Artificial Intelligence Books

Androids is my favorite sci-fi book of all time & is the inspiration for one of the best movies of all time, Blade Runner. The movie & book are very different. Androids deals with future competing religions, the extinction of all animal life & humanities' use of android pets, mood enhancing technologies & other aspects that Blade Runner does not even touch. However the "bad guy" Roy's character (played by Rutger Hower) is much more nuanced in the film; we genuinely empathize with this complex character, even while he is committing unspeakable acts. Finally, the cinematography & music of Bladerunner are unmatched.

Having watched Blade Runner before reading this, I feel that my perspective throughout the book was a bit tainted, but I enjoyed it. It's a solid read if you enjoy science fiction, if I do say so myself.

Philip K Dick did very well on this book. I was a little dissapointed though in the fact that the retirement of the Nexus 6 was straight to the point and quick unlike the movie Blade Runner where there was more suspense. But with the exception of that it is a quick read and brilliant.

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? follows a bounty hunter working for the San Francisco police in the year 2021. This particular bounty hunter doesn't track down humans, but rather androids. If this sounds familiar at all, it might be because the book was adapted into the movie Blade Runner (Four-Disc Collector's Edition) starring Harrison Ford. For those who have seen the film version, do not expect much consistency between the book and movie. It's probably more accurate to say that Bladerunner was inspired by this book, rather than adapted from it.

Our bounty hunter, Rick Deckard, is assigned to track down a half dozen androids of a new and more intelligent type than any previously created. Along the way, his experiences cause him to question a good deal about himself including his profession.

After reading this book, I can see why Dick is sometimes compared to Kafka as a writer. There is an odd, surreal quality to the world he creates and a recitation of the entire plot would sound fairly absurd in parts. Yet, I found it a compelling read even if I didn't have a perfect literal understanding of every scene. I would compare this to an abstract painting that evokes an emotion from you even if you're not quite certain why. I found the book to be thought provoking and enjoyable but if you're looking for a straightforward action tale in a sci fi setting you are unlikely to happy with this tale.

If you think you know what this book is about because you've seen the movie Blade Runner, you are mistaken. Only the character names and some of the settings / situations were lifted from this book for the movie. As in most books, there is a lot more going on here. Because the movie is so highly engrained in our (real?) memories, it is difficult to talk about one without contrasting it to the other, sadly. That said, this is a classic that any SF fan (philosophy major, medical student, or engineer) should read.

Blade Runner completely missed the invented religion / technology of Mercerism and the mood organ device. Later authors like William Gibson have PKD to thank for pioneering concepts such as these. How can a religion and technology be one?

In the book, Mercerism combined with nuclear fallout explain why animals are so expensive (and coveted) in the future. Why does an electric sheep exist (pride, vanity, religious devotion)? The mood organ usage contains references to the cold war (and presumed imminent nuclear war) - husband and wife "dialing up" the desire to win an argument at all costs.

The double yellow center line between human and androids is blurred often- taking the reader across into oncoming traffic. Did Deckard pass the VK test? Rachel and Pris are the same model android? What does it mean to have feelings? Why would an android seek revenge?

This was my first Kindle novel purchase. I no longer have a desire to dial 888 on my mood organ (desire to watch TV regardless of what is on). I'm going to dial up more PKD, Gibson, and others instead!

BTW, to get the "Hit me with a rock" reference, you have to read the book...

Just about every robot book or movie revolves around the idea robots take over the world and kill off humans. Asimov's "I, Robot" IS NOT one of those books.

Asimov's stories describe the evolution of robots from domestic help, to manual labor, to space travel, and finally "thinking" for humans. But don't think it ends with the cliche idea that robots learned the world is better off without humans. Quite the opposite.

This book is NOTHING like the movie with Wil Smith. The movie follows the Hollywood cliche of robots take over the world. The book is completely different and much better.

Excellent Short stories and especially ones that make you think. The last one is very much a thinking story.

On the surface, I Robot seems like a collection of stories about what can go wrong in a world in which artificial life forms play an important role in human life. In each of the stories there is a problem with one or more robots, and it is up to the protagonists to get to the bottom of it. However, a careful reading reveals that what Asimov is treating critically in his stories is not robots or technology, but humanity. After all, the mandates which govern robotic behavior, known as the Three Rules of Robotics, are created by and for the benefit of mankind. In every case it is these very rules, whether through contradiction or overlapping or lack of human foresight, that create the problems that must be addressed. Indeed, robotic life is largely prioritized in the book over human life. Robots who emulate human appearance perfectly prove to be better citizens than real humans, and, not surprisingly, the book's most sympathetic human character, Dr. Susan Calvin, is also its most superficially "robotic." Pity? Design.

I read this collection of short stories (nothing to do with the weak movie of the same title) just after having read the Foundation novels, and I was delighted, in these stories Asimov introduces the seed of several topics for his Foundation novels, for instance, the development of the Hyper-drive that allows mankind to establish a Galactic Empire, we can read about the moral dilemma that signifies choosing between the well being of an individual or the one of humanity, there is a humanoid Mayor in another story, who reminded me of Eto Demerzel, (I wonder, Is he Daneel?). If you haven't read this novel, I recommend it to you; It won't disappoint you.

You know, how Asimov leaves behind clues in every story so that you can solve the mistery before finishing them? I wonder if he didn't belong to a secret society. All this talk in his novels about the future development of mankind, guided by intelligent protectors, his depictions of a united Earth, without a single mention to religion. Perhaps he was letting us know of things that only those ones initiated in freemasonry talk about. I'm just speculating. Read all his novels.

