Robots, Networks, and Us

I finally finished reading Sherry Turkle's most recent book, Alone Together, which continues her examination of human relationships with machines and various forms of artificial intelligence.  It is an extremely interesting read, focusing more on anecdotal discussions with various groups participating in experiments with machines (rather than on empirical data).  The application of Turkle's psychoanalytical perspective to the question of 'us and robots' is fascinating and the latter part of the book, dealing with socialization of the generation that has grown up with Facebook, IMing, text messaging etc is really eye-opening. In fact, the organization of the book itself is quite interesting with the first half dedicated to an exploration of machines that emulate humans and the second half focused more on today's 'networked' society.

Coincidentally, I happened to read the book back-to-back with a new YA sci-fi novel that engages with some of the themes Turkle tackles in the first half of her book - dealing with human/A.I. interactions.  The novel was My Beginning by Melissa Kline.  It was an interesting juxtaposition to read the more serious psychological study of human/machine interaction followed by a sci-fi story that develops many of the same themes, and themes we have seen before in movies like Blade Runner and Bicentennial Man.  The nice thing about My Beginning is that it makes these themes accessible to a younger audience, including questions about what makes humans into humans and where the lines between machine and human might begin to blur in the future.