Why Artificial Intelligence Often Feels Like Magic

The fact that the embeddings that emerge from this “magical” optimization process are so uncannily and discomfitingly useful as a mirror for society means that we have, in effect, added a diagnostic tool to the arsenal of social science.

It turns out that computers are particularly adept at the tasks that we humans find most difficult: crunching equations, solving logical propositions, and other modes of abstract thought. What artificial intelligence finds most difficult are the sensory perceptive tasks and motor skills that we perform unconsciously: walking, drinking from a cup, s