I received a free copy of this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.  All opinions are my own. 

Author Abhishek C. George shares insights into computer systems and AI in the book “What The Hell Is AI?”

The Synopsis

You hear the word AI a hundred times a day now. Your boss mentions it in meetings as if everyone already understands. Your friends nod along when somebody talks about “models” and “agents” and “context windows,” and you sit there nodding too, pretending you understand.

You don’t. And most of the people nodding along with you don’t either.

This is a short book for the rest of us — anyone who has spent the last few years feeling like the world quietly took a class you didn’t sign up for.

It starts at the beginning. Not the beginning of artificial intelligence — the beginning of computers, because AI doesn’t make sense until you understand what’s underneath. You’ll learn what a computer actually is. How it makes pictures and sounds out of nothing but electricity and switches. How the internet really works. How software has worked for the last seventy years, and what just changed.

Only then does the book get to AI itself, and the surprisingly simple idea at the heart of it: AI is the moment the computer finally learns to listen to humans, in human language.

No jargon. No hype. No lectures about the future of humanity. Just a plain story, told by someone who has watched a lot of smart people get confused by this and decided the bad explanations were the problem, not the subject matter.

By the end, you’ll be able to hear a sentence like “the model has a 200k context window and uses tools through an agent loop” and have a real mental picture of what it means.

You can stop nodding along.

THE REVIEW

This was a powerful and engaging read on the fundamentals of computers and AI. The straightforward, engaging way the writer presents these concepts in the book allows general audiences to fully engage with the book’s core theme and message. The fast-paced nature of this book made it both an educational tool and a guide to the subject matter, allowing audiences to go back and reread specific passages whenever questions arose in this field.

What stood out to this reader was the way in which the author approached AI as a subject. Rather than focusing on the philosophical ramifications of artificial intelligence, the author honed in on AI’s basic functions and the role that computer science and computers as a whole played in AI development. Not only does the author delve into computer knowledge in a straightforward manner that allows readers of all backgrounds to be able to understand the concepts at work, but by understanding these computer basics, the reader is able to understand the original function of the development of AI, for the problems that persist with AI as it exists today do not stem with the technology itself, but by those who wheeled it without regulation or a clear understanding of what this tool was meant to be used for and by breaking these concepts down and understanding computers as a whole the author has allowed readers to gain a better understanding of this topic.

THE VERDICT

A compelling, educational, and insightful book, author ABHISHEK C GEORGE’S “What The Hell is AI” is a must-read non-fiction book and guide to computer science and AI as a whole. The knowledge and honest approach to the subject matter, paired with the fast-paced writing and the insights it provides, will resonate with many readers as this technology continues to develop exponentially. If you haven’t yet, please be sure to grab your copy today!

Rating: 10/10

About the Author

I’m Abhishek Cherian George. I build things, start businesses, write a bit, mentor founders, guide startups, invest a little and fail at a really fast pace. This is where I collect all of it — the things I make, the things I bury, and the handful still standing.

https://abhishekcheriangeorge.com/#writing

https://www.instagram.com/abhishekcheriangeorge