"I, Robot" is a collection of 9 short stories by Isaac Asimov that were originally published in magazines in the1940s, then cobbled together into a loose narrative for this book in 1950. To give the stories some cohesion, they are presented as the recollections of Dr. Susan Calvin, an elderly "robopsychologist" who was responsible for much of the advancement in robots' positronic brains during her long career at U.S. Robot & Mechanical Men Corporation, the premier robot manufacturer and patent-holder. Over the course of several interviews in the mid-21st century, Dr. Calvin tells stories that illustrate the history of robots from before they had the ability to speak until they could be made nearly indistinguishable from humans, though robots are banned on inhabited worlds.

Dr. Calvin's stories deal with the problems in understanding and trouble-shooting robots as their brains become more advanced, their roles more complicated, while their fundamental programming, the Three Laws of Robotics, remains the same. The Three Laws of Robotics are thus: 1. A robot may not injure a human or, through inaction, cause a human to be harmed. 2. A robot must obey the orders of humans, except when in conflict with Rule 1. 3. A robot must protect its own existence, except when in conflict with Rule 1 or 2. The stories are basically intellectual exercises in working out the conundrums that the Three Rules create. Though these rules keep robots safe and humans safe from them, in real life situations, they produce contradictions.

Unfortunately, the stories in "I, Robot" are little more than intellectual exercises in the Three Laws, and not very intellectual at that. The exception is the story "Liar!", in which the predicament of the robot comments on the nature of the humans. The book is written on a level suitable for pre-teen children. Even so, the characters are one-dimensional and the stories not very interesting. Dr. Calvin professes to prefer robots to humans, yet she treats them callously. I suppose that Isaac Asimov was trying to tell his readers that technology is a good thing, and those who fear it are foolish and, indeed, blind to their own reliance upon it. In the 1940s, his new way of portraying robots influenced a lot of sci-fi to come. But reading it now, I found "I, Robot" primarily a series of dubious brainteasers.

This guy spends a lot of time (not all though) cooking up sci-fi thingie and proclaiming them as the future. Artificial Intelligence researchers in the 1950's and 1960's proclaimed all fancy and wonderful things about Artificial Intelligence (like he does) and extremely few panned out in the 1970's. This resulted in gravely reduced funding (especially in England) for the field and hurt it in the public's eye. The field recovered in the 1980's but researchers are now more realistic and under-promise and over-deliever. This Ray Kurzweil is just cruising for a bruising by repeating the mistakes of the 1960's and 1970's. Interestingly, he should know the mistakes better than most of us for he was in the field back then as he is in it now.

In this volume, Ray Kurzweil offers a frighteningly detached blueprint for a digital future. (A better subject for this book might have been, "The age of dispirited humans: when humans cede intelligence to machines.") Before I launch into the following disquisition, I should note that the author is engaging, speaks clearly, and tells a good tale. Which makes it scarier still. Perhaps the undercurrent of virtual sexuality presented in SPIRITUAL MACHINES best embodies (or should I say "disembodies"?) the author's total disconnect from what I consider human and humane. He sees the present flood of sexual matter on the web as a pale harbinger of the future of virtual sex - a coming era when sexual experience with our computers will first be indistinguisable from physical relations, and then much better. He suggests that even when we are in the same room with someone with whom we wish to engage sexually we will opt for climbing into our units to get it on in cyberspace. (That is, while there are still rooms, and bodies - a condition he confidently predicts will end by the 22nd century.) He notes that there will be no STDs, no physcial awkwardnesses, hey, not even constrictions on body shapes, appendages, orifices, whatever...) And we will do it forever. The words "natural life span" will no longer have meaning. Looks like hell to me.

Ray did good inventions and he writes good books too.

In this book, Ray describes an evolution path that will lead us ( human on earth) to
a 'digitalized' (not necessarily completely digital) world where humanity transcend
the universe. Too bold? too big? too crazy? Maybe not. However, I do think he is a bit over optimestic on the time line. We could possibly change our descedant greatly in the next 100 years through our understanding about gene, protein, and cellular interaction. They could be immortal (in general, and live as long as the univese could provide humanily livable space) Nano technology could spring into life (puns intended) in the next 100 years, as for how much change will be made, it's hard to precisely predict but it will definitely fundamentally change human civilization and culture. As for computational intelligence matches human's will happen in mid 2020,
I think it is a bit early, perhaps, add another five years but who knows, it might just happen that way.

Is Ray really far fetched? no, but probably optimestic and I don't mean the overly one but hey... that is part of the reason why scientist keeps doing what they are doing and create a good impact to the world.

Now, whoever has read this perhaps should start reading "The singularity is near".

Since I get into contact with the Vinge's singularity concept I developed a very great attraction for the matter.
Ray Kurzweil explains it in a easy, not alarming and optimistic way.
After reading The Age of Spiritual Machines and his later book the Singularity is near I can not understand how somebody can live without knowing about this potential threat and at the same time potential solution to mankind problems.

It's a very chaotic collection of thoughts that didn't provide any true insight to me. Compared to "The Singularity Is Near" anyway. (Or maybe it was excactly because I had read it before). The essential subjects, like exponential trends, virtual reality and chaos, get thrown around a lot, but that's it really.

In retrospect was definitely written in a very formative stage of Kurzweil's thought. Don't get me wrong, I'm a huge Ray Kurzweil fanboy, but we have better things available now in 2007. I'd recommend skipping it and going straight for The Singularity Is Near. Or, to some other newer book for that matter if you're reading this from the even more distant future, where these subjects finally get the serious attention that they deserve...

The best part I thought was the chapter called 2009.

