Artificial intelligence (AI) has been around for decades. AI has long piqued our imagination about what is possible with this powerful technology—for good and for evil. There are a vast number of instances in which AI has played a role in both our culture and in our desire to create more sophisticated systems. In fact, AI has captured the imagination of data scientists and fiction writers for decades. Alan Turing introduced seminal work on the meaning of artificial intelligence in the 1940s with his famous Turing test. In the 1960s project, ELIZA gave us a glimpse into the future of artificial intelligence–based communications. ELIZA, a project designed at MIT’s artificial intelligence lab, was one of the first natural language processing computer programs that created a way for humans to communicate with machines. Early science fiction novels were obsessed with artificial intelligence. For example, science fiction novels such as Metropolis, written by 1925 by German writer Thea von Harbou, imagined the world in the year 2026, where humans and robots would live together but engage in massive conflicts.

In the last few years, AI has re-emerged due to two main factors: the un precedented compute ability to crunch huge amounts of data with improved machine learning algorithms, and the brilliant marketing buzz of AI and ML.

However, artificial intelligence is way more than a passing fad. It is already a major part of our daily lives and will continue to accelerate. It is clear that there is an enormous amount of accessible data. We now have the ability to synthesize this massive amount of data in order to better understand everything from changing customer behaviors to the ability to anticipate what customers will want to buy in the future. With the movement toward AI, we can improve our ability to more accurately predict future business trends and requirements. AI’s impact on modern medicine, for example, cannot be overlooked. AI will help to analyze complex data to support the physician’s ability to customize effective treatments for patients. Across industries we are seeing important uses of AI that will be transformative.

Although AI has many types and forms, the most impactful in the immediate future is augmented intelligence. Augmented intelligence has profound ramifications because it empowers humans to truly leverage data to make better-informed decisions. The goal of augmented intelligence is not to replace people or automate them out of existence but to enable them to make better decisions based on complex data. In fact, the collaboration between humans and machines is the key enabler to our ability across industries to transition to the next stage of the information revolution.

One of the greatest impacts of augmented intelligence is the need to determine the accuracy of data in context. Understanding the context of data and the ability to actually trust this information is one of the most critical issues plaguing businesses today. If data can’t be trusted or is inaccurate, decisions that are made based on that data could prove to be catastrophic. In addition to assuring data accuracy, data must be managed from a security, privacy, compliance, and risk perspective.

The book you are about to read is of great importance because we increasingly rely on machine learning and AI. Therefore, it is critical that we understand the ability to create an environment in which businesses can have the tools to understand data from a holistic perspective. What is imperative is to be able to make better decisions based on an understanding of the behavior and thinking of our customers so that we can take the best next action. This book provides a clear understanding of the impact of augmented intelligence on both society and business.