From the inventor of the PalmPilot comes a new and compelling theory of intelligence, brain function, and the future of intelligent machines Jeff Hawkins, the man who created the PalmPilot, Treo smart phone, and other handheld devices, has reshaped our relationship to computers. Now he stands ready to revolutionize both neuroscience and computing in one stroke, with a new understanding of intelligence itself. Hawkins develops a powerful theory of how the human brain works, explaining why computers are not intelligent and how, based on this new theory, we can finally build intelligent machines. The brain is not a computer, but a memory system that stores experiences in a way that reflects the true structure of the world, remembering sequences of events and their nested relationships and making predictions based on those memories. It is this memory-prediction system that forms the basis of intelligence, perception, creativity, and even consciousness. In an engaging style that will captivate audiences from the merely curious to the professional scientist, Hawkins shows how a clear understanding of how the brain works will make it possible for us to build intelligent machines, in silicon, that will exceed our human ability in surprising ways. Written with acclaimed science writer Sandra Blakeslee, On Intelligence promises to completely transfigure the possibilities of the technology age. It is a landmark book in its scope and clarity.

The inventor of the PalmPilot outlines a theory about the human brain's memory system that reveals new information about intelligence, perception, creativity, consciousness, and the human potential for creating intelligent computers.

The developer of the PalmPilot and creator of the Redwood Neuroscience Institute examines the real future of artificial intelligence, explaining why the way we build computers today won't result in intelligent machines. He shows, using accessible examples, that the brain's neocortex is a memory-driven system that uses our senses and our perception of time, space, and consciousness to construct a predictive model of the world in a way that's totally unlike even the most complex computer software.

Ceci argues that traditional conceptions of intelligence ignore the role of society in shaping intelligence and underestimate the intelligence of non-Western societies. He puts forth a "bio-ecological" framework of individual differences in intellectual development that is intended to address some of the major deficiencies of extant theories of intelligence. The focus is on alternative interpretations of phenomena that emerge when implicit assumptions of intelligence researchers are challenged.

The book includes all the background material required to understand the principles underlying intelligence, as well as enough detailed information on intelligent robotics and simulated agents so readers can begin experiments and projects on their own. By the mid-1980s researchers from artificial intelligence, computer science, brain and cognitive science, and psychology realized that the idea of computers as intelligent machines was inappropriate. The brain does not run "programs"; it does something entirely different. But what? Evolutionary theory says that the brain has evolved not to do mathematical proofs but to control our behavior, to ensure our survival. Researchers now agree that intelligence always manifests itself in behavior—thus it is behavior that we must understand. An exciting new field has grown around the study of behavior-based intelligence, also known as embodied cognitive science, "new AI," and "behavior-based AI." This book provides a systematic introduction to this new way of thinking. After discussing concepts and approaches such as subsumption architecture, Braitenberg vehicles, evolutionary robotics, artificial life, self-organization, and learning, the authors derive a set of principles and a coherent framework for the study of naturally and artificially intelligent systems, or autonomous agents. This framework is based on a synthetic methodology whose goal is understanding by designing and building. The book includes all the background material required to understand the principles underlying intelligence, as well as enough detailed information on intelligent robotics and simulated agents so readers can begin experiments and projects on their own. The reader is guided through a series of case studies that illustrate the design principles of embodied cognitive science.

This book is a professional military-intelligence officer's and a controversial insider's view of some of the greatest intelligence blunders of recent history. It includes the serious developments in government misuse of intelligence in the recent war with Iraq. Colonel John Hughes-Wilson analyses not just the events that conspire to cause disaster, but why crucial intelligence is so often ignored, misunderstood or spun by politicians and seasoned generals alike. This book analyses: how Hitler's intelligence staff misled him in a bid to outfox their Nazi Party rivals; the bureaucratic bungling behind Pearl Harbor; how in-fighting within American intelligence ensured they were taken off guard by the Viet Cong's 1968 Tet Offensive; how over confidence, political interference and deception facilitated Egypt and Syria's 1973 surprise attack on Israel; why a handful of marines and a London taxicab were all Britain had to defend the Falklands; the mistaken intelligence that allowed Saddam Hussein to remain in power until the second Iraq War of 2003; the truth behind the US failure to run a terrorist warning system before the 9/11 WTC bombing; and how governments are increasingly pressurising intelligence agencies to 'spin' the party-political line.

Examines the diagnostic process to question how we understand autism as a category and to better recognize its intelligence and uncommon sense. As autism has become a widely prevalent diagnosis, we have grown increasingly desperate to understand it. Whether by placing baseless blame on vaccinations or seeking a genetic cause, Americans have struggled to understand what autism is and where it comes from. In Autistic Intelligence, Douglas Maynard and Jason Turowetz focus on a different origin of autism: the diagnostic process. By looking at how autism is diagnosed, they ask us to question the norms we use to measure autistic behavior against, why we understand autistic behavior as disordered, and how we go about assigning that disorder to particular people. To do so, the authors take a close look at a clinic in which children are assessed for and diagnosed with autism. Their research draws on hours observing assessment evaluations among psychologists, pediatricians, parents, and children in order to make plain the systems, language, and categories that clinicians rely upon when making their assessments. Those diagnostic tools determine the kind of information doctors can gather about children, and indeed, those assessments affect how children act. Autistic Intelligence shows that autism is not a stable category, but the result of an interpretive act, and in the process of diagnosing children with autism, we often miss all of the unique contributions they make to the world around them.