The Atomic Human: What Makes Us Unique in the Age of AI

Lawrence, a machine learning professor at Cambridge University, debuts with a muddled inquiry into what distinguishes human decision-making from artificial intelligence. Relying on convoluted analogies, Lawrence details at length the uncertain intel and logistical complexities Dwight Eisenhower had to contend with when deciding when to invade Normandy, but barely develops his comparison between Eisenhower and AI, rendering his assertion that the technology lacks Eisenhower’s capacity for “judgement” somewhat nebulous. A particularly baffling chapter explains how participants in a 2006 clinical drug trial suffered debilitating side effects to make the simple point that, just as the participants should’ve been less trusting of the doctors conducting the trial, humans should be wary of AI algorithms they don’t understand. Lawrence embarks on a dizzying array of tangents touching on the invention of calculus, the fly-ball mechanism that automated steam engines, behavioral psychologist Daniel Kahneman’s cognitive theories, and the European squid’s propulsion mechanics, but their relevance to AI is often oblique at best. Lawrence also equivocates so much (he contends he’s “an optimist about AI” even as he decries tech companies for “deploying software systems that cannot be controlled”) that it’s hard to tell where he stands. This gets lost in the weeds. Agent: Max Edwards, Aevitas Creative Management. (Sept.)