| Vendor | |
|---|---|
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Mohrbooks Literary Agency
Sebastian Ritscher |
| Original language | |
| English | |
| Categories | |
| Weblink | |
| www.chrissteiner.com | |
AUTOMATE THIS
How Algorithms Came to Rule our World
Over the last two decades, our financial markets went from being dominated by insiders to admitting a new kind of genius, with roots far from Manhattan. A group of Midwestern math and technology geeks known as “quants,” have entirely remade Wall Street, creating programs that allow for high-speed training based on context-free rules, operating independently from human judgment. However, these quants also introduced an unknowable, uncontrollable element into our world.
The “Flash Crash” of May 2012 was just one example of what can happen when algorithms function as the decision-makers in a major way. The quant virus is spreading far beyond the financial world, affecting our lives in thousands of other realms. Algorithms can already predict numbers for a local beet harvest at the very beginning of the growing season by evaluating the tinge of green in a certain field. Algorithms can identify a hit song before it’s released by building a 3D model of a music file’s layers. Programs either can or soon will, choose our medicine, our blind dates, our salaries. They’ll even be able to identify and judge a work of art. Predictive software can make our lives easier, but the outsourcing of action to computer programs has implications, sometimes scary one. To what end can algorithms control our hospitals, our roads, our food supplies? What will happen if we continue to automate judgment and eliminate human instinct? The tectonic change brings the specter of unknown calamity along with the incredibly useful, life-saving possibilities it offers as well. Quants are pouring into other fields far from Wall Street and Steiner, an exciting investigative journalist, is there to take you on a ride to the brave new world. Christopher Steiner is the cofounder and co-CEO of Aisle 50, an online startup that offers deep discounts on groceries. An engineer, Steiner was previously a technology journalist at Forbes and the Chicago Tribune. His first book $20 Per Gallon, was a national bestseller.
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Book
Published 2012-08-01 by Portfolio |
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Book
Published 2012-08-01 by Portfolio |