New Books in Technology

Journalist Katherine Blunt, who writes about renewable energy and utilities for the Wall Street Journal, talks about her new book, California Burning: The Fall of Pacific Gas and Electric—and What It Means for America’s Power Grid with Peoples & Things host, Lee Vinsel. The book tells the fascinating story of how declining performance at an electrical utility eventually led to wildfires and staggering loss of human life. Blunt and Vinsel also talk about what this story means for the future of electricity utilities in the face of global climate change. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Jaipreet Virdi talks about her book Hearing Happiness: Deafness Cures in History with Peoples & Things host Lee Vinsel. The book details the long history of attempts to “fix” deaf people, including a great deal of quackery. Towards the end of the conversation, Virdi and Vinsel also talk about what a world beyond solutionist fantasies that disability can be “cured” would look like. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Historian Hanna Rose Shell, a professor at University of Colorado, Boulder, talks about her book Shoddy: From Devil’s Dust to the Renaissance of Rags with Peoples & Things host Lee Vinsel. Along the way, Shell raises a number of important and interesting things, including the long history of reuse and recycling and how forms of technology and work become tied to social status. With shoddy, it was the anxieties of low class, low social status work and poverty. Shell also discusses how individual technologies become mirrors for the worries, fears, hatreds, and other feelings of society – how when we look into the history of any technology we often see ourselves reflected back. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Regia Rini is the Canada Research Chair in Philosophy of Moral and Social Cognition at the York University. Her research resides at the intersections of moral philosophy, psychology, and political epistemology. She also publishes popular work on topics concerning the social and political impacts of technology. She is currently working on a book about social media and democracy. The "Why We Argue" podcast is produced by the Humanities Institute at the University of Connecticut as part of the Humility and Conviction in Public Life project. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Joshua Cohen is a faculty member of Apple University, and is Distinguished Senior Fellow at the School of Law, the Department of Philosophy, and the Department of Political Science at Berkeley. He is the author of several influential academic articles, many of which are collected in Philosophy, Politics, Democracy(Harvard 2009), and The Arc of the Moral Universe and Other Essays (Harvard, 2011). Since 1991, Cohen has edited the Boston Review.  The "Why We Argue" podcast is produced by the Humanities Institute at the University of Connecticut as part of the Humility and Conviction in Public Life project. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Social Media rewards snap judgments and blind conviction. Michael Lynch finds this troubling. Michael P. Lynch is Professor of Philosophy and Director of the Humanities Institute a University of Connecticut. His research concerns truth, public discourse, and the impact of technology on democratic society.  The "Why We Argue" podcast is produced by the Humanities Institute at the University of Connecticut as part of the Humility and Conviction in Public Life project. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Geospatial Data Science Essentials is your hands-on guide to mastering the science of geospatial analytics using Python. Designed for practitioners and enthusiasts alike, this book distills years of experience by wrapping up 101 key concepts from theory to implementation, ensuring you gain a practical understanding of the tools and methods that define the geospatial data science landscape today. Whether you are a seasoned data scientist, a GIS professional, a newcomer to spatial data, or simply a map lover, this book provides you solid foundation to level up your skills. The book is centered around practicalities, as you will explore real-world examples with compact code throughout ten topics and 101 sections. From understanding spatial data structures to leveraging advanced analytical techniques, from spatial networks to machine learning, this book equips you with a wide range of knowledge to navigate and succeed in the rapidly evolving field of geospatial data science.Embrace the journey into geospatial data science with this essential guide and discover the power of Python in unlocking the potential of spatial analytics. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Eyes by Hand: Prosthetics of Art and Healing (MIT Press, 2025) is a book about artificial eyes—about the artisans and artists who make them, and about the life-changing and sometimes life-saving experience of wearing them, as author Dan Roche has done for 15 years. Eye making is done by hand, for one person at a time, by a very small number of ocularists (fewer than 200 in the US); it is a slow, intricate, and unusually intimate process of molding, fitting, and painting that brings ocularist and patient together for many hours or even days.In Eyes by Hand, Dr. Roche describes the craft that goes into the making of an eye that looks uncannily real, as well as the psychological and emotional healing that such service brings to someone who has suffered the very visible trauma of eye loss—a loss that can go to the heart of self-identity.In an engaging, frankly fascinating fashion, Roche captures the intricacies of a profession whose techniques and culture have been remarkably consistent for 200 years. He explores, too, how that profession may now be facing a digital transformation in the form of scan-print-mail possibilities. Such a change might make prosthetic eyes more easily and cheaply available, though it may also risk the aesthetic qualities and intimate connection fundamental to the process of healing. