The Most Human Human: What Talking with Computers Teaches Us About What It Means to Be Alive

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The Most Human Human: What Talking with Computers Teaches Us About What It Means to Be Alive

3.89 of 5 stars 3.89 · rating details · 1,324 ratings · 226 reviews

The Most Human Human is a provocative, exuberant, and profound exploration of the ways in which computers are reshaping our ideas of what it means to be human. Its starting point is the annual Turing Test, which pits artificial intelligence programs against people to determine if computers can “think.”

Named for computer pioneer Alan Turing, the Turing Test convenes a pane...more

Hardcover, 303 pages

Published March 1st 2011 by Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group (first published January 1st 2011)

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Jun 16, 2011 Danny rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, non-fiction, computing

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Once awhile we chanced upon a book that really altered the way we look at things. The every-day things.

Learning from machines to become more human. Doesn’t it sound odd?

Brain Christian rightly pointed out that computers are tool designed without a specified purpose initially, and tons of applications were designed after computers (tools) were constructed. Now, we can see the power of computing applied to almost every mundane activity.

With computers seemingly invading all territories of our dail...more Once awhile we chanced upon a book that really altered the way we look at things. The every-day things.

Learning from machines to become more human. Doesn’t it sound odd?

Brain Christian rightly pointed out that computers are tool designed without a specified purpose initially, and tons of applications were designed after computers (tools) were constructed. Now, we can see the power of computing applied to almost every mundane activity.

With computers seemingly invading all territories of our daily activities, taking over human jobs, and with our ever-increasing reliance on computers to manage our schedule and tasks, it is inevitable that we question just how much has machines become human.

To answer that question, Brian Christian goes on to explore what really make a human.... human?

The differentiating factor is our unique ability to "communicate" with each other.

Most languages are designed around a very structured system, yet we adopt an unstructured way to deliver our ideas, thoughts and feelings everyday. Our tendency to add in conversational fillers (uhh, umm), having unique slang, ability to have our own point of view, having a 'stateful' identity, adding in emotions, all are contributing factors that add depth and flow into conversation that makes us human. Something computers just isn't quite there yet.

By creating new thoughts and ideas, and selectively choosing words, every conversation in itself is a poetry. Conversations with machines are repetition and a mimic of ideas that are after all... inputs.

Without those 'human' elements, we will never get the form of satisfaction and fulfillment in a conversation with a computer.

The duels of arguments and counter-arguments.
The gamble of approvals and rejections.
The power of anger and encouragement.
The emotional energy that bounces off two people.
Conversation with another human being is very much rewarding. Something that computers will never take away from us. And i'll start to treasure the one thing that make me uniquely human.(less)

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Apr 11, 2013 Jessica rated it 4 of 5 stars

The Loebner Prize competition is a contest held annually by the artificial intelligence community to see whether human judges can distinguish computer programs from human contestants based on five-minute online chat sessions. The program that fools the most judges is awarded the prize for "Most Human Computer" and the contestant whom the most judges believe to be human gets the prize for "Most Human Human."

In 2009 Brian Christian -- who holds degrees in computer science, philosophy, and poetry -...more

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Oct 31, 2012 Cheryl Gatling added it

