I work in software applications in biomedical research. Artificial intelligence (AI) is a natural interest impacting my work and team. I’m always looking for thoughtful explorations of the topic. I stumbled upon this book on Amazon and thought I’d give the audiobook a try. I’m glad I did. Though Daniel Dinkelman’s work is far from perfect, it provided a helpful survey of the research landscape across the landscape in computational linguistics and AI. It concisely summarized the applications of AI better than I’ve read in any other treatment.
Quickly analyzing language has long been the computer’s main shortcoming, but natural language processing (NLP) and AI are coming very close to solving that problem. It’s difficult to see all the ways it promises to transform society, but surveys like this allow curious people like me to explore AI’s social impacts more fully.
Fifty topics are covered, each with a short treatment. No one topic is covered in depth, so this book’s value lies more in its breadth. Some curiosity about language is required, but no formal training in linguistics or computational linguistics is needed to follow these short explorations. (I have none.) Beyond economic and technological topics, ethics receive a prime place in this survey. Dinkelman gives marginalized languages and cultures value to be part of the AI revolution. Clearly, he does not want a society of the AI “haves” vs. the AI “have nots.”
Despite these positive findings, the audiobook version has some clear shortcomings. It’s read by an AI bot with a British accent. I had no problems understanding her or appreciating different emphases in sentences or paragraphs. However, the bot read the references from the literature in each chapter’s endnotes. I learned to skip the end of chapters to move on to the rest. The book is much shorter without the references. Another version without scholarly citations is clearly in order. The citations, extremely valuable to researchers, should instead be placed in a supplemental document.
It’s always nice when a book – especially an independently published book – exceeds my expectations. This one definitely did. I learned a lot and had a lot of fun listening to it. I’m ready to dive into some of these topics in more detail instead of being caught in a river with the fear of missing out. I sense that I have seen most of the shoreline and can now claim my spot on the land. I’m glad I stumbled across this work and hope it can be improved to reach a wider audience. That audience needs Dinkelman’s words.
Computational Linguistics and Artificial Intelligence
By Daniel Dinkelman
Narrated by Virtual Voice
Audio copyright (c) 2025
Cineris Multifacet
Text copyright (c) 2023
Independently published
Length: 5:52
Genre: Artificial Intelligence
www.amazon.com