The ascent of information : books, bits, genes, machines, and life's unending algorithm
Scharf, Caleb, 1968-2021
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"Your information has a life of its own, and it's using you to get what it wants. One of the most peculiar and possibly unique features of humans is the vast amount of information we carry outside our biological selves. But in our rush to build the infrastructure for the 20 quintillion bits we create every day, we've failed to ask exactly why we're expending ever-increasing amounts of energy, resources, and human effort to maintain all this data. Drawing on deep ideas and frontier thinking in evolutionary biology, computer science, information theory, and astrobiology, Caleb Scharf argues that information is, in a very real sense, alive. All the data we create-all of our emails, tweets, selfies, A.I.-generated text and funny cat videos-amounts to an aggregate lifeform. It has goals and needs. It can control our behaviour and influence our well-being. And it's an organism that has evolved right alongside us. This symbiotic relationship with information offers a startling new lens for looking at the world. Data isn't just something we produce; it's the reason we exist. This powerful idea has the potential to upend the way we think about our technology, our role as humans, and the fundamental nature of life. The Ascent of Information offers a humbling vision of a universe built of and for information. Scharf explores how our relationship with data will affect our ongoing evolution as a species. Understanding this relationship will be crucial to preventing our data from becoming more of a burden than an asset, and to preserving the possibility of a human future"-- Provided by publisher.
Main title:
Author:
Scharf, Caleb, 1968-, author
Imprint:
New York : Riverhead Books, 2021.©2021
Collation:
340 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm
Notes:
Includes bibliographical references (pages 299-328) and index.
Contents:
Our eternal data -- The burden of an idea -- In sickness and in health -- An ever more tangled bank -- Genes, memes, and dreams -- The information river -- Life made machine -- The great blending -- A universe of dataomes.
ISBN:
9780593087244 (hbk)9780593087244
Dewey class:
003.54
Language:
English
BRN:
470912
More Information:
| Location | Collection | Call number | Status/Desc |
|---|---|---|---|
| Brighton Library | Adult Non Fiction - Computers and Business | 003.54 SCH | Available |