Alan Turing, one of the fathers of computer science, proposed a test to determine if computers had achieved the ability to "think." If a computer and a human both had a conversation with a human judge (via texting), and the judge was fooled into thinking the computer was human, then the computer would have passed the test. This Turing test is performed every year in a competition called the Loebner prize. The computer program that fools the most judges is awarded "The Most Human Computer." The h...more Alan Turing, one of the fathers of computer science, proposed a test to determine if computers had achieved the ability to "think." If a computer and a human both had a conversation with a human judge (via texting), and the judge was fooled into thinking the computer was human, then the computer would have passed the test. This Turing test is performed every year in a competition called the Loebner prize. The computer program that fools the most judges is awarded "The Most Human Computer." The human who convinces the most judges that he is in fact human, is "The Most Human Human." Brian Christian entered the competition as a human "confederate." Usually humans confederates are told to just be themselves. But Christian threw himself into the project. He did intense preparation. He read transcripts of previous tests. He researched the chatbot programs that were out there. He researched AI programs used for chess, for Jeapardy, and for customer service. He also researched human speech. It turns out computers are quite good at making small talk, since so many opening and closing phrases are similar in every conversations. What computers are not good at (and humans are) is following the
thread of a conversation, and coming back to it later, tailoring a conversation to a specific situation, interrupting each other, talking at the same time, and talking in a distinctive, individual style. But these details only scratch the surface of what this book covers. Christian has a background in computer science, philosophy, and poetry, and he uses all of that and more. He asks, what makes us, as humans, special? Anything? Does it matter if we are special? Drawing on anecdotes from his own life, his broad reading, and interviews with all kinds of experts, he goes off on what appear to be wild tangents. Just when I thought, "This is interesting, but what does it have to do with the Turing test?" he would bring it back, and make it make sense. He waits till almost the last page to announce that yes, he did indeed win the "Most Human Human" award. I was not surprised. But by that time, the actual award seemed minor compared to the effects of all Christian's explorations. During his research he developed a new appreciation for the discoveries and playfulness of conversation, with a friend on the phone, with a stranger in a shop. It almost seems like an exalted duty, getting "off book," past the mechanical exchanges, and making contact with the things that make each of us unique. I felt the same way. I wanted to go out and talk to people. (less)

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Jun 28, 2012 Susan rated it 3 of 5 stars

Fascinating subject - artificial intelligence and the Turing test: Alan Turing (Google celebrated his 100th birthday recently) developed the annual test to see if an AI program can fool a panel of judges into thinking they are conversing by text with a human and not a machine. Brian, the author, was one of the 'ringers' - they mix up real human contestants in with the AI programs - and was voted the 'most human human' at the end where they also vote for the 'most human' AI program. As a fellow B...more

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Apr 17, 2012 Ivy rated it 3 of 5 stars

This is a fine book. Which is a huge disappointment, because it could have been excellent. It has one of the best premises--and best titles--of any book to come out recently. It got a lot of press, because the interest in the topic is immediate and obvious.

With all that, I wanted a story of the Loebner Prize and the author's quest for the Most Human Human award, along with some computer science and philosophy. I didn't get a story of the Loebner Prize--at all. He talks about leading up to it, ma...more This is a fine book. Which is a huge disappointment, because it could have been excellent. It has one of the best premises--and best titles--of any book to come out recently. It got a lot of press, because the interest in the topic is immediate and obvious.

With all that, I wanted a story of the Loebner Prize and the author's quest for the Most Human Human award, along with some computer science and philosophy. I didn't get a story of the Loebner Prize--at all. He talks about leading up to it, makes a few references to the actual event randomly throughout, and then skips to the award ceremony, which was profoundly disappointing.

As for the computer science and philosophy, well... There's a lot of it.

Christian talks about human speech patterns, which, in spoken conversation, are overlapping, interrupting, digressing--everything but linear. Maybe it was his intent to write the book that way, but if it was, it's an impressive failure. There are some chapters that have a coherent direction. But most of them randomly wander off and never get to the point. You might find yourself suddenly reading about Aristophanes in Plato's Symposium and never quite figure out how that has anything at all to do with the Turing test. Sometimes he'll give a bit of a precis at the start of the chapter, but then he won't follow it.

And there are all these headers throughout, which contain no structural value at all. It seems like he wrote the thing and then just stuck a header in whenever a pun occured to him. Or whenever he realized that this page-long bit has nothing to do with anything in the text surrounding it. And they're all A-heads, so they don't help create a sense of hierarchy. There are also random epigraphs, sometimes in the middle of a section. I get it, dude, you studied philosophy and poetry. You know stuff. But you need to work all of this material together into a coherent whole, instead of leaving all the lumps in the gravy.

So as you read, you find yourself in a forty-page long digression about data entropy and compression algorithms. Or not even a digression, really, because "digression" implies some sort of starting off point, and the only relation this seems to have to the purported topic of the book is that he read about it while researching the book. And there are some interesting things about how video compression works in there, but somewhere in the hour or so of reading this chapter, you start to wonder what the hell happened to the narrative.

