So happy to see this pop up on hacker news again.
An anecdote (as far as I can remember it correctly), during one of his award lectures (after the 1997 Turing award), he was asked why he thinks that some of his tech was easily adapted (mouse etc.) and some others weren't (hyperlinks). He answered "Maybe the time is not right yet." ;)
Shameless self plug:
I'm part of a couple of crazy scientists and enthusiasts following work from Doug Engelbart, Wiener, Stelarc etc.
Our yearly conference is coming up next week:
https://augmented-humans.org/
> Can I get a raise of hands for folks who think "Dream Machines" is the #1 book on software? How about for those who believe that Engelbart's Augmenting Human Intellect is a driving force for humanity? And that software is a radical embodiment of that all? I think we can get a modest show of hands; I've seen enough confirming points of view from about. (Would that I have a memex to highlight all the mentions I've seen, all the other endorsements!)
Me, about an hour ago[1], in the "How can you not be romantic about software?" discussion. Amusing to see Doug echoed back on HN so quickly. Small world!
It's in reply to one of the most critical pieces of the thread, to me. The overarching article is somewhat fetishistic, just in to the wizardry of it all, the power, the skill. I was replying specifically to someone promoting the use of personal knowledge systems, to capture everything you are learning, to build a log & indexes. This, really, is the heart of what I find so romantic: this augmentative, compounding nature of software, of informatics. To gain heightened view points, and to make ourselves steersmen[2].
That thread included a shout out to Karli Coss, who has done more than anyone I've seen to draw together all the streams, to gather & create views of his own existence as it forms across the digital[2]. He's brought a wide range of software- from ebook readers to music players to web browsers- into his own domain, to build his extended brain. Karli has augmented his intellect far further than anyone else.
There's a lot of compelling things about software, a lot of ways to have fun. But of the ways to be romantic about programming, Augmenting Human Intellect is the most profound & resounding romantic notions that I have ever encountered. I see so many people engaged in software, but this seems like the core of where almost all real true meaning lives, and we should reshape our focus, abandon so much software, to chase an integrative, augmentative vision of computing in pursuit of this romance. We should be inspired, as Doug was.
i do not believe in the romantic part, but the Englebart vision and direction is what computers are for; everything else, while perhaps once praiseworthy, has become a diabolical local maxima.
Doug was a gem and we will be working to bring his ideas into the mainstream for many years to come. Steve Jobs was a big fan of Doug’s and would light up when he saw him but never funded his work as far as I know. Logitech gave him an office for many years as a thank you for the mouse. Like many geniuses, the appreciation for his work emerges long after his time.
My take on Doug's vision - having worked with him for a few years before his untimely departure:
While he is celebrated for the mouse, windows, and other ideas coming out of his lab, he should be better understood, not for the MotherOfAllDemos, but for what it meant (my opinions):
He spoke of the ABC architecture, where "C" work is the production line, "B" work is facilitating and improving C work, and "A" work is improving B work.
"A" work is where the concept flourishes: he spoke of networked imrovement communities (NICs) where the "A" team is an improvement community, and a NIC is those "A" teams in a network. Think IEEE as a NIC.
But, he didn't stop there. What is an improvement community? My interpretation is that he uses the term "Dynamic Knowledge Repository" (DKR) to explain the A team; "repository" does not refer to a bank account; rather, a DKR is a combination of human systems, tool systems, and the knowledge brought to the table by the humans. Draw a circle around that. That's how I interpret a DKR.
Key point to take home: all of the elements of a DKR are in a state of continuous coevolution. As humans improve, the tools they use must rise to the occasion.
What held back that concept, historically, has been the tool systems. When he did MOAD, I was working at IBM on OS 360 mainframes. That's what we had in the 60's. Today, my cell phone has more compute power and memory than one of the 360s I serviced back then.
It's for that reason that I am optimistic that we are on a path to realizing Doug's grand vision; our tool systems are now way ahead of we humans.
Something I can never quite explain to people is that when I can navigate the information faster, I can see deeper problems. Every time someone decided that this is good enough and that I “should be able to figure it out, what’s the big deal?” I am stymied.
Which would sound like someone whining about how the bigger kids are running too fast, but when I finally get fed up and fix the code, half the time I’m the one who spots the underlying problem that makes a big difference. Accidental complexity kills invention. Every time we make a better tool, we reduce the accidental complexity.
If we ever figure out how to draw or write directly from the motor cortex, no hands involved, that will be a new Enlightenment.
I'm very sympathetic to this, but I think you go too far with the conclusion!
If we did figure out drawing or writing without hands, I think that would be a noticeable, but still small improvement.
Much like with coding, the insight/information /s rate is very rarely keyboard limited.
A good programmer switching to Vim may help them a bit, and it can be a strong enough effect that lots of people will want to switch to better tools like Vim
But I doubt there's room enough in there to extract a whole new enlightenment from :)
Problem solving isn't keyboard-limited, but actually creating the solution definitely is.
Once I know what code needs to be written, I still need hours to actually type the damn thing out (not to mention the constant typos, deletions, reformatting, and so on). One of my loftier startup ideas is a Neuralink-PC interface that projects the code in your head to code on a screen.
The "Table of Contents" attempts to hold its original place on the page, even if its original place is below the fold. (My screen is not tall enough to access the table of contents at all)
I find this an ironic bit of User Interface failure.
> By "augmenting human intellect" we mean increasing the capability of a man to approach a complex problem situation, to gain comprehension to suit his particular needs, and to derive solutions to problems.
It sounds like general problem solving ie. Collect all the individual components of the problem and research the known methods of connecting the components to each other to achieve the desired result. When the desired result is found the problem is solved. It's how basic word problems are formatted. This is well documented. The problem is getting humans to follow the steps instead of making what they think are intuitive leaps but are really mental errors.