By 2009 there would finally be wearable computers. We'd also mainly do the hardcore work with lighter than ~1 pound portable computers that come in various shapes and sizes. We'd have "body lans" of about ten different computers around our bodies at all times. Majority of text is created with speech recognition. Mostly no keyboards. Displays with the quality of paper. Instead of speakers, some small devices that can create "audible three frequency sounds from the spectrum created by the interaction of very high frequency tones". Learning has been efficiently computerized. Translating telephone technique with live speech translation. Disabilities are levelable with technology. Computer-collaborated art and music. Awesome electronic music controllers. (We have, what, the Wiimote?) Grammar checkers are actually useful. Cancer mostly eliminated. And most of all, THERE IS INTEREST IN THIS KIND OF PHILOSOPHY.

The book presents an interesting premise that humans will evolve from purely biological to biological/technological and ultimately to technological beings. Whether or not Kurzweil has gotten the time frame right is the question. If he is right, humans are only 20 to 30 years from this singularity. A most thought provoking read.

A well-written and optimistic view of humanity's future. If even 1/100th of what Ray Kurzweil predicts comes occurs (which seems likely given his record) - then we are in for a very exciting century indeed.

It's a potentially important book as many other reviewers have pointed out but his stream of consciousness writing style gets aggravating. If you can skim, you win. If you read, you bleed. There aren't many things he says fewer than four times. But some of those things have come true, some will and some of the amazing ones may. He has an impressive track record. Now if he'd just add discipline to his writing.

Ray Kurzweil is an exceedingly intelligent and perceptive individual. His scientific insight into the future is fascinating and frightening. I am listing this as a "must read" to all of my top students.

Over 600 pages with 100 pages of "notes"!. Lots of rambling commentary. Not worth the money. Watch Nova.

I enjoyed this book as a student taking an AI class. However, it was too heavy to carry it to the class. I did like book website and Google code page.

On the negative part I'd say the layout of the examples/pseudo code was ...rather inconvenient. LISP style made it a little bit awkward for a person who never saw LISP before. Some examples about evil king and his brother, and such were a little bit off... I'd rather get some real life examples. Problems at the end of chapters did not encourage going and doing it on your own.

I am not sure I'd be able to use this book as a self-study guide, but in the class it did make sense.

Pros: Well organized, Description is clear and complete, good for beginners.
Cons: Examples chosen are not the best, author's attempts at humor are quite lame in most cases.

I'm currently teaching AI. Since it's the standard textbook for AI courses, I decided to use Russel&Norvig's book, and I am really disappointed.

The book is too superficial, trying to cover too much, and their notation and explanations are not always clear. For example, try to understand the Viterbi algorithm for HMMs. It's perfectly clear if you read an introductory article, but this book gives a very confusing idea of how it works. In several other parts of the book the same thing happens.
More often than not I have given other texts to my students.

I do not think using "one big book" is the right approach for teaching AI, because "AI" is too large. If you are teaching undergrad students in a "BS in AI" then you should use specific and in-depth books for each course: knowledge representation, vision, uncertainty, etc.
But if you are (as I am) teaching a short AI course in a Computer Science context, then I think you should probably pick very few subjects and treat them *in depth* -- otherwise your students will have no benefit in taking your course (whatever you tell them in that short time, they could learn by other means).

Following the accolades in the reviews and having a keen interest in AI (as a physician and computer scientist) - I have dived into this book. It took me more than half a year of stubbornly trying to read and understand it. What a disappointment...
On one hand, the math is inaccessible, least you have a major in computer sciences / statistics, math - or all of the above. It seems some, if not all of the math "proofs" are unnecessary for the matter at hand. Unless there are some sinister motives behind these superfluous math complications - such as providing professors with ammunition for students testing. But why should someone interested in AI - get bogged down in this? Is it really what the authors had in mind?
On the other hand there are not enough examples to follow and the examples that are there - are inconsistent and insufficient (for example: the `wumpus' world that is used in the logic chapters, actually succeeds to stir an interest in the reader and then ....it is not followed up in the subsequent chapters such as the one on Bayesian networks)...
Some easy to grasp principles (such as basic propositional logic) are repeated ad nauseam while some difficult subjects (such as MCMC) are left as puzzling axioms, for us to decipher on our own.

I summarize my disappointment asking myself what I got from this effort that I have invested into this book, absorption and digestion wise, professionally speaking:
1. Did this book help me better understand the depth and breadth of the AI domain? - No.
2. Am I able to develop, even conceptually a plan for an AI application / "intelligent agent"? Absolutely not.
3. Did the book clarify for me the fields of logic, machine learning, reasoning, uncertainty, probability and so on? - No. I am as confused now as I was before embarking on this study project, maybe even more so.
4. Am I a smarter person, able to read now the multitude of scientific articles out there on the AI subject - after finishing this book? - No.

The only reason I gave it 2 stars instead of the single one it deserves - is because of the historical and bibliographical summaries the authors have nicely detailed at the end of each chapter. I've seen other books recommended in these reviews - and I intend to look into them shortly. CAVEAT EMPTOR (buyer beware) !

Form your own opinion on this book, don't let the gushing over this book force you into questioning your instincts

I thought I liked this book at first, but I had confused interest in AI with regard for this book.

Sure this was ground breaking. But, currently, it is bloated, full of wordy, unclear descriptions. I particularly dislike the coverage in: ch. 7, 8, 9 (logics + reasoning). ch. 13, 14 (prob, belief nets). Make the search chapters shorter, fewer. We get the idea, no need to spend so much time on it. Make the logic chapters shorter, dig deeper into those subjects if you want to use that much of the readers time. Scrap chapter 13 or write it over again (refer reader to Pearl's or others coverage of probability). It is partially to elementary, stating obvious rules with very simple usages. The rest of it jumps around, with unclear explanations. Chapter 14, skims past ideas, not enough time spent explaining ideas.

