Intermediate Accounting, Solving Intermediate Accounting Problems Using Lotus 1-2-3 and Excel for Windows

Book Description

This bestseller has powered the careers of countless professionals. This update to the 11 ^th edition builds on the book's reputation for comprehensiveness, accuracy, and currency, incorporating all the recent changes to the accounting literature. It integrates numerous examples from real corporations throughout the chapters to help readers understand the application of accounting principles and techniques in practice. They'll also find problems that are modeled on the AICPA 'Simulations' - a new question format designed for the computerized uniform CPA Exam. These problems prepare readers for the exam, testing their ability to read, digest, research and respond to both a numeric problem and a short answer essay. This edition does NOT include the Problem Solving Survival Guide

Book Description

The intention of this book is threefold: presenting and advancing German reporting on income distribution and poverty, looking at experiences with advanced reporting schemes in two other EU countries, and discussing concepts for comparable social monitoring in the European Union. The first group of papers elaborates on recent findings for Germany (trends in the personal distribution of income and income poverty, multidimensional approaches to measure poverty and extreme poverty, redistribution). Of special interest is a critical methodological review of the two main German databases for distribution analyses, taking the suggestions of the Canberra Group as a reference. The second group of contributions reviews research on income distribution and poverty in Great Britain and Ireland. The last paper discusses concepts of comparable indicators for poverty and social exclusion in the EU.

Customer Reviews:

Why the physical, tangible, real world is the way it is........2002-02-08

This excellent textbook is less than 300 pages, and yet I didn't feel like I learned any less than someone who read a 1000 page textbook on the same subject. This is a comprehensive, introductory volume that is, surprisingly for a textbook, extremely well written. This book delivered Biogeography to my mind, and my great teacher Dr Patrick Armstrong of Univeristy of Western Australia made it come alive in my head. Everything you need to lead you into the fascinating study of our tangible world is here. Read it!

Biogeography: An Ecological and Evolutionary Approach

Average customer rating:

Biogeography: An Ecological and Evolutionary Approach
C. Barry Cox , and Peter D. Moore
Manufacturer: Blackwell Publishing Limited
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Science | Subjects | Books

All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books

Professional | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books

Science | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books
Similar Items:

Biogeography, Third Edition
The Song of the Dodo: Island Biogeography in an Age of Extinction
Foundations of Biogeography: Classic Papers with Commentaries
Phylogenetic Trees Made Easy: A How-to Manual, Third Edition
The Theory of Island Biogeography (Princeton Landmarks in Biology)

ASIN: 1405118989

Book Description

The latest edition of this highly successful and popular textbook has been completely revised and updated to include the latest developments in biogeography. It offers excellent insight into the multidisciplinary nature of biogeography, providing the student with a sound historical base, up-to-date factual content and a clear explanation of current controversies.Its accessible style and well-balanced coverage will strongly appeal to students, while the successful synthesis of the many fields involved and the new format will attract a broad range of teachers and lecturers in biology, geography and environmental science departments.

Average customer rating:

Biogeography: An Ecological and Evolutionary Approach
C. B. Cox , and P. D. Moore
Manufacturer: Blackwell Science
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Book Review: Biogeography. An Ecological and Evolutionary Approach [A book review from: Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology]

Average customer rating:

Book Review: Biogeography. An Ecological and Evolutionary Approach [A book review from: Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology]
D. Simberloff
Manufacturer: Elsevier
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

Elsevier | By Publisher | e-Docs | Formats | Books
ASIN: B000RR97R8

Book Description

This digital document is a journal article from Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology, published by Elsevier in 2006. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Media Library immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Description:

Product Description

Some classic Jewish foods are analogous to Chinese versions-hence the title, From Lokshen to Lo Mein. Lokshen are Jewish noodles used in many recipes, an analog to Lo Mein noodles used in Chinese cooking. Along with Don Siegels favorite Chinese kosher recipes, the author includes some comments on the connection of Jews and Chinese culture, where to get kosher Chinese ingredients, a few jokes about Jews and Chinese food, a short section on what 'kosher' means for those unfamiliar with Jewish dietary laws, and digressions on Chinese cooking techniques and products. Have fun cooking authentic Chinese dishes while reading interesting topics: The Evolution of Chinese Cooking, The Jewish Experience in China, The American-Jewish Chinese Connection, The Chinese Kitchen Cabinet, The Drop Dead Tip for Making a Chinese Dinner.