The chapters that I liked best were the ones I read all in one sitting--it seems like you need to take this book in hundred-page chunks in order for him to wander back to his topic often enough to figure out what's going on.

There are interesting things in this book. But--honestly--the interesting things have already been mined. I've heard several radio stories based on this book, and a few more brushing the same topics (on This American Life and Radiolab). Those stories were a lot better than this book is. Which shows what a really talented journalist can do with the material. Christian, on the other hand, mostly squanders it. (less)

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Mar 08, 2012 Harold rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: science

The Most Human Human is about the Turing contest in which computers and people have separate 5 minute text conversation with judges who try to pick which are humans and which computers. So far the computers have not yet sufficiently fooled the judges to win. Each year the judges also determine the most human human, and the most human computer -- the ones who get the most human votes in each category. The author volunteered to be one of the humans. and then tries to win the most human human label...more The Most Human Human is about the Turing contest in which computers and people have separate 5 minute text conversation with judges who try to pick which are humans and which computers. So far the computers have not yet sufficiently fooled the judges to win. Each year the judges also determine the most human human, and the most human computer -- the ones who get the most human votes in each category. The author volunteered to be one of the humans. and then tries to win the most human human label.

The author is a poet and a programmer, and looks at the competition from both perspectives, as well as philosophically, linguistically, and several more. So the book is a fugue, one theme and several variations. Some are very interesting. I was particularly fascinated with the with how human language works, and the tells of the computer programs. If you want to try one, go to cleverbot.com.

But some of the digressions also wind down dead ends. It is as if the human writer breaks down, and the computer takes over. Interestingly, like the computer programs, I am not sure that everyone would find the same parts the wooden ones. Not each judge in the competition had the same computer conversation, but still the computers haven't won yet. In the same vein, while different people might respond to different tangents, I doubt they all work for anyone.

And particularly disappointing was that he led up to his own participation in the contest, he doesn't describe it, even though he did in fact win the title of the most human human. Was it anticlimactic? Certainly its omission from the book is.

Yet all in, while uneven, the book did have a fascinating analysis of how computer conversation programs, and even chess programs work, and how we talk, and what some of the difference are. And it does teach something about what it means to be human, or at least sound human. I wonder what would the book would be like if he set out to convince the judges he was a computer. Yes I do. A sequel.

(less)

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Feb 25, 2012 Aaron Miller rated it 4 of 5 stars

My first edit (of hopefully many more to come) on Goodreads!

"If there's one thing I think the human race has been guilty of for a long time, it's a kind of entitlement. This is why, for instance, I find it oddly invigorating to catch a cold, come down from my high horse of believing myself a member of evolution's crowning achievement, and get whupped for a couple days by a single-celled organism."

Author, Brian Christian, explores the core differences (and similarities) between humans and machine...more

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Jan 26, 2012 Socraticgadfly rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: philosophy

Good, but oh, it could have been better.

There's an annual Turing test event in Britain every year. A group of top computer programs compete against a group of human confederates, as the computers try to prove, per Alan Turing, that they're really humans, just as the humans do.

So far, no computer has won this test, but, given the relatively narrow parameters of the test at this particular contest, that may not be too far off.

Christian, who successfully competed to be a human "confederate," takes...more

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Jan 24, 2012 Nathan rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fact, popcomp

I didn't know what to expect from this book, but it surprised and delighted me with its thoughtful but not stodgy exploration of what it means to be human. The author entered the annual staging of the Turing Test--not as an author of a chatbot, but as a human. The Turing Test is where judges blindly IM with chatbots and humans and try to tell them apart; if a chatbot is reliably mistaken for human, the creator of the test proposed, then it could be said to be artificially intelligent. The book e...more I didn't know what to expect from this book, but it surprised and delighted me with its thoughtful but not stodgy exploration of what it means to be human. The author entered the annual staging of the Turing Test--not as an author of a chatbot, but as a human. The Turing Test is where judges blindly IM with chatbots and humans and try to tell them apart; if a chatbot is reliably mistaken for human, the creator of the test proposed, then it could be said to be artificially intelligent. The book explores the nature of human intelligence and of artificial attempts at intelligence, from the significance of chess to competitive chatbots to neuroscience and philosophy.

