It’s Alive!

Description

There are few other human inventions that are likely to have as large an impact on our lives as machines that can think . . . The steam engine liberated our muscles; the computer is set to liberate our minds.

The development of Artificial Intelligence is an adventure as bold and ambitious as any that humans have attempted. And the truth is that thinking machines are already an indispensable part of our lives. Without them, Google couldn’t answer your questions in a fraction of a second. Autonomous cars would exist only in science fiction. And your smartphone would be . . . just a phone. In countless ways, with every passing day, AI is shaping and reshaping our world.

But where will AI technologies take us in the future? Will thinking machines destroy our jobs? Could their intelligence surpass our own? Could the rise of AI threaten the very existence of humanity?

Leading researcher Toby Walsh takes us on a surprising and inspiring journey through the story of Artificial Intelligence – revealing how it is already transforming our societies, our economies and even ourselves – and makes ten fascinating predictions about what it will have achieved by the year 2050.

Toby Walsh is one of the world’s leading researchers in Artificial Intelligence. He is a Professor of Artificial Intelligence at the University of New South Wales and leads a research group at Data61, Australia’s Centre of Excellence for ICT Research. He has been elected a fellow of the Association for the Advancement of AI for his contributions to AI research, and has won the prestigious Humboldt research award. He has previously held research positions in England, Scotland, France, Germany, Italy, Ireland and Sweden.