Eric Schmidt ’76 to unveil new book on AI with campus event at Princeton

Princeton Class of 1976 alumnus Eric Schmidt, a technologist, entrepreneur and philanthropist known for his pivotal role as former chairman and chief executive officer of Google, will return to Princeton on Nov. 20 to speak with Provost Jen Rexford about “Genesis: Artificial Intelligence, Hope, and the Human Spirit,” the new book he co-authored with Craig Mundie and the late Henry Kissinger.

Image courtesy of the publisher

The event, at 5:30 p.m. in McCosh Hall, Room 50, is open to the public, and the first 250 attendees will receive a free copy of the book. While tickets are sold out for this event, there will be a waiting line for any seats not filled by 5:25 p.m, and the event will be livestreamed on the Princeton University YouTube channel.

"'Genesis' charts a course between blind faith and unjustified fear as it outlines an effective strategy for navigating the age of AI," according to its publisher, Little, Brown and Co.

“Individuals, nations, cultures and faiths … will need to decide whether to allow AI to become an intermediary between humans and reality,” the authors write. They analyze AI’s promise and perils in seven vital areas — discovery, truth, politics, security, prosperity, science and fate — and warn of how quickly change may come. “AI seems to compress human timescales. Objects in the future are closer than they appear.” 

As Google CEO and chairman from 2001 to 2011, Schmidt oversaw the company’s transformation from a small Silicon Valley startup to a global tech giant, alongside founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page. Google dramatically scaled its infrastructure and diversified its products while maintaining a strong culture of innovation. From 2018 to 2020, Schmidt served as technical adviser to Alphabet, the holding company of Google, advising its leaders on technology, business and policy issues. He also was executive chairman of Alphabet from 2015 to 2018 and remained as the chairman of Google until 2015. 

Prior to joining Google, Schmidt was chairman and CEO of Novell, a software-as-a-service company. He previously spent 14 years at Sun Microsystems, starting his career as a manager and rising to become chief technology officer. He held technical positions at Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), Bell Laboratories and Zilog. 

“Genesis” coauthor Mundie was a Microsoft executive from 1992 to 2014 and has advised Presidents Clinton, Bush and Obama on technology policy. This is the final book co-authored by Kissinger, the former U.S. secretary of state who died in November 2023. Schmidt previously collaborated with Kissinger on the 2021 book, “The Age of AI: And Our Human Future.” They had met at a political conference and became friends, united by what in “Genesis” they call “the urgency of the task ahead.”