From David Berlinski reviewing Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow by Yuval Noah Harari at Inference Review:
Harari believes, are about to lose their social and economic usefulness as well as their souls.25 Robots are coming, and, if not robots, then all-powerful algorithms. Having replaced chess champions and quiz show contestants, they are shortly to replace truck drivers, travel agents, accountants, lawyers, and doctors. Whether they are about to replace historians is a question that Harari wisely declines to discuss. What makes their forthcoming domination inevitable, Harari believes, is the discovery that consciousness may be separated from intelligence. Computers are no more conscious today than they were in 1950, but they are very much more intelligent, and in the near future they are certain to become even more intelligent. This is the information revolution that Harari has persuaded himself that he sees clearly. The Whig optimist now gives way to the Whig pessimist. The information revolution is likely to benefit the minority of those with the wit, or the money, to make use of it. “As algorithms push humans out of the job market,” Harari writes, “wealth and power might become concentrated in the hands of the tiny elite that owns the all-powerful algorithms, creating unprecedented social and political inequality.”26 Algorithms might even become entities under the law, like corporations or trusts, Facebook’s corporate algorithm showing Mark Zuckerberg the door in favor of itself. More.