Video of Cray 1 and other artifacts...

[der Mouse]

> Is there such a thing as AI (I mean, outside of political circles)?

Define "AI" and maybe I can tell you. :)  I've seen it said that "the
core of AI is that which has not yet been done", and while I think that
might be overstating it, there is a germ of truth in it.  There was a
time when people would have said (and probably did say) that playing
chess as well as a human was evidence of real thought.  Thanks to Deep
Blue, we now disagree (I almost wrote "know better", but I'm not sure I
think that's an accurate phrasing).

> Has there been constructed any set of hardware or software that can
> pass the Turing test 100% of the time?

Yes, but the hardware is organic and the software is understood poorly
to not at all. :-)

The Turing test is not one for which 100% can be expected.

> Will there ever be one?

My guess is, probably.  My guess is also, probably not for quite a
while - I'd be surprised to see it this century.  For a third guess,
I'll say that this will be tatamount to creating life - that
Turing-test consciousness and life will turn out to be inextricably
linked.  Mind you, I'm not entirely sure what "life" means in this
context, so I'm not sure how meaningful that is.

> What is surprising is the prevalence of CRT-based displays in these
> old movies that purport to project "the future".  A technological
> blind spot the size of Texas.

No worse than any future-projection fiction's blind spot, in that they
can't imagine technology that isn't, well, imagined yet.

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