The Fuzzy And The Techie: Why the Liberal Arts Will Rule the Digital World

by Scott Hartley

Overview

This Financial Times Business Book of the Month from a leading venture capitalist offers a counterintuitive look at what skills are necessary in the age of AI.

Finalist for the 2016 Financial Times/McKinsey Bracken Bower Prize

“Scott Hartley artfully explains why it is time for us to get over the false division between the human and the technical.” —Tim Brown, CEO of IDEO and author of Change by Design

 

Scott Hartley first heard the terms fuzzy and techie while studying political science at Stanford University. If you majored in humanities or social sciences, you were a fuzzy. If you majored in computer or hard sciences, you were a techie. While Silicon Valley is generally considered a techie stronghold, the founders of companies like Airbnb, Pinterest, Slack, LinkedIn, PayPal, Stitch Fix, Reddit, and others are all fuzzies—in other words, people with backgrounds in the liberal arts.

In this brilliantly counterintuitive book, Hartley shatters assumptions about business and education today: learning to code is not enough in the age of AI. Rote and routine tasks may go to machines, but that is exactly why the soft skills taught through the liberal arts—curiosity, communication, and collaboration, along with an understanding of ethics and psychology—are essential in the future of work. It’s the humanities, and the liberal arts, that give humans our comparative advantage against machines. Fuzzies, rather than techies, have the essential skills ready to shape and define our future of jobs, robotics, artificial intelligence, and machine learning. This understanding of ethics and grounding in humanity is no longer an academic nice-to-have; it is the essential skill in the future of work.

For anyone doubting whether a well-rounded liberal arts education is practical in today’s era of artificial intelligence, Hartley’s work will come as an inspiring revelation for the future of work.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781328915405
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	06/05/2018
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	304
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 7.90(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

SCOTT HARTLEY is a venture capitalist and startup advisor. He has served as a Presidential Innovation Fellow at the White House, a partner at Mohr Davidow Ventures, and a venture partner at Metamorphic Ventures. Prior to venture capital, Hartley worked at Google, Facebook, and Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet & Society. He is a contributing author to the MIT Press book Shopping for Good, and has written for publications such as Inc., Foreign Policy, Forbes, and the Boston Review.

Hartley has been a speaker at dozens of international entrepreneurship events with the World Bank, MIT, Google, and the U.S. State Department’s Global Innovation in Science and Technology (GIST) program. Hartley holds an MBA and an MA from Columbia University, and a BA from Stanford University. He is a term member at the Council on Foreign Relations and lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Table of Contents

Author's Note ix

1 The Role of the Fuzzy in a Techie World 1

2 Adding the Human Factor to Big Data 31

3 The Democratization of Technology Tools 59

4 Algorithms That Serve - Rather Than Rule - Us 86

5 Making Our Technology More Ethical 109

6 Enhancing the Ways We Learn 140

7 Building a Better World 173

8 The Future of Jobs 201

Conclusion: Partnership Goes Both Ways 227

Acknowledgments 235

Notes 237

Index 280

Editorial Reviews

You can’t build a wall to keep the robots out. That doesn’t mean we’re doomed. Scott Hartley does a masterful job going beyond the headlines to explain why the future needs engineers as much as it does philosophers, and why the two need each other.” — Ian Bremmer, president of Eurasia Group and author of Superpower   

“This terrific book clearly articulates the importance of the liberal arts in our technocentric world, a view I have long supported. In the end, technology is about making the lives of humans better, and, as the author argues, it is the humanities and social sciences that teach us about the human condition and how it might be improved. A delightful read!” — John Hennessy, Chairman of Google, Inc. and President Emeritus of Stanford University   

“Scott Hartley artfully explains why it is time for us to get over the false division between the human and the technical. If received and acted upon with the seriousness it deserves, we can anticipate real benefits for business and society.” — Tim Brown, CEO of IDEO and author of Change by Design

“For generations, leadership has been viewed as an art form, refined and perfected by a healthy dose of ‘fuzzy’ liberal arts education. But in the tech-heavy world of the twenty-first century, traditional leadership preparation needs to be leavened by STEM. As Scott Hartley brilliantly illustrates, a ‘fuzzy-techie’ partnership is a prerequisite—not just as a guide for governments and businesses in meeting existential challenges but also as a foundation for emerging leaders; they, not machines, will be the keys to solving the greatest problems of the new century.” — Daniel W. Christman,lieutenant general (ret.) and 55th superintendent, U.S. Military Academy, West Point  

“Great book for all. Blows up the false dichotomy in education between tech and liberal arts. This book shows that not only can both coexist; it is dangerous if they don’t both exist side by side in an integrated manner. They make each other more effective. Scott has done an excellent job of making his argument with facts, illustrative case studies, and well-reasoned solutions. An important and enjoyable read.” — Bill Aulet, author of Disciplined Entrepreneurship and managing director of the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship

“Silicon Valley is founded on strong engineering cultures, but the biggest challenges of the coming decades will lead Silicon Valley to partner with those who best understand our humanity. Many of the greatest companies are built by fuzzies and techies working together—Scott makes a compelling case that important data and information are increasingly generated by machines, but the wisdom of humans is required to build this data into the knowledge that runs our civilization.” — Joe Lonsdale,cofounder of Palantir   

“In this book Scott Hartley succeeds better than anyone I know in articulating the indispensable role a liberal arts education plays…One of the impacts of technology has been to democratize freedom scholarship and passion. Scott Hartley lays this out in plain language that a liberal arts education trumps early specialization in STEM subjects.” — Temba Maqubela,headmaster of Groton School   

“I am a ‘fuzzy’ venture capitalist who owes a successful life in Silicon Valley to the ‘techies.’ Scott Hartley has brilliantly described the magic that is created when these two tribes work together. His insightful book shines a bright light on this rarely analyzed but highly productive relationship.” — Bill Draper, co-chair of the Draper Richards Kaplan Foundation and author of The Startup Game: Inside the Partnership Between Venture Capitalists and Entrepreneurs

From the Publisher