Think of the Turing Test. If a computer program wins, that means that a human lost: judges have two conversations at a time and must decide which is the human and which is the computer. If a program is declared to be human, that means the human was declared to be a computer. The human lacked ... humanity? The advice to human participants is to "just be yourself", but the author can't do that. He's an over-achiever, he wants to study for and excel at this test of his humanity.

The topics weren't so enchanting as the approach; the author dazzled me with insight and connection on every page. I know a little about Artificial Intelligence, I thought: I took a class at uni, I pushed machine learning on O'Reilly Radar before everyone was doing it, I've written a chatbot, and I've read Douglas Hofstadter. But, not just once but repeatedly and consistently, Christian surprises me with a new way of looking at a familiar topic.

For example:

“Sometimes it seems,” says Douglas Hofstadter, “as though each new step towards AI, rather than producing something which everyone agrees is real intelligence, merely reveals what real intelligence is not.” While at first this seems a consoling position—one that keeps our unique claim to thought intact—it does bear the uncomfortable appearance of a gradual retreat, the mental image being that of a medieval army withdrawing from the castle to the keep. But the retreat can’t continue indefinitely. Consider: if everything of which we regarded “thinking” to be a hallmark turns out not to involve it, then ... what is thinking? It would seem to reduce to either an epiphenomenon—a kind of “exhaust” thrown off by the brain—or, worse, an illusion.

I'm familiar with this line of thinking, but this is the first time I'd seen it presented in a way that let me connect it directly to the "God of The Gaps" argument. In that line of thought, God is presumed to be behind everything that science can't explain, which leaves God to be "what science hasn't explained yet", presumably on a monotonically decreasing course to irrelevance. Similarly, the Thing That Makes Humans Special (what Harvard psychologist Daniel Gilbert calls "The Sentence": "The human being is the only animal that can ___") is constantly being shot down and replaced with something new:

And here’s a crucial, related question: Is this retreat a good thing or a bad thing? For instance, does the fact that computers are so good at mathematics in some sense take away an arena of human activity, or does it free us from having to do a nonhuman activity, liberating us into a more human life? The latter view would seem to be the more appealing, but it starts to seem less so if we can imagine a point in the future where the number of “human activities” left to be “liberated” into has grown uncomfortably small. What then?

I really liked the section on computer chess. I had forgotten how seriously chess was held up as an icon of man's superiority over the machine, even though now that attitude seems a quaint relic of a bygone day. Particularly eye-opening was how IBM refused a rematch: as soon as they'd won (through a Kasparov error that was the equivalent of poker's throwing away the pair and keeping the mismatched cards), they dismantled Deep Blue, ended the research program, and moved on. So they would play rematches, improving the computer each time, until man and computer were close enough that the computer could win one series ... at which point they denied the human the chance to improve and regain superiority. Didn't seem right.

He connects the strange conversational experiment of the Turing Test to speed dating (having to create a quick instant rapport with someone), Chat Roulette (one popular chatbot may work in a similar fashion, connecting humans to each other), philosophical insistence on "authenticity", coherence of identity (bots that learn responses from lots of people have no consistent self: will say they're a single woman when replying to one question, but happily married man as a reply to a different question), the Hardy Boy (written by a team of authors, not a single authorial voice), and finally:

The New York Times reported in June 2010—in an article titled “The End of the Best Friend”—on the practice of deliberate intervention, on the part of well-meaning adults, to disrupt close nuclei of friends from forming in schools and summer camps.4 One sleepaway camp in New York State, they wrote, has hired “friendship coaches” whose job is to notice whether “two children seem to be too focused on each other, [and] ... put them on different sports teams [or] seat them at different ends of the dining table.” Affirms one school counselor in St. Louis, “I think it is kids’ preference to pair up and have that one best friend. As adults—teachers and counselors—we try to encourage them not to do that.” Chatroulette and Omegle users “next” each other when the conversation flags; these children are being nexted by force—when things are going too well.

