The New Breed

What Our History with Animals Reveals About Our Future with Robots

By: Kate Darling

Narrated by: Hillary Huber

Length: 9 hrs and 48 mins

Publisher's summary

For listeners of The Second Machine Age or The Soul of an Octopus, a bold, exciting exploration of how building diverse kinds of relationships with robots - inspired by how we interact with animals - could be the key to making our future with robotic technology work.

There has been a lot of ink devoted to discussions of how robots will replace us and take our jobs. But MIT Media Lab researcher and technology policy expert Kate Darling argues just the opposite, and that treating robots with a bit of humanity, more like the way we treat animals, will actually serve us better. From a social, legal, and ethical perspective, she shows that our current ways of thinking don’t leave room for the robot technology that is soon to become part of our everyday routines. Robots are likely to supplement - rather than replace - our own skills and relationships. So if we consider our history of incorporating animals into our work, transportation, military, and even families, we actually have a solid basis for how to contend with this future.

A deeply original analysis of our technological future and the ethical dilemmas that await us, The New Breed explains how the treatment of machines can reveal a new understanding of our own history, our own systems and how we relate - not just to nonhumans but also to each other.

©2021 Kate Darling (P)2021 Audible, Inc.

For UX professionals this is a primer on our next interaction patterns

I got this book after seeing Kate speak at the IxDA conference in 2023. As a user experience professional, I realized that as robots become more and more commonplace in our lives and work, we’re going to need to create interaction patterns and methods. Kate’s book provides a framework and historical perspective on how humans and robots can live and work together in our near future. I recommend this book for UX designers (and really anyone else). It’s interesting and thought provoking. While it doesn’t give you all the answers on how we should solve this, it will get you started on what I feel is the right approach.

Not much for reviews...

I much prefer Twitter. ;)

That said, I really enjoyed working through this audio book on a whiteboard related to several research topics for a project. Thoughtful and pertinent.

Cheers

I usually don't read books like this

This book is so damn good, it makes me sick. Although, I’ve been a computer nerd my whole life and love technology, I have little to no interest in robots or AI (Which is weird because as a kid, my dream was to go to MIT, so maybe I’m resentful because I realized how it was near impossible to fulfill that dream). So, when I saw this book recommended by another author I love, I left a reply on Twitter explaining that this topic isn’t really my thing. Then, after the author replied to my tweet (and this is surprisingly rare), I read the description and decided to give it a try because it mentioned that it was going to discuss some of the ethical and philosophical aspects of robots, and these are topics I do enjoy. Once I finally started reading htis book, I was hooked.

First off, Kate Darling is a great writer. I love to learn, but sometimes, when diving into unfamiliar territory, the jargon goes way over my head, and that’s what I was expecting from this book, but that wasn’t the case. Kate does an incredible job writing in a way that anyone can understand, but also, her whole thesis and comparing the history and treatment of animals to the future of robots made it even easier to follow. As a vegetarian, maybe Kate’s arguments resignated more with me, but I do think most people would enjoy this book. She covers so many great topics about the past, present, and future of robots and our relationships with them, and I was pleasantly surprised that there’s quite a bit of psychology discussed in the book as well.

So, do I recommend this book? Absolutely. Not only did I love this book, but she made me interested in the topic as a whole. Now that I’ve finished it, I have a bunch of books on my list to check out for more discussions around the ethical and philisophical aspects of robots and AI.

good info, worth a listen

can't say that I did not enjoy, worth a listen, good info , not great, but good. a must listen if you plan on listening to more on AI.

Must read for robotics enthusiasts

This is a great reas to give insight and an alternative viewpoint to the discussion of robotics' role in society.

The book is interesting, and makes good points, but Kate darling forgot about slavery in history

Animal rights and uses are one book end of how we’ve felt with other intelligence throughout human history, but human slavery is the other book end.

So far I’m more than half way through The New Breed, and a discussion of slavery is already well overdue. I’m pretty sure there simply won’t be one. Also Tesla announced their humanoid robot during my read. This book feels boarder like obsolete already in 2021