Book - 4

Information Technology (IT) has slowed down.  Nonetheless it will continue to dominate our lives and the data collected would require application to get meaningful results.  This would require opening of new frontiers in artificial intelligence.   

Last time I talked about three books and today I will talk about another book entitled 'The Cambridge Quintet' written   by John L. Casti and published by 'Perseus Books'. It is a fictional account of a dinner party of five greats of the last century namely, C.P. Snow, physicist, Civil servant; Alan Turing, Mathematician; J.B.S. Haldane, Geneticist; Erwin Schrodinger, Nobel prize-winning physicist; and Ludwig Wittgenstein, philosopher.  The dinner is hosted by Snow who is to give a report what Tuning had proposed in the middle of the last century, 'Is there any logical reason why we cannot envision technology advancing to the point where we could construct a computing machine that would be distinguishing from human being in its cognitive capabilities?' Or can a machine think? Snow thought best to call the other four to get their views before writing it. Strictly the book is not a science fiction.  It is also not popular science writing: it is not limited to the knowledge at that time.  The book gives arguments (pros and cons) about artificial intelligence. And one should not forget to read 'Afterwards', which gives a good account of 'Artificial Intelligence' today and the books in this regard.

There is no doubt that Casti, a Ph.D. in Mathematics, has full credentials to write such a wonderful book.