The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State

There 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 *
A 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
Who’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. The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State is at once dazzling in its range and totally on target – Elizabeth Kolbert
Lepore is our best scholar of the culture of governance, and our most vital historian. Here she repudiates the prospect of AI as a replacement for democracy. This is the issue of our times, and Lepore is the voice of sanity – Jaron Lanier
Superb. The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State is the best account I’ve ever seen of how the owners and controllers of data technology have changed and are changing us in ways we are only just beginning to grasp. Lepore seems to have left nothing out, and the result is a history that is richly informed, a view of human progress that is wise and balanced, and a timely and terrifying warning – Philip Pullman
Jill Lepore writes history like a poet – Dan Snow
Lepore is a brilliant historian with an eye for unusual and revealing stories – James Gleick
Jill Lepore is unquestionably one of America’s best historians; it’s fair to say she’s one of its best writers too * Los Angeles Times *
Lepore is a sophisticated and original thinker and an ensnaring, witty, and provocative storyteller * Booklist *
As both a Jeremiah and a troubadour, Jill Lepore has one of the most distinctive voices in American literary life – David W. Blight

Jill Lepore is the David Woods Kemper ‘41 Professor of American History at Harvard University and Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. She is also a staff writer at the New Yorker. Her many books include the international bestseller These Truths: A History of the United States. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

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