Kasparov is a great narrator, and he conveys a deep story of man/machine that is full of insights for the world today. I ennoyed his perspective reconstruction of important chess games, and the deep blue battles even though I am not much of a chess player.

The moral of the story is strong: AI, but for what, does if open our minds or black box them in... ( )

Pros:
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1. A condensed history of computing, chess machine development, and AI.
2. Fun chess factoids.
3. Kasparov's uninhibited view of what went on during the two IBM Deep Blue challenges.
3. Led me to an article I overlooked concerning my hero Douglas Hofstadter: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/11/the-man-who-would-teach-mac.... Really, this article sums up what I feel is the main point Kasparov is trying to make.
4. Several great aphorisms I tucked away to help me cope with my own IT job.
5. Kasparov offers an optimistic and sober view of AI evolution (as opposed to a dismissive or doomsayer stance).

Cons:
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1. A(nother) condensed history of computing and AI.
2. If you didn't realize that Kasparov is the one who competed against IBM's Deep Blue, he will remind you of it constantly.
3. A few overlong chapters that lost the main thread.
4. He equates human progress directly with technology/AI, with no alternative.
5. It seems his view is that the only way we will achieve our greatest dreams is with the help of machines, with seemingly no consideration for those whose dreams don't need machines.

Overall, it mostly held my attention and served up a couple bones on which to chew. The book was named-dropped at a big data conference I attended last year in Boston and I immediately thought "chess. machine learning. must buy." I thought I would get a more detailed dig into the guts of deep thinking (on both the human and machine sides), but I suppose this was my fault for bringing such an expectation to the table based on the title and blurb alone. Its strongest stratum is the condensed history of chess-machine development, and the narrative of his bouts with Fritz and Deep Blue. ( )

Kasparov has some good information about the Deep Blue chess matches, computer chess programs overall, and AI in general. I'm personally not particularly interested in chess, but Kasparov brings in enough context and detail to make this a good book. ( )

Insofar as chess can be riveting as a spectator sport (despite the fact that Kasparov "won't be deflected into pointless arguments about whether or not chess is a sport", he does maintain that "it contains most of the elements that define all sports" (p. 79)), Deep Thinking had me on the edge of my seat for the first 80% of its pages. In this "long opening," Kasparov traces the history of computer chess, leading up to (and including) his two matches against IBM's Deep Blue (the first, in 1996, won by Kasparov, and the second, in 1997, won by Deep Blue).

In the Introduction, Kasparov asks, "Could these machines really play chess at the world championship level? Could they really think?" (p. 3). The answer to the former question has been affirmatively known for 20 years, but it was the answer (or lack thereof) to the latter question that left me wanting. The book's subtitle ("Where Machine Intelligence Ends and Human Creativity Begins") remains a grey, unanswered area. For the final 20% (or less) of the book, I would've liked a more theoretical discussion of not only this, but also machine learning and artificial intelligence, and perhaps a futuristic view of where it all might lead us. It may just be that Kasparov sticks to his knitting -- he argues early on that being a chess grandmaster is not tantamount to being a genius -- and he may feel unqualified to give his prognostications outside of the game. But it would have made for a richer, more multidimensional work, and pulled Deep Thinking out of the realm of chess nerd Nirvana. ( )

A rather dull read, sadly. ( )