-
World War II
Huge strides were taken during WWII for the world of computing on both sides. The Enigma machine of Germany encoded and decoded thousands of "unbreakable" messages between the Germans and the Japanese. The machine developed by Alan Turning and England's Bletchley Park code-breaking team broke the encryption, eventually leading to the Allie Victory.
Source: https://www.ancientpages.com/2016/07/09/on-this-day-in-history-enigma-the-secret-code-used-by-germans-was-finally-broken-on-july-9-1941/ -
Child's Play
Scientists and researchers believed that reaching human-equivalent AI would be done within a generation since it was already known that computers were capable of mathematical tasks and logical programming.
Image source: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/209839663862006175/ -
Artificial Intelligence
The term "artificial intelligence" coined during a 1956 conference at Dartmouth -
AI Programs of the late 1950s
Logic Theorist in 1956- first ever AI program, built to mimic the problem-solving skills of human mathematicians.
Source: https://history-computer.com/logic-theorist/#:~:text=The%20Logic%20Theorist%20remains%20a%20breakthrough%20in%20the,was%20made%2C%20AI%20and%20Heuristic%20programming%20were%20not.
General Problem Solver in 1957- used to prove theorems in logic or geometry, complete word puzzles, or even play chess.
Source: https://www.instructionaldesign.org/theories/general-problem-solver/ -
AI Programming Language LISP
A family of programming languages that were first invented by John McCarthy in 1958. It is machine-independent, suitable for AI programs, and easily extendable for specific use. LISP provides high level debugging, advanced object-oriented programming, a macro system, is expression based, and control structures. Successful applications that were built in LISP include Emacs, AutoCad, Yahoo Store, and Igor Engraver.
Source: https://www.tutorialspoint.com/lisp/lisp_overview.htm -
Period: to
Paul Ekman's Research on Human Emotions
Paul Ekman set out to answer the question of whether or not the way emotions are perceived is universal. He determined that the way basic human emotions are perceived almost exactly the same, despite difference in culture or exposure to the outside world. Proposed six basic emotions: happiness, sadness, anger, surprise, fear, and disgust. -
AI Winter
Time period in the early 1970s in which a majority of government funding for the development of artificial intelligence was cut off in the United States and Britain. -
Rosalind Picard Joins MIT Media Lab
Rosalind Picard came to the MIT Media Lab in 1987, first joining as a teaching and research assistant and eventually joining the Vision and Modeling group in 1991.
Image source: https://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/new_logo_and_identity_for_mit_media_lab_by_pentagram.php -
Period: to
Rosalind Picard's Research Period
During this time period, Picard did new research on image pattern modeling and developing a "content-based retrieval system". -
Birth of Affective Computing
Picard began sharing her ideas with some of her colleagues through a document that shared all of her technical material and ideas. Titled "Affective Computing", the ides eventually gained traction in the public eye when press and television picked up the story in 1996-1997. -
"Affective Computing"- book by Rosalind Picard
Picard introduced the world to her ideas and launched a new branch of AI and computer science in 1997 with the release of her book "Affective Computing". -
The Rise and Fall of Clippy
Microsoft introduced an Office Assistant in the mid 1990s, which utilized an animated paperclip named Clippit (people called it Clippy and the name stuck). Clippy was often annoying and interrupted users as inconvenient time, resulting in users describing the assistant as "too helpful". Eventually, Clippy was retired in 2001 by Microsoft.
Source: https://www.geekwire.com/2019/clippy-back-mac-microsofts-infamous-office-assistant-gets-new-virtual-life/ -
Affective Computing Research Group
Picard founds her own group at the Media Lab. The group would "come to combine engineering and computer science with psychology, cognitive science, neuroscience, sociology, education, psychophysiology, value-centered design, ethics, and more. -
Squeezable Mouse
Picard's team developed a squeezable mouse, which allowed computers to better read emotional cues.
Source: https://www.wired.co.uk/article/emotion-machines -
Galvactivator
Measured and tracked skin conductance of the wearer. -
Picard and Kaliouby Meet
Kaliouby was working on developing an emotion recognition tool called MindReader as part of her doctoral project. She also utilized her FaceSense software to develop iSet, which was an emotional prosthetic. -
Kaliouby Joins Media Lab's Affective Computing Group
-
iCalm
Developed as a low-cost and low-power device that could detect and track changes in the wearer's electrodermal activity and heart rate. -
Founding of Emotient
Main focus was working with facial recognition software. -
Launching of Affectiva
Affective was launched in 2009 by Picard and Kaliouby. Described as "one of the first companies that sought to leverage affective computing technologies for commercial use". -
Millard-Brown
Millard-Brown challenged the Affectiva team and their software to correctly analyze responses from viewers to four ads. The people of Millard-Brown had already tested these responses and if the Affective team succeeded, they agreed to become a client and investor of the company. Affective and their Affdex software was successful and a $4.5 million dollar investment in the company was made by Millard-Brown. -
Beyond Verbal
An emotions analytics company focused on the extraction and identification of feelings through intonations in the human voice.
Source: https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/beyond-verbal#:~:text=Founded%20Date%20Apr%202%2C%202012%20Founders%20Yoav%20Hoshen%2C,Ltd.%20Company%20Type%20For%20Profit%20Contact%20Email%20Info%40beyondverbal.com -
AlphaGo secures a Victory
Google Deepmind developed a Go-playing AI called AlphaGo using a database of 30 million moves. The program beat the Go grandmaster, Lee Sedol, in 4 out of 5 games in 2016. -
Near Future Development
I predict that by 2050 there will be no need for humans to work as taxi-drivers. I think that the use of AI technology in cars will result in self-driving taxis in major cities like New York or San Fransisco in the next decade and that by 2050 the entire job of taxi driver will be completely wiped out. -
Far Future Development
I predict that by 2122 everyone will have some sort of implanted technology that will allow them to monitor their health from home. I imagine that this is some sort of chip that is implanted at birth, that way the body can grow around it. The implantation will monitor the individual's health, as well as provide early detection of various diseases. The chip will have a Bluetooth capabilities, meaning that people can check at will.