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The Coming Wave

AI, Power and Our Future: The instant Sunday Times bestseller from the ultimate AI insider

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The Coming Wave

By: Mustafa Suleyman, Michael Bhaskar
Narrated by: Mustafa Suleyman
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Brought to you by Penguin.

**A Sunday Times and New York Times bestseller, Sept 2023**


**SHORTLISTED FOR THE FT BUSINESS BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023**

AI. SYNTHETIC BIOLOGY. QUANTUM COMPUTING. Everything is about to change. This is the only book you need to understand this new world.

From the ultimate AI insider, Mustafa Suleyman, co-founder of DeepMind, part of Google.

Soon you will live surrounded by AIs. They will organise your life, operate your business, and run core government services. You will live in a world of DNA printers and quantum computers, engineered pathogens and autonomous weapons, robot assistants and abundant energy.

None of us are prepared.

As co-founder of the pioneering AI company DeepMind, part of Google, Mustafa Suleyman has been at the centre of this revolution. The coming decade, he argues, will be defined by this wave of powerful, fast-proliferating new technologies.

In The Coming Wave, Suleyman shows how these forces will create immense prosperity but also threaten the nation-state, the foundation of global order. As our fragile governments sleepwalk into disaster, we face an existential dilemma: unprecedented harms on one side and the threat of overbearing surveillance on the other.

Can we forge a narrow path between catastrophe and dystopia?

This ground-breaking book from the ultimate AI insider establishes 'the containment problem' - the task of maintaining control over powerful technologies - as the essential challenge of our age.


'Fascinating, well-written, and important' Yuval Noah Harari, author of Sapiens

'Deeply rewarding and consistently astonishing' Stephen Fry

'An excellent guide for navigating unprecedented times' Bill Gates

©2023 Michael Bhaskar & Mustafa Suleyman (P)2023 Penguin Audio

 Biological Sciences Biotechnology Computer Science Future Studies History & Culture Machine Theory & Artificial Intelligence Science Social Sciences Technology & Society Technology Inspiring Thought-Provoking Robotics Surveillance
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Critic reviews

Heartfelt and candid … a serious exploration of what the future might hold for us all
Thoughtful and persuasive
Confused by the current furore about AI? This book is a good place to start… The Coming Wave is a sweeping account of the latest advances in AI and synthetic biology
A cogent look at the technology’s potential to transform the economy and society, along with the risks of misuse and surveillance
The rise of AI has led to a rise in books about AI, among the most insightful of which is The Coming Wave
Unusually thoughtful, expansive, historically rooted and engagingly written
A genuinely mind-boggling read, setting out the ineluctable forces soon to completely transform politics, society and even the fabric of life itself over the next decade or two
Deeply rewarding and consistently astonishing
A fascinating, well-written and important book
A stunning book by a man at the very centre of the AI revolution - realistic, tough-minded [and] charting a meaningful course between AI catastrophe and dystopia

Featured article: Steven Bartlett recommends…


In the spirit of continuous learning we asked Steven to share with us the books he’s enjoyed and been inspired by. Covering psychology and health to business and technology, read on to discover Steven Bartlett’s top listening recommendations.

Featured article Steven Bartlett recommends…
All stars
Most relevant
Verbose. Repetitive. Monotonous delivery. Many interesting points but for heaven's sake get Leighton Pugh or someone to read it!

Awful delivery

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A genuine insight into the future benefits and pitfalls that await humanity with the rapid development of AI and Synthetic Biology. Very well structured and vast scope of the problem is covered in good detail. Certainly not a light read or listen but the book makes you think long and hard about how technology, in particular AI, is changing our everyday lives at such pace. Some of it is very dark, particularly if this technology is adopted in the wrong way by ‘bad actors’. At times chilling, but there are also glimpses of the benefits this technology might give humanity!

Thought provoking and disturbing

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Broad overview of the current state of AI and complexities of managing emerging technologies. 2-3 levels more sophisticated than standard tech journalism. But accessible to a very wide audience.

Accessible but not trivialised.

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On the whole, I liked the book. It’s an interesting perspective on anticipated future technologies and their implications.

The author expresses some pretty dubious political views (like excessively trusting authority) and presents them in a way that makes them sound like an inevitable consequence of coming technologies, which they just aren’t. Also towards the end of the book he stands by a decision to appoint a notorious transphobe to an ethics advisory position, apparently having failed to learn the lesson of that mess.

The book is well-written and well-read, but take aspects of it (especially political aspects) with a pinch of salt.

Mostly good

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I’m buying the book after hearing the audible version. It’s incredibly well explained, precise and with very good past and possible future comparisons. Totally enjoyed it. Highly recommend it, regardless of your current or previous knowledge or education.

Scary good

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