I particularly like the detailed references at the end of each chapter.

After glancing at Winston, Nilsson, and Poole books, I am leaning towards Poole, especially since I am more interested in the knowledge rep and reasoning than other areas.

I read the golden age trilogy during a fairly dark time in my life. I was hunkered down in this awful pedo clinic my fourth year of dental school. Residents were wrapping screaming kids up to drill on their teeth, and I was the lucky one who got to hold their heads still. I was going on my sixth week there.

I didn't have a car, so I was taking this shuttle thing for about an hour ride, and each way I was reading the Golden Age trilogy.

The books have all the standard things that make for a good sci fi read. Cool aliens, cool technology, action and adventure. There's something about these books though that make them stand out. Theres a deep mythology here. I don't mean "mythology" like in some cheezy Robert Jordan book, I mean mythology like it speaks to some deep Jungian type architecture in the human (or at least in my) subconscious. There is something incredibly noble and humane in these books. They are as important and as good, and certainly more enjoyable, imho, as any of the great "classics" like Brother Karamozoff, etc. Highly recommended to readers and lovers of sci fi.

The Golden Age and the subsequent two books in the series explore the question of what it means to live your life, as opposed to simply continuing to exist. The world of the Golden Oecumene has created amazing wonders of technology and conquered death and crime. But what can give meaning to life in a utopia? What can inspire people to great deeds that differentiate a golden age from the dark ages? The Golden Oecumene may have perfect tranquility, but it also is stagnant and unimaginative. People have become increasingly withdrawn into their own little worlds, a term with a literal meaning in this society, as each person is free to reshape his perceptions to see the world exactly as he wants to see it instead of what it really is.

The novel's plot pits the world's entrenched oligarchy and their desire to keep things as they are, preserving their privileges, wealth and status, against one man who wants to do great things with his life. Phaeton's plan to send out colonies to other stars threatens to destroy the social order and the future security of the ruling class, whose monopolies in nearly every part of the economy would be destroyed by competition, and who will have no way to impose their will on the millions of those colonies. Furthermore, once the sun finishes its evolutionary course in a few hundred billion years, these immortals would have nowhere to escape if the nearby star systems are already colonized, and would have to die or to fall to the lowest strata of those societies. Needless to say, Phaeton is not a popular man with these people, and they try to put him in his place. Ultimately, they fail (not in this book; in The Golden Transcendence : Or, The Last of the Masquerade (The Golden Age)), demonstrating the futility of trying suppress humanity's progress.

Admittedly, the book can be heavy reading for non-technical people. Even today, technology pervades our world, and just as a savage would gaze incomprehendingly upon our computers, iPhones, and airplanes, so do we have difficulty with the ideas that must be understood to live in the Golden Oecumene, many millenia into the future. However, the technology really is central to the plot, as it is the underlying cause of that society's stagnation and corruption. A reader who takes his time to understand it would not only enrich his understanding of the plot, but of his understanding of where our continuing efforts to integrate with computers will take us. Today we already are facing many of the issues discussed in the book, like electronic privacy, intellectual property, and life in virtual environments, to name a few.

The book's philosophical base can also be a turn off to some readers, who might recognize the same symptoms of stagnation that plague the Golden Oecumene's citizens in themselves. Just like Phaeton, we are permitted by our civilization to choose a tranquil life of no consequence, where one day is just like the one before it, and a man can live his entire life and die without accomplishing a single thing. But Phaeton chooses the other path, to strive for greatness. At one point in the book he has an explicit choice to recover his memories, and I think that the inscription on the box that contains them applies to the book as well:

"Sorrow, great sorrow, and deeds of renown without peer, within me sleep, for truth is here. Truth destroys the worst in man; pleasure destroys the best. If you love truth more than happiness, then open; otherwise, let rest."

I wasn't quite sure what to expect when I picked this up. I have to admit, the cover intrigued me, but at the same time it also was just a little cheesy in my mind. All that aside, it took my breath away, in the end. I say that because at first, I was in way over my head with all the scientific mumbo-jumbo Wright was throwing around. Nothing really wrong with it, it just took me a little bit to get accustomed to it. After I got used to the terminology, I really began to enjoy the book.

I definitely don't recommend this as the first Science Fiction book for someone to read. I think you need to be used to some of the "out there" concepts which are integrated into this book from the get-go.

I found myself completely captivated by Phaethon and the amazing complicated predicament he literally finds himself in as he attempts to discover why 250 years of his memory are missing...at his request! And I think Wright did an incredible job of introducing you to character unobtrusively and then "quietly" revealing them through the progress of the story.

Sad to say, this is the first of a trilogy of books, but from the other reviews I read, they are all worth the read. I do highly recommend this book to anyone daring to dive this deep into Science Fiction. But please, be forewarned, you're going to have to be able to digest some pretty abstract concepts to really enjoy this book.

A novel set in the far, far future, where everyone is about as
posthuman as you can imagine. A little reminiscent of Moorcock's
Dancers at the End of Time, in tone, but with more obvious humanity and
human characters. It appears that the main character, now happily going
about his business, was some sort of maverick in the past. The current
group of people in power, including his father, removed a large chunk
of his memory. This is a long period of time, some centuries, are the
people in this era are functionally immortal.

He tries to find out why, and what he should do about it. He gets
into some serious amount of trouble as a destabilising influence in a
society that is being manipulated into stagnation by its masters.

