These Strange New Minds: How AI Learned to Talk and What It Means

How the technology that is revolutionising our world actually works, and what that means, from the Research Director at the UK government’s AI Safety Institute

Stunning advances in digital technology have given us a new wave of disarmingly human-like AI systems. The march of this new technology is set to upturn our economies, challenge our democracies, and refashion society in unpredictable ways. We can expect these AI systems to soon be making autonomous decisions on the user’s behalf, with transformative impact on everything we do. It is vital we understand how they work.

Can AI systems ‘think’, ‘know’ and ‘understand’? Could they manipulate or deceive you, and if so, what might they make you do? Whose interests do they ultimately represent? And when will they be able to move beyond words and take actions for themselves in the real world? Ultimately, can we look forward to a technological utopia, or are we in the process of writing ourselves out of history?

Review: A brilliant guide to the most important technology of our times — Mustafa Suleyman, CEO of Microsoft AI & Cofounder of DeepMind
By far the best guide to a newly emerging species with which we will share the planet for the foreseeable future — Stuart Russell, author of Human Compatible
As a leading authority in both computational neuroscience and the social impacts of AI, Christopher Summerfield is perfectly situated to explore the meaning and implications of these machines that are so uncannily like – and unlike – ourselves — Brian Christian, co-author of Algorithms to Live by
Summerfield takes us on a tour of this astonishing new technolog – general purpose AI – and helps us to understand the issues it raises. You might choose to be alarmed, excited, or indifferent to large language models but you should read Chris’s book before you decide — Mike Woolridge, author of The Road to Conscious Machines
With clarity, insight and wit, Summerfield dives beneath the ever-breaking wave of large language models to reveal the deeper principles at play, and the challenges and opportunities that these powerful new technologies present. An essential and highly readable guide to thinking abut how, and weather, computers can think, what’s coming next and what we should do about it — Anil Seth, author of Being You
‘A closeup look at the large language models that have radically changed computer technology…a clear-minded, accessible examination of how AI systems work’ * Kirkus *
For readers fascinated by the future of AI, this book is an eye-opening exploration of a revolution unfolding before our eyes * New York Journal of Books *

Format: Paperback
Pages: 384
Imprint: Viking Penguin
Publication date: 17/06/2025