Customer Reviews:

This is my favorite cookbook!.......2006-09-07

I'm so happy that I bought Dr. Siegel's book. His simple, easy to follow recipes are the delight of my kitchen. I can't say enough good things about it. It's also a great book to read and learn from. mmm...red-cooked chicken...

Average customer rating:

Shooting spree in Disney World!!
A complete surprise

Lo Mein
Robert Eringer
Manufacturer: Cote Literary Group
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Comic | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

General | Mystery | Mystery & Thrillers | Subjects | Books

General | Mystery & Thrillers | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 1929175140

Customer Reviews:

Shooting spree in Disney World!!.......2004-06-16

Lo Mein: Like Crime and Punishment, but with more crime, less punishment and the untimely death of Mickey Mouse.

There are certain types of entertainment that seem to revel in the bizarre, sick and twisted. Surely Lo Mein, a new novel by Robert Eringer, falls into this category.

Lo Mein seems reminiscent of the movie Very Bad Things, which starred Cameron Diaz and Christian Slater. In the movie, people are killed without regard to the death's role in the plot, with each gruesome death played up as supposedly "funny."

In this same vein of humor lies Lo Mein.

Willard Stukey is an artist who has never sold a single painting. Making comparisons between himself and van Gogh, who also never sold any paintings during his lifetime, only soothes his discontent for a short time.

Stukey plots his way to fame with the theory that it would be better to be famous behind bars than to never be famous at all. He purchases a gun and goes to Disney World, where he plans to murder many people, as this will surely attract the recognition he needs.

Upon arriving in Disney World, Stukey goes to the rides with the longest lines, but decides that a murder based only on the amount of people present is not inspired enough. Instead, he waits until the parade goes down Main Street before he lets loose a shower of bullets and then flees to Kentucky.

Mickey and Minnie Mouse lie among the dead, and the "Mickey Murder Manhunt," as the story comes to be known on CNN, is the leading story of the day. However, newscasters report that Stukey is a failed artist on the run from authorities. Stukey thus calls in and says that if the station doesn't refer to him as a successful artist, he will go on another killing rampage- first with Donald Duck and then with a multitude of other Disney characters.

As can be expected, Disney chief Michael Eisner is not pleased with the death toll mounting at his amusement parks, and he calls his own personal investigator, Jef Dalkin, onto the case. Dalkin looks exactly like Bruce Willis and suffers from Tourette Syndrome. This combination gets Dalkin in trouble repeatedly and lands Willis' name in the tabloids more than once.

The whole Tourette Syndrome subplot is supposed to be funny, but frankly, it's not - it comes off as a weak ploy to get laughs rather than an attempt at well-developed jokes or legitimate humor.

Still, the deaths in Disney World do have a twinge of twisted humor; the murder spree exacts the ultimate revenge on the Disneyfication of the world.

If any greater lesson is to be derived from Lo Mein (and that seems unlikely), it's Eringer's denouncement of the irrational litigation rampant in American society compiled with the large amounts of power in the hands of such entities as Walt Disney and CNN.

Otherwise, the book only offers some very bad artists doing very bad things.

A complete surprise.......2000-05-15

A quirky read from an author new to me, but not for long. I read this whole book on a flight from Chicago to San Francisco. My laughing out loud had passangers & flight crew looking at me like I was some crazy woman.

I've been going aroung for days saying "Lo mein" out loud and laughing to my self. My husband read it as soon as I finished, and he's also "lo mein-ing all over the place.

If you've even thought about what makes a person creative or a genius, this book will give you plenty of food for thought.

I don't want to give away the plot, but let me say the premise, as clever as it is, will offend some people. Suspend belief and enjoy it for the good story it is.

And if you guess the ending, I'll eat this review. It sure caught me by surprise.

Product Description

December 7, 1941, opened up a new theater of war in the Pacific and a new threat for what was then the Netherlands East Indies. The Dutch, with their Naval Air Force or Marine Luchtvaart Dienst (MLD), made a significantand often overlookedcontribution to the Allied effort. With their 175 aircraft, the MLD in Southeast Asia outnumbered American and British naval air reconnaissance forces combined. Three months of intense fighting left the Dutch bereft of thousands of naval personnel and over 80 percent of their aircraft. This work details the actions of MLD during the Japanese invasion of the Netherlands East Indies. Beginning with a look at the origins of the MLD, it provides an overview of the force, including an analysis of its aircraft, equipment, personnel and training. Operations of the United States Navy and Royal Air Force seaplane units are included in order to provide a thorough history of the campaign. Final chapters cover the MLDs ill-fated attempts at evacuation of the island battleground and offer an overall review of the MLDs performance. Appendices contain such information as Allied and Japanese aircraft specifications, squadron tables of organization, and MLD bases and operational areas. The result is by far the most comprehensive English-language account of the Allied naval air war in the Netherlands East Indies.

