Darwin Among the Machines

Darwin Among the Machines tells the story of humankind's journey into the digital wilderness. Introducing a cast of familiar and not-so-familiar characters, historian of science George B. Dyson traces the course of the information revolution, illuminating the lives and work of visionaries—from Thomas Hobbes to John von Neumann—who foresaw the development of artificial intelligence, artificial life, and artificial mind. This profound and elegant book derives both its title and its outlook from Samuel Butler's 1863 essay, "Darwin Among the Machines." Observing the beginnings of miniaturization, self-reproduction, and telecommunication among machines, Butler predicted that nature's intelligence, only temporarily subservient to technology, would resurface to claim our creations as her own. Updating Butler's arguments, Dyson distills the historical record to chronicle the origins of digital telecommunications and the evolution of digital computers,...