Hand-picked Artificial Intelligence books for beginners and non-techies

There are so many good books being written these days. I am the type of person that just goes and buys every book on the remote chance I could learn something new from it. Often, I then end up putting it away after the first couple dozen pages - but sometimes, they send me on an incredible journey of new knowledge.

 
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With books about Artificial Intelligence, it is a bit complicated. I find that there are many of them promising all kinds of introductions and to explain the impact on industries and corporations. To be honest: they are boring and quite often wrong. I feel that those are books being written by business people with a lot of imagination (no offense).

After I’ve started my email newsletter the AI Weekender, I’ve been asked quite often about books to go even deeper into the field. The twist is though, that although there are a lot of books that explain the tech, it’s quite hard to find books that get you thinking - especially if you are not an expert.

To save you the trouble of reading through lots of Amazon reviews and deciding, which books are the important ones, I’ve put them together for you. Each time I’ve read a new book and decided it’s worthy to be on here, I’ve also sent it out to my readers, asking for their feedback. Through this, you can be sure the books are field-tested by a whole bunch of curious non-experts!

I thought it makes sense to categorize and cluster the books a little. So, without further redo, if you

  • want to learn about potential impacts of AI on society and other philosophical discussions, go to the Society and Philosophy AI Books category.

  • want to read up on more technical stuff and understand what’s happening under the hood, go to the Technical AI Books category.

  • want to understand further how Artificial Intelligence might impact and affect your business, go to the Business AI Books category.

  • want to not learn, but entertain yourself with novels that prominently feature stories about Artificial Intelligence(s), then look into the AI Novels category.