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda’s interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Can networks unlock secrets of AI or make sense of a social media mess? A behind-the-scenes look at how networks reveal reality. According to mathematician Anthony Bonato, the hidden world of networks permeates our lives in astounding ways. From Bitcoin transactions to neural connections, Dots and Lines: Hidden Networks in Social Media, AI, and Nature (Johns Hopkins UP, 2025) explains how networks shape everything from political landscapes to climate patterns and how deceptively simple dots and lines can unveil the wonders of technology, society, and even nature. From a fresh and startling look at the true impact of clever keywords in politicians' social media posts to a fun breakdown of survival strategies in reality TV shows, Bonato shows us how network theory operates everywhere. Each chapter focuses on a unique aspect of networks to reveal how they provide a captivating lens for bringing diverse phenomena into clearer focus. The book offers an accessible snapshot of networks for anyone curious about what makes the modern world tick. Bonato's insights will give readers a deeper appreciation and understanding of networks and their relevance to our everyday lives. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Peoples & Things host, Lee Vinsel, talks with Tiia Sahrakorpi, Visiting Professor at Weber State University, about her interesting book project, Our Land: An Oral History of Energy, which was funded by the Research Council of Finland. The project, which was rooted in oral histories in three locations in Finland, takes a use-based perspective and examines how ordinary Finnish people adopted and used electricity. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Ground Combat: Puncturing the Myths of Modern War (Georgetown UP, 2025) reveals the gritty details of land warfare at the tactical level and challenges the overly subjective and often inaccurate American approach to characterizing war. Ben Connable's motivation for writing the book is to replace overly subjective analyses with an evidence-based approach to examining war. From analyzing a set of over 400 global ground combat cases, Connable shows there has been a modest and evolutionary shift in the characteristics of ground combat from World War II through the early 2020s. This evidence of gradual change repudiates the popular but often hyperbolic arguments about military-technical revolutions and that there is a singular character of war in the modern era. Connable identifies past and current weaknesses in military design and strategy, examines common characteristics in modern ground combat from the data, and reframes the debate over the historical and prospective impact of emerging technologies on war. Ground Combat sets an evidentiary baseline and a new, detail-oriented standard for conflict research and policymaking. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Everything we do today is recorded as data that’s sold to the highest bidder. Plugging our personal data into impersonal algorithms has made government agencies more efficient and tech companies more profitable. But all this comes at a price. It’s easy to feel like an insignificant number in a world of number crunchers who care more about their bottom line than your humanity. It’s time to flip the equation, turning math into an empowering tool for the rest of us. In Robin Hood Math: Take Control of the Algorithms That Run Your Life (Penguin, 2025), award-winning mathematician Noah Giansiracusa explains how the tech giants and financial institutions use formulas to get ahead—and how anyone can use these same formulas in their everyday life. You’ll learn how to handle risk rationally, make better investments, take control of your social media, and reclaim agency over the decisions you make each day. In a society that all too often takes from the poor and gives to the rich, math can be a vital democratizing force. Robin Hood Math helps you to think for yourself, act in your own best interests, and thrive. Noah Giansiracusa is an Associate Professor of Mathematics at Bentley University, Visiting Scholar at Harvard University, and the author of How Algorithms Create and Prevent Fake News. His writing has appeared in Scientific American, TIME, WIRED, Slate, and the Washington Post, among others, and he has been featured as a guest on CNN, BBC Radio 4, and Newsmax. Giansiracusa lives in Acton, Massachusetts, with his wife, two kids, two dogs, and 12 chickens. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

A veteran Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist shadows the top thinkers in the field of Artificial Intelligence, introducing the breakthroughs and developments that will change the way we live and work. Artificial Intelligence has been “just around the corner” for decades, continually disappointing those who long believed in its potential. But now, with the emergence and growing use of ChatGPT, Gemini, and a rapidly multiplying number of other AI tools, many are wondering: Has AI’s moment finally arrived? In AI Valley: Microsoft, Google, and the Trillion-Dollar Race to Cash In on Artificial Intelligence (Harper Collins, 2025), Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Gary Rivlin brings us deep into the world of AI development in Silicon Valley. Over the course of more than a year, Rivlin closely follows founders and venture capitalists trying to capitalize on this AI moment. That includes LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman, the legendary investor whom the Wall Street Journal once called, “the most connected person in Silicon Valley.” Through