After On, by Rob Reid, takes us through an all too real journey through Silicon Valley. It follows a team of tech heroes and their recently sentient super AI. As someone in the tech world, I related with the specific imagery and interactions. The characters and histories were deep. I appreciated the effort Rob put into their development. I'm not sure I've read another sci-fi book quite like this. It's almost too real. It takes place so close to now that it may already be unfolding in some SF server room.
Key Takeaways
Memorable Quotes
Rating: 9/10
I enjoyed the combination of deep characters, tech talk, and action in After On. I haven't read anything comparable to this book. I'd recommend it to any technofile, sci-fi nerd, or startup employee.
Key Takeaways
- Super AI will be unpredictable. It will be faster than we can imagine, and that causes all kinds of problems.
- I hope people developing AI are thinking about the risks and ethical concerns.
- I know nothing about quantum computing, but it sounds cool.
Memorable Quotes
- “On a scale of Burning Man to North Korea, how free are you tonight?”).”
- The passage of time makes wizards of us all.
- An “emergent” AI is one that spontaneously arises after the local server farm plugs in one transistor too many.
- I submit that an emergent AI that’s smart enough to understand its place in our world would find it terrifying. Terminator fans would want to shut it off. Governments and criminals would want to make it do odious things. Hackers would want to tinker with its mind, and telemarketers would want to sell it shit.
- “It all starts with the fact that thinking is expensive from the standpoint of natural selection,” Mitchell continues. “The brain consumes 20 percent of the calories that humans eat. And while intelligence enabled humanity’s survival, our ancestors were in a constant race against starvation, too. So their brains only got so big.” Pugwash gets it. “Being smarter gets you more to eat but only up to a point,” he says. “Then there’s diminishing returns.” Mitchell nods. “And if human brains devoured double the calories, grandma and grandpa wouldn’t have found twice the nuts and berries. So our ancestors’ brains grew until they hit a certain equilibrium.” “Which means humans are a lot stupider than maybe they could be. Which explains Republicans.”
Rating: 9/10
I enjoyed the combination of deep characters, tech talk, and action in After On. I haven't read anything comparable to this book. I'd recommend it to any technofile, sci-fi nerd, or startup employee.