It's Alive

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.

‘A whirlwind tour through the history and the future of AI – and why it matters to all of us. A must-read.’ —Sebastian Thrun, CEO of Udacity, a Google Fellow and VP, and a Research Professor at Stanford University.

‘Toby Walsh’s story of how artificial intelligence evolved from the dreams of Alan Turing to a powerful technological force today is exciting, insightful and incisive. Will his predictions about how AI will change life as we know it in the coming decades prove equally dead-on? I, for one, would not bet against him!’ —Henry Kautz, past President of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence, and Founding Director of Institute for Data Science and Professor at University of Rochester

‘It’s Alive! addresses a broad range of issues in clear and refreshingly non-technical language that is suitable for readers who are looking to explore the subject without being scared off by too much scientific jargon.’ —Chris Saliba, Books+Publishing

Toby Walsh is one of the world’s leading researchers in Artificial Intelligence, and has spent his life dreaming about and researching machines that might think. He is 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 the field, and has won the prestigious Humboldt Research Award.