Robots and Artificial Intelligence

DANCING WITH ROBOTS by Bill Bishop offers “The 29 Strategies for Success in the Age of AI and Automation.” Bishop, a Canadian entrepreneur and futurist, argues that machine learning algorithms, automation, and artificial intelligence are increasingly important and pervasive elements and that it is essential that humans develop and hone effective interactions. Basically, he writes, “We won’t be able to beat them, and we can’t ignore them. We need to learn how to embrace and dance gracefully with them.” Generally optimistic about humans’ competitive edge, he summarizes “Five Human Superpowers: embodied pattern recognition, unbridled curiosity, purpose-driven ideation, ethical framing, and metaphoric communication.” Next, he outlines strategies such as Ask Purpose-Driven Questions or Facilitate Flow or Connect with Nature. These ideas challenge our fundamental assumptions, moving from “an economy predicated on assembly lines and assembly-line thinking to an economy structured as a network… of relationships mediated by technology.” As a result, Bishop contends that we need new skills, attitudes, and ways of being. While these strategies may not be original, they clearly have profound implications for what and how we teach in an effort to prepare students for the future. I look forward to discussing this accessible text with others.

RULE OF THE ROBOTS by Martin Ford (Rise of the Robots) describes “How Artificial Intelligence Will Transform Everything.” Ford encourages readers to view AI as “not as a specific innovation, but rather as a uniquely scalable and potentially disruptive technology.” He compares it to electricity and data to the new oil in a series of chapters which deal with topics like deep learning, disappearing jobs, and China and the role of the surveillance state. Roughly fifteen percent of the text encompasses a set of footnotes which have been extremely helpful to the student researchers who have repeatedly requested this text.  Ford concludes by saying that we need to “begin by solving the problem of income distribution while maintaining a strong incentive for people to educate themselves and pursue meaningful challenges.” No simple task.  

Those looking for an even more scholarly text should turn to WORK by James Suzman which is subtitled “A Deep History, from the Stone Age to the Age of Robots.” Suzman, an anthropologist by training, now applies those methods to solving contemporary social and economic problems. In this work, published about a year ago, the self-described advocate for taking “a far more relaxed approach to work,” argues that the “principle purpose, however, has been to loosen the claw-like grasp that scarcity economics has held over our working lives, and to diminish our corresponding and unsustainable preoccupation with economic growth.” WORK received a starred review from Kirkus, plus positive feedback from Adam Grant, Charles Duhigg, Seth Godin, and Susan Cain (author of Quiet) who describes Suzman’s text as, “An incisive and original new history that invites us to rethink our relationship with work -- and to reimagine what it means to be human in an ever-more automated future.”