How to Stay Smart in a Smart World: Why Human Intelligence Still Beats Algorithms

by Gerd Gigerenzer

Overview

How to stay in charge in a world populated by algorithms that beat us in chess, find us romantic partners, and tell us to “turn right in 500 yards.”

Doomsday prophets of technology predict that robots will take over the world, leaving humans behind in the dust. Tech industry boosters think replacing people with software might make the world a better place—while tech industry critics warn darkly about surveillance capitalism. Despite their differing views of the future, they all seem to agree: machines will soon do everything better than humans. In How to Stay Smart in a Smart World, Gerd Gigerenzer shows why that’s not true, and tells us how we can stay in charge in a world populated by algorithms.

Machines powered by artificial intelligence are good at some things (playing chess), but not others (life-and-death decisions, or anything involving uncertainty). Gigerenzer explains why algorithms often fail at finding us romantic partners (love is not chess), why self-driving cars fall prey to the Russian Tank Fallacy, and how judges and police rely increasingly on nontransparent “black box” algorithms to predict whether a criminal defendant will reoffend or show up in court. He invokes Black Mirror, considers the privacy paradox (people want privacy but give their data away), and explains that social media get us hooked by programming intermittent reinforcement in the form of the “like” button. We shouldn’t trust smart technology unconditionally, Gigerenzer tells us, but we shouldn’t fear it unthinkingly, either.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780262046954
Publisher:	MIT Press
Publication date:	08/02/2022
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	460,024
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Gerd Gigerenzer is Director of the Harding Center for Risk Literacy at the University of Potsdam, Director Emeritus at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development, and Partner of Simply Rational—the Institute for Decisions. He is the author of Calculated Risks, Gut Feelings, Risk Savvy, and How to Stay Smart in a Smart World (MIT Press).

Table of Contents

Introduction ix
Part I: The Human Affair with AI
1 Is True Love Just a Click Away? 3
2 What AI Is Best At: The Stable-World Principle 21
3 Machines Influence How We Think about Intelligence 41
4 Are Self-Driving Cars Just Down the Road? 49
5 Common Sense and AI 73
6 One Data Point Can Beat Big Data 93
Part II: High Stakes
7 Transparency 113
8 Sleepwalking into Surveillance 139
9 The Psychology of Getting Users Hooked 173
10 Safety and Self-Control 187
11 Fact or Fake? 199
Acknowledgments 227
Notes 229
Bibliography 255
Index 285

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“This is a masterful weaving of different facets of artificial intelligence that manages to cover some extremely complex topics in a way that non-specialists can readily understand. It is also highly readable—Gigerenzer is such a good writer, and his examples are very compelling. I think it is an essential read because it provides an important perspective on AI for all those who are tired of being bombarded by hype and exaggerated claims, and for those who are rightfully worried about the dangers to society that are posed by AI.”
—Gary Klein, Ph.D., author of Sources of Power: How People Make Decisions, and CEO of ShadowBox LLC

“In clear, unencumbered, and unpretentious prose, Gigerenzer demystifies the logic of our ‘smart’ societies. And despite cataloguing many depressing examples of the ambitions of big tech, the overall message of the book—and indeed the author’s view of human nature—is empowering.”
—John Zerilli, University of Oxford, co-author of A Citizen’s Guide to Artificial Intelligence (MIT Press)

“Gerd Gigerenzer is the most original and coherent follower of the bounded rationality tradition of Herbert Simon in economics and decision making. This inspiring book dispels many myths about the predictive power of connectionist AI,  describes its failures to tackle  uncertain and unstable phenomena, and relaunches the simulationist psychological approach as the best way towards an ethical and Human AI.”
—Riccardo Viale, Full Professor in Behavioral Sciences and Cognitive Economics, University of Milano Bicocca and Secretary General of Herbert Simon Society

Editorial Reviews

05/30/2022

Gigerenzer (Risk Savvy), director emeritus at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development, offers plausible reassurance for those who fear artificial intelligence is poised to take over human decision-making. Things that AI can do well, Gigerenzer explains, such as playing chess, occur in strict rules-based environments where there’s little or no chance of something unpredictable happening. The AI Watson’s vaunted Jeopardy! victory over human champions Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter, for example, was less impressive than it appears, Gigerenzer writes, as it was the result of an altered game in which certain kinds of questions were excluded because it was anticipated that the AI wouldn’t be able to answer them accurately. Gigerenzer also covers more pressing issues, among them self-driving cars that are unable to accurately assess dangers to pedestrians, tech and ads that are designed to demand attention and distract users, and the large-scale voluntary abandonment of privacy. It amounts to a solid case against “unconditional trust in complex algorithms,” arguing that “more computing power and bigger data” won’t bridge the gap between machine and mind, because most problems humans face involve “situations in which uncertainty abounds.” Anyone worried about the age of AI will sleep better after reading this intelligent account. (Aug.)

Publishers Weekly

07/01/2022

According to psychologist Gigerenzer (Calculated Risks: How To Know When Numbers Deceive You), with our technologically-centered world increasingly driven by artificial intelligence (AI), it's important to understand how algorithms work within AI. Grasping what algorithms can do well and understanding their limitations is the key to staying in charge of our lives. Gigerenzer reminds that AI works best in a stable world situation (with little unpredictable human behavior). AI is good at playing chess, analyzing health data, and assisting the field of astronomy, but comes up short with dating apps, predictive policing software, and fully self-driving cars. After providing readers with numerous examples of myriad uses of algorithms in our daily life, the author turns his attention to exploring other tech minefields, such as our willingness to hand over personal data to companies like Google and Facebook, resulting in a now ubiquitous form of economy known as surveillance capitalism. VERDICT Gigerenzer explains why technology is so addictive and offers tips for fostering digital self-control. A seriously compelling, eye-opening, and well-researched investigation.—Ragan O'Malley

Library Journal

"Anyone worried about the age of AI will sleep better after reading this intelligent account."
— Publishers Weekly

“A seriously compelling, eye opening, and well researched investigation.”
— Library Journal

“Persuasive.”
— The Times UK 

“Gigerenzer deftly explains the limits and dangers of technology and AI.”
— New Scientist

"Essential reading for anyone exposed to technology that shapes our behavior rather than meeting our needs. In other words, it is essential reading for all of us.”
— Morning Star

From the Publisher