The Body Digital: A Brief History of Humans and Machines from Cuckoo Clocks to ChatGPT

by Vanessa Chang

256 pages, Paperback

Published November 4, 2025

Reviews

[Alia · Rating 5 out of 5]

It’s eye-opening to realize that many technological shifts were initially challenged (what’s even more eye-opening is that the shifts don’t seem like they would’ve been shifts since the machine is already embedded within our lives/or outdated!) One memorable example is the music box, which sparked fears that it would replace mothers’ voices and disrupt bonding with their babies. The book ultimately rewired how I think about machines and their role in our lives.

[James G. · Rating 4 out of 5]

A meaningful review of our human connection to technology from writing, to have thoughts live outside our minds, to careful writers’ collaborations with A.I.; with more than a few highly quotable bits that make fresh fodder for taking all the author has reviewed into our lives for serious consideration.

“ this view of intelligence builds on long-standing traditions across the world that recognize intelligence is entangled with land, waters, ancestors, and more than human skin. The Zapatista of Chiapas fight for a world where many worlds fit, rejecting extraction for coexistence Yolņu sSonglines in Australia’s northern territory we’ve land, language, and story into living maps of knowledge. In the Andean cosmovisión, the Quechuan ethic of ayni enshrines reciprocity as a principle of balance between humans, the Earth, and the universe. Such ways of knowing remind us that intelligence is not only computed, but cultivated.” p. 215

[Amit Chandra · Rating 5 out of 5]

From phonographs to AI, Chang traces the impact of technology on the human experience. A poetic meditation on the machines that make us human. Read my review in Science and the companion review in my SubStack: https://apothek.substack.com/p/the-bo...