AI before AI: The forgotten Soviet programme (1/2)
Summary
In the 1950s, the Soviet Union started a program to develop artificial intelligence (AI), focusing on cybernetics, the study of communication between humans and machines. Soviet researchers made notable achievements, including developing Kaissa, the first computer to win a World Computer Chess Championship in 1974.Key Facts
- The Soviet Union began exploring AI in the 1950s, using cybernetics as a main approach.
- Cybernetics was sometimes viewed skeptically as a "bourgeois science" but was also promoted as important for scientific progress.
- The Soviet AI program focused on creating "thinking machines" and practical tools for managing the economy.
- Kaissa, a Soviet-developed chess computer, won the first World Computer Chess Championship in 1974.
- Alexander Kronrod led the team that developed Kaissa and is considered a key figure in Soviet AI.
- Dmitry Pospelov helped build support for AI research and criticized Western AI views that simplified intelligence to computer-like calculations.
- AI in the USSR was often used to improve industries such as oil and gas by optimizing processes.
- The Russian Association for Artificial Intelligence was created in 1989 as a result of these efforts.
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