The Illusion Engine: The Quest for Machine Consciousness

by Kristina Šekrst

This textbook opens with a simple what does it mean for a machine to think? Bridging philosophy, cognitive science, cybernetics, and machine learning, it connects contemporary advancements in artificial intelligence with foundational debates about mind, perception, and truth. By examining the capabilities and limitations of AI systems – including the phenomenon of AI hallucinations – it interrogates whether machines can truly ‘understand’ or if their intelligence is ultimately an illusion. This interdisciplinary textbook offers a timely exploration of the evolving relationship between humans and intelligent systems, shedding light on how AI challenges and reframes our understanding of cognition, knowledge, and the nature of intelligence itself and contains helpful key concept lists and summaries making it of great use to graduate students and professionals.

323 pages, Hardcover

Published October 30, 2025

Reviews

[Ana · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've had the pleasure and privilege to collaborate with this author and she was kind enough to give me excerpts from her book to read. It is a seminal work, absolutely groundbreaking, and I highly recommend it to anyone dealing with AI. You will get amazing insights!

It breaks new ground in how we think about language models, cognition, and perception. It isn’t just another book about AI or language, it lays out a theoretical architecture for how large language models don’t “understand” in the human sense, but simulate understanding through illusion. This concept of an “illusion engine” gives us a precise way to talk about AI’s epistemic status.

The author connects linguistics, semiotics, philosophy of language, and cognitive science with computer science in a way nobody has quite done before. This interdisciplinary integration makes it a touchstone for both humanities scholars and technologists.

p.s. the 1-star rating must've been by someone who has a personal vendetta against the author since the book is currently in pre-order only! Plain pathetic, but not surprising that people will be hurt they didn't think of this first.

[Mike · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is like that moment when you realise someone has actually taken the time to understand how llms work and can explain them without either hand waving or technical chest beating. My favourite parts are where familiar philosophy of mind questions are reframed through very concrete explanations of embeddings, transformers, and hallucinations, in a way that just kinda clicks. I kept thinking how much easier my own studies would have been if I had had this as a textbook in college since it's the kind of book you want to assign to students because it meets them where they are, but it's also perfectly readable for anyone who is simply curious about AI and minds. Serious ideas, no unnecessary fog, and a tone that makes you want to keep reading. Love the occasional humor, makes it not dull. Dull philosophy is the worst, and this is an amazing book

[Breez · Rating 5 out of 5]

This one feels like someone took all the confused late night talks I have had about AI and consciousness and actually sorted them out.It explains technical stuff like embeddings and transformers in a way I could follow without already being a computer scientist, but it still connects to serious debates about qualia, zombies, and illusionism. I finished it with more questions than answers, but in a good way

[Jon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Basically replaces 10 books I read

[David J · Rating 4 out of 5]

i went into this book expecting it to lean hard in one direction, either dense philosophy or very technical ai, and it ended up sitting somewhere awkwardly in the middle. that turns out to be both its biggest strength and, depending on what you are looking for, a bit of a hurdle. some parts slow down to really unpack ideas, especially the chapter on llms, and i appreciated that even when it made the pacing a little uneven. there were moments where i wanted a clearer pause or summary before moving on but i also got the sense that this was intentional. the author does not pretend these questions are settled, and they do not rush past the hard parts just to make things feel tidy. it is thoughtful without being pretentious, moves across diffferent fields without showing off, and it is clear the author actually understands both the philosophical questions and the technology itself, not just one or the other which is often the case