A Brief History of Intelligence
Evolution, AI, and the Five Breakthroughs That Made Our Brains
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Narrated by:
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George Newbern
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By:
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Max Bennett
About this listen
Equal parts Sapiens, Behave, and Superintelligence, but wholly original in scope, A Brief History of Intelligence offers a paradigm shift for how we understand neuroscience and AI. Artificial intelligence entrepreneur Max Bennett chronicles the five “breakthroughs” in the evolution of human intelligence and reveals what brains of the past can tell us about the AI of tomorrow.
In the last decade, capabilities of artificial intelligence that had long been the realm of science fiction have, for the first time, become our reality. AI is now able to produce original art, identify tumors in pictures, and even steer our cars. And yet, large gaps remain in what modern AI systems can achieve—indeed, human brains still easily perform intellectual feats that we can’t replicate in AI systems. How is it possible that AI can beat a grandmaster at chess but can’t effectively load a dishwasher? As AI entrepreneur Max Bennett compellingly argues, finding the answer requires diving into the billion-year history of how the human brain evolved; a history filled with countless half-starts, calamities, and clever innovations. Not only do our brains have a story to tell—the future of AI may depend on it.
Now, in A Brief History of Intelligence, Bennett bridges the gap between neuroscience and AI to tell the brain’s evolutionary story, revealing how understanding that story can help shape the next generation of AI breakthroughs. Deploying a fresh perspective and working with the support of many top minds in neuroscience, Bennett consolidates this immense history into an approachable new framework, identifying the “Five Breakthroughs” that mark the brain’s most important evolutionary leaps forward. Each breakthrough brings new insight into the biggest mysteries of human intelligence. Containing fascinating corollaries to developments in AI, A Brief History of Intelligence shows where current AI systems have matched or surpassed our brains, as well as where AI systems still fall short. Simply put, until AI systems successfully replicate each part of our brain’s long journey, AI systems will fail to exhibit human-like intelligence.
Endorsed and lauded by many of the top neuroscientists in the field today, Bennett’s work synthesizes the most relevant scientific knowledge and cutting-edge research into an easy-to-understand and riveting evolutionary story. With sweeping scope and stunning insights, A Brief History of Intelligence proves that understanding the arc of our brain’s history can unlock the tools for successfully navigating our technological future.
Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.
PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
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Hilarious, fascinating, and a roller coaster of dizzying, historical what-ifs, Napoleon's Hemorrhoids is a potpourri for serious historians and casual history buffs. In one of Phil Mason's many revelations, you'll learn that Communist jets were two minutes away from opening fire on American planes during the Cuban missile crisis, when they had to turn back as they were running out of fuel. You'll discover that before the Battle of Waterloo, Napoleon's painful hemorrhoids prevented him from mounting his horse to survey the battlefield.
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They just throw the facts too fast
- By Concerned_llama on 12-11-20
By: Phil Mason
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Welcome to the Universe
- An Astrophysical Tour
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Welcome to the Universe is a personal guided tour of the cosmos by three of today's leading astrophysicists. Inspired by the enormously popular introductory astronomy course that Neil deGrasse Tyson, Michael A. Strauss, and J. Richard Gott taught together at Princeton, this book covers it all - from planets, stars, and galaxies to black holes, wormholes, and time travel.
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All About What We Know About the Universe - ALL
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Naked Statistics
- Stripping the Dread from the Data
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From batting averages and political polls to game shows and medical research, the real-world application of statistics continues to grow by leaps and bounds. How can we catch schools that cheat on standardized tests? How does Netflix know which movies you'll like? What is causing the rising incidence of autism? As best-selling author Charles Wheelan shows us in Naked Statistics, the right data and a few well-chosen statistical tools can help us answer these questions and more.
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Starts well then becomes non-Audible
- By Michael on 09-07-13
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Reentry
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From launchpad explosions to a pernicious cricket infestation to the demanding management style of Musk himself, the rise of SpaceX was beset with challenges and far from inevitable. Find out how the startup beat the odds and flew high enough to outpace their rivals... and where they're going next.
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Just phenomenal
- By Everyday Guy on 11-17-24
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Plant Science: An Introduction to Botany
- By: Catherine Kleier, The Great Courses
- Narrated by: Catherine Kleier
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Dr. Catherine Kleier invites us to open our eyes to the phenomenal world of plant life and to the process she calls “Natura Revelata”, the joy of celebrating and learning from the secrets of nature. As Dr. Kleier shares her knowledge with contagious excitement for her subject, she emphasizes the middle ground: Instead of focusing on cell microbiology or the study of ecosystems and habitats, she stresses the basic biology, function, and the amazing adaptations of the plants we see all around us.
