7. Stapledon, “Experiences,” 362.
8. Olaf Stapledon to Agnes Miller, 22 October 1918, in Crossley, Talking Across the World, 332.
9. Stapledon, “Experiences,” 372.
10. Olaf Stapledon to Agnes Miller, 26 December 1917, in Crossley, Talking Across the World, 264–265.
11. Lewis Richardson, as quoted by Ernest Gold, “Lewis Fry Richardson, 1881–1953,” Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society 9 (November 1954): 230.
12. Olaf Stapledon to Agnes Miller, 12 January 1918, in Crossley, Talking Across the World, 270.
13. Lewis Fry Richardson, Weather Prediction by Numerical Process (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1922; facsimile reprint, New York: Dover Publications, 1965), 219.
14. Olaf Stapledon to Agnes Miller, 8 December 1916, in Crossley, Talking Across the World, 192–193.
15. Olaf Stapledon, Death into Life (London: Methuen, 1946); reprinted in Olaf Stapledon, Worlds of Wonder: Three Tales of Fantasy (Los Angeles: Fantasy Publishing Co., 1949), 130 (page citation is to the reprint edition).
16. Olaf Stapledon, The Star Maker (London: Methuen, 1937); reprinted in Last and First Men & Star Maker (New York: Dover Publications, 1968), 263–264.
17. Stapledon, Last and First Men, 119.
18. Ibid., 117–118.
19. Ibid., 118.
20. Ibid., 129.
21. Ibid., 142.
22. Frederic W. H. Myers, Phantasms of the Living (London: Trübner, 1886), lxv.
23. Frederic W. H. Myers, Science and a Future Life (London: Macmillan, 1893), 50.
24. Stapledon, Last and First Men, 222.
25. Fred Hoyle, The Black Cloud (London: Heinemann, 1957; reprint, Harmondsworth, U.K.: Penguin Books, 1960), 158 (page citation is to the reprint edition).
26. Irving J. Good, “The Mind-Body Problem, or Could an Android Feel Pain?” in Jordan M. Scher, ed., Theories of the Mind (New York: The Free Press of Glencoe, 1962), 496–497.
27. Irving J. Good, personal communication, 12 July 1994.
28. Irving J. Good, “Speculations Concerning the First Ultraintelligent Machine,” Advances in Computers 6 (1965): 35–36.
29. Paul Baran, “Is the UHF Frequency Shortage a Self Made Problem?” address to Marconi Centennial Symposium, Bologna, Italy, 23 June 1995.
30. Ibid.
31. Lewis Thomas, “Social Talk,” New England Journal of Medicine 287, no. 19 (9 November 1973): 974.
32. Olaf Stapledon, Nebula Maker (Hayes, Middlesex: Bran’s Head Books, 1976); reprinted in Nebula Maker & Four Encounters (New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1983), 47–48.
33. Stapledon, Star Maker, 332.
34. Ibid.
CHAPTER 12
1. Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1851, The House of the Seven Gables, centenary ed. (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1965), 264.
2. Loren Eiseley, The Invisible Pyramid (New York: Scribner’s, 1970), 21.
3. William of Malmesbury, ca. 1125, in J. A. Giles, ed., William of Malmesbury’s Chronicle of the Kings of England; from the Earliest Period to the Reign of King Stephen (London: Henry Bonn, 1847), 174.
4. Ibid., 181.
5. The Famous History of Frier Bacon, Containing the wonderful things that he did in his Life; Also the manner of his Death, with the Lives and Deaths of the two Conjurers Bungey and Vandermast. Very pleasant and delightful to be read (London: T. Passenger, 1679), 12–13.
6. Ibid., 15.
7. Ibid., 17.
8. Warren S. McCulloch, “Where Is Fancy Bred?” in Henry W. Brosin, ed., Lectures on Experimental Psychiatry (Pittsburgh: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1961), reprinted in Embodiments of Mind (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1965), 229.
9. Olaf Stapledon, Nebula Maker (Hayes, Middlesex: Bran’s Head Books, 1976); reprinted in Nebula Maker & Four Encounters (New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1983), 38.
10. Robert Davidge, “Processors as Organisms,” University of Sussex, School of Cognitive and Computing Science, CSRP no. 250, October 1992, 2.
11. Ibid.
12. Samuel Butler, Luck, or Cunning, as the main means of Organic Modification? (London: Trübner & Co., 1887); reprinted as vol. 8 of The Shrewsbury Edition of the Works of Samuel Butler (London: Jonathan Cape, 1924), 58.
