Welcome to AI

May 1, 2024
Grades 2-5 This vividly illustrated history of artificial intelligence covers human attempts to recreate living and thinking machines, starting back in ancient times and progressing through modern day. Beautiful, bright illustrations reminiscent of the pop-art style of Peter Max fill pages, while brief, accessible paragraphs introduce creations ranging from a flying wooden dove from Roman antiquity to mechanical saints and monks from the Middle Ages, to twentieth-century robots and twenty-first-century AI deepfakes. The overall tone is reassuring and measured, explaining how some tasks, such as a robot sweeper maneuvering around a kitchen floor, may be easy for machines to replicate while other seemingly simple tasks, such as pouring a glass of water or writing an original poem, may be beyond most current algorithms' capabilities. The text also addresses concerns regarding the disproportionately high amounts of energy consumed by the technology sector. The final message is that AI will only ever be as good as the humans who provide its data. This eye-catching treat serves as an effective supplement for STEM collections.

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