From AI to Humble Pi: the best new science books to buy for Christmas

Do we have more to fear from artificial intelligence or natural stupidity? This year's best science books offer plenty of both. Artificial intelligence has been much in the news this year, even though it doesn't really exist yet – as was made clear by the story of how people's conversations with Apple's "smart assistant", Siri, were being listened to by real human beings, low-paid workers in the global digital sweatshop. Nevertheless, the arrival of really intelligent machines has the potential to transform our world utterly. Consider ordering a superintelligent computer to make paper clips.