READING LIST
Essential resources for understanding the future
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41 OF 41 RESOURCES
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1979Gödel, Escher, Bach
Douglas Hofstadter
Classic exploration of consciousness, self-reference, and the nature of mind.
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1986Engines of Creation
K. Eric Drexler
The foundational book on nanotechnology that introduced molecular manufacturing and its transformative potential.
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1988Mind Children
Hans Moravec
Pioneering work on robotics and AI, introducing Moravec's paradox and predictions about machine intelligence.
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1990The Age of Intelligent Machines
Ray Kurzweil
Kurzweil's foundational work on AI, featuring essays by experts and predictions about machine intelligence.
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1992Nanosystems: Molecular Machinery, Manufacturing, and Computation
K. Eric Drexler
Technical treatise providing detailed engineering analysis of molecular nanotechnology.
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1999The Age of Spiritual Machines
Ray Kurzweil
Kurzweil's predictions for the 21st century, exploring how machines will match and exceed human intelligence.
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1999Robot: Mere Machine to Transcendent Mind
Hans Moravec
Vision of robot evolution from industrial machines to superintelligent beings.
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2005The Singularity Is Near
Ray Kurzweil
The definitive roadmap to the technological Singularity, with detailed predictions and exponential trend analysis.
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2007Ending Aging
Aubrey de Grey
The scientific case for defeating biological aging through targeted medical interventions.
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2012Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think
Peter Diamandis & Steven Kotler
Optimistic vision of how exponential technologies will solve humanity's grand challenges.
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2012How to Create a Mind
Ray Kurzweil
Kurzweil's theory of pattern recognition and the path to brain emulation.
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2013Radical Abundance
K. Eric Drexler
Updated vision for atomically precise manufacturing and how it could transform civilization.
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2013Our Final Invention
James Barrat
Investigation into the risks of artificial general intelligence and superintelligence.
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2014Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies
Nick Bostrom
Rigorous analysis of the risks and challenges posed by artificial superintelligence.
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2014The Future of the Mind
Michio Kaku
Physicist's perspective on consciousness, brain-computer interfaces, and mind uploading.
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2014Meditations on Moloch
Scott Alexander
Influential essay on coordination failures and existential risk.
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2015Rationality: From AI to Zombies
Eliezer Yudkowsky
Comprehensive guide to human rationality and its application to thinking about AI and existential risk.
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2015The Technological Singularity
Murray Shanahan
Accessible introduction to the singularity concept from an AI researcher.
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2015The Master Algorithm
Pedro Domingos
Quest for the ultimate learning algorithm that could derive all knowledge from data.
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2015The AI Revolution: The Road to Superintelligence
Tim Urban (Wait But Why)
Accessible two-part introduction to AI and its implications.
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2016The Age of Em
Robin Hanson
Economic and social analysis of a world dominated by brain emulations.
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2016Concrete Problems in AI Safety
Amodei et al.
Foundational paper outlining key technical challenges in AI safety.
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2017Life 3.0
Max Tegmark
Exploration of how AI will transform the future of life, work, and society.
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2017Attention Is All You Need
Vaswani et al.
The paper introducing the Transformer architecture that powers modern LLMs.
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2019Human Compatible
Stuart Russell
A new approach to AI development that prioritizes human values and preferences.
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2019Lifespan: Why We Age—and Why We Don't Have To
David Sinclair
Harvard geneticist's groundbreaking research on aging as a treatable disease.
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2019The Bitter Lesson
Rich Sutton
Influential essay arguing that compute and general methods beat hand-crafted approaches.
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2020The Future Is Faster Than You Think
Peter Diamandis & Steven Kotler
How converging technologies are transforming business, industries, and our lives.
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2020Scaling Laws for Neural Language Models
Kaplan et al. (OpenAI)
Empirical study showing predictable relationships between model size, data, and performance.
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2020The Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity
Toby Ord
Comprehensive analysis of existential risks facing humanity, including AI.
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2020The Alignment Problem
Brian Christian
Accessible exploration of how to make AI systems that reflect human values.
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2020The Scaling Hypothesis
Gwern Branwen
Comprehensive analysis of why scaling neural networks leads to AGI.
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2021A Thousand Brains
Jeff Hawkins
New theory of intelligence based on cortical columns and reference frames.
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2022Constitutional AI: Harmlessness from AI Feedback
Anthropic
Anthropic's approach to training AI systems to be helpful, harmless, and honest.
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2022Training Compute-Optimal Large Language Models
Hoffmann et al. (DeepMind)
The Chinchilla paper showing optimal balance between model size and training data.
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2022Emergent Abilities of Large Language Models
Wei et al. (Google)
Analysis of capabilities that emerge unpredictably at scale.
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2023GPT-4 Technical Report
OpenAI
Technical details and capabilities of GPT-4.
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2023Sparks of Artificial General Intelligence
Microsoft Research
Analysis of GPT-4's capabilities and their relationship to AGI.
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2024The Singularity Is Nearer
Ray Kurzweil
Updated vision for the path to Singularity, reviewing predictions and charting the final steps to merging with AI.
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2024Situational Awareness: The Decade Ahead
Leopold Aschenbrenner
Detailed analysis of the path to AGI and its implications.
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2024State of AI Report
Nathan Benaich & Ian Hogarth
Annual comprehensive review of AI progress across research, industry, and policy.
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