It's this charming pan across the range of life and experience, showing how the dilemma of humanity runs through each vignette, that makes this book a keeper. If it had kept up the delight and glory of the first third, I'd have given it five stars. To be fair, though, I did stay up to a ridiculously late/early hour to finish this, so flaws in the last two thirds may well be entirely in my mind. And that, I must say, seems fitting.(less)

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Jan 02, 2012 Stephanie rated it 5 of 5 stars

I know loving this book seals my geek status, but I don't care! Brilliantly conceived and written. I learned this new word, and I'm still trying to work it into my vocabulary: entropy. I also loved learning about the Shannon theory of entropy.

Check this stuff out:

P 143: “With poetry, as with philosophy, there is no exterior, only certain well-behaved interiors: in philosophy we call them sciences (physics originally began as the largely speculative field of ‘natural philosophy’), and in poetry...more

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Dec 12, 2011 Dave rated it 3 of 5 stars

The central premise of the book is excellent and thought provoking: Maybe the fact that machines are starting to look more human is a sign that a) Yes, technology is improving, but b) Maybe humans are getting worse at being human. Hidden behind this question is to what degree we begin to act more like machines the more we interact with them. With interactions between cultures, a least something gets exchanged from one side to the other. Maybe the same thing happens when we interact with machines...more

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Sep 11, 2011 Deb (Readerbuzz) Nance rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: problems-ideas, work, surprise

The AI community meets together to assess the "human-ness" of the latest and greatest in computer technology. The best computer is awarded "the Most Human Computer" award. And, in addition, there is a small additional contest for "the Most Human Human."

Brian Christian decides to compete for "the Most Human Human." He is an intriguing person who has degrees in computer technology, philosophy, and poetry. (That is such an odd combination of degrees that I feel led to repeat it again: He is an int...more

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Jul 18, 2011 YingYing rated it 5 of 5 stars

What I love about this book is the idea that machines could potentially make us more human, forcing us to reexamine the standards we hold for ourselves.
Basically, I found this book in the 'new nonfiction' section of the library, and I was immediately intrigued by the title.when the read the first section, about the Turing test, which is a competition for AI program designers where judges talk via chat with a computer and a human and try to tell which one is which. The computer program that best...more

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Jun 20, 2011 Bruce rated it 5 of 5 stars

First there was Eliza. Then fractal music giving way to database-rich Bach- and Beethoven-simulators. Then Deep Blue. Then Watson. Soon… R. Giskard Reventlov of Aurora? Philip K. Dick’s Preserving Machine? Suffice it to say that The Most Human Human is one of the best nonfiction books it has been my pleasure to read. It touches on all my favorite topics -- recreational math, information theory, philosophy, social psychology, virtual vs. genuine identity – it’s like John Searle meets William Poun ...more

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Jun 19, 2011 Jim rated it 5 of 5 stars

The context for this exploration of human intelligence is an annual contest in which judges engage in casual 'chats' with computers and humans and try to determine which is which. The point of the contest, of course, is to determine the "most human" computer, a modified Turing test. The risk to the human entrants is that they might be judged a computer! The author was determined not to let that happen to him and so he engages in one of the most entertaining explorations of what it means to engag...more

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Jun 06, 2011 Emily rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2011

I always complain about books that were better as magazine articles; this one is the opposite! I didn't like the excerpt in The Atlantic which struck me as superficial but the longer version is a nice exploration of AI. The author is a participant in the annual Loeb Prize contest that tests chatbots to see if they can convince human interlocutors that they are human; each judge chats with a variety of bots and human confederates, without knowing which is which. There is a Most Human Computer awa...more

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Apr 20, 2011 Paul rated it 5 of 5 stars

Quite simply, the best book I've read, ever. I'm compelled get up out of bed and write down some thoughts after finishing The Most Human Human. I did a double-take when Christian wrote about listening to the Spice Girls in middle school. He writes way beyond his 26 years. On the other-hand maybe those further along in years are writing ever so slightly off the pulse of the intersection of humans and technology. In contrast to What Technology Wants by Kelly, a journalist and also a favorite of mi...more

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Mar 18, 2011 Jenn Dotson is currently reading it

So far, this is a great book about human language. At times, it feels a little unfocused, as he talks about computers, Greek philosophers, right-brain psychology, and language. However, so far he is weaving the topics together in an intersting way.

