Genius Makers

A secret history of the high technologies of our time
What does it mean to be intelligent? To be human? What do we truly expect from life and from the intelligence we already have—or could create?
Using exclusive reports and hundreds of interviews, New York Times journalist Cade Metz takes the reader into the back rooms hidden from the general public, where many questions can finally be answered. Where a powerful artificial intelligence is being built—already an integral part of major business, social discourse, and our everyday lives—even if we don’t notice it.
For a long time, artificial intelligence was considered a question of the distant future. It was brushed off, and only the most fanatical researchers studied it seriously—who were seen by the scientific community as oddballs and outcasts. But two scientists showed up and changed everything.
They pursued their lofty goals along completely different paths, and very soon their ideas sparked a new kind of arms race, in which Google, Microsoft, Facebook, and OpenAI joined; a new research laboratory was also founded by Elon Musk—one of the rulers of Silicon Valley. At the same time, many believe that the Chinese will cross the finish line first.
In the book, this dramatic conflict of national, corporate, and scientific interests is vividly described, and much attention is paid to concerns related to confidentiality, security, and bias. Like a Victorian-era novel, the author depicts an entire world inhabited by eccentric, unimaginably smart, and incredibly wealthy characters—and leads us to the deepest moral dilemmas. As in a good thriller, astonishing facts and an intricate plot arc bring to the reader’s mind a fundamental, life-important question: how far will we let this go?