rggoebel@watdaisy.UUCP (Randy Goebel) (09/23/83)
The ``Alvey Report'' is the popular name for the following booklet:
A Programme for Advanced Information Technology
The Report of the Alvey Committee
published by the British Department of Industry, and available from
Her Majesty's Stationery Office. One London address is
49 High Holborn
London WC1V 6HB
The report is indeed interesting because it is a kind of response to
the Japanese Fifth Generation Project, but is is also interesting in
that it is not nearly so much the genesis of a new project as the
organization of existing potential for research and development. The
quickest way to explain the point is that of the proposed 352 million
pounds that the report suggests to be spent, only 42 million is for
AI (Actually it's not for AI, but for IKBS-Intelligent Knowledge Based
Systems; seniors will understand the reluctance to use the word AI after
the Lighthill report).
The areas of proposed development include 1) Software engineering,
2) Man/Machine Interfaces, 3) IKBS, and 4) VLSI. I have heard the
the most recent national budget in Britain has not committed the
funds expected for the project, but this is only rumor. I would appreciate
further information (Can you help D.H.D.W.?).
On another related topic, I think it displays a bit of AI chauvinism
to believe that anyone, including the Japanese and the British
are so naive as to put all the eggs in one basket.
Incidently, I believe Feigenbaum and McCorduck's book revealed
at least two things: a disguised plea for more funding, and a not so
disguised expose of American engineering chauvinism. Much of the American
reaction to the Japanese project sounds like the old cliches of
male chauvinism like ``...how could a women ever do the work of a real man?''
It just maybe that American Lisper's may end up ``eating quiche.'' 8-)
Randy Goebel
Logic Programming Group
University of Waterloo
UUCP: watmath!rggoebel