Peter de Bolla is Professor of Cultural History and Aesthetics at the University of Cambridge, UK. Between 2014–2018 he was Director of the Cambridge Concept Lab. He is the author of numerous academic works ranging from Wordsworth to American History, the sublime to human rights. He was a founding editor of Granta magazine and has written regularly for Granta, The LRB and other literary periodicals and magazines.

This compelling and brilliantly-argued book charts the career of an exceptionally important and visionary figure in the history of artificial intelligence. It establishes the remarkable importance of Margaret Masterman, philosopher and pioneer, theologian and theorist, whose collaborative research and brilliant innovations established the bases for radical models of human and machine language. De Bolla’s account completely changes every standard story of the history of AI and its direction of travel. This is a book that needs to be read by anyone concerned with the realities of artificial intelligence, the ways in which it has been designed, and its many possible futures.

• Foreword1. ‘One day it will be possible to do think with machines’ 2. ‘Learning to generalize freely and fancifully’: Masterman at Newnham, 1929 -1933 3. From theatre to commune: 1933-1951 4. Thinking machines: 1947-1952 5. The foundation of the CLRU: 1953 – 1956 6. Testing to destruction: 1957 7. The mechanization of thought processes: 1958 – 1961 8. Freeing the mind: 1962 9. ‘I don’t have words, I have phrases’: The Sands Hotel, Las Vegas, 1965 10. ‘Language is a dynamic corporate memory device’: The breakthrough of 1968 11. ‘Put on my tomb “This is what she was trying for”’ Appendix I: Timeline of early MT research.Appendix II: Significant papers and publications of Margaret Masterman.

Peter de Bolla is Professor of Cultural History and Aesthetics at the University of Cambridge, UK. Between 2014–2018 he was Director of the Cambridge Concept Lab. He is the author of numerous academic works ranging from Wordsworth to American History, the sublime to human rights. He was a founding editor of Granta magazine and has written regularly for Granta, The LRB and other literary periodicals and magazines.

This compelling and brilliantly-argued book charts the career of an exceptionally important and visionary figure in the history of artificial intelligence. It establishes the remarkable importance of Margaret Masterman, philosopher and pioneer, theologian and theorist, whose collaborative research and brilliant innovations established the bases for radical models of human and machine language. De Bolla’s account completely changes every standard story of the history of AI and its direction of travel. This is a book that needs to be read by anyone concerned with the realities of artificial intelligence, the ways in which it has been designed, and its many possible futures.

• Foreword1. ‘One day it will be possible to do think with machines’ 2. ‘Learning to generalize freely and fancifully’: Masterman at Newnham, 1929 -1933 3. From theatre to commune: 1933-1951 4. Thinking machines: 1947-1952 5. The foundation of the CLRU: 1953 – 1956 6. Testing to destruction: 1957 7. The mechanization of thought processes: 1958 – 1961 8. Freeing the mind: 1962 9. ‘I don’t have words, I have phrases’: The Sands Hotel, Las Vegas, 1965 10. ‘Language is a dynamic corporate memory device’: The breakthrough of 1968 11. ‘Put on my tomb “This is what she was trying for”’ Appendix I: Timeline of early MT research.Appendix II: Significant papers and publications of Margaret Masterman.

Peter de Bolla is Professor of Cultural History and Aesthetics at the University of Cambridge, UK. Between 2014–2018 he was Director of the Cambridge Concept Lab. He is the author of numerous academic works ranging from Wordsworth to American History, the sublime to human rights. He was a founding editor of Granta magazine and has written regularly for Granta, The LRB and other literary periodicals and magazines.

This compelling and brilliantly-argued book charts the career of an exceptionally important and visionary figure in the history of artificial intelligence. It establishes the remarkable importance of Margaret Masterman, philosopher and pioneer, theologian and theorist, whose collaborative research and brilliant innovations established the bases for radical models of human and machine language. De Bolla’s account completely changes every standard story of the history of AI and its direction of travel. This is a book that needs to be read by anyone concerned with the realities of artificial intelligence, the ways in which it has been designed, and its many possible futures.

• Foreword1. ‘One day it will be possible to do think with machines’ 2. ‘Learning to generalize freely and fancifully’: Masterman at Newnham, 1929 -1933 3. From theatre to commune: 1933-1951 4. Thinking machines: 1947-1952 5. The foundation of the CLRU: 1953 – 1956 6. Testing to destruction: 1957 7. The mechanization of thought processes: 1958 – 1961 8. Freeing the mind: 1962 9. ‘I don’t have words, I have phrases’: The Sands Hotel, Las Vegas, 1965 10. ‘Language is a dynamic corporate memory device’: The breakthrough of 1968 11. ‘Put on my tomb “This is what she was trying for”’ Appendix I: Timeline of early MT research.Appendix II: Significant papers and publications of Margaret Masterman.