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allisonwonderlandreads 's review for:
Girl Decoded: A Scientist's Quest to Reclaim Our Humanity by Bringing Emotional Intelligence to Technology
by Carol Colman, Rana El Kaliouby
This informative book about emotion AI is a summation of how this field began and progressed as well as the personal contributions of the author, Rana el Kaliouby. The book includes memoir elements, as well, as Rana shares observations about how her own life developed side-by-side with her cutting edge work. I listened to the audiobook and enjoyed hearing these reflections in the author's own voice.
Rana's personal history of growing up in Egypt, going to Cambridge alone to pursue her PhD in unfamiliar environs, and finding her way to MIT for postdoc work before settling in the US was inspiring and intriguing. She talks about her family, political and social factors that impacted her life, and the way her work in emotion AI encouraged her to embrace her own emotions. I particularly appreciated her commentary on what it's like as a high-powered woman in her field, what it's like being a Muslim immigrant in the US, and how growing up in Egypt has affected her worldview.
Rana addresses how technology fails to meet human needs when it ignores our emotions. The specifics of where the technology is at now and where it is going were fascinating to me, especially since I didn't have any prior knowledge and was surprised by all that has already been accomplished. Rana acknowledges the importance of transparency and receiving permission to collect this highly personal data in a world where tech companies rarely and stealthily seek such consent. Her dedication to privacy and focus on biases in tech even mollified me, a suspicious person who has drawn a line in the sand between me and Alexa (she can't be trusted, people!).
The middle portion of the book, falling between personal narrative and tech applications held less interest for me. It gives a lot of detail about creating a start-up and growing a company that should probably earn more of my attention but frankly does not. There was a lot of name-dropping and business jargon that bogged things down for me.
Overall, this was a great learning experience. From the nitty gritty of coding to the broader view of how emotion AI could improve human existence, I was engrossed. Rana's care to analyze how diversity and inclusiveness can better grow the industry and impact the world was especially meaningful. I am happy to walk away better informed than when I started this book.
Rana's personal history of growing up in Egypt, going to Cambridge alone to pursue her PhD in unfamiliar environs, and finding her way to MIT for postdoc work before settling in the US was inspiring and intriguing. She talks about her family, political and social factors that impacted her life, and the way her work in emotion AI encouraged her to embrace her own emotions. I particularly appreciated her commentary on what it's like as a high-powered woman in her field, what it's like being a Muslim immigrant in the US, and how growing up in Egypt has affected her worldview.
Rana addresses how technology fails to meet human needs when it ignores our emotions. The specifics of where the technology is at now and where it is going were fascinating to me, especially since I didn't have any prior knowledge and was surprised by all that has already been accomplished. Rana acknowledges the importance of transparency and receiving permission to collect this highly personal data in a world where tech companies rarely and stealthily seek such consent. Her dedication to privacy and focus on biases in tech even mollified me, a suspicious person who has drawn a line in the sand between me and Alexa (she can't be trusted, people!).
The middle portion of the book, falling between personal narrative and tech applications held less interest for me. It gives a lot of detail about creating a start-up and growing a company that should probably earn more of my attention but frankly does not. There was a lot of name-dropping and business jargon that bogged things down for me.
Overall, this was a great learning experience. From the nitty gritty of coding to the broader view of how emotion AI could improve human existence, I was engrossed. Rana's care to analyze how diversity and inclusiveness can better grow the industry and impact the world was especially meaningful. I am happy to walk away better informed than when I started this book.