The AI Con: How To Fight Big Techs Hype and Create the Future We Want

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Two of the world's best-known AI insiders-turned-critics expose the lies and hype surrounding AI A smart, incisive take-down of the bogus claims being made about so-called 'artificial intelligence', exposing the real harm these technologies do to our jobs, health, society and environment, who stands to gain from them, and how to fight back. Is AI going to take over the world Have scientists created an artificial lifeform that can think on its own Is it going to replace all our jobs, even creative ones, like doctors, teachers and care-workers Are we about to enter an age where computers are better than humans at everything The answers to these questions, as the expert authors of The AI Con make clear, are 'no', 'they wish', 'LOL', and 'definitely not'. In fact, these fears are all symptoms of the hype being used by tech corporations to justify data theft, motivate surveillance capitalism, and devalue human creativity so they can replace meaningful work with jobs that treat people like machines. Meanwhile, across healthcare, education, media, government and law-enforcement, 'AI' products are already being introduced that are unreliable, ineffective, unjust and dangerous. Packed with real-world examples, pithy arguments and expert insights, The AI Con arms you to spot AI hype in all its guises, expose the exploitation and power-grabs it aims to hide, and push back against it at work and in your daily life.

Author Bio

Emily M. Bender (Author) Dr. Emily M. Bender is a Professor of Linguistics at the University of Washington where she is also the Faculty Director of the Computational Linguistics Master of Science program and affiliate faculty in the School of Computer Science and Engineering and the Information School. She is a leading voice in criticizing AI hype, and co-author of the touchstone 'Stochastic Parrots' paper that debunks the myth that large language models are or could ever be intelligent, which has been cited over 5,500 times and is taught in AI curricula around the world. She has made over 150 media appearances across the top international news outlets and in 2023 was included in the inaugural TIME100 AI list of most influential people in AI. Alex Hanna (Author) Dr. Alex Hanna is Director of Research at the Distributed AI Research Institute (DAIR) and a Lecturer in the School of Information at the University of California Berkeley. Formerly a senior research scientist on Google's Ethical AI team, her resignation letter from Google has over 79,000 views. She is an outspoken critic of the tech industry, a proponent of community-based uses of technology, and a highly sought-after speaker and expert who has been featured across the media, including articles in the Washington Post, Financial Times, The Atlantic, and Time.