science & techanalysisThe Public Domain Review1700s · Europe
Automata, the mechanical figures of medieval and Renaissance courts, were an early chapter in the story of AI
Artificial intelligence has a long prehistory in automata, machines built to imitate living things. In 1739 Jacques de Vaucanson showed a mechanical duck that appeared to eat, digest and defecate; the digestion was a trick. Wolfgang von Kempelen's chess-playing Turk, built in 1770, was a hoax, with a human chess master hidden inside. There were also talking heads and mechanical religious figures. Such machines were meant to model how life and thought work, and their makers argued over whether intelligence could be mechanical. These debates anticipated modern questions about robotics and AI.
AI's questions about what it means to think, and whether imitation counts as the real thing, are centuries old. The history also warns about hype, since the Turk fooled audiences for decades.
The Turk toured Europe and America, beating opponents such as Napoleon and Benjamin Franklin, according to popular accounts, until it was destroyed in a fire in 1854.
background
An automaton (pl.: automata or automatons) is a relatively self-operating machine or control mechanism designed to automatically follow a sequence of operations or respond to predetermined instructions. Some automata, such as bellstrikers in mechanical clocks, are designed to give the illusion to the casual observer that they are operating under their own power or will, like a mechanical robot. The term has long been commonly associated with automated puppets that resemble moving humans or animals, built to impress and/or to entertain people.
Animatronics are a modern type of automata with electronics, often used for the portrayal of characters or creatures in films and in theme park attractions.
From Wikipedia: Automaton (CC BY-SA 4.0) ↗
Image: The Public Domain Review
