What Algorithms Want - Imagination in the Age of Computing Finn Ed Arizona State UniversityPaperback / softback
The gap between theoretical ideas and messy reality, as seen in Neal Stephenson, Adam Smith, and Star Trek.We depend on--we believe in--algorithms to help us get a ride, choose which book to buy,…
Specifikacia What Algorithms Want - Imagination in the Age of Computing Finn Ed Arizona State UniversityPaperback / softback
The gap between theoretical ideas and messy reality, as seen in Neal Stephenson, Adam Smith, and Star Trek.We depend on--we believe in--algorithms to help us get a ride, choose which book to buy, execute a mathematical proof. It's as if we think of code as a magic spell, an incantation to reveal what we need to know and even what we want. Humans have always believed that certain invocations--the marriage vow, the shaman's curse--do not merely describe the world but make it. Computation casts a cultural shadow that is shaped by this long tradition of magical thinking. In this book, Ed Finn considers how the algorithm--in practical terms, "a method for solving a problem"--has its roots not only in mathematical logic but also in cybernetics, philosophy, and magical thinking.Finn argues that the algorithm deploys concepts from the idealized space of