Without effective regulation of AI, society is at risk of a head-on collision with a self-driving car | Peter Lewis

A self-driving vehicle crashes into an oncoming car, burning the occupants and leaving the survivors battered and injured as they stare into their devices and wonder who is to blame.

That’s the starting point for Bruce Holsinger’s tech-focused bestseller Culpability, an exploration of agency and responsibility in the age of AI through the eyes of a lawyer, an ethicist, and their screen-addicted offspring.

It is also a more complete description of our current moment, as this self-driving technology accelerates exponentially before being equipped with brakes, seat belts, speed limits or a working GPS.

Looking back at the crash, Holsinger deftly weaves together the concurrent lines of causation: those who design the technology, those who deploy it, those who use it, and, most profoundly, the spaces that intersect.

“Guilt” lies in those gray areas of legal and moral responsibility where we are still thinking about formal and ethical rules of conduct, which in turn…