Wright is talented at world-building and actually fairly talented at characters as well. What he does less well, at least in this book, is provide a plot suitably subtle or integrated to support his skills in the other areas. Phaethon is a complex and interesting character; the choice to make him the center figure in a fight between the forces-of-Utopian-good-who-are-actually-just-trying-to-milk-humanity is extremely heavy-handed. It doesn't do credit to his own work. Section 3 of Chapter 1 irritated me so much (why not dress the Peers up in black hats and have them twirl their long waxed moustaches? "Adventures, risk, rashness must receive no further applause"-- oh, please.) that I almost didn't finish the book. In the end, I'm not sorry that I did finish it. But all the same, I find it irritating to be bludgeoned by an author's Point in the name of Plot.

Anyhow, this aside, there's some great stuff in here. I'm particularly fond of the way that he develops the future notions of identity. Great stuff to chew on, and combines thinking issues with futurism in the best tradition of Space Opera. Light reading it is not, so if you decide to give it a try, then give yourself some room and time to absorb the material.

I'm glad I didn't start with Excession, but built up to it by reading some of his other books. I can sympathize with one reviewer who found it incomprehensible, with little action. I loved it, and think it is the most humorous of them (which may not be saying much). I'd recommend reading some of Banks's earlier books before you try this one.

I finally finished reading Excession. I liked the book overall, but it took me 300 pages before it was interesting enough for me to read it for long periods of time. I've had been struggling reading through it a few pages at a time before that, which probably only exacerbated my disinterest.

The ideas in the book were interesting and there was a lot of new information about the Minds and the way the Culture works in general. Events weren't as rosy (from a Culture society perspective) in the book as there were in previous books. The most notable philosophical conflict was with the Affront, a new race introduced in the book.

I've thought about why it wasn't as good to me over the past couple of days and I think the main reason I was disappointed is because the characters fell kind of flat. I didn't really like anyone in the book. Genar-Hofoen came the closest, but he still wasn't well-developed to me. Dajeil Gelian was completely unlikeable, caught in a 40 year sulk and Ulver Seich was hardly better.

The ships were mildly entertaining, but compared to Mawhrin-Skel from Player of Games, they were dull. I think there were just too many characters spread out over the book and in the end, it didn't come together for me. I'd have to put this about even with State of the Art on my list of Banks books, but I think overall it was a good book, for the history of the Culture, more than for the story (as I felt with State of the Art). Ah well.

I read this about six years ago in dental school. Since then have read a great deal of Sci Fi- some good some mediocre. I picked this up again the other day, and man does this guy rock. He writes sf with a depth of imagination and seriousness of purpose that you won't find anywhere else. This is going to sound sweeping, but many sf writers are just a joke compared to Banks. I told my wife that reading Banks is like listening to Jimi Hendrix play guitar. No understatement.

So if you like sf, give this a try. Its one of the only Banks books you can get in the US. Its cheap, its long, its filled with mind blowing writing. Just trust me on this.

It helps to enjoy this book if you're the type of person who wonders equally at the technology, the themes, the math, the characters, and the possibilities. Banks' imagination is really going full-blast here with sentient spaceships (sometimes going 'eccentric', doing their own thing) and all of the creative, fantastic inventions that inhabit his far-future world.

I will be the first to admit that it's not the easiest read at first. Get past the first 40-50 pages though, and you'll be glad you did. Charles Stross writes in a similar style, though with more contemporary wit than in The Excession, but these two authors are similar enough that if you like one, you'll probably like the other.

If you really want to dig in deep to a new, imaginative, hard sci-fi universe, then this Culture novel by Banks should satisfy. Don't expect an easy, thoughtless summer-read though.

When expecting a Banks' sci-fi book, expect only excellence.
When expecting a Banks' "Culture" book, expect seven things:
1) war, weapons, death and destruction
2) glanding different sensations to alter reality
3) drones with smart mouths, attitudes and a cunning wit
4) knife missiles slicing through baddie targets
5) quirky aliens in and out of the Culture
6) dark, grim gory scenes that will leave you cringing
7) Minds and their space vessels

Here's the breakdown of this Culture novel:
1) War breaks out between the Affront and the Culture, but there was little death and destruction. One or two deaths were satisfying enough.
2) Glanding different sensations to alter brain chemistry was prevalent throughout the book. It played no key role, but it was remarked upon enough.
3) Three of four drones made an appearance here. None of them were over the top scene catchers, but one drone did have a few choice words to say.
4) Sadly, no knife missiles were used.
5) The Affront species was humorous to read about. They seem like a hearty species to be mixed with, as long as you're not their dinner or hunting game.
6) I very much like the gritty scenes in Banks' novels, especially the island scene in Consider Phlebas. Excession had two gritty scenes (one with a death and one with grisly injury). Not up to par.
7) There were more Minds in this Culture book than any other Culture novel I have yet to read. It was bordering on mind-boggling, but the story cleared up towards the end. Reading the conversations between Minds was extremely interesting to experience (especially the Eccentric Minds).

Not all categories were up to par, but between the greatness of witnessing the Affront and the Minds. Well played out.

I picked this one up on a whim. I had wanted a good sci fi that was hard, real and written well. I couldn't have found a better book than Moriarty's Spin State. I stumbled upon a style of writing in sci fi that focuses on posthuman, or humans genetically engineered or altered in such a way that they are, essentially, no longer the human that we know today.

Spin State's main character Li fits this perfectly with reinforced muscle and built in "online" connection, although online doesn't necessarily describe accurately what this world revolves around, being so much more vast and huge with AIs lurking around every corner.

Beyond all the sci fi attributes that make this book so great there is also a well written storyline that is backed up with a nicely researched science background as well. When a strong storyline is backed up with well researched science and interesting characters then you can only sit back and enjoy the ride.

Moriarty's debut novel is an engaging, fun and exciting ride that I want more of. In fact I now want to find many other books that are "posthuman". Bravo Moriarty, I look forward to reading a lot more from this author.

