The Worlds I See: Curiosity, Exploration, and Discovery at the Dawn of AI

Stanford University computer scientist Li debuts with an affecting memoir about immigrating to the U.S. and her cutting-edge work creating the ImageNet database that has proved critical to training visual recognition in artificial intelligence. She recounts living in poverty after moving with her parents from China to New Jersey when she was a teen in the early 1990s, but she excelled in school and eventually earned a PhD in computer science from the California Institute of Technology. The years after her graduation were filled with challenges, including her mother’s declining health and her long-distance marriage (her husband was a fellow professor employed in a different state), but professionally she made a name for herself studying artificial intelligence. She recalls her Stanford University lab’s race against Google to create software capable of describing images and, during her tenure as chief scientist of AI at Google Cloud while on sabbatical from Stanford, navigating the controversy that roiled the company after it accepted a Department of Defense contract for developing AI-powered facial recognition technology. Li’s insider perspective sheds light on how Silicon Valley is handling the ethical questions posed by AI, as when she remembers feeling “awkward” trying to reconcile her Google colleagues’ “good intentions” with her worry that AI could lead to “digital authoritarianism,” and her story of overcoming adversity inspires. This brings new dimension and humanity to discussions of AI. (Nov.)