Is there a TL;DR version? Before you downvote, I don't want to invest hours into reading something when 80% of the value can probably be summarized into one paragraph.
BTW, I wonder how many of the people who upvoted this have actually read it.
If I was to add my own spin to the problem outlined, I think it would be one of information and organisation. If we can significantly improve the bandwidth of information flow between individuals and groups, and then more efficiently organised larger groups towards a singular task we could achieve many things.
Some groups do achieve great things but it's not clear to me that we've codified how this can be achieved and/or identified what is required for such success.
If the part of your brain responsible for reading things got shot off in the war, the smart move would be to find and watch the “Mother of all Demos” video in its entirety. It is how most people are introduced to Englebart’s ideas.
Theirs was definitely shot-off in The Great War. The only plausible excuses for not reading would be disabilities such as reading (lexical / comprehension) and/or attention. Dyslexia would be a tough one, as well as severe ADHD. I happen to have the latter but still forcibly plow through books.
It is good to have well-constructed readers to summarize and discuss implications of subject matter, but not as primary material, only to ensure mastery of it.
It wasn't, I read a lot, I just think it's really stupid and suboptimal to limit your learning and information consumption strategy to either fully reading (or skimming) long texts or ignoring them.
I mean, why not spend <1 minute reading a TL;DR when it can sometimes give you most of the value and if not, provide you with information whether it's worth reading the whole thing. It seems like a good deal, why avoid it?
I'd rather spend my time reading stuff thay has a higher expected value (e.g. a book about macroeconomics with great reviews if I'm interested in that topic) rather than random long texts on HN that can turn out to be complete garbage.
Englebart’s is a pretty good example of work you’ll want to spend some time exploring on your own if you can, simply because it’s important and you shouldn’t fully trust a typical summary of his ideas.
For example, plenty of people watch the demo I mentioned above and spend all their time marveling at the invention of the mouse, or some other detail of the hardware, rather than taking in what was really being explored by the users of the hardware in terms of human/computer and human/human interaction.
For what it's worth, wc tells me that the main text of the OP is about 44,500 words, and a web search suggests that the average adult reads 250-300 words per minute, which yields about 2.5-3.0 hours of reading time.
Good point! I don't think HN is catering for the average adult, however. A college student 500+ wpm is what I'd had in mind, and that along with the 131 pdf pages both suggest something around an hour to me.
(I didn't remember it being that long from both times I've read it, but I guess I found the thesis interesting enough that the time passed quickly?)
(Something else that I haven't seen pointed in this thread is that people with whose english is an L2 may legitimately be slower than in their L1.)
As a minor nit, the way it was said was a bit harsh, but it seemed to be done in the spirit of necessary, tough love.
I'm appalled by intellectual laziness and codependency these days. We have a mostly illiterate, ignorant, distracted, atomized society that doesn't read, doesn't dig into primary or even secondary sources, doesn't have critical thinking skills, is easily-manipulated by advertising, mainstream news, and social media, doesn't communicate in-person that much, and more and more people feel entitled to be spoon-fed answers and information like helpless chicks tweeting for a worm (the definition of codependency). Only by more people reading, learning, researching, thinking, and doing for themselves more often can these trends be reversed.
PSA: Turn off the screens and read a respectable nonfiction book more often, please.
"Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime." - English proverb
I think we should also be able to summarize but not exclusively or reaching a point of cargo-culting blindly because only one book priest can read. Against oversimplification: There are nuances and details that are often lost as the memetic game of "telephone" gets played and introduces mutations. Also, intellectual dilettancy, whereby people no longer master any other details other than utilitarian ones; history gets lost, anecdotes get lost, and so forth.
Writers should aim for concision where possible, but not skimp on evidence, rationale, or interesting anecdotes or analysis. Einstein said something about "irreducible basic elements" but never said "Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler."
Time and attention are valuable, but the essence shouldn't be sacrificed on the altar of expediency.
I honestly don't get this "you should read it" fetish.
I actually spend a lot of time reading. But if I have, say 4 hours per day allocated to reading, I want to choose material that gives me the highest possible value per minute of reading.
You're basically saying that the optimal learning and information consumption strategy is to always either read (or skim) the whole thing or ignore it. I disagree, the optimal strategy includes reading TL;DRs if available because they give you good value per unit of time or energy and they give you information whether it's worth to read the whole thing.
(Interestingly enough, Doug would agree with you. The irony of those condemning you is multi-layered. There's the first-order irony that those doing the condemnation probably haven't themselves read the thing they are upset with you about. The second-order irony is that the overall thrust of their clamor is directly opposed to the ideas that Doug expresses -- if only they knew it by reading for themselves...)
"I'm sorry, Dave, but I'm afraid you need to purchase the Universal Homework Cheating app from the App Store on your mobile device or move to Finland where there is no homework and better educational outcomes."
If AI/ML can be made general enough and enough computing horsepower is available, then a UHC is possible. Soon afterwards though, self-reprogramming will be possible, rendering most programmers and software engineers redundant. You then have to wonder what jobs cannot be automated until emotion AI and truly general AI arrive, and displace people into perhaps an economically-driven technological singularity / organic transcendence.
Shameless self plug: I'm part of a couple of crazy scientists and enthusiasts following work from Doug Engelbart, Wiener, Stelarc etc. Our yearly conference is coming up next week: https://augmented-humans.org/
Here's a preview of this years work ... happy to see some crazy works there as well. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YYmu2bFN6kE
Last year we had a keynote from Stelarc (linked from my blog): https://kaikunze.de/post/2020-02-18-augmented-humans/
edited: anecdote fixed + spelling