Hoffman, Rivlin is granted access to a number of companies on the cutting-edge of AI research, such as Inflection AI, the company Hoffman cofounded in 2022, and OpenAI, the San Francisco-based startup that sparked it all with its release at the end of that year of ChatGPT. In addition to Hoffman, Rivlin introduces us to other AI experts, including OpenAI cofounder Sam Altman and Mustafa Suleyman, the co-founder of DeepMind, an early AI startup that Google bought for $650 million in 2014. Rivlin also brings readers inside Microsoft, Meta, Google and other tech giants scrambling to keep pace. On this vast frontier, no one knows which of these companies will hit it big–or which will flame out spectacularly. In this riveting narrative marbled with familiar names such as Musk, Zuckerberg, and Gates, Rivlin chronicles breakthroughs as they happen, giving us a deep understanding of what’s around the corner in AI development. An adventure story full of drama and unforgettable personalities, AI Valley promises to be the definitive story for anyone seeking to understand the latest phase of world-changing discoveries and the minds behind them. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Autonomous weapons exist in a strange territory between Pentagon procurement contracts and Hollywood blockbusters, between actual military systems and speculative futures. For this week's Liminal Library, I spoke with Jascha Bareis, co-editor of The Realities of Autonomous Weapons (Bristol UP, 2025), about how these dual existences shape international relations and cultural imagination. The collection examines autonomous weapons not just as military hardware but as psychological tools that reshape power dynamics through their mere possibility. These systems epitomize what the editors call "the fluidity of violence"—warfare that dissolves traditional boundaries between human decision and machine action, between targeted strikes and algorithmic inevitability. Bareis and his contributors trace fascinating connections between fictional representations and military doctrine—how Terminator narratives influence Pentagon planning while actual weapons development feeds back into artistic imagination. The book wrestles with maintaining "meaningful human control" over systems designed to operate faster than human thought, a challenge that grows more urgent as militaries worldwide race toward greater autonomy. Each chapter reveals how thoroughly we need to rethink human-machine relationships in warfare, from the gendered coding of robot soldiers in film to the way AI imaginaries differ between Silicon Valley and New Delhi. Autonomous weapons force us to confront uncomfortable realities about agency, violence, and the increasingly blurred line between human judgment and algorithmic certainty. Links: A Clean Kill? the role of Patriot in the Gulf War Statement delivered by Germany on Working Definition of LAWS / “Definition of Systems under Consideration” The Silicon Valley venture capitalists who want to ‘move fast and break things’ in the defence industry Hype Studies 'The Gatekeepers' documentary Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

'Seeing Like a Platform: An Inquiry into the Condition of Digital Modernity (Taylor & Francis, 2025)' by Petter Törnberg & Justus Uitermark In my conversation with Petter Törnberg about Seeing Like a Platform, we kept returning to a simple but unsettling point: platforms don't just carry our messages or connect us to information. They've created an entirely new way of knowing the world. His book with Justus Uitermark argues that when everything must be tagged, ranked, and fed through recommendation engines, we get a reality that only makes sense through those mechanisms. This goes beyond previous technological shifts. The printing press expanded what we could know. Television changed how quickly we could know it. But platforms have altered the conditions of knowledge itself. When a platform "sees" the world, it only recognizes what can be counted, sorted, and optimized. Everything else becomes invisible or, worse, stops seeming real. We start mistaking the map for the territory, except now the map is writing itself based on our clicks and swipes. What troubles me most about Törnberg's analysis is how naturally we've adapted to this new epistemology. We optimize our research for algorithmic discovery. We think in terms of engagement rather than understanding. The platform's logic becomes so embedded in daily life that other ways of organizing knowledge start to feel antiquated, inefficient. For STS researchers, this creates a genuine bind: we're trying to study platform society while swimming in its assumptions. The challenge isn't escaping platform thinking but remembering that there are other ways to think. Notes: The Ascendance Of Algorithmic Tyranny Talking about Machines: An Ethnography of a Modern Job (Collection on Technology and Work) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Principles of Bitcoin presents a holistic, first-principles-based framework for understanding one of the most misunderstood inventions of our time. By stripping away the hype, jargon, and superficial analysis that often surrounds the crypto industry, this book uncovers the true ingenuity behind Satoshi Nakamoto’s creation—and its profound implications for the future of money, governance, and individual freedom. Vijay Selvam analyzes the technology, economics, politics, and philosophy of Bitcoin, making the case that only through this holistic understanding can we gain an appreciation of its true meaning and significance. Readers are invited to consider Bitcoin as a tool for individual empowerment, a catalyst for economic autonomy, and a challenge to traditional monetary systems. Selvam demonstrates why Bitcoin stands alone in the digital asset space as a path-dependent once-in-history invention that cannot be replicated. Principles of Bitcoin is an invaluable resource for professionals in the financial world seeking a rigorous and accessible understanding of Bitcoin. Students, curious thinkers, and all who find the technology daunting will also benefit from its clear, foundational approach. Equipping readers with the tools to grasp the many facets of Bitcoin, this book is an ideal guide to exploring its role in shaping a more decentralized, transparent, and equitable future. Vijay Selvam is a corporate lawyer and financial services expert with nearly twenty years of experience across the United States, United Kingdom, and Asia. He spent more than a decade at Goldman Sachs and has also held leadership roles in the digital assets industry, advising on the evolving regulatory landscape. Selvam is a graduate of Harvard Law School, Oxford University, and Cardiff University. