A thoughtfully cautious appraisal of AI and its promise.
In this debut technology treatise, investor and entrepreneur Shwartz argues for more modest expectations for the future of artificial intelligence and a cleareyed assessment of its potential pitfalls.
The author observes that the general public’s conception of the promise of AI is largely the result of “fear-inducing hype” of the dystopian threat of a machine-led tyranny. Even notable technologists have jumped on the grim-prediction bandwagon, as when legendary physicist Stephen Hawking fretted in 2014 that the rise of intelligent computers “could spell the end of the human race.” The author compellingly argues that such prognostications are empirically indefensible and presuppose a technological sophistication that AI simply can’t claim. In fact, he says, the notion that machines can have humanlike intelligence conflates AI with artificial general intelligence, or AGI. The former is a reality but restricted to the performance of singular, exceedingly narrow tasks, Shwartz notes, while the latter—the emergence of machine-based consciousness—is an outright fiction. With impressive prudence, he asserts that AGI–based technology is unlikely at best: “How long will it be before we know enough about how people think to make real progress toward AGI? At the current rate of progress, it appears we will need hundreds—maybe thousands—of years, and it may never happen.” Throughout, the author astutely considers the very real challenges that AI poses, such as the potential threat to public safety from autonomous vehicles. At the heart of this searching account, however, is his elucidation of the contrast between human and artificial cognition: The former, he notes, is infinitely more complex and nimble and requires a “commonsense reasoning,” and the latter can only superficially mime it. Despite his subject’s forbidding technicality, Shwartz writes with unwavering clarity in a book that will be accessible to a wide audience.
A thoughtfully cautious appraisal of AI and its promise.Pub Date: Feb. 2, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-73542-453-8
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Fast Company Press
Review Posted Online: March 17, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A powerful melding of image and text inspired by Instagram yet original in its execution.
Smith returns with a photo-heavy book of days, celebrating births, deaths, and the quotidian, all anchored by her distinctive style.
In 2018, the musician and National Book Award–winning author began posting on Instagram, and the account quickly took off. Inspired by the captioned photo format, this book provides an image for every day of the year and descriptions that are by turns intimate, humorous, and insightful, and each bit of text adds human depth to the image. Smith, who writes and takes pictures every day, is clearly comfortable with the social media platform—which “has served as a way to share old and new discoveries, celebrate birthdays, remember the departed, and salute our youth”—and the material translates well to the page. The book, which is both visually impactful and lyrically moving, uses Instagram as a point of departure, but it goes well beyond to plumb Smith’s extensive archives. The deeply personal collection of photos includes old Polaroid images, recent cellphone snapshots, and much-thumbed film prints, spanning across decades to bring readers from the counterculture movement of the 1960s to the present. Many pages are taken up with the graves and birthdays of writers and artists, many of whom the author knew personally. We also meet her cat, “Cairo, my Abyssinian. A sweet little thing the color of the pyramids, with a loyal and peaceful disposition.” Part calendar, part memoir, and part cultural record, the book serves as a rich exploration of the author’s fascinating mind. “Offered in gratitude, as a place to be heartened, even in the basest of times,” it reminds us that “each day is precious, for we are yet breathing, moved by the way light falls on a high branch, or a morning worktable, or the sculpted headstone of a beloved poet.”
A powerful melding of image and text inspired by Instagram yet original in its execution.Pub Date: Nov. 15, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-593-44854-0
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 5, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2022
Dense and striking, to be savored and reread.
A compact return to the personal by one of today’s sharpest literary minds.
Following two recent works of cultural criticism, Nelson’s new text swings and sings back to the intimate and personal. Her quest to alleviate persistent, consuming orofacial pain serves as a narrative backbone assembled from a series of treatment plans, including Botox, a tongue-tie frenectomy, and even the suggestion to tape her mouth shut while sleeping. As she collects recommendations for pain management that veer from the surgical to the “woo-woo”—each promising accurate diagnosis and permanent deliverance—Nelson drifts between the tangible sensation of her pain and the surreality of her dreams. Her search for relief swells around the puncture wound of the coronavirus, and her prose echoes the nebulous space and abrupt transitions between specifics of time, place, interrupted activity, and the singularity and absurdity of that period. Tensions and tenderness in her relationships with her partner, her son, and a dear friend on the verge of a lonely death are atomized by the pandemic, dancing in the shadows alongside twisted nightmares, reflections on her career, and visits to dentists, therapists, and other healers. While the text is short, it packs plenty of Nelson’s signature power punches of brilliance and shrewd humor, driving the reader to look between carefully constructed lines that twitch with secrets and memories held and defended. The author’s audit of her physical pain, its undulating waves, and its stubborn betrayal of and distraction to her body and mind serves as a conduit for discerning the necessity of a person’s mouth, voice, and words, cautioning against both exhausting one’s words and stifling a person’s speech, revealing both the power and burden of what is said and what is not.
Dense and striking, to be savored and reread.Pub Date: April 1, 2025
ISBN: 9798891060111
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Wave Books
Review Posted Online: March 21, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2025
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
