China Won't Win the Race for AI Dominance

Once upon a time, Japan was widely expected to eclipse the United States as the technological leader of the world. In 1988, the New York Times reporter David Sanger described a group of U.S. computer science experts, meeting to discuss Japan's technological progress. When the group assessed the new generation of computers coming out of Japan, Sanger wrote, "any illusions that America had maintained its wide lead evaporated." Replace "computers" with "artificial intelligence," and "Japan" with "China," and the article could have been written today. In AI Superpowers: China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order, which unsurprisingly became an instant bestseller, former Google China President Kai-Fu Lee argues that China's unparalleled trove of data, culture of copying, and strong government commitment to artificial intelligence give it a major leg up against the United States.