Having read "Cryptonomicon" before & receiving an introduction to Alan Turing has brought some depth to this book. Also, I'm also in the middle of reading "The Man Who Mistook His Wife For a Hat" after Carey's recommendation at the last book club...more

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Jan 07, 2013 Ryan Morton rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: computerscience, psychology

Great look at the Turing test from the human point of view. Brian looks at AI test not from the standard "how do I create a chatbot to perform well during the test", but rather, "how and why would you be able to convince another human that you were in-fact a human". It is amazing how much of our daily lives are scriptable, and hence copyable by computers/AI. Hopefully nobody falls for those long lost cousin in Nigeria scam emails, but an email that simply says "hey this (as a hyperlink) made me...more

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Apr 12, 2011 Mark rated it 4 of 5 stars

Although the book lacks a solid theme and tends to be a mash of somewhat disconnected topics, Christian still able to describe some of the most intriguing elements of individual humanity. I'm giving the book 4 stars because it included infobites I find interesting, even though many were not new to me.

It is obvious Christian is an intelligent author with a careful skill of recognizing the importance of many elements of life that are commonly overlooked. His positive outlook and admiration for hum...more

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Aug 04, 2012 Rob Adey rated it 3 of 5 stars

In which Brian Christian gets stuck in an automated phone queue, worries he's turning into a robot, and decides he MUST win 'Most Human Human' award in the Loebner Prize or Skynet will take over the world...

This isn't an especially coherent book. There's not actually that much about the Turing test (neither the theory nor the Loebner trials), there's a fair bit of flailing at straw men, and there's some wrong (as far as I can tell) neuroscience.

But there's some interesting stuff on language and...more

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Jul 24, 2012 Josh Hamacher rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I have a bad habit: I often get seduced by books with clever or funny titles, buying them without really researching them (the primary reason I own The Right to Arm Bears).

It is possible, however, that I would have purchased this book even after a little research. After all, I'm a software developer and AI is a fascinating topic for me. And that's what I expected this book to be about.

But it's not. It's 271 pages of Christian rambling on about whatever topic strikes his fancy. The narrative is f...more

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Mar 14, 2011 David Everling rated it 5 of 5 stars

Review notes:

-Brian Christian really fleshes out the central anecdote, his participation as a convince-you-I'm-human "confederate" vs. AI chat-bots at the Loebner Prize (a Turing Test challenge), framing the contest with asides in psychology, philosophy of mind, physics, logic and computing, games, communication, language and linguistics, and other topics that illustrate the complexity of interaction on display here. Broadly insightful and rarely overwrought.

-Author's background in science writi...more

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Jul 31, 2011 Rebecca Johnson rated it 5 of 5 stars

I have said this many times, but I absolutely love science books by poets. Especially in this frame of reference where the author weaves in philosophy, science, technology and creates a tapestry that forces you to look in the mirror and ask yourself what it means to be alive...to be human...and how to make the most of your interactions with others.

Most people are poets in some way; however, Brian Christian knows he is a poet and reveals his insecurities and his willingness to invest his heart i...more I have said this many times, but I absolutely love science books by poets. Especially in this frame of reference where the author weaves in philosophy, science, technology and creates a tapestry that forces you to look in the mirror and ask yourself what it means to be alive...to be human...and how to make the most of your interactions with others.

Most people are poets in some way; however, Brian Christian knows he is a poet and reveals his insecurities and his willingness to invest his heart into the quest for knowledge the turing test requires. In a way, this book reminded me of the best parts of Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk. Christian talks about the emptiness of having aesthetic experiences withouth closure...blind dates with no follow-up, conversations on a bus where you never learn the other person's name. Pleasant, even illuminating, but leaving a sense of emptiness when all is said and done, leaving Christian to ask, "But to live a whole life like that?" Is it worth it? Very similar to Palahniuk's, "single serving relationships." Living a whole life of surface-based relationships cannot be very gratifying, can it?