5 stars.

Spin State is probably the best hard hard SF book I've read in the last couple years. I say 'hard hard' because this book is more deeply rooted in certain sciences than a lot of other hard SF novels that focus on more visual technologies. Spin State is a novel of AI's, genetic constructs, quantum mechanics, and the Matrix-type world of Streamspace. There's string theory thrown in there too. The interesting thing about Spin State is that despite all the heavy research Moriarty had to do for this novel--research he provides at the end of the novel--it doesn't force you to understand the concepts. You don't have to know quantum theory or entanglement to get this novel, and you certainly don't need to know string theory.
Summary: Li is a genetic construct. Essentially she's human, but not like your or me.

She has quick reflexes, super strength, and a way to jump in and out of Streamspace whenever she wants. Think of her as a computer link node, able to go into the mainframe and rummage around, much like an AI would, only at a slower pace--since she's human. She lives in a universe where people can wipe their memories, where AI's are actually intelligent and almost human in their own right, and where a war between an organization known as the Syndicates has ended. Li is what you might call 'special forces', and a bit of a 'hero' from the aforementioned war with the Syndicates. When one of her intel gathering assignments goes wrong she is suddenly plunged right into the middle of a mysterious murder of a scientist named Sharifi, the same women her genetic makeup was modeled after, and she finds herself in a twisted battle of alliances as not only the UN but the Syndicates and the AI collective ALEF all vie for the information she might be able to give them.

For some the novel might seem a little slow paced. It starts right off with some action, but things sort of slow down for quite a while into this semi SF detective style piece of work. At 597 pages it does have a little tendency to slow down too much. However, once you get into the story and get an understanding of who the characters are and what motivations they have, you really pay attention to the tiny details. Moriarty has created a richly detailed world here. It's a world unlike our own on the outside, but strangely similar on the inside. What sets it apart from other novels in the same mold is that the science doesn't get in the way. It's understandable, clean cut, and interesting. You're not forced to read about quantum mechanics to know what he's talking about. It's as much a part of the flow as the characters, and entirely unpredictable. Just when you think you know what is going to happen, something entirely different takes place. At any one moment a friend could turn into and enemy. This sort of suspense is exactly what makes this book entertaining. Sure, the world is fascinating, but Moriarty has managed to create a truly intriguing SF epic.
Thumbs up from me!

I have to say that Moriarty's debut was a fantastic read. Not for the SF amateur. This book combines elements of military SF and cyberpunk beautifully and just throws you in. It expects you to swim, and even though I stumbled in the first few pages, I found my footing and the book read at a good, solid pace, though not a pace you want to speed through. It's a complex and detailed plot that focuses on Catherine Li, a genetic construct who snuck her way into the military and, thanks to FTL jumps, forgets more than she remembers. But she does remember the name of her homeworld, and dreads going back there when she's assigned to investigate the murder of a famous physicist who also happens to be Li's genetic twin. There's a little bit of everything in this book, battle scenes, Emergent AIs, and a touch of romance (same-sex romance, in some cases). Definitely worth the read for any SF fan.

Loved this book --- well plotted, strong female lead, an A.I., clones, all in a detailed and fascinating future world. This book --- and its sequel --- rock.

This first novel seems built upon homages, large and small, to other novels, SF and other. Moriarty's key concept is a substance that is a naturally occurring Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC). This substance, called crystal for short, is found on only one planet in the universe and can be extracted only by the most dangerous means. The substance allows space-time to the effectively collapsed ("folded," perhaps?) such that instantaneous transport and communications can be attained. (These properties are yet to be discovered in BEC, a real substance, in our century.)

Well, 40 odd years ago in "Dune" the substance was called spice and the foiling of relativity was given a lot less scientific window-dressing, but the similarity is clear. And I don't doubt Moriarty read the many papers and books in her bibliography, and talked to the scientists she credits, but she never makes any real attempt to explain the means by which quantum entanglement might actually facilitate instantaneous transport or communications. What I expect in a good SF story that extrapolates from some real discovery is some convincing mumbo-jumbo that makes me believe, or at least *want* to believe, that the science might really work. I would refer the readers to Niven, Heinlein, Haldeman, or Clarke for many examples. (Yeah, I'm old - get over it.)

The novel opens with an action prologue a little like the James Bond movies where we meet our heroine, Catherine Li, while she is on a dangerous mission to bust into a lab to steal some technology. She is revealed to be *twice* augmented beyond a normal human, being both the product of genetic engineering and also internally wired with bionic assists that are always on the verge of injuring her more than her opponents by overstressing her remnant bones, tendons, adenoids, etc. Even 20th century fighter planes had software smart enough to prevent the pilot from breaking the wings off by pulling too many G's. You'd think her designers would have built in similar stoppers. And yes, she reminded me of Juan Rico and William Mandala in their fighting suits. This is not a bad thing, of course. But Heinlein and Haldeman seemed to put more thought into the actual engineering than Moriarty, who relies more on rapid-fire use of buzz- and coined words to convey futuristic technology.

After the prologue, we spend most of the rest of the story on the planet Compton's World where miners work in 19th century conditions mining the crystal which is threaded through veins of coal. A couple comments here--Martin Cruz Smith took a break from the great Arkady Renko series to write an excellent novel, "Rose," set in a 19th century coal mine in England. Now I have only ever read one coal mine novel, and "Rose" was it, and maybe they are all similar, but I'd swear Moriarty was channeling Smith in her descriptions of the mine and the company town. Maybe there's only one way to describe a coal town... More importantly: the mine is the only source of the most important substance in the universe, the BEC. It supports the whole infrastructure of galactic commerce. So why do the miners live in incredible poverty and filth? Surely they could have, like, middle class lives, if not outright wealth.

