History of AI · Chapter 1

Dreams

Long before computers, people imagined machines that move, serve and think.

Automata

Book cover: Homer, The Iliad and The Odyssey
Homer, The Iliad and The Odyssey: 800–600 BC
C-3PO and R2-D2 from Star Wars
C-3PO
Poster for The Odyssey, a 2026 film by Christopher Nolan
The Odyssey: 2026
Poster for Troy, a 2004 film
Troy: 2004

The same stories, nearly 3,000 years apart: the Iliad already has Hephaestus' self-moving tripods and golden servants.

Aristotle

Book cover: Politics by Aristotle
Politics, written ~320 BC

Early attempts at automation and AI

A copy of Ars Magna with its paper rotating wheels
Ars Magna (~1300 AD) by Ramon Llull
A reconstruction of Leonardo da Vinci's automaton knight beside its mechanism
Automaton Knight (1495) by Leonardo da Vinci

The dream, dated

Positions are to scale in time: most of the story is waiting.