Customer Reviews:

An Unknown War gets some light shined upon it.......2007-04-05

Over the past few years I've been expanding my knowledge of WWII by focusing on the early portion of the war, more specifically, the war in the South Pacific. For awhile, Amazon has been recommended this book to me because of my rating of other related books. Anyway, I decided to give this book a try.

I'll open by saying this book only deals with the Dutch Naval Air Force (referred to as the MLD [Marine Luchtvaart Dienst]), the aircraft they flew, and the missions they performed in defense of the Netherlands East Indies. Passing references are made to US, British, Australian, and the Dutch Army Air Force (ML-KNIL). These passing references are usually related to the different patrol aircraft used by these forces, occasionally to the fighters or bombers.

Mr. Womack opens by describing the aircraft used by the MLD and the MLD's state of condition, prior to the start of WWII for the Dutch and once the Netherlands had been overrun by the Germans. While Mr. Womack describes all of the aircraft used by the Dutch, particular attention should be paid to his descriptions of the Dornier Do24's (called X boats by the MLD) and the PBY Catalina (Y boats). At times the other aircraft of the MLD are mentioned, but usually it's the X and Y boats going to war with the Japanese.

Having established pre-war conditions and how the Dutch attempted to improve their position, Mr. Womack brings us to December 1941 and the initial actions between the Japanese and Dutch. This is followed (rather rapidly) by the steady advancements the Japanese made in the South West Pacific and ending with the fall of Java. The book concludes by describing how the MLD evacuated from the East Indies and their general participation in the rest of WWII.

This book is a very solid 4.5 star book. The writing is clean, Mr. Womack describes things as a historian, not one translating oral history. There are some great photo's in the book showing the Dutch aircraft and other equipment. The maps are nice, but a little on the weak side, they show where the Japanese are able to threaten at any one time but I found it a little difficult finding where the different bases were that the aircraft were operating from. The appendices are nicely put together, providing very good information on the aircraft (there's a breakdown of what happened to every X and Y boat), squadrons, and losses. The charts should have been done considering a black and white printing (because of the grey scaling used, you can tell that the originals were in color). Also I wish Mr. Womack would have given us a little more of his analysis than he did. However, since Amazon doesn't grade on half stars, I need to decide on 4 or 5. Since this is obscure material and Mr. Womack has put together a very informative book on something most people aren't aware of, and he used excellent references (without regurgating what the original author said), I'll give him the nod to 5 stars. A very good job sir!

Too Little Too Late.......2007-03-09

This is an area of warfare I am very interested in. Unfortunately, books like this only come along once every 10 to 20 years. This fills a gap in our knowledge of events leading up to and through the Pacific War against Japan.
The MLD, or Dutch Naval Air Force of the Netherlands East Indies, probably had the best organized reconnaissance force in the southwest Pacific area at the time. Maintaining neutrality in wars spreading around the globe was difficult, but the Netherlands East Indies were doing all they could not to become involved, and to be a haven for those trying to escape the European, African and Chinese theatre wars. The Japanese had different plans.
Once the fighting started though, the MLD was right in the thick of it, fighting hard right alongside their British, Australian and American allies against a Japanese war machine far superior to anything the allies could cobble together. Flying older German designed Do-24s, American PBYs, and Fokker seaplanes, the MLD kept up what pressure they could as the Japanese invasion forces swept through the East Indies, southeast Asia and into the Indian Ocean in the late fall of 1941, and the winter and spring of 1942. Most of the MLD crews paid with their lives to keep the allies abreast of where the Japanese forces were located and what they were doing. Some of the "invincibility" that became associated with the superb Japanese Mitsubishi A6M Zero fighter, and in general the Japanese naval forces, was established and enhanced during this campaign.
When the smoke cleared, the Japanese were in control of the Netherlands East Indies, and the remaining MLD crews and ground personnel, if not captured, were evacuated to Australia or Ceylon. It was a story of too little, too late. The Dutch had tried to get more aircraft, AA guns and ordinance prior to the Japanese invasion, but a lack of interest on the part of her future allies, and a greater concern for the European conflict, even by the Dutch government-in-exile, left the MLD with only a handful of aircraft and hardware with which to face battle-hardened Japanese forces.
The book has many excellent and previously unpublished photographs of personnel, aircraft, and bases of the MLD. If your interests are for stories of some of the little known campaigns and more exotic places that became embroiled in the global conflagration known as World War Two, you will enjoy this book. Tom Womack is to be commended for researching, compiling and fleshing out this story,

