You can’t talk about paper usage in the 21st century without mentioning the environment. Of all the reasons to abandon the widespread use of paper, the need to stop cutting down trees would seem the most urgent.

So while people will always try to build C-3PO-style machines that look and talk like us, the real advances will come in individual components we design to do one job well. Human intelligence arose from the unconscious co-operation of such systems to sustain the organism. Maybe if we get the constituent ‘smart’ parts right, a true AI system will spontaneously evolve — dare we say it — intelligently…

If the above are among your benchmarks, you might end up disappointed according to a recent flood of books warning us away from The Chase. It’s a clich√© that human nature is to always want more (food, power, etc) — according to zoology and behavioural science it was hardwired into us millions of years ago.