‘An excellent starter for those who want to gain an insight into how AI works and why it’s likely to shape our lives.’
– The Daily Telegraph

‘This book is a wild, brilliant ride through centuries of thinking about and decades of developing machines that can learn.’
– Ciaran Martin, former CEO, the UK National Cyber Security Centre

Artificial intelligence will shake up life in the 2020s as dramatically as the internet did in the 2000s.

This accessible, up-to-date book charts Al’s rise from its origins in the Cold War to its increasing impact on us today and in the coming years. Journalist Chris Stokel-Walker (TikTok Boom and YouTubers) meets the Silicon Valley innovators making rapid advances in ‘large language models’ of machine learning like Google’s Bard and ChatGPT and reveals the extraordinary plans they have for them.

And he explores the dark side of Al by talking to workers who have lost their jobs to chatbots and to futurologists worried that we are unwittingly creating a force that could destroy humankind.

How Al Ate the World answers all the key questions, such as how Al will transform the way we live and work; the professions that will ultimately win and lose; and whether the likes of Elon Musk are right to warn about a looming threat to humanity. This is a pithy ‘start here’ guide for anyone who wants to know more about the next big technology that will govern our lives, whether we like it or not.