{"product_id":"the-rise-and-fall-of-the-artificial-state","title":"The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State","description":"\n\u003ctable align=\"center\" border=\"0\" cellpadding=\"2\" cellspacing=\"0\" width=\"100%\"\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd class=\"productDetailSmallElements\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eReview Quotes\u003c\/strong\u003e:\u003cbr\u003e\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tWho's going to determine the future: the tech billionaires or the rest of us? Jill Lepore argues that there's nothing inevitable about eliminating jobs, destroying ecosystems, and arming authoritarian regimes. \n\u003cem\u003eThe Rise and Fall of the Artificial State\u003c\/em\u003e is at once dazzling in its range and totally on target.--Elizabeth Kolbert, Staff writer at The New Yorker and author of Under a White Sky\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eReview Quotes\u003c\/strong\u003e:\u003cbr\u003e\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tThere are times when a historian is absolutely necessary for understanding the future--this is one of those times, and Jill Lepore is the perfect person for the job. A fascinating, perceptive, and completely timely account of how we got to artificial intelligence and how we might get past it.--Bill McKibben, author of Here Comes the Sun\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eReview Quotes\u003c\/strong\u003e:\u003cbr\u003e\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tA person can't help but feel inspired by the riveting intelligence and joyful curiosity of Jill Lepore. Knowing that there is a mind like hers in the world is a hope-inducing thing.--George Saunders, Booker Prize-winning author of Lincoln in the Bardo\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eReview Quotes\u003c\/strong\u003e:\u003cbr\u003e\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tHow lucky are we to be alive at the same time as Jill Lepore? Generations to come will marvel that anyone could think so clearly amidst such chaos. At a moment when the AI takeover feels new and strange and inevitable, Lepore shows it to be anything but. She connects dots from different eras, different stories, different technologies, even different species. The result is a profound reframe of what we really mean by 'artificial.'--Latif Nasser, co-host of Radiolab\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eReview Quotes\u003c\/strong\u003e:\u003cbr\u003e\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t[A] powerful anti-AI treatise . . . . [A] fiery cri de coeur. \n\u003cbr\u003e--Publishers Weekly, starred review\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eReview Quotes\u003c\/strong\u003e:\u003cbr\u003e\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tIn this pointed rejoinder to Hannah Arendt's Origins of Totalitarianism (1951), which foresaw a world in which humans were essentially superfluous, Lepore charts a long history that extends deep into the 'machine age' . . . .A deeply learned dive into the frightening visions of technocrats past and present.--Kirkus Reviews, starred review\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eReview Quotes\u003c\/strong\u003e:\u003cbr\u003e\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tLepore posits that individuals and institutions have the wherewithal to guide the trajectory of AI towards positive ends, but only if we understand the foundations of its development and the motivations of its developers. An ardent observer of the artificial state, Lepore traces its history through literary influences, such as science fiction and its metamorphosis from simple mechanical engineering to potentially world-destroying system reconfigurations. . . . Staggering, sobering, yet essential reading for all who want to understand the arc of this increasingly digital, online, corporate, and out-of-control world.--Booklist, starred review\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003ePublisher Marketing\u003c\/strong\u003e:\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"Much in history is headlong but few grand transformations have been more precipitate or more heedless than the rise of . . . the Artificial State,\" writes Jill Lepore in this passionate account of how rule by machine has ravaged the world. Inspired by Hannah Arendt's \u003cem\u003eThe Origins of Totalitarianism\u003c\/em\u003e, which argued in 1951 that the machinery of modern life was reshaping the very fundamentals of human existence, Lepore, profoundly disturbed by the technology revolution and by the soulless inundation of artificial intelligence, unfurls a new history for our own twenty-first century.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Building on an essay in \u003cem\u003eThe New Yorker\u003c\/em\u003e in 2024, Lepore's clarion call traces our increasing dependence on and strangulation by data. Political campaigns, awash in an avalanche of fake bots, have been reduced to attention-mining algorithms, while multinational media corporations dictate public discourse, and the era of the liberal nation-state seems to be coming to a rapid end, replaced by billionaire technocrats reliant on autocracy and the tools of AI.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e With Orwellian overtones, \u003cem\u003eThe Rise and Fall of the Artificial State\u003c\/em\u003e demonstrates how technology has corroded global democracy, leading to the destruction of both human community and capacity for self-government, creating a new form of AI government, a digital citizen's assembly, where AI will recommend the course of action to humans in place of human-run legislatures. Especially sobering with this proliferation of \"dizzying, ever-changing schemes, prophesies, and predictions\" is that the Artificial State has come at the expense of the natural world, leading to catastrophic loss of wildlife habitat and biodiversity.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Deliberately alarming, \u003cem\u003eThe Rise and Fall of the Artificial State\u003c\/em\u003e, despite its abundance of dire facts, is not a funeral dirge; rather, it's an inspiring wake-up call, written in Lepore's typically elegiac prose, which demonstrates that nothing about the Artificial State was inevitable, for it is a \"\u003cem\u003egovernment without consent, even government without humans.\u003c\/em\u003e\" It can, Lepore asserts, be dismantled. Other heinous systems, like feudalism, fascism, and slavery, have also been dismantled, but disassembly requires identifying the parts, tracing the sources. It requires telling a new history. This is the purpose of \u003cem\u003eThe Rise and Fall of the Artificial State\u003c\/em\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eReview Citations:\u003c\/strong\u003e\n\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cspan class=\"italic\"\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/span\u003e 06\/01\/2026 (EAN 9781324098423, Hardcover) - *Starred Review\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cspan class=\"italic\"\u003eBooklist\u003c\/span\u003e 06\/01\/2026 (EAN 9781324098423, Hardcover) - *Starred Review\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cspan class=\"italic\"\u003eKirkus Reviews\u003c\/span\u003e 06\/15\/2026 (EAN 9781324098423, Hardcover) - *Starred Review\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eContributor Bio:\u003c\/strong\u003eLepore, Jill\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eJill Lepore\u003c\/strong\u003e is the David Woods Kemper '41 Professor of American History at Harvard University, professor of law at Harvard Law School, and a staff writer at \n\u003cem\u003eThe New Yorker\u003c\/em\u003e. Her many books include the \n\u003cem\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/em\u003e bestsellers \n\u003cem\u003eThese Truths\u003c\/em\u003e and \n\u003cem\u003eWe the People\u003c\/em\u003e. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003c\/table\u003e\n","brand":"Liveright Publishing Corporation","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51496251064598,"sku":"9781324098423","price":35.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0857\/9910\/8886\/files\/9781324098423.jpg?v=1783058270","url":"https:\/\/lusper.myshopify.com\/products\/the-rise-and-fall-of-the-artificial-state","provider":"Lusperbooks","version":"1.0","type":"link"}