Enormous Info on Obscure Battle .......2006-05-18

Mr. Womack is to be commended for his attention to a particular element of World War II. Rather than trying to encompass the entire war into a single book he spends time examining a pivitol yet widely unknown saga of WWII. Historians and war buffs will want to read this book.

Great book on MLD.......2006-04-25

Tom Womack has written an very thorough book on Dutch naval aviation in the East. As a Dutchman it's interesting to read about the history of the MLD from an outside perspective. Well, researched, nice new pictures. Well worth reading!

I Am The Author Of This Book.......2006-02-17

As the author of this text, I am perhaps being somewhat biased when I say that this book easily represents the most complete description of the naval air war in the Netherlands East Indies compiled to date in any language. The result of 11 years of research, it details the role of the Dutch Naval Air Force (MLD) and its doomed from the start effort to stem the Japanese invasion of the former Netherlands East Indies between December 1941 - March 1942. While there have been a number of English language sources highlighting the role of American and British naval air operations few, if any, have detailed the actions of their Dutch allies in any measurable detail. It is for this reason that I undertook this project.

At the same time, the invasion of the Netherlands East Indies represented a fundamental reason for the pre-emptive Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. Yet, this key fact eludes many casual readers and amateur historians of the Second World War alike. In addition to providing a brief overview of the who, what, when, where, why and how of Japan's prewar strategy, I have also sought to provide a detailed review of the savage, yet hopeless, air campaign fought by the Dutch in order to preserve a colonial empire that had stood for 300 years. It was a magnificent fight by the airmen of a valiant and loyal Allied nation whose story deserves to be told.

Customer Reviews:

The Way We Were, The Way We Are.......2001-09-02

"The St. Louis Irish: An Unmatched Celtic Community" is a delightful book which can be appreciated on several levels.

On a personal level, any member of this Celtic Community, which includes Fr. Faherty and myself, can enjoy reading the extensive list of names of people who have enriched our Community over the centuries. In the early chapters we read names familiar to us from a variety of sources. Some names we know from the other historical books we have read or from the mosaics of the St. Louis Cathedral Basilica which we have admired. Other names remind us of streets or businesses which have been part of our community for as long as we can remember. Some names are those of contemporary friends or acquaintances who may be descendants of these notable citizens. In the later chapters we read of people known to us personally.

This book also teaches us the history of St. Louis, which has been shaped, in large degree, by its large Celtic community. St. Louis' unique history as a Catholic center prepared it to be a fertile ground for Irish settlement. Unlike eastern cities whose original aristocracy was Anglo-American and Protestant, the original St. Louis aristocracy was French-Canadian and Catholic. This originally French city welcomed the Irish and smoothly integrated them into all walks of St. Louis life. From the early days of Irish immigration, the Irish have prospered and contributed to the life of the St. Louis community. I was surprised to learn that many of these early immigrants who were proud members of the St. Louis Celtic community were Protestants, as was the case among the Irish of Ireland.

The study of the St. Louis Irish gives us an insight into the histories of America, the Irish and the Irish Americans. Here we see that many of the pre-famine Irish immigrants brought educations and mercantile traditions which were maintained in their new homes. Many Irish, barred, like European Jews of the day, from land ownership and the professions, had turned to mercantile trades for the employment of their talents.

As the world approached the middle of the nineteenth century two related events impacted on our story. The failure of the Irish potato crop in the 1840s sent millions of poor, uneducated Catholics teeming onto American shores. For the first time, millions of Catholic, non-Anglo-Saxons threatened the WASP vision of an American culture exclusively its own. In response to this influx, a nativist movement arose which sought to exclude immigrants and Catholics from American society. This movement found its political expression in the "Know Nothing" party in the years before the Civil War.

The "Know Nothing" movement had a significant affect on the St. Louis Irish. With the mass immigration of the Famine Era, the Irish Community became more working class than mercantile, more Catholic than ecumenical, more self contained rather than an integrated into the local community. The altered national mood made the Celtic community one with which Protestants preferred not to be identified. After this time the Protestant Irish tended to identify with and meld into the predominant Anglo-American identity, leaving the Irish community largely Catholic. From this time on, to be Irish, largely meant to be Catholic.

