AI Needs You How We Can Change AI’s Future and Save Our Own, reviewed

We look at this interesting new book by Verity Harding, published today. See more about it here.

AI Needs You How We Can Change AI’s Future and Save Our Own, reviewed

This book is well written and has a multi-decade perspective on the issues we face, and the deep deep challenges that we need to overcome for a less negative future. We enjoyed reading the book and felt it capture the issues well, with a good analysis of the problems we face. At the same time we also became a little depressed, because, is it actually possible to successfully deal with these issues.

When you look at the US and it is, currently, a toss up in the US presidential race between someone very old, and someone running on a list of personal grievances they want to redress, you wonder, how on earth is this even a choice for sane people?

You could argue that, in the context of global warming, despite repeated warnings, humanity has failed, time and time again, to act in its own best interests. Therefore how, or why, can we even have confidence that this new, and utterly existential challenge can be dealt in any sort of effective way. This book is informative, well written and clearly identifies the issues. The challenge however is whether humanity itself can do anything to stop something that surely, down the line, is not going to act in our own best interests…?

More about the book AI Needs You

Verity Harding: The 100 Most Influential People in AI 2023 | TIME

“Few people understand the intersection between emerging technology and democracy better than Verity Harding.”

Yasmeen Serhan, TIME

“Verity Harding is a rare beast—a technologist who thinks deeply about society. So when she tells us AI needs us, we should listen. In this thoughtful, clever, and very accessible book,

you will learn about how we have faced huge technical innovations in the past and why, more than ever before, we must engage with how AI is shaping the future.”

Martha Lane-Fox

“What is the world that AI is creating? And why are the rest of us letting this world be shaped by a small, privileged group of (mainly) men in Silicon Valley?

This book, rooted in deep historical insights about prior technological disruptions, is essential reading for anybody keen to ensure the transformative power of AI is directed to the common good.”

Diane Coyle

“This is history at its most essential. Providing a forensic analysis of the past that provokes lessons, warnings, and inspiration,

Harding empowers us to join a conversation from which the tech bros have tried to exclude us. This brilliant book is a scholarly, optimistic call to action.”

Dan Snow

“A must-read for anyone who wants to understand the defining technology of our era, from a unique author who has had a front row seat in AI’s development.”

Katie Prescott, technology business editor, The Times

“An important and insightful book on one of the most important and challenging issues of our time.”

Alastair Campbell

“Essential. There’s no one else I’d more want to read on this subject.”

Sathnam Sanghera, author of Stolen History

“An excellent and refreshing primer from someone who has been thinking about AI ethics for years.

For anyone looking for a pragmatic yet optimistic view of how we can live with AI, this book is very timely.”

Rory Cellan-Jones

“Verity Harding is an important thinker on the future of AI and this book makes a major contribution to the debate.

The parallels the book draws between the regulation of AI and previous technological breakthroughs, from nuclear weapons to human embryology, should make policymakers think.”

William Hague

“An absolutely captivating narrative. AI Needs You is a riveting page-turner about the moral dilemmas posed by seismic technological innovation.”

Jude Browne, co-editor of Feminist AI: Critical Perspectives on Algorithms, Data, and Intelligent Machines

“I share the belief that we can learn from history and this timely book enables us to do just that by highlighting those valuable lessons and what they mean for AI.”

Linda Yueh, author of The Great Crashes: Lessons from Global Meltdowns and How to Prevent Them

Artificial intelligence may be the most transformative technology of our time. As AI’s power grows, so does the need to figure out what—and who—this technology is really for. AI Needs You argues that it is critical for society to take the lead in answering this urgent question and ensuring that AI fulfills its promise.

Verity Harding draws inspiring lessons from the histories of three twentieth-century tech revolutions—the space race, in vitro fertilization, and the internet—to empower each of us to join the conversation about AI and its possible futures. Sharing her perspective as a leading insider in technology and politics, she rejects the dominant narrative, which often likens AI’s advent to that of the atomic bomb. History points the way to an achievable future in which democratically determined values guide AI to be peaceful in its intent; to embrace limitations; serve purpose, not profit; and to be firmly rooted in societal trust.

AI Needs You gives us hope that we, the people, can imbue AI with a deep intentionality that reflects our best values, ideals, and interests, and that serves the public good. AI will permeate our lives in unforeseeable ways, but it is clear that the shape of AI’s future—and of our own—cannot be left only to those building it. It is up to us to guide this technology away from our worst fears toward a future that we can trust and believe in.

One of TIME’s 100 Most Influential People in AI, Verity Harding is Director of the AI & Geopolitics Institute at the Bennett Institute for Public Policy at the University of Cambridge and founder of Formation Advisory, a consultancy firm that advises on the future of technology and society. She worked for many years as Global Head of Policy for Google DeepMind and as a political adviser to Britain’s deputy prime minister.

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