Life 3.0

Tegmark is an exuberant AI cheerleader awash in the unbridled nerdy enthusiasm of an inevitable post-human future. To his credit the book, a reflection of the work he's doing out in the world, attempts to broaden the discussion around AI to something more than wondering if sentient robots will kill us all.

His prelude on a plausible AI trajectory is compelling and thoughtful stuff and I loved how it expanded the way I think of AI's progress. The exploration into considering whether super intelligent AI become zookeepers or benevolent dictators or enslaved gods is great too. But thinking about the philosophical considerations of consciousness, intelligence and evolution left me cold and the name dropping, back slapping historical narrative added yet another element to this unbalanced read.

In here is a fascinating exploration of what AI could mean for the world, it's just buried under a lot of wonky, wordy stuff that obscured the picture I was trying to form. Maybe I've been spoiled by more narrative, bite-sized, non-fiction - I want the abridged version of this book.