Inven%ng

 The  Future  From  The  Future*  

 
(As  Opposed  To  
Incremen4ng  From  The  Present)  

Alan  Kay  

*i.e.  Trillions  Instead  of  Billions  

 Escaping  the  Tyranny  of  
the  Present*  
Talk  1:  Process  and  Methods  
Talk  2:  A  Few  Things  That  Need  To  Be  Known  

alan.viewpoints@yahoo.com  

*The  worst  possible  place  to  live!  

 SCHOOL IS THE
BEST THING EVER INVENTED
TO KEEP YOU FROM THINKING
ABOUT SOMETHING IMPORTANT
FOR MORE THAN A FEW
MINUTES!

—  Marvin  Minsky





Learn  the  rules  like  a  
pro,  so  you  can  break  
them  like  an  artist

(and  wakes  you  up!)

Art  is  a  lie  that  tells  the  truth
—  Pablo  Picasso
Modern Personal Computer “The GUI” WYSIWYG & DTP “Real OOP”
Bit-Map
Screens

Symmetrical
Pointing “Reading” and
“Writing”

~ “8 ½” Inventions
~ 25 Researchers ~ 5 Years
~ cost $10M-$12M/year today’s dollars
~ return $35+ Trillion Dollars and counting
~ 45 Years Ago
Laser Printer
~ an “Industry” rather than an “Increment”

PUP ARPA

Outline Fonts & Peer-Peer & Client-

Ethernet
Postscript Server
Personal Computer GUI WYSIWYG & DTP “Real OOP”
The “real Xerox PARC” ended in 1983 when
Bob Taylor
Bit-Map
got fired by Xerox and most of his
Computer
Screens
Science Lab left with him.

Any super advanced *deep invention* stuff with

~ “8 ½” Inventions
similar wealth creation happened in the 35
~ 25 Researchers ~ 5 Years
years since?
~$10M-$12M/year today’s dollars
~ $35+ Trillion Dollars and counting
The most
Laser Printer “interesting thing” has been the
contrast between appreciation/exploitation of the
inventions/contributions vs. the almost complete PUP

lack of curiosity and interest in the processes

Outline Fonts &
that produced
Postscript
them
Ethernet Peer-Peer & Client-
Server
Personal Computer GUI WYSIWYG & DTP “Real OOP”
The “real Xerox PARC” ended in 1983 when
Bob Taylor
Bit-Map
got fired by Xerox and most of his
Computer
Screens
Science Lab left with him.

Any super advanced *deep invention* stuff with

~ “8 ½” Inventions
similar wealth creation happened in the 35
~ 25 Researchers ~ 5 Years
years since?
~$10M-$12M/year today’s dollars
~ $35+ Trillion Dollars and counting
The most
Laser Printer “interesting thing” has been the
contrast between appreciation/exploitation of the
inventions/contributions vs. the almost complete PUP

lack of curiosity and interest in the processes

Outline Fonts &
that produced
Postscript
them
Ethernet Peer-Peer & Client-
Server
PARC was part of the ARPA Community (but funded by Xerox)
ARPA research started in 1962 (so 8+ years of prior art)
So about 12-14 years of funding to get the big inventions
The “larger community” started in WWII (so 30+ years)
“The  Present”  aka  “Normal”  aka  “Reality”  ca  1940-­‐~70s  

Most  computers  during  the  last  half  of  this  period  were  made  
to  replace  these  punched  card  accoun4ng  machines  
Try  to  see  the  technology  of  today  as  these  machines!  And  what  
you  are  doing  as  trying  to  replace  these  machines!  
S P
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t e
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s s
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a t
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e
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W MIT  Building  20  Radar  Project   r
o t
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T a
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g
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t
h
e SAGE  Air  Defense  
r
S P
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e g
n r
t e
i s
s s
t i
s s
a t
n
d ManhaVan  Project   h
e
E o
n n
g l
i y
n
e i
e m
r p
s
o
W MIT  Building  20  Radar  Project   r
o t
r a EVERYONE WILL
k n
i t HAVE ONE OF THESE
n g IN THEIR HOME
g MIT  Whirlwind  Project   o
a SOMEDAY!
T l
o
g
e
t
h
e
“Informa4on  U4lity”?  
r SAGE  Air  Defense  
“When  there  was  only  one  personal  computer”  …  
Ivan  Sutherland  -­‐  1962  