Oh well, the story does go on from there - there's a murder in the mine and the outsider, Li, is sent to investigate (as also happened in "Rose"). Li interacts with and is helped by Cohen, an AI who is a combination of Michael the Computer in "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" and Agent Aloysius Pendergast in the novels of Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child. Cohen ends up being the best character, no doubt due to the illustrious parentage, but again seems derivative. He lives in a fabulously appointed mansion (although it is possibly a VR), is tremendously suave and urbane, and even makes great use of the "memory palace" mental trick, all reminiscent of Pendergast.

So. Three stars for nice descriptive writing, an awareness (but not convincing use) of leading-edge science, good bad guys, and Cohen. Good editing could have added at least another half star. The book is 250 pages too long for its story. The sequel, "Spin Control," is in my in-basket. If it gets up to four stars, I'll be back with another review.

When you are the inspiration for a Jurassic Park character (or at least I think he was), then you immediately capture my attention. I'll buy your book, even if its subject matter is generally outside my interests.

Stuart Kauffman seems to have been at least partially the inspiration for the interesting chaotician character "Ian Malcolm" in Jurassic Park, and I thought his real life ideas would be as interesting as his fictional incarnation's ranting on chaos theory.

Not quite. At Home in the Universe sounds a lot more interesting than it was. It's plodding and full of jargon. And for a bonus, atheist polemic is included at no added charge! Yay! *Cough*

Kauffman also inserts random drivel about nature being sacred despite the falsehood of religion. Not only is that absurd on its face (sacred means set aside for religious veneration), but what the hell does it have to do with his ideas about complexity and emerging order? Spare me the atheo-preaching, please.

Actually the books is an outcome of scientific experiments in a computer lab. Differently from other reviewers, I want to notice that the facts of chaos exist in every where such as in Nature or in A Company.
Writer shows that everything in the world can be reduced to a series of chemical reactions. Chemical reactions can generate a complex system such as life from dead. He argues also the equilibrium of life and dead from the view of the number of kinds of molecules and the number of kinds of outcome from these molecules create or which are already in the system.
He also like many chaos theorist says that small changes in the system make big changes in the whole. (Explaining evalution). By some evidents and using probability, he shows that life on earth is the expected.
The books most important view is explaning everything as chemical reactions. And I believe this is the right thing...At Home in the Universe: The Search for the Laws of Self-Organization and Complexity

In this book, Stuart Koaffman opens new doors to us. Through the theory of the chaos, proportions fractals and their networks boulinas, give an interesting speculation us on the origin of the life, the complex systems and the societies. It is hour to be on the awares and to try to focus to us in new horizons. This book took to him of the hand by these new horizons. It is hour to know our house in the universe...

Stuart Kaufman's At Home in the Universe is a lay redaction his scientific hypotheses from his Origins of Order, a rich, fascinating, sophisticated, and complementary set of hypotheses added to Darwin's theories of evolution. For the moment, at least, they are the promising fruit of speculative or theoretical biological hypotheses (with physics, chemistry, geology, paleontology, mathematics, game theory, and economics thrown in), but they go a long way to filling in many of the gaps that strict Darwinists seem content to ignore. And some of his hypotheses, he readily admits, are heretical.

One of the obvious problems, if not primary one, that Kaufman sets to answer, Is how can natural selection work, culling the fittest to survive, without something to act on? In other words, natural selection operates on the already existent (i.e., regressive engineering), not in the formation of the entity itself. Another problem is that 4 billion years, long as that is, is still not sufficient time for natural selection to have acted through a totally random, step-by-step process in determining today's survivors. Even 100 billion years would not be enough. Another problem is how could so many species have come into existence and failed to survive (99.9%), leaving a mere 100 million for the present, in the span of a mere 4 billion years (mathematically impossible on Darwin's theories alone).

The central theme of Kaufman's work is Self-organized Criticality, a scientific twist on the notion of irreducible complexity (from the Discovery Institute's lexicon, no less), where a minimal degree of inherent complexity in a subcritical-supercritical phase transition is what spontaneously orders the animate world and generates and sustains life in accord with other, as yet, unknown, but implicit laws. From the moment that a sufficiently critical diversity of molecules reached the ideal phase transition, life itself was "spontaneously generated" as inevitable, not by accident. Once life appeared, the acts of natural selection, adaptation, coevolution, evolution of coevolution, cellular, morphological, and physiological differentiation, ontogeny, niches, populations, stable cum-chaotic dynamics, etc., could operate, but in addition to forces beyond natural selection. And while speculative, apparently many scientists share Kaufman's intuitions, inferences, and insights.

But the "other" force or forces is not mystical, much less divine, even if they may be truly awesome. Rather, it is in the nature of the universe, and more particularly in our evolving earth, that these implicit laws work in tandem with Darwin's laws. At this point, these laws are posited from the empirical knowledge we do have, but have not yet demonstrated in the scientific manner to make them even hypotheses. But Kaufman's speculative biology is not a whimsical or arbitrary metaphysics, but logical inferences based on laws and facts already in place. Having done the easy work (thinking the notions of what these other general laws of nature must be like), now science must work in earnest to confirm or reject his speculative hypotheses.

The key word and concept throughout this humorous, heady, and exacting exposition is "complexity" and within the manifold complexities of lives, environments, and mutually intersecting dynamics is a spontaneous order that arises "for free" that in turn sustains stable and steady systems just at the subcritical-supercrticial phase transition (e.g., horizon, or "edge of chaos"). Another key word and concept is "dynamic." Steady-state and homeostasis are often thought of as a static plateau, but that is mistaken, as such states are actually in a fluctuating dynamic at the phase transition between equilibrium (death) and disequilibrium (disorder). Indeed, on many different levels, living organisms are born, dwell, and die precisely at this phase transition between the subcritical (stasis, moribund) and supercritical (chaotic, disordered) states. And the key thesis is that order ("for free") is embedded in the delicate balancing act precisely at this phase transition.

