Endorsements for
"The HAL 9000 computer and the vision of
2001: A Space Odyssey"

Illustrated lecture by
David G. Stork
Ricoh California Research Center
and Stanford University

• "I'd like to thank you for a wonderfully entertaining and informative banquet talk that you gave at the Symposium on Technologies for Intelligent Systems held in honor of Professor Laveen Kanal's retirement. It was clear that everyone in the audience thoroughly enjoryed the talk. I found comparisons of the state of the art in artificial intelligence and its anticipation by the movie makers three decades ago particularly interesting."
  
  Vipin Kumar
  Professor, Computer Science Department
  University of Minnesota
  kumar@cs.umn.edu
  
  
• "I thought your talk was excellent for our banquet. You kept the non-technical people interested by relating to the movie and to popular conceptions of robots and computers, and at the same time mixed in enough technical components to keep the interest of the experts in the field of AI. Also, I thought you did a fine job of rotating through the different media in your delivery. And, of course, in keeping with the abrasive politial season, you added your own boast that Kasparov will be beaten by a computer chess program next Spring! (Thinking the probability much less than 50%, I would take a bet on that.) Thanks again for contributing this great talk to our Symposium."
  
  George Stockman
  Professor, Computer Science Department
  University of Minnesota
  stockman@cpswells.cps.msu.edu
  
  
• "On October 11 and 12, 1996, my former students together with the Dept. of Computer Science of the Univ. of Maryland at College Park, organized a two day symposium on Technologies for Intelligent Systems to mark my retirement from the University and to celebrate my 65th birthday. At the banquet on the evening of Oct. 12, Dr. David Stork of the Ricoh California Research Center gave a highly engaging talk based on his forthcoming book, HAL's Legacy: 2001's computer as dream and reality. I found the talk, with its video and sound clips from the movie 2001, very interesting, illuminating and entertaining. Comments from others who were there confirmed that most of the audience, consisting of both technical professionals,their spouses, my family and friends, enjoyed the talk and found it very well conceived and pesented. I thank Dr. Stork for taking the time to come to my retirement/birthday banquet to give his talk. It fit the occasion perfectly."
  
  Laveen N. Kanal
  Prof. Emeritus of Computer Science
  Univ. of Maryland at College Park
  kanal@mimsy.umd.edu
  
  
• "Thank you for the enlightening and entertaining talk about HAL's Legacy which you gave to the MIT Club of Northern California this past Tuesday. The content and presentation style were excellent. You drew attention to numerous important subtleties which will certainly enhance my appreciation of future viewings of this classic film. I enjoyed your commentary about various research projects prior to 1968, as well as subsequent efforts to realize the dream of a highly intelligent computer. The brief video clips were very effectively woven into your live presentation."
  
  John Keen
  Events Coordinator, MIT Club of Northern California
  Silicon Graphics Corporation
  jkeen@sgi.com
  
  
• "Your talk was very well received. I had a number of people come up to me after the presentation and stated they thought your talk was the best SIGCSE luncheon talk they have ever heard (and I thought we have had some good speakers in the recent past!). It held their interests, it was extremely timely and relevant, and the mixture of sound and video with the talk was very well done. Thank you very much for being our luncheon speaker."
  
  Professor Curtis White
  Dominican University
  ACM SIGCSE
  whitecm@email.rosary.edu
  
  
• "Thank you for spending some time with us and delivering an entertaining and informative talk entitled, 'The HAL 9000 computer and the vision of 2001: A Space Odyssey.' The presentation intermeshed nicely an approximately 30 year old view of computer science predictions with the current reality. In light of your discussion of HAL's chess playing ability, it is remarkable that Deep Blue defeated Kasparov shortly after your visit. Thanks again for your fine presenatation! Your talk ranks with the very best in in our distinguished Cowper Lecture Series."
  
  Joseph J. Tufariello
  Dean
  Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics
  State University of New York at Buffalo
  chejjt@msmail.buffalo.edu
  natscidean@acsu.buffalo.edu
  
  
• "Our survey of attendees at this year's Intelligent User Interfaces conference (IUI98) indicated high satisfaction with the invited speakers in general, and several respondents praised Dr. Stork in particular. Not only was his presentation informative and entertaining -- a perfect capstone address, in my personal opinion -- but several of his themes resonated strongly with aspects of the technical program. Researchers in our area would do well to read his book and watch the movie again!"
  