13. W. Daniel Hillis, “New Computer Architectures and Their Relationship to Physics, or Why Computer Science Is No Good,” International Journal of Theoretical Physics 21, nos. 3–4 (April 1982): 257.
14. Samuel Butler, Life and Habit (London: Trübner & Co., 1878), 128–129.
15. Olaf Stapledon, Last and First Men (London: Methuen, 1930); reprinted, from the U.S. edition of 1931, in Last and First Men & Star Maker (New York: Dover Publications, 1968), 226.
16. William H. Calvin, “Fast Tracks to Intelligence (Considerations from Neurobiology and Evolutionary Biology),” in George Marx, ed., Bioastronomy—The Next Steps: Proceedings of the 99th Colloquium of the IAU (New York: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1988), 241.
17. George Dyson, Grenade Fighting: The Training and Tactics of Grenadiers (New York: George H. Doran Co., 1917), 11.
18. George Dyson, Grenade Warfare: Notes on the Training and Organization of Grenadiers (London: Sifton, Praed & Co., 1915), 6.
19. Ibid., 8.
20. Ibid., 7.
21. Ibid., 11.
22. Garet Garrett, Ouroboros; or, the Mechanical Extension of Mankind (New York: Dutton, 1926), 51.
23. Sir George Dyson, “Fred Devenish and Others,” R.C.M. Magazine 51, no. 2 (1955): 36.
24. Sir George Dyson, Fiddling While Rome Burns (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1954), 30–31.
25. Sir George Dyson, address to the Royal College of Music, September 1949; reprinted in Christopher Palmer, ed., Dyson’s Delight: An Anthology of Sir George Dyson’s Writings and Talks on Music (London: Thames Publishing, 1989), 80.
26. Dyson, Fiddling, 32–34.
27. W. Daniel Hillis, “Intelligence as an Emergent Behavior; or. The Songs of Eden,” Daedalus, (winter 1988) (Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences 117, no. 1), 177–178.
28. Felix Mendelssohn to Marc-André Souchay, 15 October 1842, in Paul Mendelssohn Bartholdy, ed., Letters of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy from 1833–1847 (London, 1864), 23–24.
29. John Wilkins, Mercury; or, the Secret and Swift messenger: Shewing, How a Man may with Privacy and Speed communicate his Thoughts to a Friend at any distance (London: John Maynard, 1641), 141, 143.
30. J. B. S. Haldane, “Man’s Destiny,” Possible Worlds (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1928), 303.
31. Garrett, Ouroboros, 19.
32. Ibid., 24.
33. Ibid., 100.
34. Ibid., 92.
35. Ibid., 51.
36. Isaac Newton, Opticks; or, A Treatise of the Reflections, Refractions, Inflections and Colours of Light. The Fourth Edition, Corrected (London: William Innys, 1730); reprinted, with a foreword by Albert Einstein (London: G. Bell, 1931; New York, Dover Publications, 1952), 370 (page citation is to the 1952 edition).
37. Henry David Thoreau, “Walking,” Atlantic Monthly 9, no. 56 (June 1862): 665.
INDEX
A
Aberdeen (Md.) proving ground, 79–80
absolute addressing, 114
Accidents and Emergencies; A Guide for their Treatment before the arrival of Medical Aid (Smee), 45
adaptation, 6, 113, 114
and evolution of software, 57, 185
without natural selection, 176–77
addition, modulo, 66
Adleman, Leonard, 165
AEC (Atomic Energy Commission), 77, 91, 102, 118
Agamemnon (Aeschylus), 131–32
agents (software), 182, 185, 189
Air Force, U.S., 76, 144–45, 152, 178–80, 183. see also nuclear weapons; RAND; SAGE
air pump (Boyle), 3, 134
Alamogordo (New Mexico) bomb test, 78
alchemy, 214
Alexander I (Czar), 141
Alexander, James, 96
algae, 112, 129
algebra, 43. see also Boolean algebra; philosophical algebra
algorithms, 54, 58, 158
for binary arithmetic, of Leibniz, 37
packet switching, 12, 42, 151
and punched-card data processing, 83–84
alphabet, 49, 62, 132, 137–38, 140, 225
binary coding of, 61, 132–33, 143
genetic, 27, 118
