Laura E Yates |

Superminds is the first book I have seen that deeply explores the power of information technology to enable truly new forms of human organization. I really love the premise and thoughtfulness of the book, and I highly recommend it if you want to understand and make sense of what we are likely to see in the next few years!

- Jimmy Wales, Wikipedia founder

From the father of collective intelligence, a refreshingly realistic view of how computers will supercharge collective intelligence and how these superminds can help us tackle the most complex problems that face the world today.

- Joi Ito, Director, MIT Media Lab

Thomas Malone was a decade ahead of most of the rest of us in thinking about the future of work. Now—in this fascinating book—he has done it again, looking ahead to a hyper-connected world and introducing us to new vistas of human capability and creativity achievable through collective intelligence. By thinking imaginatively about our future, Malone helps us think differently about the present.

- Anne-Marie Slaughter, CEO of New America; author of “Unfinished Business”

Tom Malone puts worries about artificial intelligence in perspective, explaining why AI works best when combined with humans in superminds. What makes a supermind more or less intelligent is just one of many surprises in this fascinating book.

- Patrick Winston, former director of the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory; author of “Artificial Intelligence”

As Tom Malone observes, it’s usually harder to create the future than to imagine it, but in the case of interacting, networked people (as with Facebook), sometimes it’s the other way around. The wonderful essence of Tom’s book is to imagine how people and computers will interact on a massive scale to create intelligent systems. And by imagining them in advance, we have some hope of nudging them in a positive direction.

- Esther Dyson, executive founder of Way to Wellville; author of “Release 2.1”

After helping introduce the phrase Future of Work in his 2004 book with that name,Tom Malone is back to remind us that the real impact of technology will come not only from AI but also from harnessing human minds at hyperscale. In this terrific, well-researched, and highly readable book, he explores provocatively and practically the opportunities and challenges that superminds will help us address in businesses and society. Leaders who care about harnessing the power of human minds in a world enabled by digital technologies must read this book.

- James Manyika, Chairman, McKinsey Global Institute

Humans plus computers and networks have enormous potential. How can such wee creatures as ourselves take advantage of this potential? In his new book, Malone addresses this question in a concrete way, laying the foundation for a new discipline: the systems engineering of superminds.

- Vernor Vinge, Hugo Award-winning science fiction author; originator of the “technological singularity” concept

Malone takes us on an intentional journey into thinking about thought, intelligence, reasoning and consciousness. He sees these notions in extremely broad terms that have changed my views of what it means to "think" - a property that emerges from aggregations and organized structures. I may never see a four-legged table the same way again!

- Vint Cerf, VP, Google; one of the “fathers of the Internet”

A remarkable journey into the basic structures – markets, hierarchies, democracies and more – that have advanced civilization throughout history and now bring us to a turning point where the complex problems facing humanity can be addressed by people and computers working together in totally new ways. A must read for anyone interested in a fresh look at artificial intelligence.

- Amy Edmondson, professor, Harvard Business School; author of “Building the Future”

Superminds offers a fascinating deep dive into the science of collective human intelligence, and how communities of minds may ultimately be integrated with AI to produce a new, composite super-intelligence that might soon be leveraged to help solve some of humanity’s most pressing problems.

- Martin Ford, author of the bestselling “The Rise of the Robots”

The story of human civilization has fundamentally been the story of coordination: in families, tribes, markets, nations. The challenge we now face is learning how to collaborate at an unprecedented scale, with both human and nonhuman partners alike – be they institutions, decentralized networks or intelligent machines. Superminds opens a window into what may be the defining question of the coming century.

Hello! I’m Laura.

I support people, teams, and organizations working towards a better world.

I specialize in project management, strategy, and experience design.

I contribute by operating both from the balcony and on the dance floor. From the balcony, I diagnose and determine what’s needed from a high-level, strategic perspective. On the dance floor, I build the tools, systems, resources, and convenings needed to move projects forward.

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