A digital version of the author.
Photo by Jessica Brandi Lifland/Polaris, modified by the author.
This book is about the creative partnership of humans and technology. Not to dismiss legitimate worries about the disruptive effects of technology, the real power of technology stems from its partnership with humans. We humans, with all our limitations and foibles, are central to its creation and nurture. Hence, many technological developments are as much cultural as scientific. Digital technology and computing have advanced to the point where physical constraints matter less than our imagination and our ability to absorb new paradigms.
I explore the ways that engineers use models to build inventive artificial worlds and to give us things that we never dreamed of—for example, the ability to carry in our pockets everything humans have ever published. But in a yin-and-yang balance, I also attempt to counter the runaway enthusiasm of some technology boosters who claim that everything in the physical world is a computation—that even such complex phenomena as human cognition are software operating on digital data. I argue that the evidence for this is weak, and the likelihood that nature has limited itself to processes that conform to today's notion of digital computation is remote.
I go on to argue that artificial intelligence's goal of reproducing human cognitive functions in computers vastly underestimates the potential of computers. In my view, technology is coevolving with humans. It augments our cognitive and physical capabilities while we nurture, develop, and propagate the technology itself. Complementarity is more likely than competition.
The book is aimed at literate technologists and numerate humanists. I hope you are one of these. Some of my arguments cannot be made convincingly without a bit of math, but I have made every attempt to make these arguments accessible. I have provided guideposts where, if you are willing to accept my conclusions without diving into the math, you can skip the nerd storm.
Download the front matter (table of contents and preface):
I explore the ways that engineers use models to build inventive artificial worlds and to give us things that we never dreamed of—for example, the ability to carry in our pockets everything humans have ever published. But in a yin-and-yang balance, I also attempt to counter the runaway enthusiasm of some technology boosters who claim that everything in the physical world is a computation—that even such complex phenomena as human cognition are software operating on digital data. I argue that the evidence for this is weak, and the likelihood that nature has limited itself to processes that conform to today's notion of digital computation is remote.
I go on to argue that artificial intelligence's goal of reproducing human cognitive functions in computers vastly underestimates the potential of computers. In my view, technology is coevolving with humans. It augments our cognitive and physical capabilities while we nurture, develop, and propagate the technology itself. Complementarity is more likely than competition.
The book is aimed at literate technologists and numerate humanists. I hope you are one of these. Some of my arguments cannot be made convincingly without a bit of math, but I have made every attempt to make these arguments accessible. I have provided guideposts where, if you are willing to accept my conclusions without diving into the math, you can skip the nerd storm.
Download the front matter (table of contents and preface):
| platoandthenerddigitalv08preface.pdf |