of ideas, and Leibniz, 36–38
of machine instructions, 118, 121
and Turing machine, 55
Ampère, André-Marie (1775–1836)
and cybernétique, 6, 141, 161–162
and game theory, 6, 153–54
on telegraphy and electrodynamics, 141
“Analogy Between Mental Images and Sparks” (Richardson), 87
analytical engine (Babbage), 38–43, 59, 68, 103
AN-FSQ-7 computer (Army-Navy Fixed Special eQuipment), 179–81. see also SAGE
architecture, computer. See computer architecture
architecture, naval, 161
architecture, network, 2, 12, 157, 167, 168, 205, 208. see also neural networks
Argonne National Laboratory, 98, 107
argument from design, 18, 116, 185–86, 188–89
arithmetic, 120, 135, 156, 168, 178, 212, 214. see also binary arithmetic; Boolean arithmetic; political arithmetic
floating point, 68, 106
and incompleteness, 49, 50, 54
and logic, 7, 36, 38, 44, 50
and mind, 6–7, 39, 109, 110
powers of, and Vannevar Bush, 61–62
arithmetic engine (Hooke), 135
armada, Spanish, 5, 133
Arms and Insecurity (Richardson), 87
army, French, in World War I, 86, 193–94
army, U.S., 67, 79, 80–81, 91, 145
art, and imagination, 222
artificial intelligence, 59, 128, 177, 179, 189, 211–14
alien, in origin or time scale, 187–88, 217, 224
and Babbage, 35, 41–42
and Butler, 24–26, 28, 33–34, 188
cautions against, 16, 24–26, 33–34, 192, 224, 226–27
collective, 7, 10–11, 13, 34, 72, 109–110, 172, 187, 192, 203–204, 209–210, 214
emergence of, 9, 11–13, 168, 172, 187, 204, 209–210, 211, 224, 228
and Gödelian incompleteness, 50, 70
and I. J. Good, 72, 170–71, 177, 203–204
and Hobbes, 2–3, 6–7, 35, 50–51
and Leibniz, 7, 35–36, 50–51, 73
and mathematical logic, 7, 157, 183
and meaning, 7–8, 171
paradox of, 182
and Smee, 46–48
and Turing, 53, 66–67, 68, 70–73, 117
unfulfilled promises of, 121, 157, 213–14, 218
and von Neumann, 108–10, 125, 157, 168
artificial life. see also symbiogenesis; Tierra
and Barricelli, 111–19, 121, 124–25, 128–30
and Butler, 15, 24–26, 28, 31, 33–34
cautions against, 24–26, 33–34, 127
and Hobbes, 1–2
origins and evolution, 9, 30, 32, 121–23, 125, 128–30, 172, 177, 202, 215–16, 228
and von Neumann, 76, 125, 155, 175, 190
Ashby, William Ross (1903–1972), 175–77, 184
AT&T (American Telephone and Telegraph Co.), 9, 149, 152, 180
Atlas (computer, Manchester University), 118, 119
Atlas (intercontinental ballistic missile), 145
atoms, not indivisible, 198
Aubrey, John (1626–1697)
on Hobbes, 5, 160
on Hooke, 134, 135–36
on Petty, 160, 161
autocatalytic systems, 29, 113, 189
automata, 1–2, 47, 89, 157. see also under von Neumann
cellular, anticipated by Lewis Richardson, 197
proliferation of, 2, 108–110, 125, 214
Automatic Computing Engine (ACE), 67–69
automobile, and Erasmus Darwin, 22
Aydelotte, Frank, 95, 99
B
B-mathematics (Barricelli), 120
Babbage, Charles (1791–1871), 35, 38–43, 48
and Augusta Ada, countess of Lovelace, 41
his calculating engines, 38–43, 59, 68, 103
on infinite powers of finite machines, 40, 42–43
his mechanical notation, 38–39, 49, 128
on natural religion, 35, 41–42
on packet-switched communications, 42, 81
back-propagation, in neural and financial nets, 169
Backus, John, 122
Bacon, Francis (1561–1626), 132
Bacon, (Friar) Roger (ca. 1214–1292), 212–14
Ballistic Missile Early Warning system, 146
ballistic missiles, 75, 76, 144–47, 180
Ballistic Research Laboratory, 80, 81
ballistics, 75, 79–80, 220
and evolution of digital computing, 75, 79–82, 224
and evolution of mind, 82, 219, 224
Bamberger, Louis, 95
bandwidth, 132, 147, 148, 216
and digital ecology, 206–207
and intelligence, 203–205, 209
Bank of England, 45, 162, 171
banks and banking, 11, 62, 159, 162–65, 167, 170, 171
Baran, Paul, 146–52, 168, 206–208
on cryptography and security, 152
on the Internet as a free market economy, 168
and packet switching, 146–52, 206–208
