Dr. Lathan‘s book is an enjoyable tour of her personal experiences as an entrepreneur as well as an insightful overview of a broad range of emerging digital technologies. Throughout the book, her enthusiasm, optimism, and creativity shine through, whether she’s talking about robots, software, or medical devices. The scope of her experiences and expertise is also really amazing. How many people have excelled in the nonprofit sector, the military, high-tech, health care, consumer products, and even space exploration!? She places importance on ethics, diversity, fun, sustainability, and mutual respect. She frequently builds bridges as an advocate of multi-use technologies and technology transfer. She wants to make machines that collaborate with people rather than replacing them.

In business, one of the secrets to her success seems to be taking a practical approach and really getting to understand the users of a potential technology, whether they are kids with disabilities or soldiers. She is extraordinarily well-connected, so as the book progresses, there is an opportunity to “meet“ many other influential inventors and business leaders. She explores a broad range of business topics including how to assess customer need, technology maturity, market readiness, and the feasibility of a product idea.

When discussing the history of technology, the public often seem to focus on a few seminal inventions by famous people (e.g. Gates, Jobs, Musk), but her book illustrates that the evolution of technology is in fact a much more gradual process of many academic prototypes and failed products along the way that enable the great steps forward. Throughout her story, she also highlights examples where she personally needed to adapt to the rapidly changing landscape. As she discusses the emergence of driverless cars, virtual reality, and drones, she already sees that the future digital world will not depend on laptops, smartphones and headsets but will instead use voice recognition, eye tracking, and hand gestures. She has big hopes for the future of technology and its role in human enhancement, both empowering individuals and making communities more inclusive. There are big social and ethical issues to be addressed in these and other areas of tech development, so I eagerly look forward to a sequel to this book!

Dr. Lathan has dedicated her life and career to inventing technologies that enhance human lives, from robots that teach kids with autism how to connect with other people, to gloves used by the military to control robots. She sees a world of technological possibility and opportunity that we are all collectively responsible for creating and gives good arguments as to why the positives of emerging technologies like AI and AR/VR outweigh the negatives. After reading so many doomsday stories of how robots will take over the world, this book is a breath of fresh air backed by science and extensive research. Dr. Lathan is an MIT PhD, former professor of bioengineering, entrepreneur and inventor who believes that “the future of human-computer interaction must be based on empathy and innovation.” She tells her stories with humor and authenticity which makes this book a fabulous and fun read!

Inventing the Future: Stories from a Techno-Optimist" by Dr. Corinna Lathan is a captivating exploration of technology's potential to enrich human lives. Dr. Lathan's journey, from her diverse career encompassing sectors like healthcare, space exploration, and AI, to her innovative projects like robots for children with autism, is narrated with an infectious enthusiasm and a deep commitment to ethical, empathetic technology development. The book is not just an account of technological advancements; it's a testament to the power of persistence, empathy, and ethical considerations in shaping the future of tech. Her stories, infused with humor and authenticity, offer a refreshing perspective in a field often overshadowed by doomsday predictions, making this read not only informative but also inspiringly human. Dr. Lathan's work and this book are a beacon of hope for the future of technology, emphasizing its role in enhancing and empowering human capabilities.

Inventing the Future is an uplifting book during a time when hope can seem elusive. It's encouraging to know that there are people out there using technology to guide us toward a more empathetic future. This book is interesting on several levels. First, it makes the future seem bright. Second, it's interesting to get the inside view of new technologies through engaging stories of how they're applied. Third, some sections of the book reminded me a bit of NPR's How I Built This. Dr. Lathan gives us a peak into how she built her business, AnthroTronix, to help others. Inventing the Future is accessible and completely engaging.

“Inventing the Future” is a fascinating read of wonder and invention with no stone left unturned. Dr Lathan brings you along the journey of creating and innovating in all of its tribulations. It’s difficult to understand truly what’s goes on in bringing a product to life and this book helps you peek into the trenches of what goes on. As a fellow technologist, I share Dr. Lathan’s positive outlook on technology’s role in enhancing the human experience and bringing positive global change.

I loved this excerpt: “Dr. Cassell has the best definition of AI that I’ve heard. She says, “AI is not a technology; it’s a technique for understanding people and making machines act the way people do.” She goes on to say that this allows us to make machines that know how to collaborate with people rather than replacing them. So using Dr. Cassell’s definition, the role of machine learning and artificial intelligence in social robotics is clear: to close the loop on building the relationship between human and machine.”