So, the book's root inspiration is the Turing Test...the test for bots to act like humans and, in the process of reading the book, I went and chatted with the bot at www.cleverbot.com and had some interesting conversations. Very single serving, very surface.

Me: Am I boring you?
Bot: No, I was bored before we met.
Me: What is your favorite word?
Bot: Your face.

Haha, witty bot. Most lines of questioning were interrupted with: can we talk about something else? Tell me more about that. Answering questions with questions. They say you always like people (bots?) who let you talk about yourself a lot.

My favorite thing about this book was that it allowed me to see some of my own fallacies, my own willingnes to take part in, "what's new and exciting?" "What's going on?" "What's new with you?" "How are you?" "How is the weather?" Like the essence of someone is held in the answers to these questions!

With many winding roads and examples from some of my favorite authors (David Shields, for example), the author questions his own human-ness and holds the reader's hand down some very scientific roads to let them question themselves concurrently.

A beautiful book with a great message and the right degree of technical/science/theory.

I will never think of chess the same again.

Oh, on another note...the author talks about the process of reading and how he keeps his journal of books online and could abandon books if he didn't need to go back in and mark them off as "read." Though I never felt like abandoning this book, I could totally relate to it and often do the same thing. (less)

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Sep 23, 2012 Mike Thone rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction

This is such a wonderful, thoughtful book about what it means to be human. Centered around the Turing Test, an annual competition for computers to exhibit intelligent behavior alongside human competitors in various language based assessments, the author trains to win The Most Human Human prize. While the prize is sort of a gag (since the competition is really meant to test the computers against real live people) the author starts to meditate on what it might mean to be the most human human and i...more

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Jan 08, 2012 Katherine rated it 5 of 5 stars

Recommended to Katherine by: Amy

I do remember getting some kind of notice on Facebook from Brian Christian when his book first came out to promote it, and I'm a little ashamed that I stayed self-absorbed (with wedding planning at the time, I suppose?) and didn't look into it much beyond "well I guess that's cool that someone I know* wrote a book." My loss! I wish I'd picked it up when he was still doing the book tour so I could've gone to an event--he even spoke at the MTV offices last year.

Thank goodness I have friends like A...more I do remember getting some kind of notice on Facebook from Brian Christian when his book first came out to promote it, and I'm a little ashamed that I stayed self-absorbed (with wedding planning at the time, I suppose?) and didn't look into it much beyond "well I guess that's cool that someone I know* wrote a book." My loss! I wish I'd picked it up when he was still doing the book tour so I could've gone to an event--he even spoke at the MTV offices last year.

Thank goodness I have friends like Amy who pay more attention to what's going on around them and was inspired to put this on hold at the library after I saw that she had started reading it. I'm so glad, because I experienced this book as sort of the next step from How We Decide, pulling in philosophy in a much more easily absorbable way than I experienced in my classes at BC and reflecting on the advancement of technology and artificial intelligence against what we're discovering about how the human mind works and perhaps more importantly, how much we don't know.

There are many thought-provoking ideas in here, many of which I really relate to (like the feeling of frustration and impatience with wanting to break free of the "how are you" "good how are you" small talk templates to skip to the middle of a conversation that's actually interesting to both parties) and others that I'll probably noodle over for awhile in the background (his argument for talking to people and connecting with strangers while traveling is the very first argument for doing so that is actually a little persuasive to me, since I tend to really shrink away from getting far too overstimulated by new people in a new environment and felt so vindicated and relieved by this essay on being an introverted traveler http://tinyurl.com/bzrdve).

I started getting a little lost near the end in some of the passages (maybe it was just that I got pretty invested in Brian succeeded at being awarded the "Most Human Human" award and started reading too quickly) but overall I found it really engaging and the weaving back and forth between different topics and how the competition actually went to be really skillfully done. No deep background in philosophy or computers or neuroscience necessary, but not dumbed down at all either. There is perhaps a slightly distracting overuse of italics throughout for emphasis :) but I think Brian has enough self-awareness about it since he mentions that philosophers have a tic of putting words in quotes all the time and perhaps the italics are his version of that, or at least a way to really earnestly try to connect with you, the reader, on the points he's illustrating and communicating here. I got used to it after awhile and enjoyed feeling like he was talking to me, but in a professional well-written way, not like a lazy blog-to-book adaptation kind of way.