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Needs accompanying documentation and visual aides
- By Ryan on 04-04-19
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How Dogs Love Us
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How Dogs Love Us answers the age-old question of dog lovers everywhere and offers profound new evidence that dogs should be treated as we would treat our best human friends: with love, respect, and appreciation for their social and emotional intelligence.
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misleading title
- By Cindy on 08-06-15
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Just over 125,000 years ago, humanity was going extinct until a dramatic shift occurred—Homo sapiens started tracking the tides in order to eat the nearby oysters. Before long, they’d pulled themselves back from the brink of extinction. The human brain, and its evolutionary journey, is unlike anything else in history. In A History of the Human Brain, Bret Stetka takes listeners through that far-reaching journey. He also tackles the question of where the brain will take us next, exploring the burgeoning concepts of epigenetics and new technologies like CRISPR.
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For as long as we’ve studied human cognition, we’ve believed that our senses give us direct access to the world. What we see is what’s really there—or so the thinking goes. But new discoveries in neuroscience and psychology have turned this assumption on its head. What if rather than perceiving reality passively, your mind actively predicts it?
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About halfway through, it became propaganda
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What listeners say about A Brief History of Intelligence
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- D. Gustafson
- 05-23-24
Most thought provoking and relevant
Must read for anyone in technology and psychology. Wonderful attempt at connecting the dots of what makes us uniquely human and how we can build tools to optimize humanity.
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- BillR
- 05-02-24
fascinating and easy ro understand
The way this was laid out and explained made it relatively easy to understand for non-scientists and those who are non-technical. it gives you have an idea of what he's talking about and how it all relates to the potential for artificial intelligence
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- Cliente Kindle
- 12-18-24
Me fez pensar sobre o futuro
Reflexão sobre a condição humana . Isto é tudo que gostaria de falar sobre o livro que ouvi
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- Mitch1953
- 06-08-24
I completed the book in three sessions because of the quality of information presented. Good Job!
The thesis of the book drew me in. The content was well organized and very interesting. I had not read on these topics before. This book has planted seeds. I completed the book in three sessions because of the quality of information presented.
There were detectable splices of the reader's efforts.. These were distracting.
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1 person found this helpful
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- D. Lockwood
- 07-04-24
Rationality wins another one.
A logical and understandable explanation of a complex subject. No need to resorting to magical thinking required.
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- Alex Kwak
- 08-04-24
Utterly fascinating
The best audiobook I have listened to. This book completely changed the way I think about thinking.
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- Yuser
- 08-04-24
incredible book, but wtf is with the Jekyll and Hyde narration ?
it's like they use 2 different ai voices in order to generate the audiobook. every once in a while, it'll suddenly switch from voice 1 to voice 2
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- C.N. Cotten
- 05-27-24
Impressive!
My background is in molecular biology and biochemistry but I haven't read much on neuroscience. From what I understand the author has no formal background in biology, he majored in math and economics in college and was involved in AI-related technologies later. However, I'm really impressed by his overall understanding of basic biology.
I'm only 1/5 of the way through the book but so far I've really enjoyed this listen -- and I've been learning some things along the way about early animal evolution that I have not heard before.
For example, why the evolution of bilateral symmetry may have arose: to aid locomotion -- and how this led to what the author labels the first major breakthrough in intelligence evolution. Bilateral animals evolve to go really fast only in one direction, when we want to go in another direction we turn to face it and then run (think about how slow you would run to an object 90 degrees from you if you could not turn and run toward it). But to coordinate the decision making process on which way to run required primitive bilateral organisms to process a multitude of signals (coming from many different cells) and coordinate the response. Thus we can begin to understand why complex brains arose in mobile multicellular animals and not in plants or more 'primitive' radial symmetric and less mobile creatures like sea anemones.
The author then ties in this first step in the evolution of animal intelligence to the makers of the first commercially successful robot, irobot's Roomba vaccum cleaner by 3 members of MIT's Artificial Intelligence lab.
Looking forward to the rest of the book and congratulations to the author on his research and on how well he explains things and a very interesting read (audible)!
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3 people found this helpful
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- James A Marr
- 06-05-24
Thorough, entertaining and insightful
While it was a lengthy foray into the subject matter, it was a very entertaining and insightful approach to examine our history where we have been in a relatively short time and where we are going in an exceedingly accelerating pace. Well done!
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- Cory Wilcsek
- 08-23-24
Really eye opening into intelligence, thinking and why animals and humans do and think the way they do
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