the topic was fascinating, I wasn't a huge fan of the writing. It
Very interesting subject matter. I think it would have been better to read the physical text, rather than listen to the audio, as I'm sure some of the things covered flew past me while I found my thoughts wandering. While the topic was fascinating, I wasn't a huge fan of the writing. It
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was easy to understand, but there was a lot of unnecessary name dropping and I'd have preferred a less personal take on the topic. Definitely worth reading though, gave me a lot of food for thought. Show Less
LibraryThing member GShuk
Best book I have read on this topic to date. He starts with a great story then goes over the positive and negative and the philosophy that is involved.
Awards
LA Times Book Prize (Finalist — Science & Technology — 2017)
Collection
DDC/MDS
| 006.301 |
Original publication date
2017
Physical description
384 p.; 6.62 inches
ISBN
1101946598 / 9781101946596
UPC
615145024417