The Loop: How Technology Is Creating a World Without Choices and How to Fight Back

Much of book is a rehash of what's already out there: Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky's work, simple view of how AI works, survivor bias, AI bias because of data bias, facial recognition used for surveillance, how the different parts of the brain work. I appreciate that he pulled all this together but not a lot of new thinking. Additionally, I don't agree that AI is this monster that turns all of us into button clicking idiots. At its heart, AI just looks at past performance and tries to predict the future. We have the agency to do something different. It doesn't need to be completely regulated. I believe like other technology, cars or airplanes, for example, we will learn to modulate it in a way that has a huge positive impact for society with limited downside. There is so much good AI can do from helping patient diagnosis to democratizing teaching to unclogging our freeways that we should continue to develop and continue to enjoy the benefits with the light hand of regulation. I wish some of these tech writers would just a little bit push personal responsibility. People need to continually grow. They need to be educated. They need to understand how the world works. They can't just use the reptile parts of their brains. If they do grow and get educated, it's easy to see what AI might be able to do to their behavior and then they are able to break the cycle themselves. Maybe they'll even write a program using AI.

This book is infinitely deeper and broader than its title and subtitle suggest. Ward draws on research and study of the brain going back more than 100 years, and spends a good half of this book delineating the human context within which artificial intelligence is beginning to wreak its havoc. He then takes us through the current state of artificial intelligence, and its deployment in social casino gaming (as insidious a product as has ever been marketed), consumerism, law enforcement, and many other areas of our lives where we have no idea how powerfully it is constricting us. It is important to note that, as dire as prospects are for those of us living in a capitalist society in thrall to the deployment of AI, Ward offers a good recipe for hope. I’ve read countless jeremiads about technology, but his stands alone for that note of hope, as well as for the clarity of its writing, the gentle persuasiveness of its argument, and for its narrative power. Ward has been on a long journey (nearly 20 years long), and he gives us just enough of his personal story throughout to add a compelling dimension to his book. He is an exceptionally eloquent writer on this subject—a rarity in technology coverage. An example: “We are capable as a society of making choices and rules based on something softer, messier, more important than the data, something we can all sense but can’t quite see, something that touches on the human emotions we all share, the immeasurable but unmistakable dark matter of our minds.”

Spent the weekend reading this remarkable book! Ward is an eloquent writer and a master at translating science for the layperson. When he describes the two systems at work when we make decisions he refers to the mostly subconscious, instinctive System I as the younger sibling needing guidance and the thinking System II as the older sibling capable of putting the brakes on System I but using precious energy to do so. He weaves the science from multiple fields to analyze how developers of AI take advantage of our human vulnerabilities to peddle their products with scary implications for all of us now and in the future. But what comes through in this book is a gentleness, an empathy for the human condition - those tendencies in all of us that allow us to be manipulated by AI. It’s not judgmental - quite the opposite. Ward bemoans the loss of the System II, hard, beautiful and important work we do that gets ambushed by AI and lures us into allowing the easier, but potentially more dangerous, System I to govern our actions and rob us of our choices.

We should all read this.

OMG pretend you are having a dinner party with your smartest, funnest friends - and you're talking about how technology is (negatively) affecting our agency and authenticity and what the eff we can do about it.This is literally that book and I am HERE for it.Fresh. Surprising. Not a "downer" but makes me feel I can make a change that will matter.

One can just hope that "The Loop" will hit the top of the non-fiction best seller lists once it is being released. While a few books have been written about AI and it impact, Jacob Ward takes it to a new level. The theme of the book is that we basically give up our free will by consuming too much algorithmically calculated content instead of the human curated type of content. It is not only that AI solution in our lives make sometimes harsh and bad decisions, we make these as well influenced by AI. Lots of references to previous books provide great context for the scholar as well as the novice on the topic.

An interesting, unique take on AI and its promise and peirls. I've followed Jacob Ward since his days as the science/tech correspondent at Al Jazeera America (go on YouTube and search "Jacob Ward and Al Jazeera to see insightful and excellently produced 2-minute segments) and the book's topic deserves attention from everyone who uses a computer or smartphone. We may be no longer controlling tech as opposed to it controlling us.

The Loop is an interesting book that combines the author’s stories as a news correspondent to discuss why we all may be stuck in the loop. I found it interesting from a technology side but some of the stories interested me less than others.Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for a copy to honestly review.