The history of computers has always been shadowed by the elusive realization of artificial intelligence. Ever since the first functional computing machines were built with primitive electronics, scientists and mathematicians have struggled with the nature of intelligence. The history of computers is a long compilation of various ingenious discoveries in mathematics, physics, and machine logic. George B. Dyson’s book, Darwin Among the Machines, chronicles the development of computers, dating back to initial mathematic and electronic concepts, in an effort to build a case for an evolutionary intelligence among the machines of our lives.

     George B. Dyson appears to be a self-proclaimed philosopher concerning computers and electronic machines in our lives through intense self study. Dyson’s studies include time sneaking into the world renowned library at Princeton University, as well as research associate status with library privileges at Western Washington University’s Fairhaven College. His thought also developed largely from the works of his parents, Origin’s of Life by his father, and Godel’s Theorems by his mother. He also attributes his interest and knowledge of the current technological world to observing his sister, Esther Dyson, who became editor of the Rosen Electronics Letter in 1983, a Wall Street investment paper interested in the wider implications of personal computers. The Rosen Electronics Letter later became a book entitle Release 1.0 bearing her name in 1983. Geroge B. Dyson’s studies formed him into a self-taught researcher and philosopher.

     Dyson’s effort begins with looking at the coming of the Industrial Revolution. As machines began to invade the everyday lives of people, thinkers and scientists of the time began to fear a world in which machines ran our lives, rather we the machines. With the invention of the steam engine, and factory equipment, fears grew of a world where man’s creation evolved to overcome its creator. Dyson chronicles the onset of Darwinian Theory at this time in history, and how it captured the imagination of the world. Dyson takes a look at the theory of evolution and the arguments for evolutionary theory in the biological world. He then presents a case for an emerging evolution of a digital machine world culminating in the present day World Wide Web.

     Taking a step back, Dyson presents an in-depth history of computers and the electronics underlying this relatively new technology. Dyson starts with the theoretical concepts behind electrical computation, binary arithmetic and logic. Dyson writes of the first primitive computers, necessitated by the World Wars, but more importantly by World War Two. Dyson spends an incredible effort to document the development of computers for the use of projectile trajectory computations, and code breaking intercepted German communications. One of the greatest feats of World War Two, according to a scientist working for the British Enigma code-breakers, was the ability to run and read hole-punched paper tape through a machine at 30 miles per hour!

     Dyson then takes a look at more modern technology and how it has evolved from the initial primitive electronic machines, in an effort to find an emerging intelligence among the modern machines of our time. Dyson takes a look at the development of global communications and the growing communications network spanning the globe. Simple electronic communication via telegraph wire gave birth to ever more complicated electronic communication methods. Electronic communications lade the groundwork for distributed systems, combining the resources of several machines located large distances apart to achieve things impossible for one machine alone. He starts with the initial technological developments that make electronic communications possible and follows the history of electronic communication to the creation of the modern World Wide Web.

     The focus of the book then seems to take a detour as the author looks at the meaning and the nature of intelligence. Dyson looks at evidence of intelligence in a macro level view of games and economic behavior. He argues that economies and marketplaces seem to have an undeniable corporate intelligence all their own, made up of the individual parts, in this case people. Dyson argues that the current world-wide communications network, linking an many computers together, and providing the backbone for the exchange of information, may in have an intelligence all its own, similar to that of an economy or a marketplace. Dyson envisions a future with technology building upon and feeding on the current ‘intelligence’ of our global network of computers, slowly evolving into a distributed consciousness, or realized intelligence, made up of the many computers and component parts.

     It is a scary to look at the current state of technology and the sheer complexity of todays distributed network of computers across the World Wide Web. Because of this Dyson’s book is by no means out of date. Due to the historical and theoretical nature of the material, it does not seem likely that this book will become out of date anytime in the near future. The content is both current and futuristic in is outlook on a global distributed system built upon the back of the World Wide Web. The author is careful not make known his specific stance on whether machines will evolve to a state of true artificial intelligence. To some degree, he seems to argue against a concept of artificial intelligence as known by science fiction, but rather focuses on a much more broad definition of intelligence. However, the author also takes an in depth look at a comparison between a computer as an electronic computing machine versus the human brain as a biological computing machine. If his stance is oriented around a belief that mankind is nothing more than a biological machine, a very serious argument regarding the existence and nature of the human soul must be examined. I personally do not believe that computers will ever achieve artificial intelligence at the level of realized consciousness; however, if the author’s aim is merely to attribute intelligence to a global computer network, much the same way as economists attribute intelligence to the global marketplace, I have no argument at all. His background as a self-taught researcher and philosopher without any formal teaching or noted credentials cause me to question his credibility and the reliability of his arguments.

     However, I find it interesting to look at the fears society possessed of early machines such as the steam engine running their lives. Those old fears appear foolish to us today, yet we ourselves attribute similar to the modern machine of our day, the computer. Perhaps someday in the future, society will look back and wonder how foolish we were to assume so much from a computer.