Artificial Intelligence: Modern Magic or Dangerous Future?

by Yorick Wilks

Overview

Artificial intelligence has long been a mainstay of science fiction and increasingly it feels as if AI is entering our everyday lives, with technology like Apple's Siri now prominent, and self-driving cars almost upon us.
But what do we actually mean when we talk about 'AI'? Are the sentient machines of 2001 or The Matrix a real possibility or will real-world artificial intelligence look and feel very different? What has it done for us so far? And what technologies could it yield in the future?
AI expert Yorick Wilks takes a journey through the history of artificial intelligence up to the present day, examining its origins, controversies and achievements, as well as looking into just how it works. He also considers the future, assessing whether these technologies could menace our way of life, but also how we are all likely to benefit from AI applications in the years to come.
Entertaining, enlightening, and keenly argued, this is the essential one-stop guide to the AI debate.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781785785177
Publisher:	Icon Books, Ltd. UK
Publication date:	06/06/2019
Series:	Hot Science
Sold by:	Bookwire
Format:	eBook
Pages:	176
File size:	616 KB

About the Author

Yorick Wilks is an emeritus Professor of Artificial Intelligence at the University of Sheffield, a research associate of the Oxford Internet Institute and a Senior Research Scientist at the Florida Institute of Human and Machine Cognition. His books include Artificial Companions (Benjamins, 2010) and Artificial Believers: The Ascription of Belief (with Afzal Ballim, Psychology Press, 1991).
Yorick Wilks is an emeritus Professor of Artificial Intelligence at the University of Sheffield, a research associate of the Oxford Internet Institute and a Senior Research Scientist at the Florida Institute of Human and Machine Cognition. His books include Artificial Companions (Benjamins, 2010) and Artificial Believers: The Ascription of Belief (with Afzal Ballim, Psychology Press, 1991).

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements ix

1 Setting out my stall: what is artificial intelligence? 1

2 How should robots think?: the place of logic in AI 17

3 Our first encounters with AI: the World Wide Web 31

4 What is an AI program like? 47

5 Talking and understanding: AI speech and language 55

6 Can AI really learn? 71

7 AI seeing and doing: robots and computer vision 91

8 Making things personal: Artificial Companions 103

9 The Companion as a way into the web 119

10 AI invades its neighbours: war, ethics, automation and religion 135

11 Shutting up shop: the takeaway message from this book 153

Further Reading 157

Index 159