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A review by anttirask
AI 2041: Ten Visions for Our Future by Kai-Fu Lee, Chen Qiufan
4.0
AI 2041 is a curious book. It combines sci-fi short stories and accompanying non-fiction essays that are also somewhat fictitious, since they are, as are the short stories themselves, speculating about what will the world look like in 20 years from now. They do, however, also explain some key concepts of AI and machine learning that are already in use, in some form, today.
The short stories have all different characters, but are linked by the existence of rather advanced AI and a world that has evolved due to advancement in that and other technologies.
As science fiction goes, the book felt like a less cynical version of Black Mirror. The book doesn't necessarily paint a cheery picture, because humanity hasn't managed to combat climate change that well, for instance, but the closest thing to resembling war is a terrorist attack by crazy quantum computing scientist (one of the more far-fetched plots, by the way). I know it's a little bleak to criticize a book not depicting of how a war would be fought in 20 years, but thanks to the war raging in Ukraine at the moment, it's hard to imagine a world without wars, even if we get AI working.
So, what did I think of the book in the end? I did like most of the ideas and also most of the execution of the short stories. Naturally, amongst the 10 stories, some of them were better than the others (it's hard to keep that consistency, even if it's just one author), but I can say that it was easy to get through all of them. And there were even moments that I managed to forget that there was a lecture coming, after the story, about the underlying technology.
Still, my favorite quote (it's from the outro and doesn't really spoil anything) from the book is actually form [a:William Gibson|9226|William Gibson|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1373826214p2/9226.jpg], the author of [b:Neuromancer|6088007|Neuromancer (Sprawl, #1)|William Gibson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1554437249l/6088007._SY75_.jpg|909457]: “The future is already here. It's just not evenly distributed yet”. And that was the thought I was left with after having read the book. If we can't produce equity with the technology that we have now, is the world really going to change for the better just because of AI. I'm not sure. But it's still interesting to think about the possible scenarios of what the world might look like 20 years from now.
The short stories have all different characters, but are linked by the existence of rather advanced AI and a world that has evolved due to advancement in that and other technologies.
As science fiction goes, the book felt like a less cynical version of Black Mirror. The book doesn't necessarily paint a cheery picture, because humanity hasn't managed to combat climate change that well, for instance, but the closest thing to resembling war is a terrorist attack by crazy quantum computing scientist (one of the more far-fetched plots, by the way). I know it's a little bleak to criticize a book not depicting of how a war would be fought in 20 years, but thanks to the war raging in Ukraine at the moment, it's hard to imagine a world without wars, even if we get AI working.
So, what did I think of the book in the end? I did like most of the ideas and also most of the execution of the short stories. Naturally, amongst the 10 stories, some of them were better than the others (it's hard to keep that consistency, even if it's just one author), but I can say that it was easy to get through all of them. And there were even moments that I managed to forget that there was a lecture coming, after the story, about the underlying technology.
Still, my favorite quote (it's from the outro and doesn't really spoil anything) from the book is actually form [a:William Gibson|9226|William Gibson|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1373826214p2/9226.jpg], the author of [b:Neuromancer|6088007|Neuromancer (Sprawl, #1)|William Gibson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1554437249l/6088007._SY75_.jpg|909457]: “The future is already here. It's just not evenly distributed yet”. And that was the thought I was left with after having read the book. If we can't produce equity with the technology that we have now, is the world really going to change for the better just because of AI. I'm not sure. But it's still interesting to think about the possible scenarios of what the world might look like 20 years from now.