Anyway, I'd recommend it if you're into Jonah Lehrer or Daniel Kahneman or like thinking about computers and the advancement of technology along with ideas about how humans think of themselves. I'd buy a copy and read this again (that's probably like, top 10 positive things I can say about a book, maybe even top 5).

*I went to the same high school as Brian and we overlapped by 2 years, I think, so since the pool of people that I can be said to have gone to high school with is around 500 people total from those who were seniors when I was a freshman and those that were freshman when I was a senior, it's pretty cool to see him doing well for himself. It makes me really happy (and undeservingly proud), actually. I didn't know him very well but we were on the chess team together for a bit (maybe math league as well?) and he was always nice to me as far as I can remember.(less)

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Mar 19, 2011 Arnaud Le Marchand rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: essais

Brian Christian combines philosophy, poetry and computer science to define what is humanity, while computer and machine it seems are changing so fast...is there a real definition of Humanity ? Will machines and computers soon act and think like we do ? What defines Humanity and what will differ us from the machines ?
Using philosophy poetry and computer science to explore humanity is a very interesting and original way. Brian Christian gives us very good paths to define humanity better, showing...more

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Mar 20, 2012 Sam rated it 2 of 5 stars

This is the author's musing about the process he went through to win the title of "Most Human Human" at a Loebner Prize competition for the Turing test. Perhaps I am too knowledgeable about this area, but I found almost nothing new or insightful in this book.

I was trying to think one of new thing I learned from the book: it that the space was introduced as an interword separator by Irish monks in the seventh century. (See page 245.) This is apparently true, but the author also makes it sound lik...more

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Mar 28, 2011 Christy rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2011, non-fiction

Interesting mix of philosophy, science, and technology... all stemming from with what it means to be the human confederate in the judge/computer/confederate trio that makes up the Turing test (and what it would take to win the "most human human" award). From there, we explore what makes humans unique (and how we've changed our minds over the centuries), how computers might be challenging how we define intelligence and creativity, what about human conversation & human behavior is difficult fo...more

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Feb 17, 2012 Caren rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: adult-nonfiction

I listened to the author's talk on Book TV, then read the book. Mr. Christian is an interesting fellow, having a double major degree in computer science and philosophy, with a MFA in poetry. Talk about a Renaissance man! I thoroughly enjoyed his well-researched musings. Afterwards I had an interesting discussion with my son-in-law, a web developer, about artificial intelligence. He pointed out that the real difference between humans and computers is that machines can't feel, but offered that per...more

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About Brian Christian

BRIAN CHRISTIAN's writing has appeared or is forthcoming in The Atlantic, The Paris Review, Wired, Gizmodo, AGNI, Gulf Coast, and Best New Poets, and in scientific journals such as Cognitive Science. Christian has been featured on The Daily Show and Charlie Rose, and his work has won several awards, including fellowships at Yaddo and the MacDowell Colony and an award from the Academy of American P...more

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“To be human is to be 'a' human, a specific person with a life history and idiosyncrasy and point of view; artificial intelligence suggest that the line between intelligent machines and people blurs most when a puree is made of that identity.” — 11 people liked it

“When I fight off a disease bent on my cellular destruction, when I marvelously distribute energy and collect waste with astonishing alacrity even in my most seemingly fatigued moments, when I slip on ice and gyrate crazily but do not fall, when I unconsciously counter-steer my way into a sharp bicycle turn, taking advantage of physics I do not understand using a technique I am not even aware of using, when I somehow catch the dropped oranges before I know I've dropped them, when my wounds heal in my ignorance, I realize how much bigger I am than I think I am. And how much more important, nine times out of ten, those lower-level processes are to my overall well-being than the higher-level ones that tend to be the ones getting me bent out of shape or making me feel disappointed or proud.” — 6 people liked it

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The Most Human Human: What Talking with Computers Teaches Us About What It Means to Be Alive

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