In the later sections of the book, much of the history of the St. Louis Irish is reflected in the history of the Church in St. Louis. Throughout this period, Fr. Faherty does an excellent job of highlighting many Irish people who played prominent roles in the life of the community.

After World War II, the Irish identity became more a memory than an ever present part of our lives. Irish remained active and prominent in many organizations, but the organizations were no longer exclusively or predominantly Irish in their identity and membership. We now shared our parishes with Catholics of other ethnic backgrounds, rather than worshipping in national parishes as had earlier generations. To a large degree, the Irish have merged into the American melting pot. In order to recover that which we have lost, we now study our past to learn what it is to be Irish. Many St. Louis Irish of today know more about Irish history, culture and art than our ancestors to whom Irish was a way of life, rather than an object of study. Reflecting, perhaps, the divisions in Ireland, St. Louis has become a two parade city. St. Louis Irish now have to opportunity to choose between two rival St. Patrick's Day Parades.

It is said that being Irish is a terrible thing-until you consider all the alternatives. The behavior of the Irish is sometimes bewildering, even to ourselves. This book helps us understand better the way we were and how we became the way we are.

Machines Who Think: A Personal Inquiry into the History and Prospects of Artificial Intelligence
Average customer rating:

An Update to a Classic

An insightful view of AI from an insider in the field.

Machines Who Think: A Personal Inquiry into the History and Prospects of Artificial Intelligence
Pamela McCorduck
Manufacturer: AK Peters
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Scientists | Professionals & Academics | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books
History | Business & Culture | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books
General | Artificial Intelligence | Computer Science | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books
Computer Mathematics | Artificial Intelligence | Computer Science | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books
General | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books
General | Science | Subjects | Books
General | History & Philosophy | Science | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

Ai: The Tumultuous History of the Search for Artificial Intelligence

Edison's Eve: A Magical History of the Quest for Mechanical Life

The Emotion Machine: Commonsense Thinking, Artificial Intelligence, and the Future of the Human Mind

Rebels Against the Future: The Luddites and Their War on the Industrial Revolution: Lessons for the Computer Age

Society of Mind

ASIN: 1568812051

Book Description

Pamela McCorduck first went among the artificial intelligentsia when the field was fresh and new, and asked the scientists engaged in it what they were doing and why. She saw artificial intelligence as the scientific apotheosis of one of the most enduring, glorious, often amusing, and sometimes alarming, traditions of human culture: the endless fascination with artifacts that think. Machines Who Think was translated into many languages, became an international cult classic, and stayed in print for nearly twenty years.

Now, Machines Who Think is back, along with an extended Afterword that brings the field up to date in the last quarter century, including its scientific and its public faces. McCorduck shows how, from a slightly dubious fringe science, artificial intelligence has moved slowly (though not always steadily) to a central place in our everyday lives, and how it will be even more crucial as the World Wide Web moves into its next generation.

Customer Reviews:

An Update to a Classic.......2005-01-18

Twenty five years ago Pamela McCorduck wrote a definitive book on Artificial Intelligence. She first went among the artificial intelligentsia when the field was fresh and new, and she asked the scientists engaged in it what they were doing and why. She saw artificial intelligence as the scientific apotheosis of one of the most enduring, glorious, often amusing, and sometimes alarming, traditions of human culture: the endless fascination with artifacts that think.

Long out of print, it became a classic, often quoted, but not often read. Now it's back and in a new edition with an extended afterword that brings the field up to date in the last quarter century, including its scientific and public faces. McCorduck shows how, from a slightly dubious fringe science, artificial intelligence has moved slowly to a central place in our everyday lives, and how it will be even more crucial as the World Wide Web moves into its next generation.

An insightful view of AI from an insider in the field........2004-04-11

The field of artificial intelligence, in terms of its research content, and the confidence it expresses in the results of this research, has executed a roller coaster ride in the last five decades. There have been many proposals, many leads not going anywhere, but just as many leads showing great promise but were abandoned. The reasons why they were abandoned are unclear, but many researchers in artificial intelligence have let them themselves be persuaded that their results do not reflect real intelligence. This has thwarted the development of many promising areas in artificial intelligence, which could have been highly developed by now.

