Arguing A.I.: The Battle for Twenty-first-Century Science by Sam Williams

by Sam Williams

The drive to create artificial intelligence has been contentious since its beginnings, and the arguments have sharpened our understanding of fields as diverse as mathematics, neuroscience, and philosophy. Science writer Sam Williams's brief history of the controversies, Arguing The Battle for Twenty-First Century Science, is an excellent starting point for readers interested more in arguments than in circuit diagrams.Its six chapters, while strongly focused, occasionally go in curious directions; for example, while Jaron Lanier is no doubt an important figure, he gets a surprising and disproportionate amount of page space. Still, Williams defines and clarifies the debates over the feasibility and desirability of A.I. and includes plenty of paper and online resources to inspire further investigation. --Rob Lightner

Paperback

First published January 1, 2002

Reviews

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sam Williams offers us a well-constructed time capsule of AI debates circa the dawn of the 21st Century, when much of the debate was about AI becoming "human" -- passing the Turing Test by developing "general intelligence" in computing algorithms. Twenty years on, there's certainly efforts in that direction (and there's still much discussion of a post-human robotic future) but much of what AI is actually focused on now (and where AI is making money) seems to be in using the power of the cloud to develop machine learning. Robotic humans don't appear all that much closer than they did in 2000.

Starting with the inspiration of Hilbert and Turing, Williams goes on to cover the pioneering work of John McCarthy and the work of three other representative men in AI at the start of this century -- Ray Kurzweil, the Optimist; Jaron Lanier, the Humanist; Bill Joy, the Pessimist. Having read some of Kurzweil's work and knowing Bill Joy from the computing press at the time of the writing of this book, I was very happy to be introduced to Jaron Lanier, who's apparently still active in the field. Kurzweil works at Google now, I believe, and Bill Joy has faded from the limelight.

I borrowed the paperback from the Rice University Library and resisted the temptation to just buy the kindle version, though I may still buy the Kindle version because it is a very well written little book, and I'm fascinated by the prospect of clicking on the links in his Website Resources Directory at the end of the book.

[Diego Pino · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found out about this book while researching other works by Sam Williams, of whom I had read before "Free as in Freedom". I'm glad I did because Sam Williams is such as good chronicler of computer science history as he proves in this book as well as in "Free as in Freedom".

First of all, I think it's worth clarifying what this book is and what is not. This book is not a kind introduction to A.I for the general public, and neither it is a sensationalist discussion about the same topic. This book is, from my point of view, a snapshot of the state of the art of A.I at the beginning of the 21st century. It consists mainly of three interviews with 3 relevant people in the field: Ray Kurzweil, "the optimist"; Jarouz Lanier, "the humanist" and Bill Joy, "the pesimist". Among the three, Bill Joy is perhaps an intruder in the field of A.I but his essay "Why the future doesn't need us", published in Wired maganize in early 2000, where he discusses the moral implications of genetics, robotics and nanotechnology brought him to the spotlight, granting him a slot here.

Besides these 3 interviews, the essay also features a beautifully crafted chronicle of the history of A.I and computer science, without any doubt one of the best I've ever read, as well as an epilogue chapter where several conclusions, and new questions, are exposed. Another thing I loved of this book was the quality of its bibliography and references to other works.

Summarizing, I would strongly recommend this book to anyone interested in A.I from a historical point of view, but take into account that certain familiarity with A.I and computer science is probably needed.

[Andrea Nicaretta · Rating 3 out of 5]

Analisi generale sulla IA

[Paolo Capitelli · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interessante leggere cosa si diceva dell’AI nel 2003
Ma non imperdibile

[Krishna Kumar · Rating 3 out of 5]

The author takes a look at the arguments of the various proponents and critics of artificial intelligence. He also discusses the historical origins and progress of the artificial intelligence and the philosophical debates. The arguments are interesting, yet we don't get a clear picture of what the future holds after we finish the book. Of course, that is not the author's intention, either. So we can give him credit for presenting us an overview of where artificial intelligence is at today.

[Cypress Butane · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good information, short book. Has a beat on some important trends and people in the A.I. debate, and is fairly current, published 2002. Has a lot of web links in the text, that, if any of them still work, could make this a more valuable resource to have around. Serves well as a primer for A.I. research.