We see, use and experience artificial intelligence software not only in movies, books, games, but also in our daily lives. So who first used the concept of “artificial intelligence”, which caused endless debates and misunderstandings? Let’s take an important journey in the history of technology.
Artificial intelligence, For some it is a great blessing, for others it is a great danger. Artificial intelligence, which has gradually turned into reality from books to movies, namely fiction, and today, is the name given to the technologies of “make computers do things that can be done with human intelligence” in its roughest and shortest definition. However, who first used this name and it has become so valid that it shapes today and even the future.
In this article, the inventor of the concept of artificial intelligence, John McCarthyWe covered every aspect of his life. McCarthy, who has always done good and useful things throughout his successful life, besides being the inventor of artificial intelligence. known as the Lisp language We can say that he is also the inventor of the programming language.
John McCarthy’s successful teen years:
John McCarthy was born on September 4, 1927 in Boston, USA, to an Irish immigrant family. Due to the economic crisis forced to move many times, He was the son of a family whose economic situation was not very good. They moved to California when John was just two years old, after his father got a job as an organizer in California.
Although he goes to school late due to various health problems he has, thanks to his intelligence graduated from high school 2 years early. McCarthy, who had already determined his educational plans, improved himself by studying advanced mathematics from university books and was exempted from advanced mathematics courses for the first two years at Caltech, where he was accepted in 1944.
Uninterrupted academic career:
Unfortunately, he could not show the success he showed in his school lessons, especially in the mathematics lesson, in the physical education lesson. When he was expelled from the university for not attending physical education classes He was a soldier and served in the army for a while.
John McCarthy, II. While serving in the army in World War II, he aimed to decipher the Germans with his mathematical knowledge. He thought that if it were possible to write special programs for computers, computers could learn to think just like humans. Re-admitted to Caltech after serving in the military for a while and graduated in mathematics in 1948.
Attended at Caltech “Cerebral Mechanisms in Behavior” Comparing brains and computers at a symposium on the theme inspired John McCarthy for the idea of artificial intelligence. McCarthy, who embarked on a quest to develop machines that can think like humans, thus “People prefer to deal with machines rather than bureaucracy.” He has proven his word.
He studied at the best universities in the world:
McCarthy under the supervision of Donald C. Spencer after successfully graduating “Projection operators and partial differential equations” He completed his doctoral thesis titled, and earned a PhD in mathematics from Princeton University in 1951. Princeton University and Stanford UniversityIn 1955, after his short-term work in Dartmouth UniversityHe became an assistant professor.
A year later, McCarthy became a research fellow in the fall of 1956. MIT UniversityHe started working in While working as a research assistant at MIT, he took part in a committee that developed the programming language ALGOL in 1956.
He took the first steps of artificial intelligence:
As a young academician in 1956 He organized the Darthmouth Conference, the first artificial intelligence conference. While defining artificial intelligence at the conference “If all aspects of learning and intelligence are described down to the smallest detail, computers can simulate them and as a result think like humans.” said.
Years later, he admitted that it was too early to make this statement, but added that he was confident that it would happen in the coming years. McCarthy believed that suitable software could be written for computers that would pass the Turing test. In order to achieve this, he introduced the concept of artificial intelligence and with this effort he Artificial intelligence has developed as a branch of science.
When McCarthy came up with the idea of artificial intelligence+a, the Cold War between Russia and the United States was heating up. For this reason, the US Department of Defense provided great financial support to artificial intelligence research. In addition, the USA wanted to be a leader in the field of artificial intelligence, since it lagged behind Russia in the space race.
He developed the Lisp language, one of the oldest and most powerful programming languages:
- John McCarthy plays chess with his IBM 7090 computer, 1967.
It has been used continuously for decades and is still used today. He wrote the Lisp language for use in the programming of artificial intelligence applications. Lisp language became the only language used in artificial intelligence products after 1959 and became the most preferred language of artificial intelligence program writers. This language has continued to evolve up to the present day and Emacs Lisp, ANSI Common Lisp, Scheme and Autolisp dialects such as
He then worked as a professor of mathematics at Stanford University from 1962 until his retirement in 2000. However, after his retirement, he continued to pursue his scientific studies at the university.
He has made numerous contributions to artificial intelligence and computer science:
at Stanford He founded the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory in 1965. and he was the head of this laboratory until 1980. He directed thirty doctoral dissertations on artificial intelligence. McCarthy, who developed the concept of artificial intelligence + a and opened the horizons of scientists, once again proved that artificial intelligence is important for the future of humanity.
It was accepted as the most important award in this field in 1971 for its achievements and contributions to computer science. He was awarded the Turing Award. McCarthy, who had a life full of success, died on October 24, 2011 at his home in Stanford.