Sketchpad  –  A  Man-­‐Machine  Communica4on  System  

One  Bay  of  TX-­‐2  (1958-­‐78)  

MIT  Lincoln  Labs  
Sketchpad  –  A  Man-­‐Machine  Communica4on  System  
Ivan  Sutherland  -­‐  1962  

Programming  
by  Automa4c  
Constraint  
Solving  
Objects:  
Masters  &  
Instances  

Interac4ve  
Computer  
Graphics  
Automa4c  
Dynamic  
Simula4ons  
 ARPA-­‐Informa4on  Processing  Techniques  Office  (IPTO)  —  1962  
ARPA  Dream  
“Computers  are  des4ned  to  become  interac4ve  intellectual  amp-­‐
lifiers  for  everyone  in  the  world  universally  networked  worldwide”  
1.  Really  Advance  Something  Very  Important  
2.  Visions  not  goals—  “Visions:  Cosmic  and  Roman4c”  
3.  Fund  people  not  projects  
4.  Only  fund  the  very  best  people  (“MacArthur”  for  groups)  
J.C.R.  Licklider  “Lick”   5.  It’s  a  Research  Community,  not  a  research  project  
“Man-­‐Computer  Symbiosis”  
6.  Fund  Problem  Finding  —  not  just  Problem  Solving  
(1960)   7.  Milestones  not  deadlines  
8.  It’s  “Baseball”  not  “Golf”  (5  year  commitment)  

 ADVANCED  RESEARCH  PROJECTS  AGENCY  

!Washington 25, D.C. April 23, 1963!
!MEMORANDUM FOR: Members and Affiliates of the!
! Intergalactic Computer Network!
!FROM: J.C.R. Licklider!
… If we succeed
!SUBJECT: Topics for in making
Discussion an Forthcoming
at the Intergalactic
Meeting!
!
Network,
!
then our main problem will be!
learning to communicate with Aliens …!
The  goodness  of  the  results  correlates  most  
strongly  with  the  goodness  of  the  funders  

Lick  1962-­‐4   Ivan  1964-­‐6   Bob  Taylor  1966-­‐8   Larry  Roberts  1968-­‐70  

9.  You  can’t  think  inside  the  Beltway!  

10.  It’s  about  shaping  “computer  stuff”  to   12.  Sorware  drives  the  hardware,  rather  than  
human  ends  per  the  vision.  Much  of  the  Bme  this   vice  versa  
required  the  researchers  to  design  and  build  preFy  much  
everything,  including  much  of  the  hardware  —  including  a  variety  
of  mainframes  —  and  virtually  all  of  the  soKware  needed  
13.  “Living  Lab”  –  make  enough  of  the  
(including  OSs  and  programming  languages,  etc.).  Many  of  the   inven4ons  so  that  more  than  the  
ARPA  researchers  were  quite  fluent  in  both  HW  and  SW  (though  
usually  beFer  at  one  than  the  other).  This  made  for  a  preFy   inventors  can  use  them.  
homogeneous  compuBng  culture  and  great  synergy  in  most  
projects.   14.  Argue  for  clarity,  not  to  win  
11.  “if  you  can  make  your  own  tools,  HW  and   15.  An  important  part  of  the  research  results  
SW,  then  you  must!”.  The  above  goes  against  the   are  new  and  beVer  researchers.  This  extends  the  
commonsense  idea  that  “computer  people  should  not  try  to   “baseball”  idea  to  human  development.  The  grad  schools,  especially,  
make  their  own  tools  (because  of  the  infinite  Turing  Tarpit   generally  admiFed  people  who  “seemed  interesBng”  and  judgements  
weren’t  made  unBl  a  few  years  down  the  road.  Many  of  the  researchers  
that  results)”.  The  ARPA  idea  was  a  second  order  noBon:.   who  ulBmately  solved  most  of  the  many  problems  of  personal  compuBng  
The  idea  was  that  if  you  are  going  to  take  on  big  important  and   and  networking  were  created  by  the  ARPA  community.  
new  problems  then  you  just  have  to  develop  the  chops  to  pull  off  
all  needed  tools,  partly  because  of  what  “new”  really  means,  and  
partly  because  trying  to  do  workarounds  of  vendor  stuff  that  is  in  
16.  The  reaching  is  the  reward  
the  wrong  paradigm  will  kill  the  research  thinking.  
 “Got  six  bits?”  

