Life Engineering. Machine Intelligence and Quality of Life

Hubert Osterle
Published by Springer Nature 2020
ISBN 978–3–030–31481–1
ISBN 978–3–030–31482–8 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-31482-8

Machine Intelligence is changing every aspect of our life. The internet traffic, sensors in households, in cars, in wearables etc. deliver the data that oligopolistic companies collect and use to extract patterns of the human behavior. Active digital assistants take over more and more decisions of our daily life. Humanity is on the verge of an evolutionary leap and it is the time to determine if this development will be for the benefit of well-being of people or just for the accumulation of capital and power without regard to the quality of life.

The book integrates the perspectives of several disciplines that are striving to establish resilient foundations: computer science, economics and social sciences, political science, psychology, philosophy, neuroscience, ethics and religion. As a researcher who works at the interface of these disciplines Hubert Osterle is taking the attempt to clarify some positions and thus objectify the discussions. The book wants to stir the discussion about the future of man and machine, about happiness and evolution and the major changes brought by digital technology. And it is a manifesto calling for a new — integrated — discipline to be founded, life engineering.