Darwin Among The Machines: The Evolution Of Global Intelligence (Helix Books) (Paperback)

by George B. Dyson (Author) "Nature (the Art whereby God hath made and governes the World) is by the Art of man, as in many other things, so in this..." (more)
Key Phrases: numerical organisms, ultraintelligent machine, electronic computer project, Samuel Butler, World War, Erasmus Darwin (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
Here's a mesmerizing account of the evolution of machines and thoughts about machines, woven into a story about the evolution of intelligence. Darwin Among the Machines is not so much about how today's intelligence came to be, but about how it may further develop as humanity and computer grow closer together. George Dyson tells the story largely through stories--both historical and legendary--from the lives of scientists and philosophers who paved the way for today's cybernetics revolution, starting with the 17th-century insights of Thomas Hobbes. This book challenges the assumption that nature and machine are opposing forces. Dyson believes them to be allies. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal
Dyson, son of scientist Freeman and brother of computer guru Esther, sees the World Wide Web as a major evolutionary development in the creation of "a globally networked, electronic, sentient being." Using historical fact as well as fiction, he explains how we have arrived at this juncture. He reveals an impressive literary and scientific background as he moves from Thomas Hobbes, Samuel Butler, and Leibniz to Turing, von Neumann, and others. However, it is not always obvious what point he is making, and he finds mythology as useful in explaining this evolution as historical fact. Dyson provides substantial detail about the development of intelligent machines as he traces the history of modern computing from the ballistics computations of the 1940s and 1950s to the SAGE project and other military applications, which had spinoffs and by-products culminating in today's network-based system. Certainly, computer technology is having a revolutionary effect on how we do many things and, in fact, what we do. But whether we are seeing Darwinian evolution among the machines remains unproved to this reviewer. Recommended for larger collections.?Hilary D. Burton, Lawrence Livermore National Lab., Livermore, Cal.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Basic Books; 1st Edition edition (October 7, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0738200301
• ISBN-13: 978-0738200309
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #94,302 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Required Reading, March 21, 2000

By	[e-mail] (Denver, Colorado) - See all my reviews

George Dyson has the rare skill of being able to put flesh on ideas. He is particularly good at Samuel Butler(evoked in the title essay) and a few Darwins: Erasmus (a great character and, we learn here, Mary Shelly's inspiration for Dr. Frankenstein), his grandson Charles (Origin of Species), and brief mention of Charles' grandson Sir Charles Darwin (who headed the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) which employed Alan Turing, but was unable to gain support for Turing's project to build an "Automatic Computing Engine" in 1945). Selected against.

The Chapter on Butler is worth the price of the book. Readers will also encounter many obscure names brought alive with interesting detail and then fit into the evolution of a familiar technology. For example, Dyson explains how wooden tally sticks, used as a primitive, secure means of record keeping in the English (twelfth century) pre-history of banking, both facilitated the establishment of a banking system and served as an early precursor and model for encryption keys.

Familiar, iconographic names, Charles Babbage and John Von Neuman, to name just two examples, are shown in somewhat different, and more human, light than they are usually presented. Babbage, for example, was a prophet of telecommunications whose early ideas for what we now call packet switching revolutionized the British mail system. Babbage analyzed the operations of the British postal system and found that its costs were governed more by switching than by distance. His recommendaton of a flat rate service was introduced in 1840 as the penny post. Von Neuman's influence is described in detail in many places, for his contributions to mathematics, game theory, computing, the Cold War defense system, and the Institute for Advanced Studies at Princeton.

Students looking for a concise description of the history of "distributed communication" (most familiarly now the Internet) will also find a great and amusing chapter in this book. Dyson has written a remarkably compact description of how the issues and concerns of the defense establishment encouraged the creation of what we now know as the Internet.

The boundlessness of the book, its avoidance of the shelter of one or a few strict disciplines, is among its greatest attractions. If anyone ever asks you what a liberal arts education is, point them to this book. There is no better book on how ideas live and grow across generations.

Darwin Among the Machines is science writing, intellectual history, personal essay, and more.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful treatment of an important subject, August 8, 1999

By A Customer

This book was really extraordinary to read. Dyson correctly approaches digital evolution and delivers expansive and well thought theories. Really thought provoking and well laid out. While the prose is difficult sometimes the ideas burn through it and communicate some very powerful ideas that still bounce around my head months after reading it. The exploration of macro-consiousness in the economy and the world-wide network were really enlightening and almost unsettling.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Title sizzles, but book was unappetizing., February 15, 2003

By	"doug3141" (Newport News, VA United States) - See all my reviews

I bought this book in the hope of reading some intelligent speculations by the author about evolution, machines, and AI, which is what the title suggested I would find. However, it turned out to be a history of the evolution of computers with old speculations from the computer pioneers concerning the evolution of computers injected along the way. To be fair, the author does have an overarching thesis that he tries to weave into the historical narrative whenever some past speculation seems to lend it some support. It is that the World Wide Web - that well known network of millions of computers - may some day, at a certain critical size and running who knows what software (certainly not the author) will become intelligent in some way (also not specified by the author). Come to think of it, I think the author has used the historical angle of the book - the similar speculations of the computer pioneers of the past - as a device to lend credence to his thesis - a kind of proof by consensus. I remain unconvinced, however. His arguments (where there were any; it was hard to tell his arguments from narrative) were very weak and unconvincing. To his credit, the author did a tremendous job of scholarship for the historical side of the book. However, he left the speculative side undeveloped (at the most weakly developed) and, therefore, the book was unappetizing to me.