'The Singularity' is what Silicon Valley calls the idea that, eventually, we will be overrun by machines that are able to take decisions and act for themselves. What no one says is that it happened before.
A few hundred years ago, humans started building the robots that now rule our world. They are called states and corporations: immensely powerful artificial entities, with capacities that go far beyond what any individual can do, and which, unlike us, need never die.
They have made us richer, safer and healthier than would have seemed possible even a few generations ago - and they may yet destroy us. The Handover distils over three hundred years of thinking about how to live with artificial agency.
Review
Persuasive ... the ever-erudite host of the terrific Talking Politics podcast ... ranges far and wide, from hunter gatherers to Elon Musk, from the wisdom of juries to the (terrifying) implications of autonomous weapons systems -- Tim Adams - Guardian
Runciman's erudition is formidable ... a wide-ranging history of the modern state and an exploration of how AI technology may change the world [from] one of our leading public intellectuals -- Jason Cowley - Sunday Times
Compelling ... David Runciman makes salutary arguments [about] the most urgent problem we face -- Blake Smith - Literary Review
Quirky, meditational, disturbing ... original thinking -- Sherelle Jacobs - Telegraph
Praise for David Runciman: 'A clear and forceful writer - Financial Times
Runciman's flair for turning a pithy and pungent phrase is one of the things to admire about his writing ... That and [his] cogency, subtlety and style - Observer
Refreshingly free of received and rehearsed wisdoms, Runciman doesn't tiptoe around sacred cows and invites us to take part in that most adult way of thinking: to examine contradictory ideas in tandem and ponder what the dissonance amounts to - Australian
Book Description
Does it matter if we are ceding power to AI? Especially if we have been there before.
About the Author
David Runciman is Professor of Politics at Cambridge University and the author of many books about politics, including The Politics of Good Intentions (2006), Political Hypocrisy (2008) and The Confidence Trap (2013). He writes regularly about politics and current affairs for a wide range of publications including the London Review of Books.
Politics is the first book in Profile's new Ideas in Profile series.
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