'If you want to see what that future might look like, Duncan's book
is a fun place to start' NPR 'Intensely readable, downright
terrifying, and surprisingly uplifting' Vanity Fair '5 books not to
miss . . . A fascinating work of imaginative futurology' USA Today
One of Time magazine's '32 Books You Need to Read This Summer' - 'a
riveting read' One of David Baldacci and Elizabeth Acevedo's best
summer reads, on USA Today's Today programme 'A refreshing
variation on the will-intelligent-robots-bring-Armageddon genre . .
. this colourful mixture of expert futurology and quirky
speculation does not disappoint' Kirkus Reviews What robot and AI
systems are being built and imagined right now? What do they say
about us, their creators? Will they usher in a fantastic new
future, or destroy us? What do some of our greatest thinkers, from
physicist Brian Greene and futurist Kevin Kelly to inventor Dean
Kamen, geneticist George Church, and filmmaker Tiffany Shlain,
anticipate about our human-robot future? For even as robots and AI
intrigue us and make us anxious about the future, our fascination
with robots has always been about more than the potential of the
technology - it's also about what robots tell us about being human.
From present-day Facebook and Amazon bots to near-future 'intimacy'
bots and 'the robot that swiped my job' bots, bestselling American
popular science writer David Ewing Duncan's Talking to Robots is a
wonderfully entertaining and insightful guide to possible future
scenarios about robots, both real and imagined. Featured bots
include robot drivers; doc bots; politician bots; warrior bots; sex
bots; synthetic bio bots; dystopic bots that are hopefully just bad
dreams; and ultimately, God Bot (as described by physicist Brian
Greene). These scenarios are informed by discussions with
well-known thinkers, engineers, scientists, artists, philosophers
and others, who share with us their ideas, hopes and fears about
robots. David spoke with, among others, Kevin Kelly, David
Baldacci, Brian Greene, Dean Kamen, Craig Venter, Stephanie Mehta,
David Eagleman, George Poste, George Church, General R. H. Latiff,
Robert Seigel, Emily Morse, David Sinclair, Ken Goldberg, Sunny
Bates, Adam Gazzaley, Tim O'Reilly, Tiffany Shlain, Eric Topol and
Juan Enriquez. These discussions, along with some reporting on
bot-tech, bot-history and real-time societal and ethical issues
with robots, are the launch pads for unfurling possible bot futures
that are informed by how people and societies have handled new
technologies in the past. The book describes how robots work, but
its primary focus is on what our fixation with bots and AI says
about us as humans: about our hopes and anxieties; our myths,
stories, beliefs and ideas about beings both real and artificial;
and our attempts to attain perfection. We are at a pivotal moment
when our ancient infatuation with human-like beings with certain
attributes or superpowers - in mythology, religion and storytelling
- is coinciding with our ability to actually build some of these
entities.
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