To illustrate just how far expert systems have come, leader of the UK Alvey research programme Brian Oakley called to mind an anecdote from the life and times of Alan Turing, early on in a research visit to AT&T Bell Laboratories: the great mathematician was crystal ball gazing out loud in the canteen one day about the prospect of an intelligent computer – Oh it won’t be that intelligent, not a superbrain or anything, just a normal incompetent brain like… (pause for thought) like the president of Bell Labs has; Oakley believes that, 40 years on, we’re more or less there.
