A Balanced View of AI

In the The Equality Machine, Orly Lobel expertly presents a nuanced view of both the positive and negative aspects of artificial intelligence (AI) technology. This is no small feat, as it has become increasingly popular for commenters on emerging technologies to fall into one of two polarized camps: techno-solutionism or techno-criticism. At its extreme, techno-solutionism tends to lionize technologies like AI and unrealistically position them as easy solutions for the much more complex, systemic issues in society.  Conversely, techno-criticism, at its extreme, tends to overemphasize the negative aspects of technologies like AI, either by unduly focusing on potential future problems that may or may not occur, or by disproportionately highlighting edge-cases where a technology is problematic while overlooking other areas where it may be bringing incremental, or significant, societal improvements.