Dynakit  “top  class”  Amp  

Now  get  a  college  degree  in  some  

of  the  difficult  parts  of  this  stuff!  
Homemade  Cloud  Chamber  
Cortlandt  St  NYC  
 “Techne”  (Gr)  and  “Ars”  (Ltn)  mean  “what  we  make”  

Tinkering  &  
Engineering  
Explora4on  

Today  

Mathema4cs   Science   Largest  

Qualita4ve  
POV  Change  
MOORE’S  LAW  

1995  
 1968  –  Mother  Of  All  Demos  

1964  –  Mouse  -­‐  Engelbart  &  English  

192K  Bytes!  
50  Years  Ago  —1967-­‐8  —  GRAIL  System  at  RAND  Corp  
1964  —  Tom  Ellis  and  the  RAND  Tablet  
P
r
o
g
r
e
s
s

What Is Actually Needed Yay!

Boo!

Better

Time ~ 20 Years
P
r
o
g
r
e
s What Is Actually Needed
s

Boo!

Better

Time ~ 20 Years
P
r
o
g e ded
r N e
e s A c tually
a t I
s Wh
s

Better

Time ~ 20 Years
 BeVer  and    are  
the  two  enemies  of  
What  Is  Actually  Needed!  

P
r n   se e !   e t   S pot”  
o I  ca d y   “Swe
re a
g ed MacC
r N e e d
e s A c tually
a t I Problem  Finding  
s Wh Learning  Curve  
s (about  8-­‐10  years  
for  ARPA-­‐IPTO)  

US  Moon  Shot  

Better
ARPA-­‐IPTO  

Time ~ 20 Years
P
r n   se e !   e t   S pot”  
o I  ca d y   “Swe
re a
g ed MacC
r N e e d
e s A c tually
a t I
s Wh Problem  Finding  
s Learning  Curve  
(about  8-­‐10  years  
for  ARPA-­‐IPTO)  

Better
ARPA-­‐IPTO  

Time ~ 20 Years
Having a really reactive computer? … and “of your very own”?

LINC   1962   1968  

Cosmic Goodness!
Wes  Clark  

Good Idea! Dynabook  

1955  

Harry  Huskey  
1967-­‐9  
Cheadle  &  Kay  
 Wayne Gretzky Game  
9.  Bingo!  
4.  Can  we  say  
“it  would  be  
ridiculous  if  
we  didn’t  
have  this!”?  
YES!  

8.  compute  “in  
the  future”  

$  
ture  

1.  “cosmic  
6.  make  a  bunch  of  flexible  
 fu

goodness”  
supercomputers  to  run  and  
W  for

intuiBon   2.  IdenBfy  “favorable  

adapt  to  design  learning  
ent  S

  exponenBals”  
7.  inv

1968   1970   1975   1980   1990   2000  

 Bringing  The  Future  Back  To  Now  
vs.  
Trying  To  Move  The  Present  Ahead  

Talk  1:  Process  and  Methods  

Talk  2:  A  Few  Things  That  Need  To  Be  Known  
Of  The  ^  
Many  
alan.viewpoints@yahoo.com  
What  is  more  important?  

Lead!  

Simplest  
Snare  
Context?  
“IQ”?   Outlook?   Knowledge?  
World  View?  
Point  of  View?  
0.  Point  of  View  =  80  IQ  Points!  
1.  Debugging  is  
harder  than  
programming  so  
don’t  use  all  your  
cleverness  to  write  
the  program!  

…  or  to  make  

anything!  

