Synopsis
A wide-ranging intellectual history that reveals how important games have been to human progress, and what’s at stake when we forget what games we’re really playing.
We play games to learn about the world, to understand our minds and the minds of others, and to make predictions about the future. Games are an essential aspect of humanity and a powerful tool for modeling reality. They’re also a lot of fun. But games can be dangerous, especially when we mistake the model worlds of games for reality itself and let gamification co-opt human decision making.
Playing with Reality explores the riveting history of games since the Enlightenment, weaving an unexpected path through military theory, political science, evolutionary biology, the development of computers and AI, cutting-edge neuroscience, and cognitive psychology. Neuroscientist and physicist Kelly Clancy shows how intertwined games have been with the arc of history. War games shaped the outcomes of real wars in nineteenth and twentieth century Europe. Game theory warped our understanding of human behavior and brought us to the brink of annihilation—yet still underlies basic assumptions in economics, politics, and technology design. We used games to teach computers how to learn for themselves, and now we are designing games that will determine the shape of society and future of democracy.
In this revelatory new work, Clancy makes the bold argument that the human fascination with games is the key to understanding our nature and our actions.
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Playing with Reality: How Games Shape Our World
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Playing with Reality: How Games Shape Our World
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Playing With Reality
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Playing with Reality (Hardcover)
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Penguin Books Ltd, London, 2024
ISBN 10: 0241545501
ISBN 13: 9780241545508
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Hardcover. Condition: new. Hardcover. A sweeping intellectual history of games and their importance to human progressWe play games to learn about the world, to understand our minds and the minds of others, and to make predictions about the future. They're also a lot of fun. But what happens when we mistake games for reality?Playing With Reality explores the riveting history of games since the Enlightenment, weaving an unexpected path through military theory, biology, artificial intelligence, neuroscience, cognitive psychology and the future of democracy. As neuroscientist and physicist Kelly Clancy shows us, games have been deeply intertwined with the arc of history. War games shaped the outcomes of real wars in nineteenth and twentieth-century Europe. Game theory warped our understanding of human behaviour and brought us to the brink of annihilation - yet still underlies basic assumptions in economics, politics and technology. We used games to teach computers how to learn for themselves, and now we are designing games that will determine the shape of society and future of democracy.Lucid, thought-provoking, and masterfully told, Playing With Reality makes the bold argument that the human fascination with games is the key to understanding our nature. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability. Seller Inventory # 9780241545508
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Playing with Reality
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Hardback. Condition: New. 'A book to get the neurons firing. As a passionate game player I loved reading a neuroscientist's perspective on the role games have played in humanity's attempts to navigate the game of life. A dopamine hit on every page' Marcus du SautoyA sweeping intellectual history of games and their importance to human progress.We play games to learn about the world, to understand our minds and the minds of others, and to practice making predictions about the future. Games are thought to be older than written language, and have now become the dominant cultural media-bigger than movies, TV, music, and literature combined. They are also fun. But as neuroscientist and physicist Kelly Clancy argues, it's time we started taking them more seriously. In Playing With Reality, she chronicles the riveting and hidden history of games since the Enlightenment, weaving an unexpected path through military theory, biology, artificial intelligence, neuroscience, cognitive psychology, and the future of democracy. Games, Clancy shows us, have been deeply intertwined with the arc of history. War games shaped the outcomes of real wars in nineteenth and twentieth century Europe. Game theory warped our understanding of human behaviour and brought us to the brink of annihilation-yet still underlies basic assumptions in economics, politics, and technology. We used games to teach computers how to learn for themselves, and now we are designing games that will determine the shape of society and future of democracy. Games also inform the basic systems that govern our daily lives: the social media and technology that can warp our preferences, polarise us, and manufacture our desires. Lucid, thought-provoking, and masterfully told, Playing With Reality makes the bold argument that the human fascination with games is the key to understanding our nature. Seller Inventory # LU-9780241545508
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