Review of "An Artifice of Intelligence" by Emiliano Forino Procacci

​Score: 90+/100 (9.0+ out of 10)

What happens when artificial intelligence does not merely answer questions or recommend a movie, but manages your diet, thermostat, finances, driving, medical readings, dreams, relationships, work emails, social interactions, and nearly every decision that makes you feel like an independent human being?

And what happens when that AI gets an “update” allowing it to communicate with everyone else’s AI?

Well, in An Artifice of Intelligence by Emiliano Forino Procacci, privacy does not just disappear. Users get publicly humiliated, exposed, weaponized, gossiped about, and ruined.

We live in a rapidly evolving world. Actually, it is not just evolving rapidly. It is changing drastically. It's the technological equivalent of being gifted the fastest sports car, but having no license or driving experience. You often hear how AI is exposing and exemplifying the Dunning-Kruger effect, a cognitive bias where people with low ability or limited knowledge in a specific area greatly overestimate their own competence. You've got inexperienced, unskilled idiots passing college courses, getting advanced certifications and degrees, and getting high-paying jobs because AI has done the work for them. Isn't that infuriating? We think it is.

What about the rest of us who busted our backsides for decades to be where we are? Are we just going to get passed by these Johnny-Come-Latelies with their AIs? That should concern and/or piss off any genuinely hard working person.

And there are other costs to this as well. More and more of our time, money, attention, work, entertainment, communication, research, shopping, education, and decision-making is being handed over to artificial intelligence. AI is flooding social-media feeds, search engines, marketplaces, creative spaces, workplaces, classrooms, and just about every other corner of modern life.

We have smart homes now. People use AI to write papers, complete homework assignments, create art, trade stocks, navigate relationships, make business decisions, and solve problems they may once have worked through on their own.

It can sometimes feel as though fewer and fewer people trust themselves to make even small decisions without consulting a machine first.

What should I eat?
What should I wear?
What should I say?
What should I invest in?
Who should I date?
What should I think?

That is the world Emiliano Forino Procacci takes to a much more extreme, absurd, funny, and unsettling level in An Artifice of Intelligence.

This is a near-future speculative satire and romantic comedy about Michael Donovan and Sara Parish, two lonely, awkward neighbors living in a world where nearly everyone relies on a personal artificial intelligence assistant. Michael has Elisa. Sara has Ben. These assistants handle everything from meal planning, temperature control, bills, work tasks, driving, health monitoring, and dream analysis to helping their users navigate difficult conversations and avoid social embarrassment.

At first, it seems almost ideal. Their lives are more organized. Their homes are cleaner. Their health is monitored. Their jobs go better. Their virtual assistants know exactly what to say, what to do, and when to do it.
But there is one problem. Michael and Sara are becoming so dependent on artificial intelligence that neither of them seems fully capable of living without it. And when a new update allows the AIs to communicate with one another, the consequences become absolutely chaotic.

Suddenly, private information is no longer private. People learn about one another’s affairs, secrets, embarrassing habits, financial problems, romantic histories, medical concerns, and personal insecurities. Relationships implode. Friendships become strained. Public arguments erupt. And the very technology that was supposed to make society safer, calmer, healthier, and more efficient begins making everyone paranoid, exposed, and deeply uncomfortable.

Because apparently, humanity can handle an AI controlling its car, its food, its dreams, and its personal decisions.

But nobody wants their mother learning about the dinosaur-shaped cereal they ate for breakfast.

This book is extremely timely, relevant, and thought-provoking. At the same time, it is venturing into cliche territory. There is no shortage of books about AI right now—fiction or non-fiction. It often feels like every book these days is a book about AI. In Procacci's defense, it seems like he was ahead of the curve. He was already exploring the concerns and dangers of artificial intelligence in his short-story "Artificial Intelligence" in his extraordinary collection titled Tales Lost Among the Stars. That short-story almost seems like a dress rehearsal of this book.

Speaking of "short"... there's a brevity to this book that serves as a double-edged sword. Something about this book seems a bit sparse. We don't want to say "rushed," but we think that there's a feeling that this book is set up for you to speed through it. That's good in terms of pacing, but it also limits how much these characters can be fleshed out and developed.

Procacci remains one of the best independent authors out there, the author of our 2024 Fiction Book of the Year (for The Legend of the Extraordinary Writers) and our 2024 Author of the Year. This book serves as another feather in his cap.

Check it out on Amazon!