The AI Delusion

Description

We live in an incredible period in history. The Computer Revolution may be even more life-changing than the Industrial Revolution. We can do things with computers that could never be done before, and computers can do things for us that could never be done before. But our love of computers should not cloud our thinking about their limitations. We are told that computers are smarter than humans and that data mining can identify previously unknown truths, or make discoveries that will revolutionize our lives. Our lives may well be changed, but not necessarily for the better. Computers are very good at discovering patterns, but are useless in judging whether the unearthed patterns are sensible because computers do not think the way humans think. We fear that super-intelligent machines will decide to protect themselves by enslaving or eliminating humans. But the real danger is not that computers are smarter than us, but that we think computers are smarter than us and, so, trust computers to make important decisions for us. The AI Delusion explains why we should not be intimidated into thinking that computers are infallible, that data-mining is knowledge discovery, and that black boxes should be trusted Cover......Page 1 The Al Delusion......Page 4 Copyright......Page 5 Contents......Page 6 Introduction......Page 8 Chapter 1. Intelligent or obedient?......Page 14 Tic-tac-toe......Page 17 Checkers......Page 20 Chapter 2. Doing without thinking......Page 28 The fuel and fire of thinking......Page 29 Superhuman......Page 35 Singularity......Page 36 Emotions......Page 38 Critical thinking......Page 40 The Turing test......Page 42 Chinese room thought experiment......Page 46 Translation software......Page 48 Can computers read?......Page 52 Can computers write?......Page 54 InspiroBot......Page 56 Seeing things in context......Page 57 Tanks, trees, and clouds......Page 60 The cat and the vase......Page 61 Chapter 4. Bad data......Page 64 Self-selection bias......Page 66 Correlation is not causation......Page 71 The power of time......Page 73 Survivor bias......Page 74 Fake data......Page 75 Recognizing bad data......Page 77 Chapter 5. Patterns in randomness......Page 80 Data mining......Page 84 Knowledge discovery......Page 86 Black boxes......Page 87 Big data, big computers, big trouble......Page 89 A conflict of interest......Page 90 Hard-wired to be deceived......Page 91 Seduced by patterns......Page 92 An example of random noise......Page 93 Amateur weather forecasting......Page 95 The Smith test......Page 98 Chapter 6. If you torture the data long enough......Page 100 Mendel......Page 101 The Texas sharpshooter fallacy......Page 102 Data mining......Page 103 QuickStop......Page 104 Torturing data......Page 106 Retroactive recall......Page 107 Money priming......Page 109 Seek and you will find......Page 111 The Laugher Curve......Page 115 It's not you, it's me......Page 118 Great to good......Page 119 Aggressiveness and attractiveness......Page 121 The Dartmouth salmon study......Page 123 Quack, quack......Page 124 Chapter 7. The kitchen sink......Page 126 Predicting presidential elections......Page 129 The secret sauce......Page 132 Nonlinear models......Page 138 Stepwise regression......Page 144 Ridge regression......Page 146 Data reduction......Page 148 Neural network algorithms......Page 151 Blinded by math......Page 154 Chapter 9. Take two aspirin......Page 156 Call me in the morning......Page 157 I'll have another cup......Page 159 Distant healing......Page 160 Cancer clusters......Page 162 Most proven treatments don't work......Page 164 Data mining......Page 166 Too much chaff, not enough wheat......Page 169 Chapter 10. Beat the market I......Page 170 Noise......Page 171 Wacky theories......Page 172 Technical analysis......Page 175 An inverted head and shoulders......Page 176 Flipping coins......Page 179 Wall Street Week's ten technical indicators......Page 180 Market breadth......Page 181 Low-price activity ratio......Page 182 Advisory service sentiment......Page 183 Tweet, tweet......Page 184 Technical gurus......Page 185 The Foolish Four......Page 186 Black box investing for fun and profit......Page 187 Chapter 11. Beat the market II......Page 190 The stock market and the weather......Page 191 Try, try again......Page 193 The set-aside solution......Page 196 Real data mining......Page 200 Royal Dutch/Shell......Page 201 The GSR......Page 204 Another convergence trade......Page 206 High-frequency trading......Page 209 The flash crash......Page 211 The bottom line......Page 212 Chapter 12. We're watching you......Page 214 A pregnancy predictor......Page 217 Google Flu......Page 218 Robo-Tester......Page 220 Job applications......Page 221 Job advertisements......Page 223 Loan applications......Page 224 Car insurance......Page 226 Social credit scores......Page 228 Unreasonable searches......Page 229 Watch your wristbands......Page 231 Do you need plastic surgery?......Page 233 Gaming the system......Page 235 MAD......Page 238 Conclusion......Page 242 Bibliography......Page 246 Index......Page 254