The Frankenstein Fix: Why Big Tech Goes Astray & What We Can Do About It - Softcover

Cohen, Gabriel

Softcover

ISBN 13: 9798993462400

Publisher: Edgewood Avenue Press, 2026

Synopsis

"I really like The Frankenstein Fix for the way it provides clear, actionable alternatives to tech doom."—Douglas Rushkoff, author of Throwing Rocks at the Google Bus

"A sweeping, cogent analysis…offers intriguing practical solutions …a well-researched and frightening warning about unfettered technology." —Kirkus Reviews

Did you get any say in whether or not A.I. will radically transform your world? (Or autonomous weapons, or bioengineering, or many other radical new technologies?)

At this very moment, a tiny number of Silicon Valley leaders are making risky decisions that will have a huge impact on the rest of the eight billion people on this planet. They don't mean to cause harm, but their new creations often bring dire unintended consequences: destructive psychological, social, economic, and political impacts. We call these "side effects," but they're often more powerful than the intended ones.

Too many books about technology end with a vague plea that we really ought to do something about these problems. The Frankenstein Fix gets to the deep roots of what tends to cause them—and it provides a broad array of actual solutions.

The book offers insights from interviews with many experts, and provides a cornucopia of unique features, from an intriguing account of how people have resisted dangerous inventions throughout history, to surprising takes on space colonization and why the Amish reject technologies, to a toolbox of powerful techniques that could enable us to predict—and avoid—future troubles.

About this title

About the Author

Gabriel Cohen is a professor in the Writing department at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York, where he teaches journalism, critical thinking and writing, and fiction. He has also taught at New York University, the Center for Fiction, and Long Island University. He is the author of the novels Red Hook (which was nominated for an Edgar Award), The Graving Dock, Neptune Avenue, The Ninth Step, and Boombox, and the nonfiction books The Frankenstein Fix: Why Big Tech Goes Astray & What We Can Do About It, and Storms Can't Hurt the Sky: A Buddhist Path Through Divorce. He has written for the New York Times, Poets & Writers, and many other publications. He worked as a staff writer at the New Haven Advocate weekly newspaper, was a guest lecturer aboard the Queen Mary 2 ocean liner, and was profiled in the New York Times for publishing three different genres of books from three different publishers in one year.

Edition details

• Publisher: Edgewood Avenue Press
• Publication date: 2026
• Language: English
• ISBN 13: 9798993462400
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 386