Kaufman extrapolates some of these implicit biological laws and applies them to human cultural and technological advancement. The "fit" is remarkably uncanny, helping us to understand some of the dynamics of technological improvements (and diminishing returns), innovation, extinction, and spontaneity of the economy. Perhaps the most salient features are the concepts of "dynamic" and "spontaneous."

Moreover, if an analogy can be drawn from the biosphere and ecology to the social and political realms, the overwhelming preponderance of biological evidence screams complexity, diversity, and interdependence of organisms and their environments, which arise spontaneously and reciprocally to each other, in a constant dynamic that is vibrant, active, and always on the threshold of "chaos," but retains some stability through change. It is only those social and political forms that are "adaptive" that are socially and politically the "fittest," and democracy and market economies are obviously the most adaptive mechanisms to adapt to changing human needs.

Frederick Hayek addressed himself to these very issues over 50 years ago, and called the market economy and democracies "spontaneous" associations, in contradistinction to "planned" economies and governments. The former "adapt" to changing environments and circumstances, while the latter lack flexibility, and thus do not easily yield to adaptive mechanisms. "Planned" economies attempt to calculate rationally human desires, motivations, and needs in either an abstract or a priori fashion, then calculate the mode of production, the degree, and whether to accommodate, as if some "Absolute Human Mind" could anticipate all contingencies and changes by a simple mathematical formula. The problem is that bureaucrats are notoriously theory-laden and too calculating to include, much less advance, diversity (think Medicare Part D for "planned" absurdity). In practice, socialisms impede innovation and stifle ingenuity. With no means of adaptation, there is no "fittest," much less any mechanism to adapt to the actual dynamics of the world.

Communism's planned economy is an extreme case of an irrational calculus asserting what the government will allow, applying the lowest-common denominator as a criterion of sufficiency. We all know of the U.S.S.R.'s food lines, limited products, forced housing, inferior merchandise, and minimal labor investment. But even weaker forms of the rational calculus, such as socialism, does not do much better. At least their democracies allow policies to change, even if it becomes years for government to adapt to the new exigencies. Even the most socialized societies have "capitalist" outlets, to provide some barometer of social wants and meeting them. Social insurance makes sense on many fronts, but social or state "planning" of economics has rotted state and worker. Kaufman's biological analogies explain why.

Postscript: Kaufman's book is a provocative, challenging, and fascinating (sometime heady) read. Even if all of his hypotheses in the abstract are found to be untrue, at least he captures the reader's imagination, and asks the questions that most of us non-dogmatic Darwinians have raised for some time. In a time when the "easy" and "orthodox" are all too convenient for slipping under the rug, Kaufman's questions (and suggested answers) go the the very nexus of the difficulties. His suggested answers are at once perhaps too simple, on the other hand, perhaps too complex. What is refreshing, above all, is that he's not afraid to ask, and even less fearful of suggesting solutions. Thank gawd for the Sante Fe Institute, where brave and curious minds still ask questions.

Stuart brings the science of complexity and complex adaptive systems to a broad range of topics from evolution to business to learning curves. The book is masterly written to allow you to skim over the formulas without lossing the excitement or to dig into the technology to understand its broad application.

Unfortunatly Morgan has not written a follow up to "Woken Furies."

That is the only down side to an EXCELLENT book. Morgan continues the same standard of perfection as with the previous two books of the series. I have even gone as far to email Morgan and practically beg him to continue this series.

Buy this book, and hope that Takeshi Kovacs makes a swift return!

this book was as nice to read as the first two in the series. also...i do hope that the author writes one more book for this series, as he creates great possibilities for a fourth novel.

Brilliant, original, completely engrossing. Mr. Morgan never disappoints. There isn't a single superfluous word. This man's brand of talent can't be learned, can't be bought, and sadly, can't be plugged in and soaked up Matrix style. Either you have it or you don't, and most of us don't. I'm in awe.

While I liked Altered Carbon for its new content, and somewhat the second book, this one was kind of tired. While the storytelling was good and the SF strong, the character was tiring, especially with the double running around. It could have been more exciting, but still deserves a read as part of the series.

I have been hooked on Richard K. Morgan's hard-boiled science fiction since Altered Carbon. I was quite pleased when I heard that Woken Furies, the third book with Takeshi Kovacs as a main character, was available. These books mix cyberpunk with noir detective novels in a very effective way. They are moody, violent, and have some fascinating world building involved. The basic concept involves personality as embedded in cortical stacks which can be backed up, moved to another body ("sleeve"), or destroyed for real death. The Morgan universe is a host to a whole array of problems around class, militarism, wealth, exploitation and violence. A really interesting and entertaining series.

I have heard folks say that Woken Furies is the weakest of the three books. I would tend to agree with that, even though it also has some of the most interesting elements. The beginning is particularly slow. It took me quite some time to engage with the work. I could not tell you exactly why it felt so slow, but I really had to give it 100 pages before I had warmed up to the text. Again in this book, I really like the thread of Quellism (a political theory) that runs through the work. What I think is great about Woken Furies is that Quellism gets explored more thoroughly.

I actually think that you could read this book without reading the first two. However, I suspect that you would enjoy them more in order. If you don't know Takeshi Kovacs yet, you are in for a treat. If you are already a fan, expect some bumps in this installment but it is still a worthy entry in the series.