India, Aug. 22 -- On the invisible human labour that drives AI and the biases and hidden costs of this seemingly magical technology

Samrat Choudhuryletters@hindustantimes.com

The New Divide by Jibu Elias starts dramatically on a grey morning in Vienna with clouds "pressed over the city like a lid". The author writes of "a life-sized mannequin draped in flowing Ottoman robes, a turban perched regally atop its carved wooden head. There was a loud ratcheting sound. The figure stirred. the audience gasped". The year was 1770. This was the Mechanical Turk, which was sold to the world as an artificial intelligence - a chess-playing automaton. This legendary "machine" played chess with emperors and kings including Napoleon Bonaparte.

After a ...