How Data Happened: A History from the Age of Reason to the Age of Algorithms

"Fascinating." -Jill Lepore, The New Yorker

From facial recognition-capable of checking people into flights or identifying undocumented residents-to automated decision systems that inform who gets loans and who receives bail, each of us moves through a world determined by data-empowered algorithms. But these technologies didn't just appear: they are part of a history that goes back centuries, from the c...