This book is in Dutch. An English edition is being translated. The Dutch paperback and e-book are available now; if you would like to hear when the English one is out, let us know.

The book

De machine wordt slimmer.
Wat doe jij?

The machine does what you do, and it does it faster. It writes, calculates and advises, and every few months it can do more. For the first time a technology reaches our heads instead of our hands. If that grates, your instinct is right: this is unlike anything we have been through before.

Two clocks

The clock of technology ticks in doublings. The human clock ticks the way it always has: in habits, in trust, in the time it takes to make something new truly your own. The distance between them grows every month, and most people and organisations are still standing there watching it. Try to keep up with the machine and you lose. Ignore her and you lose as well.

The third way

This book is about what you do instead. Alf Parmentier takes the fear seriously, including the fear of the people building it, and shows where the damage is already landing: in courtrooms, in customer service, and very nearly on a warship. Then he turns it around. AI is no longer a tool but a partner, and with a partner you make agreements before you trust her. Eight agreements, from “why and what for” to “who keeps the last word”, for home as much as for work. A chapter in which he tries to take his own argument apart. And a first step you can take tomorrow.

Buy the paperback Read on Kindle

Both on Amazon.nl, in Dutch.

Paperback: 201 pages · Dutch · published 6 October 2026 · ISBN 979-8178487129

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Who it is for

For anyone who feels the question on the cover coming: at home, at work, or while reading the news. You need to know nothing about technology to read it. It is written for directors and for the people doing the work, with particular attention to parents and to the young people growing up with a machine that can do any piece of homework.

What it is about

What this book does

Choose your door

Bystander, user or partner: you recognise all three at home and at work, and most of the time you are already standing at one without having chosen it. The book shows what the third door asks of you, and what it gives back.

You know what the machine is

A prediction machine that calculates faster than anyone and has no stake in the truth. Understand that, and you know when you can trust her and when to check her work.

Eight agreements for trusting her

From why and what for to who keeps the last word, for the kitchen table as much as for your team. Agreements you make together and revisit as the technology changes.

You get your curiosity back

What looked like a threat becomes something to try. Nobody has to talk you into that; it arrives the moment you understand what is actually happening.

It puts calm where the worry is and urgency where the ease is

Most people have a little too much of both, in the wrong places. This book puts them back.

De machine wordt slimmer.Wat doe jij?