Review of Sam Williams' Arguing AI: The Battle for Twenty-First-Century Science

I read Sam Williams' Arguing AI: The Battle for Twenty-First-Century Science in one sitting. It is not a hard book, nor was it highly informative. Basically the book starts with a chapter on the mathematical roots of AI. There Hilbert, Turing, Godel, and von Neumann are mentioned. There is nothing at all technical mentioned. The author barely understands it himself (or so it would appear from his references to Godel's making use of the power of infinity to provide room for all them Godel numbers!).

Then Williams goes on to the more familiar names in the early history of AI, including Marvin Minsky, John McCarthy, and Hans Moravec, and mentions that they did a lot of early research, especially when few understood the big problems.

Then it is off to chat about the gurus like Ray Kurzweil, Jaron Lanier, and Bill Joy. There is also a bit about David Stork and his HAL project.

The whole book is more of a long article on the gossip, culture, hopes, and prophecies surrounding these people. Basically if you have been either keeping up with Wired Magazine, or even if you have read Kurtzweil's books and the Lainer and Joy articles, you know all that the book has to offer.

The author apparently feels a lot more comfortable reporting the gossip then he does with the technical stuff too. This is a shame since understanding AI is all about understanding the philosophical and technical obstacles.

Otherwise it is a good way to kill two hours. The book is not worth the money. Do what I did, read it while leaning against the wall at your local bookstore.