and RAND, 146–52
on wireless networks, 206–208
Barricelli, Nils Aall (1912–1993), 111–21, 124–25, 129. see also symbiogenesis
on evolution of evolution, 128, 191
on Gödel’s incompleteness proof, 120
and IAS computer, 113–18, 121, 124–25, 129, 192
on intelligence and evolution, 115, 187–88
on languages, 120, 123
on origins of genetic code, 129
on punched cards, 120
and von Neumann, 125
batch processing, 180
Bateson, Gregory, on information, 167
Baudot, Jean Maurice Émile, 65, 143
Baudot (teleprinter) code, 65, 105, 143
Beethoven, Ludwig van (1770–1827), 222
“Behavior, Purpose and Teleology” (Wiener, Rosenblueth & Bigelow), 101
“being digital,” Turing on, 69
Bell, E. T., 36
Bell Telephone Laboratories, 61, 144, 179
Berkeley, Edmund C., 108
Berlin, University of, 78
Bernal, J. D., (1901–1971), 13
Bigelow, Julian
and ancestry of microprocessors, 203
and founding of cybernetics group, 100–101
and IAS computer project, 100–107, 111
on purposive systems, 170
and von Neumann, 101, 102
and Wiener, 100–101
Billings, John Shaw (1839–1913), 60
BINAC (Binary Automatic Computer), 91
binary arithmetic, 7–8, 37, 44, 66, 89, 103, 106
biology, coined by Lamarck, 20
bits (of information), 7, 73, 106, 113, 180, 205, 216
nature of, 158, 216
origins of term, 61, 99
strings of, 32, 90, 104, 119, 129, 144, 150, 185
Black Cloud, The (Hoyle), 204
Blackwell, D. H., 146
Bletchley Park (code-breaking facility), 9–10, 63–67, 69, 72, 75, 88, 90, 104, 170, 204, 205. see also Colossus; Enigma; Fish
blind watchmaker, 116, 186, 189
Bombe (cryptanalytic machine), 64, 67
Book of Numbers, 142
“Book of the Machines” (Butler), 24, 26
Boole, George (1815–1864), 41, 43–45, 49
Boolean algebra, 43–44
Boolean arithmetic, and Colossus, 10, 65–67
Booth, Rob
ert, 17
Borel, Émile, 154
Boulton, Matthew (1728–1809), 21, 22
Boyle, Robert (1627–1691), 3, 6, 75, 134
brain. see also neural networks; neurology
capacity of, 136, 222
complexity of, 45, 71, 109, 158
and digital computers, 89–90, 108, 155–57
evolution of, 81–82, 218–19
as evolutionary system, 109–110, 156–57, 176, 187, 188
initial randomness of, 12, 71, 170, 175
and mind, 5, 45–48, 72, 87, 89, 109–110, 136, 155–59, 168, 176, 204, 214–15, 219, 225
and pulse-frequency coding, 156, 169, 225
statistical nature of, 45, 156, 168–69
Brainerd, John Grist (1904–1988), 81
Bramhall, John (bishop of Derry, 1594–1663), 4
brass head, legend of, 212–14, 224
Bricklin, Dan, 122
British Museum, 135
British Tabulating Machine Company, 64
Brodrick, Sir Alan, 161
Brookhaven National Laboratory, 118
Budapest, University of, 78, 89
Buffon, Georges Louis (1707–1788), 17, 20, 27, 154
Bungey, Friar, 212–14
Bureau of Standards, U.S., 79, 107
bureaucracy, and formal systems, 47, 49, 129
Burks, Arthur W, 77, 90, 93, 98, 99–100, 102–103, 121
Bush, Vannevar (1890–1974), 61–62, 80
Butler–Darwin quarrel, 17–18, 23–24, 26–27, 186–87
Butler, Dr. Samuel (1774–1839), 15
Butler, Reverend Thomas (1806–1886), 15, 24
Butler, Samuel (1835–1902), 15–18, 23–28, 31, 32–34
on artificial intelligence and artificial life, 15, 24–26, 28, 31, 33–34, 119, 191
and Charles Darwin, 17–18, 23–27, 186–87
on collective intelligence, 31, 34, 168, 187–88, 217–18
on evolution, 17–18, 23–28, 30, 119, 186–87, 217
on intelligence of evolution, 18, 27, 115, 124, 186–89
in New Zealand, 15–17, 24–25, 32–34
on origins of life, 28, 188, 216
on species-level intelligence, 18, 27, 116, 187–88
foresees World Wide Web, 33–34
Buxton, Harry Wilmot, on Babbage, 39–40
Byron, George Gordon Noel (1788–1824), 41
C
C.M. (anonymous telegraphist), 140
Cairns-Smith, A. Graham, 119, 202
calculus, 36, 39
logical, 7, 36–38, 43, 89
calculus ratiocinator, 36, 48
California Institute of Technology, 173
Darwin Among the Machines Page 36