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Tatiana Bur, Technologies of the Marvellous in Ancient Greek Religion (Cambridge UP, 2025) This open-access book investigates the ways that technological, and especially mechanical, strategies were integrated into ancient Greek religion. By analysing a range of evidence, from the tragic use of the deus ex machina to Hellenistic epigrams to ancient mechanical literature, it expands the existing vocabulary of visual modes of ancient epiphany. Moreover, it contributes to the cultural history of the unique category of ancient 'enchantment' technologies by challenging the academic orthodoxy regarding the incompatibility of religion and technology. The evidence for this previously unidentified phenomenon is presented in full, thereby enabling the reader to perceive the shifting matrices of agency between technical objects, mechanical knowledge, gods, and mortals from the fifth century BCE to the second century CE. New Books of Late Antiquity is presented by Ancient Jew Review Tatiana Bur is Lecturer in Classics at Australian National University Michael Motia teaches in Classics and Religious Studies at UMass Boston Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

Octopuses can open jars to get food, and chimpanzees can plan for the future. An IBM computer named Watson won on Jeopardy! and Alexa knows our favorite songs. But do animals and smart machines really have intelligence comparable to that of humans? In Bots and Beasts: What Makes Machines, Animals, and People Smart? (MIT Press, 2021), Paul Thagard looks at how computers (“bots”) and animals measure up to the minds of people, offering the first systematic comparison of intelligence across machines, animals, and humans. Thagard explains that human intelligence is more than IQ and encompasses such features as problem solving, decision making, and creativity. He uses a checklist of twenty characteristics of human intelligence to evaluate the smartest machines—including Watson, AlphaZero, virtual assistants, and self-driving cars—and the most intelligent animals—including octopuses, dogs, dolphins, bees, and chimpanzees. Neither a romantic enthusiast for nonhuman intelligence nor a skeptical killjoy, Thagard offers a clear assessment. He discusses hotly debated issues about animal intelligence concerning bacterial consciousness, fish pain, and dog jealousy. He evaluates the plausibility of achieving human-level artificial intelligence and considers ethical and policy issues. A full appreciation of human minds reveals that current bots and beasts fall far short of human capabilities. Galina Limorenko is a doctoral candidate in Neuroscience with a focus on biochemistry and molecular biology of neurodegenerative diseases at EPFL in Switzerland. To discuss and propose the book for an interview you can reach her at galina.limorenko@epfl.ch. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

In this episode of the Language on the Move Podcast, Tazin Abdullah speaks with Dr. Esther Monzó-Nebot, Associate Professor in Translation and Interpreting Studies at Universitat Jaume I in Catalunya. They talk about Dr. Monzó-Nebot's new book The Social Impact of Automating Translation: An Ethics of Care Perspective on Machine Translation. The conversation delves into ideological issues involved in the widespread use of machine translation and the real-life impact for those who may rely on machine translations in various situations. Esther’s research and the wide variety of contributions to the book highlight the need to open a discussion about instilling an ‘ethics of care’ perspective into the use of technology to make AI-generated translations more inclusive and relevant for the communities using them. For additional resources, show notes, and transcripts, go here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology

With the rise of the gramophone around 1900, the shellac disc traveled the world and eventually became the dominant sound format in the first half of the twentieth century. Format Friction brings together a set of local encounters with the shellac disc, beginning with its preconditions in South Asian knowledge and labor, to offer a global portrait of this format.Spun at seventy-eight revolutions per minute, the shellac disc rapidly became an industrial standard even while the gramophone itself remained a novelty. The very basis of this early sound reproduction technology was friction, an elemental materiality of sound shaped through cultural practice. Using friction as a lens, Gavin Williams illuminates the environments plundered, the materials seized, and the ears entangled in the making of a sound format. Bringing together material, political, and music history, Format Friction decenters the story of a beloved medium, and so explores new ways of understanding listening in technological culture more broadly. Nathan Smith is a PhD candidate in Music Theory at Yale University nathan.smith@yale.edu Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/technology