Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 14, No. 180.
Centre for Computing in the Humanities, King's College London
<http://www.princeton.edu/~mccarty/humanist/>
<http://www.kcl.ac.uk/humanities/cch/humanist/>
Date: Sat, 19 Aug 2000 08:28:28 +0100
From: Willard McCarty <willard.mccarty@kcl.ac.uk>
Subject: machines, pride and pure research
I recently encountered an interesting statement attributed to Marvin Minsky
(1982): "Do not be bullied by authoritative pronouncements about what
machines will never do. Such statements are based on pride, not fact." What
interests me about this statement is that its truth value isn't changed by
removing the negative adverb "never". "Pride goeth before a fall",
undoubtedly, but the fact is that we do not know "what machines will
[never] do", and for some that cloud of unknowing is intolerable, it seems.
If research of the undirected kind (a.k.a. "pure") requires the cloudy
state of mind, then how does research in our area get done in the real
world, where funding is required and available largely from people who want
products guaranteed?
Comments?
Yours,
WM
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Dr. Willard McCarty, Senior Lecturer, King's College London
voice: +44 (0)20 7848 2784 fax: +44 (0)20 7848 5081
<Willard.McCarty@kcl.ac.uk> <http://ilex.cc.kcl.ac.uk/wlm/>
maui gratias agere
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