Computer Power and Human Reason
Weizenbaum separated what a machine is able to do from what it should be given to do, and argued that some decisions cannot be handed to anything but a person.
Why it matters
The first ethical critique from inside the field, written by ELIZA's author after he saw how quickly people credited the program with understanding.
Weizenbaum watched his secretary ask to be left alone with ELIZA, and psychiatrists discuss automated therapy in earnest. The book distinguishes deciding from choosing: computation can do the first and not the second. The field read the text as a betrayal, and his relations with MIT colleagues suffered for years.