Living and Working with AI
Ethan Mollick’s Co-Intelligence is part wake-up call, part how-to manual, and part pep talk for a species standing on the edge of a technological revolution. You may know Mollick as the sharp-witted Wharton professor behind the viral One Useful Thing Substack, but here he goes bigger, pairing academic insight with practical advice in a readable, often entertaining guide to life in the post-ChatGPT era.
The premise is simple but seismic. In November 2022, something quietly but profoundly changed. AI became general-purpose, startlingly fluent, and capable of doing creative work. Tasks that once demanded years of human expertise, such as writing code, summarizing research, building business strategies, or composing poems, were suddenly being tackled by machines.
Rather than fear this shift, Mollick leans in. His mission is to help us understand how to not just live with AI but collaborate with it. In Co-Intelligence, AI is not a sci-fi villain but a co-worker, a study buddy, a brainstorming partner. The book shows how we can use AI tools to enhance creativity, productivity, and learning. These aren’t distant hypotheticals but real-world examples pulled from classrooms, startups, and creative teams already adapting to this new normal.
Mollick also acknowledges the risks. Overreliance, misinformation, and the erosion of human judgment are all very real. The key, he argues, is building a values-driven partnership with AI, one where humans stay in the driver’s seat as the tools get smarter.
You’ll come away from this book with:
- Practical ways to experiment with AI in your own work
- A clear-eyed sense of what AI can do today, and what it can’t
- A hopeful, human-centered vision of our shared future
Whether you’re a curious educator, a cautious manager, or someone who just asked ChatGPT what day it is, Co-Intelligence offers a smart, funny, and deeply human guide to understanding the technology that is reshaping everything.