Tony  Hoare  
ACM  Turing  Laureate  
2.  Medicis:  the  goodness  of  the  results  correlates  
most  strongly  with  the  goodness  of  the  funders  

Lick  1962-­‐4   Ivan  1964-­‐6   Bob  Taylor  1966-­‐8   Larry  Roberts  1968-­‐70  

ARPA  Dream  
“Computers  are  des4ned  to  become  interac4ve  intellectual  amplifiers  
for  everyone  in  the  world  universally  networked  worldwide”  
3.  Really  Advance  Something  Very  Important   12.  It’s  about  shaping  “computer  stuff”  to  human  
4.  Visions  not  goals  —  “Visions:  Cosmic  and   ends  per  the  vision.    
Roman4c”   13.  “if  you  can  make  your  own  tools,  HW  and  
5.  Fund  people  not  projects   SW,  then  you  must!”..  
6.  Only  fund  the  very  best  people   14.  Sorware  drives  the  hardware,  rather  than  
7.  It’s  a  Research  Community,  not  a  research   vice  versa  
project   15.  “Living  Lab”  –  make  enough  of  the  inven4ons  
8.  Fund  Problem  Finding  —  not  just  Problem   so  that  many  can  use  them.  
Solving   16.  Argue  for  clarity,  not  to  win  
9.  Milestones  not  deadlines   17.  An  important  part  of  the  research  results  are  
10.  It’s  “Baseball”  not  “Golf”   new  and  beVer  researchers.    
11.  You  can’t  think  inside  the  Beltway!   18.  The  reaching  is  the  reward  
 1962  
1964-­‐8  
Sketchpad  
Ivan  Sutherland  
GRAIL  
Ellis  &  Groner  

NLS  
Engelbart  &  English   “Helmet”  
1962-­‐8   Ivan  Sutherland  1968  

1955   1967-­‐9   1968  

1962   Cheadle  &  Kay  
LINC  

Harry  Huskey  

Wes  Clark  
Dynabook  
 19.  BeVer  and    are  
the  two  enemies  of  
What  Is  Actually  Needed!  

20.  Design  and  build  in  the  

Future,  then  bring  results  
back  to  the  present  
Personal Computer GUI WYSIWYG & DTP “Real OOP”

Bit-Map
Screens
50% 70% 70% 10%
Pointing

VHLL CPU ARPA

90% Chip 10%

0%
ca 72-78
0%
~ 50% Internet of Objects
Laser Printer

100% PUP ARPA

100% 50%
100%
Outline Fonts & Peer-Peer & Client-
Ethernet
Postscript Server
  
GUI  
WYSIWYG & DTP “Real OOP”
Personal Computer

Bit-Map

21.  “Reality”  is  a  

Screens
50% 70% 70% 10%

Low  Pass  Filter!  

Pointing

 
Try  
90% To  Avoid  10% Winding  
VHLL CPU
Chip
0%
ARPA

Up  With  A  Dial  Tone!  

ca 72-78
0%
~ 50% Internet of Objects
Laser Printer

100% PUP ARPA

100% 50%
100%
Outline Fonts & Peer-Peer & Client-
Ethernet
Postscript Server
Our
Trillions

Alan C. Kay
Most  Light  Sensi4ve  Cells   No  light  sensi4ve  cells  
(fovea)   (“blind  spot”)  
Most  Light  Sensi4ve  Cells   No  light  sensi4ve  cells  
(fovea)   (“blind  spot”)  
Powerful  Idea:  
22.  We  have  a  blind  spot  
in  our  eyes  that  our  brain  
makes  up  stuff  to  fill  in!  

