[SIGCIS-Members] Anyone in the UK want a talk March 19 to April 2?

Tue Feb 4 14:27:41 PST 2025

Hello SIGCIS,

I am currently a participant in the Modern History of Mathematics program at
the Isaac Newton Institute (https://www.newton.ac.uk/event/mhm/). As I still
have a job in Milwaukee to do, I'm mostly in the US this semester, but was
in residence for most of Jan and will be back in late-March and early April
to coincide with the main period of activity for a subproject on the history
of data and computing.

The institute encourages residents to give talks elsewhere in the UK, and
even has some travel funding available for the purpose though I am not sure
what the terms and details of that are. So if any of you are in the UK and
would like me to try to set up a visit to give a talk, let me know and we'll
see what can be worked out. 

My main talk currently is called "Artificial Intelligence: The Brand that
Wouldn't Die" and presents material from my CACM series (described in my
earlier message below) and upcoming book. But I also have talks on ENIAC
labour, early data base management history, etc. I've also got a talk about
A New History of Modern Computing should anyone be really into the
historiography of computing, and a talk that adapts my article "Hey Google,
What's a Moonshot: How Silicon Valley Mocks Apollo" which I could freshen a
little to acknowledge the huge sums currently being talked about around AI
investment.

Some dates during the period are earmarked for activities at the institute.
The best for a talk would be March 19-21 which are entirely free, but I can
also be free Mar 31-April 2 and, depending on how things shape up,
potentially on a couple of other days.

Best wishes,

Tom

Thomas Haigh

Professor & Chair, UWM History Department

Chair, IEEE Computer Society History Committee

Director, ACM History Committee Turing Awards Project

See more at  <http://www.tomandmaria.com/Tom> www.tomandmaria.com/Tom 

From: thomas.haigh at gmail.com <thomas.haigh at gmail.com> 
Sent: Monday, January 13, 2025 4:39 PM
To: members at sigcis.org
Subject: History of AI series in CACM

Hello SIGCIS,

CACM recently put up the online version of the fifth and final part in my
history of AI series, which has been appearing slowly over the past year and
a half. These add up to a very short history of AI from 1955 to the present.

1.	Conjoined Twins: Artificial Intelligence and the Invention of
Computer Science," Communications of the ACM 66:6 (June, 2023):33-37.
https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/3593007   
2.	"There Was No 'First AI Winter'," Communications of the ACM 66:12
(December 2023):35-39. https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/3625833
3.	"How the AI Boom Went Bust," Communications of the ACM 67:2
(February 2024):22-26.  https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/3634901
4.	"Between the Booms: AI in Winter," Communications of the ACM 67:11
(November 2024):18-23. https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/3688379
5.	"Artificial Intelligence Then and Now," Communications of the ACM
68:2 (February 2025).
https://cacm.acm.org/opinion/artificial-intelligence-then-and-now/

A somewhat less short (circa 50K words) version of this story will be
appearing as an MIT Press book with the working title Artificial
Intelligence: The History of a Brand. Other than more detail, context, and
human background a main difference is that each short chapter in the book
features a relatively detailed case study of a classic AI-branded system.
This is a short history of AI in all senses, focusing on the brand itself
and the relationship of AI to the development of computer science as a
discipline. Given the huge industry focused on writing about modern AI the
focus is almost exclusively on AI prior to the recent boom, with a brief
discussion of contemporary approaches there primarily as a contrast. 

In all formats, I've been making an effort to showcase a variety of
interesting work that's been appearing on the topic from younger scholars
over the last few years.

In November I was at the IWM in Vienna as the Senior Digital Humanism
fellow. While in town I also agreed to teach a compressed graduate course
for the compute science students at the technical university, using a draft
of the book as the core text. You can see the syllabus at
https://www.tomandmaria.com/Tom/TUW

If anyone is interested in trying out a newer draft of the book for teaching
in the summer or fall then let me know and I'll see what I can do.

Best wishes,

Tom

Thomas Haigh

Professor & Chair, History Department, University of Wisconsin--Milwaukee

Chair, IEEE Computer Society History Committee

Director, ACM History Committee Turing Awards Project

See more at www.tomandmaria.com/Tom <http://www.tomandmaria.com/Tom>  

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