AI milestones of the 1950s
4 documented milestones spanning 1950 to 1959. Mostly method and capability entries.
General Problem Solver introduced by Newell, Shaw and Simon
In 1959, Allen Newell and Herbert A. Simon at the RAND Corporation and Carnegie Institute of Technology, with J. C. Shaw, presented the General Problem Solver, a computer program that separated problem-solving strategy from domain knowledge using means–ends analysis.
Theory and foundationsThe Logic Theorist: first automatic theorem-proving program, developed by Newell, Shaw, and Simon
In late 1955, Allen Newell, J. Clifford Shaw, and Herbert A. Simon at RAND Corporation and Carnegie Institute of Technology completed the Logic Theorist, a computer program that proved mathematical theorems from Whitehead and Russell's Principia Mathematica by heuristic search, establishing that symbolic reasoning could be mechanised.
Theorem provingJohn McCarthy Coins the Term 'Artificial Intelligence' in the Dartmouth Conference Proposal
In 1955, John McCarthy of Dartmouth College, together with Marvin Minsky, Nathaniel Rochester, and Claude Shannon, submitted a proposal to the Rockefeller Foundation for a summer research workshop, introducing the term 'artificial intelligence' and framing machine intelligence as a formal field of scientific inquiry.
Theory and foundationsProgramming a Computer for Playing Chess, Claude Shannon
In March 1950, Claude Shannon, then at Bell Telephone Laboratories, published 'Programming a Computer for Playing Chess' in Philosophical Magazine, outlining two strategic approaches, exhaustive search (Type A) and selective heuristic search (Type B), that framed computer chess research for decades.
Theory and foundations