Feynman was the reason that many a young kids became enamored with physics and drawn to science in more general. A true legend.<p>What many people don't know is that he was also a deep thinker about computers towards the latter part of his life and seems to have been increasingly more fascinated by them after his son started studying computer science at MIT.<p><a href="https://longnow.org/essays/richard-feynman-connection-machine/" rel="nofollow">https://longnow.org/essays/richard-feynman-connection-machin...</a>
Something interesting towards the end. Feynman describes Lenat's fleet in the game as being one giant ship with all the armour.<p>Previously I've heard that Lenat's winning fleet was many small ships.[0]<p>In a sense the details don't matter; what matters is that the winning solution was apparently quite different from all the other entrants submissions.<p>[0] <a href="https://www.wired.com/2016/03/doug-lenat-artificial-intelligence-common-sense-engine/" rel="nofollow">https://www.wired.com/2016/03/doug-lenat-artificial-intellig...</a>
My favorite quote from the Feynman lectures on computation:<p>“All we would lose by the omission of ‘parallel processing’ is speed, nothing fundamental.<p>We talked earlier about computer science not being a real science...”
Feynman Messenger lectures: brilliant!<p>Feynman on curiosity: lovely!<p>Feynman on Manhattan project: fascinating!<p>Feynman on cargo cults: funny!<p>Feynman on bongos: cool!<p>Feynman on quantum electro-dynamics: incomprehensible! (to me).<p>Feynman on computers: exhausting.
I found it kind of humorous this was done at the Esalen Institute, ground zero for a lot of the new age woo, considering Feynman's no-nonsense public persona and being the origin of the phrase 'cargo cult.' Maybe it had other draws.