Powerful  Idea  About:  

23.  We  can’t  learn  to  *see*  
un4l  we  realize  (and  admit)  
that  we  are  blind!  

Powerful  Idea  About:  

0.  It  makes  a  huge  difference  if  
Ideas  are  experienced  in  as  
many  ways  as  possible!  
 A  Private  
“Alternate   UTniverse  
Beliefs  ruths”  

A  Private  The   Dream  

Waking   Dream  

24.  Our  “Mind’s  Eye”  is  different  than  our  “Sensory  Eye”  
A  beauBful  Pink  world  —  but  you  can’t  see  Pink  —  you  might  not  think  to  look  all  the  way  up  
Einstein  at  4  or  5  years  old  

25.  ”There  is  something  behind  

things,  something  deeply  hidden."  
Tradi4onal  human  socie4es  
don’t  know  they  are  “inside  
an  outlook”.  They  think  they  
live  in  “reality”.    
We  had  to  invent  the  idea  of  
“outlook”!  
McLuhan  asked  and  answered:  “What  is  wri4ng  and  prin4ng  as  an  environment?”  
 “What  is  “media”  as  an  environment?”  
McLuhan  and  Postman  asked  and  answered:  “What  is  television  as  an  environment?

This  is  like  a  tradi4onal  society  or  like  France!  

We  need  to  ask  and  answer:  “What  is  social  media  as  an  environment?”

We  are  tuned  to  the  visible,  the  

small,  the  nearby,  the  quick,  the  
soon,  the  few,  and  the  social  
Human  Universals   Human  Non-­‐Universals  
Hun4ng/Gathering   Agriculture  
Coping  
Social  
Wri4ng  &  Reading  
Oral  Language   Deduc4ve  Abstract  Math  
Culture  
Model  Based  Science  
“Smarts”   About  300  
Fantasies   of  these  have   New  
Stories   been  iden4fied   Progress  
Music   —  
News   Gene4cs  driving  
Knowledge  
Theater   Culture;  Culture   Context  
Supers44on   comple4ng  
Religion/Magic   Self-­‐consciousness  
Gene4cs  
Tools,  Art,  Technologies   Thought,  Thought,  Thought  
Salt,  Sugar,  Fat,  ….  
Goals,  Plans  ...   Equal  Rights  
Play  &  Games   Democracy  
Fixed  Rules,  Flexible  Strategies  
Case  based  learning   Similari4es  over  Differences  
Case  based  reasoning   Slow  Deep  Thinking  
Quick  Reac4ons  To  PaVerns  
Differences  over  Similari4es  
Legal  System  vs  VendeVa  
"The  Other"   Perspec4ve  Drawing  
Supernormal  Responses  
Theory  of  Harmony  
VendeVa,  Revenge  
Value  Shortages   …  
Human  Universals   Human  Non-­‐Universals  
Hun4ng/Gathering   Agriculture  
Coping  
Social   L   V  
Wri4ng  &  Reading  
Oral  Language  
Culture   e   e  
Deduc4ve  Abstract  Math  
Model  Based  Science  
“Smarts”  
Fantasies   g   About  300  
New  
r   T  
of  these  have  
y   o  
Stories  
Music   a   been  iden4fied   Progress  
       
News  
Theater   l     Human  Wants  
Knowledge  
D   L   Human  Needs  
Context  
Supers44on  
Religion/Magic  
  I   e  
Self-­‐consciousness  
D  
Tools,  Art,  Technologies   a   Thought  
f   Thought,  
Thought,  
r  
Salt,  Sugar,  Fat,  ….  
Goals,  Plans  ...  
Learning  
f  Rights  r  
Equal  

u  
Play  &  Games  
Fixed  Rules,  Flexible  Strategies   Curve  on  these  
I   n  
Democracy  
Similari4es  !  
g  
Case  based  learning   “built-­‐ins”  is  s4ll   c   over  Differences  
preVy  darn  
Case  based  reasoning  
s  
Quick  Reac4ons  To  PaVerns   long!   u  
Slow  Deep  Thinking  
Legal  System  vs  VendeVa  
Differences  over  Similari4es   l  
"The  Other"   !  
Supernormal  Responses  
Perspec4ve  Drawing  
t  
Theory  of  Harmony  
VendeVa,  Revenge  
Value  Shortages   …  
Note  that  our  words/categories/pictures  are  very  poor  at  systems  
We  like  Things  rather  
than  Rela4onships!  

All  Are  Invisible!  

The  Systems  We  Live  In,  

The  Systems  We  Are  
 A  Large  Part  Of  Our  Mind  
Fights  What  We  Can  Learn