The author, in this new edition of her book, has given the reader her opinions of the status of artificial intelligence in the twenty-five years after the first edition of the book. Her assessment of the last twenty-five years is in general optimistic, but her review concentrates mostly on research in the academic setting. There have also been dramatic advances in artificial intelligence in the commercial sector in the last twenty-five years, but many of these are difficult to document, since issues of propriety arise in the business environment. The many applications that are used by business and industry are practical proof of the rise of machine intelligence in the last twenty-five years, and many of these make use of the academic developments that the author discusses in this book.

The self-doubts and concentrated attention expressed by various researchers are well documented by the author, and some interesting historical anecdotes are included. The author describes the "odd paradox" in artificial intelligence as one where the its practical successes are absorbed into the domains in which they found application. Once assimilated, they become "silent partners" alongside other (non-intelligent) approaches. This reinforces the belief that the intelligent applications were not intelligent in the first place, and are then viewed merely as "valuable automatic helpers". This scenario has been played out many times in the history of artificial intelligence, and, even worse, the fact that the workings of these applications were understood made many assert that this was proof of their non-intelligence. If a process or algorithm is understood, it cannot be intelligent. This bias, the author correctly observes, continues to this day. Regardless of these beliefs or prejudices, the fact remains though that many of today's computers and machines are packed full of intelligence, albeit in different levels, and these levels will dramatically increase in the next twenty-five years.

Researchers in artificial intelligence have been accused of exaggerating the status of machine intelligence, and similar to the same exaggerations that occur in other fields, which arise many times from pressures to obtain funding, these accusations do have some truth to them. But the author points out a case where the funding was cancelled due to the project not being "extravagant enough." This is an interesting historical fact, and one that illustrates the large swings in confidence that have plagued AI research from the beginning.

The strong emphasis on emulating human intelligence has been dampened in recent years, with researchers realizing, refreshingly, that human intelligence is not the only kind in nature. It is in retrospect quite surprising that silicon-based machines were thought to be able to mimic the processes and powers of biological systems. The author quotes one researcher as saying that "Silicon intelligence would surely be different from human intelligence". This is indeed correct, and one can expect many different types of intelligence to reside in future machines, each of these types emphasizing particular tasks, but being general enough to think in many domains. Maybe a better word for describing the field would be to call it `Alien Intelligence', so as to emphasize the (non-human) idiosyncrasies of these different intelligences.

With very exceptions, the philosophical community has been against the possibility of artificial intelligence. This continues to this day, and the author discusses some of the philosophical tirades leveled against artificial intelligence since the first edition of the book. Researchers in AI have taken the time (unfortunately) to answer some of these criticisms, but there is also a trend, which hopefully will continue, to ignore them and instead spend time on what is important, namely the design and construction of intelligent machines. There is no penalty in ignoring philosophical criticism; it lends no constructive insight into artificial intelligence. However there is a great penalty taken in the form of wasted hours in attempting to answer the vague and impractical claims of philosophers. Ironically, there have been a few renowned philosophers that have left the practice of philosophy and have entered into research into artificial intelligence (and have done a fine job in this regard).

The author also shares with the reader her personal insights into artificial intelligence, and these are interesting considering her involvement with some of the major academic experts in AI. She describes her bias in thinking of (mobile) robots as the sole representative of artificial intelligence. This bias has been alleviated to a large degree in the last decade, but many still equate artificial intelligence to the presence of bipedal robots wandering around performing useful tasks or possibly acting as adversaries to human beings. The latter view of course is very popular in Hollywood interpretations of artificial intelligence. The real truth though is that (immobile) machines, be they servers in networks, laptop computers, or other types of machines, can exhibit high levels of intelligence, depending on what kind of "software" or "mind" is overlaid on them.

The most important thing to be settled for the field of artificial intelligence, and this is brought out also in many of the author's remarks, is a general methodology for gauging machine intelligence. The Turing test is too subjective and tied too much to measures of human intelligence. The AI community definitely needs to arrive at quantitative measures of machine intelligence in order to assess progress and allow the business community to judge more accurately whether a certain level of machine intelligence is needed for their organizations.

Machines Who Think. A Personal Inquiry into the History and Prospects of Artificial Intelligence.
Average customer rating:
Machines Who Think. A Personal Inquiry into the History and Prospects of Artificial Intelligence.
Pamela. McCORDUCK
Manufacturer: W. H. Freeman
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Artificial Intelligence | Computer Science | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books
ASIN: B000OR9R8U

Books:

Books Index

Books Home

Recommended Books