Algorithms to Live By

The Computer Science of Human Decisions

By: Brian Christian, Tom Griffiths

Narrated by: Brian Christian

A fascinating exploration of how computer algorithms can be applied to our everyday lives, helping to solve common decision-making problems and illuminate the workings of the human mind

All our lives are constrained by limited space and time, limits that give rise to a particular set of problems. What should we do, or leave undone, in a day or a lifetime? How much messiness should we accept? What balance of new activities and familiar favorites is the most fulfilling? These may seem like uniquely human quandaries, but they are not: computers, too, face the same constraints, so computer scientists have been grappling with their version of such problems for decades. And the solutions they've found have much to teach us.

In a dazzlingly interdisciplinary work, acclaimed author Brian Christian (who holds degrees in computer science, philosophy, and poetry, and works at the intersection of all three) and Tom Griffiths (a UC Berkeley professor of cognitive science and psychology) show how the simple, precise algorithms used by computers can also untangle very human questions. They explain how to have better hunches and when to leave things to chance, how to deal with overwhelming choices and how best to connect with others. From finding a spouse to finding a parking spot, from organizing one's inbox to understanding the workings of human memory, Algorithms to Live By transforms the wisdom of computer science into strategies for human living.

©2016 Brian Christian and Tom Griffiths (P)2016 Brilliance Audio, all rights reserved.

Unique perspective

It takes algorithms used by computers and shows you how they relate with daily life. Great approaches to many of life's problems.

increased my scientific literacy much more than ex

you should have a little scientific background to get the most out of this book. I was unimpressed with the first few chapters which I was pretty well versed in but the book does go much more deeply into big principles in algorithms and computer science as you keep reading so don't give up too early on this one. even the approach used to discuss game theory made a widely discussed topic feel new.

"Mostly Just Algorithms" might be a better title

The book is informative, although I was personally hoping the authors would make light of more applicable scenarios to use the algorithms. I have a degree in computer science, and can say this book is pretty much an entry-level algorithms course, with historical context in some areas. There are some, although few, examples of applying algorithms in daily life, most notably how to sort socks near the beginning and the importance of honesty near the end. I would recommend this book to people in the tech field, or prospective students who are interested in computer science or mathematics. I wouldn't recommend this book for anybody else.

Algorithms

Enjoyable read but book could’ve provided more detailed real world examples of algorithms in life.

Exceptional for the analytically inclined

If you have a scientific bent, and also like popular psychology, this is a winner.

A bit boring and difficult to follow

The book provides good points, but sometimes it is just to boring to follow that I was loosing attention

Listen or better read?

This book had the potential to be an amazing book, it just never managed to fully score that a-ha moment. It could be because of the performance, the vocabulary used or the at-times unnecessary clichés.

Some chapters are just brilliant. It might worth just looking for the summary or reading it instead of listening to it.

Fascinating!!

I somewhat recently made a career transition from nursing to clinical software. I found my work to encompass all of the challenges and edification I desired at that time. The ways I was being taught to think and encouraged to share were personally and professionally fulfilling. I never knew when I purchased this book that the information it discussed would be so pertinent to my job and even personal life. Algorithms to live by is no joke. It's not a euphemism to sell books. These things matter! I also acknowledge that because of my career choice and overall personality perhaps, that I may have a bias towards the information learned within these "pages". But at the end of the day, we all want to sharpen both our emotional and our logical intelligence. This book breaks that latter science down. In a very humane way. I also appreciate the many quotes introducing the different sections.

Interesting content

One must have a basic understanding of statistics if they hope to follow this. It would have been helpful to hear where they came up with the probability fractions as most were not obvious. Seeing the shapes of the graphs they reference would be helpful, but I am not sure if they are even included in the written copy of this book. I would have liked more information on how these algorithms are programmed into computers, but I suppose there is another book out there for that.

Kind of boring

The book starts ok, I liked the first case study about decision making, the rest were too detailed and hard to stay engaged.