The concept of computers as brain amplifiers goes back to at least the 1950s, as part of the cybernetics movement.<p>Engelbart's "Augmenting Human Intellect" (1962) was a big influence of the idea that computers, which were mostly used for computations, should be seen as a "increasing the capability of a man to approach a complex problem situation, to gain comprehension to suit his particular needs, and to derive solutions to problems. ... We do not speak of isolated clever tricks that help in particular situations."<p>This essay, by comparison, likes that computers can be used to "trad[e] understanding for extreme speed of execution."<p>That sounds more like an isolated clever trick for computations, rather than the heart and soul of augmenting human intellect.<p>I suppose one way to view it is that Engelbart's vision is so much embedded in how most people think about computers that it's taken for granted that computer have mice, are networked, include sound and video, etc., and instead think that the computational abilities are what lead to brain amplification.