The 3rd industrial revolution of 1969 brought us electronics, IT, and automation, leading to globalization, the internet, mobile phones, social media, e-commerce, and the latest “wonder child” – artificial intelligence (AI).
Unlike in many cases, AI has both “parents”.
The “father” of AI is John McCarthy, who coined the term “artificial intelligence” (1955) and founded the science with Alan Turing, Marvin Minsky, Allen Newell, and Herbert A.
The “mother” of AI however – who lived 100 years before a computer was built – is Lady Ada Lovelace, (1815-1852) daughter of the poet Lord Byron and Lady Byron who was a mathematician.
Ada Lovelace excelled in logic, maths, and science from an early age.
In her 20s, Ada engaged in collaborations with scientists of her time and the early explorations of calculating machines.
In her contributing notes, she presented her insights into an “analytical engine” – the theoretical precursor of computers built 100 years later – that could follow instructions based on numbers – a program – to perform complex calculation tasks. Her algorithm to compute Bernoulli numbers is considered the first algorithm written for a computer.
Ada suggested that computers could do much more than just calculations. She believed that if numbers were used to represent different things, such as letters or musical notes, then computers could manipulate these symbols according to specific rules. In this way, the “Analytical Engine,” a theoretical early computer, could, for example, create complex and scientific music compositions of any length or difficulty.
She expressed an interest in creating a mathematical model for how the brain gives rise to thoughts and nerves to feelings (“a calculus of the nervous system”) and worked on the relation of maths and music.
Ada stated that computational capacity is always informed by individual and subjective understandings, with user perceptive and reactive effects and experience not necessarily predicted by developers (The Lovelace effect).
Ada’s visionary mind used both art and metaphysics alongside mathematics, blending intuition and imagination with science, as tools to explore “the unseen worlds around us”.
She also envisioned the Lovelace test (an alternative to the Turing test) which – unsurprisingly – uses the concept of creativity to verify if AI can think like a human being and, with no programming, be spontaneously creative.
Ada died aged only 36, but leaving behind a significant mark that has been celebrated in many ways, such as:
– The computer language Ada, used by the US Department of Defence with the standard reference MIL-STD-1815, is named after her and her birth year;
– Ada Lovelace Awards, since 1981, by the Association for Women in Computing;
– Lovelace medal, since 1988, by the British Computer Society (BCS) with a competition for women students since 2008;
– Ada Lovelace Day, since 2009, to raise the profile of women in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and maths).
Significantly, the 2 parents of AI represent together reason and imagination, thinking and dreaming, pragmatism and aestheticism.
Adina Tarry
Business & Consumer Psychologist, Mentor, Author
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