This book is a highly relevant read in today’s world struggling to understand the role of technology in creating a positive impact.

Dr. Lathan's book is a great read for anyone that enjoys thinking outside of the box, making connections across disciplines, and solving real-world problems with creative innovation. While her impressive resume may initially intimidate readers, they will quickly realize how relatable she is and how her projects and innovations encourage each of us to approach challenges in original and inventive ways. Her work reminds us that we do not need to be credentialed scientists to be successful problem solvers. By following Dr. Lathan's example, we can answer the collective call to find solutions that help our communities and one another to live more fulfilled lives. Sharing the personal stories behind her work, Dr. Lathan hits home the importance of being passionate about your work, because having a personal commitment inspires one to not give up but, instead, to have tenacity and drive in tackling challenges. So, read Dr. Lathan's book, be inspired, and share the fire it lights in you with others - because that is what she is doing through the stories she shares in her book.

This isn’t your average story of a tech titan with a lightbulb moment and an instant fortune. What’s special to me about this book is that Lathan seems like she could be your next-door neighbor, the cheering mom at the robot wars, or the woman sitting next to you at the conference. It’s inspiring that she got the education, worked her way up the ladder, gathered good people, tried, failed, and tried again. And in that process, she made an incredible difference to the world around her. Between her work in helping neurodiverse kids, military providers, astronauts, and Alzheimer’s patients, Lathan has paid technology forward again and again.

For me, this book was a) a feel-good story about an innovator who sounds like a good person as well, b) a little inspiration to keep going when I hit a challenge and c) even a few fun tricks to play on your own mind. This story gives us a reason to believe in the future of what she calls “collective innovation.” Corinna Lathan might be the answer to our next big technology challenge, and we will all benefit from reading about her focus on innovating to enable human potential.

This five star book brings together the words of a person who personifies an optimistic model for educating and inspiring our children with humanist principles for inventing and designing the future. She gives inspiration to keep rolling up our creative sleeves at all ages. Such an easy read because she makes sense through her lense of experience and story telling. Accumulating lab results for her theories, like a focused scientist, she invents and applies solutions for positive change and doesn’t give up. This book is a statement of her personal evolution and revolution in science and technology. I visited her lab 20 years ago and am delighted to witness how she has brought her experience together in print to share with her readers the leadership energy and can do attitudes that create and unite solutions. Great insight and well worth the read.

As an engineer reading Dr. Lathans book was of particular interest for me. I enjoyed reading how she had intervowen new technologies with her personal stories. Most people are not aware of the importance of electric currents in our bodies. This is the basis of bioelectronic medicine which is used for the treatment of diseases with electrical signals. as alternative to chemical signals or drugs. I just love this approach.

In the book Dr. Lathans explains electroconvulsive theapy can save the lives of people with severe depression with far fewer side effects than many imagine. These technologies are only the beginning!

This is just one of the fascinating stories in the book: stories from real people integrated in mind blowing scientific facts.

This book is inspiring you to rethink your own relationship to technology and human performance. Dr. Lathans shows you how embracing the potential for human-centered interconnectedness will have a positive impact on humanity. She is opening the space for all of us to use our creativity to invent!

Voted most likely to go to Mars in 5th grade, Cori Lathan is a creative optimist driven by enabling others. Technology just happens to be her medium of choice. We follow Cori on her journey as she works to enable others by bridging the gap between what humans can do and humans should do. Her methods and take Cori - and the reader - on a winding journey that always returns to her core vision of helping people do things better. Along the way we see how she helps children learn, astronauts adapt to space and even fall out of a spaceship by trying to relax against the wall of the virtual cockpit. Through her successes - and her failures - Lathan shows what it takes to help invent the future. Excellent for anyone looking to a career around inventing the future and especially recommended for those passionate about science and technology.

There are so many nuggets of gold in this book: from the story about agency where we can all learn a lesson from the disabled kids, then the behind the scenes of what it is like to be an inventor, followed by the information on the amazing research on cognitive coupling, all the way to the mentions of the work of so many contemporary female scientists. I have to recommend this book to everyone. I am sure it will change lives and propel many people to take the leap and follow in Dr. Cori Lathan’s footsteps.