  Joe Marks
  Mitsubishi Electronics Research Lab (MERL)
  IUI98 Program Committee
  marks@merl.com
  
  
• "I was happy to see a presentation that led to an excited room of students during and after your talk. HAL's Legacy points out the many difficult problems that must still be solved before we will encounter an entity like HAL. The lecture did a great job of pointing out why these problems are hard and what some of the interesting directions are in attempts to solve them. This is a lecture that can be enjoyed bya ll audiences, technical and non-technical."
  
  James A. Landay
  Assistant Professor
  Computer Science Division, EECS Department
  University of California at Berkeley
  landay@cs.berkeley.edu
  
  
• "Your talk on HAL's Legacy could not have been more appropriate for the audience of the 'Machines that Learn' workshop. The long-term goal of many people at the workshop is to build machines with the same abilities as HAL. If they are like me, the movie '2001: A Space Odyssey' may have had an influence on their choosing a career in Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning. We are living proofs of a claim you made during your talk: Science fiction movies that get the Science right can have a profound and positive effect on young minds. You remind us that HAL was 'built' in 1997. This is the only time I took pleasure being told that I missed a deadline."
  
  Yann Le Cun
  Head, Image Processing Research Department
  AT&T Labs - Research
  yann@research.att.com
  
  
• "Students and faculty from Film, English, and all the sciences enjoyed the third and final Winifred Asprey Lecture in Computer Science this past Monday, given by Dr. David Stork. The talk delivered precisely what it promised: generous helpings of the movie '2001: A Space Odyssey' (including plenty of breathing) with commentary on where Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence are today in comparison to HAL. The talk was at the perfect level for the audience, with enough technical flavor to interest everyone, but not too much to confuse or insult anyone. It is normally a tall order, but from computer science students fresh out of coding their own minimax heruistics to film majors wondering how the astronauts floated in space, the entire audience was entertained and informed."
  
  Christopher A. Welty
  Department of Computer Science
  Vassar College
  weltyc@cs.vassar.edu
  
  
• "On behalf of the AI Meets the Real-World '98 Lessons Learned Meeting, I'd like to thank you for an excellent key-note address on 'HAL's Legacy: 2001's computer as dream and reality.' Your talk took many us back to our roots of why we entered this field in the first place and the visions we have had that shaped all of our work. Through an excellent mix of video clips both from the movie and relevant historical work in the field, you provided a unique perspective of how the field has been influenced and evolved these past decades. On top of that, I personally found the talk highly entertaining and thought provoking, among the best I've attended in a long while. Thank you again for providing us this great talk!"
  
  Eugene Santos Jr.
  Department of Computer Science and Engineering
  University of Connecticut at Storrs
  eugene@cse.uconn.edu
  
  
• "We greatly enjoyed your post-banquet talk on 'The HAL 9000 Computer and the Vision of 2001' at the 1999 International Joint Conference on Neural Networks. With both highly technically oriented scientists and engineers and nontechnical spouses and friends making up the audience, you struck exactly the right balance between entertainment and science. Your presentation was both extremely enjoyable and very thought provoking. It was also right on target for the theme of the Conference and was certainly the high point of our evening."
  
  David G. Brown
  General Chair, IJCNN'99
  dgb@cdrh.fda.gov
  
  
• "On behalf of the IEEE-sponsored International Workshop on Automatic Speech Recognition and Understanding (ASRU99), we would like to thank you for the excellent keynote address entitled 'The HAL 9000 computer and the vision of 2001 a Space Odyssey' which you presented on December 14th, 1999, at Keystone Colorado. Your talk touched on a variety of topics of great interest to attendees of this workshop. It was not only informative and entertaining, but also provided a vision on the path that human interface technology has followed and will follow in the future. Thanks David for a very enjoyable talk!"
  
  Mazin Rahim
  General chair, ASRU99
  AT&T Shannon Laboratory
  mazin@research.att.com
  
  Roberto Pieraccini
  Technical committee, ASRU99
  SpeechWorks
  roberto.pieraccini@speechworks.com
  
  
• "The talk provided interesting and penetrating insights into the riveting Kubrick movie of the 60's. The comparison of the HAL's capabilities with the current capability in speech understanding, speech synthesis, and computer cognition were especially interesting."
  
  Professor Bill Bynum
  College of William & Mary
  Department of Computer Science
  bynum@cs.wm.edu
  
  
• "We have received many positive comments from the audience about your energetic presentation style and your informative (and entertaining) subject matter. You lecture gave our research personnel a different perspective on R&D. Though your talk dealt with a field far different from materials science, which they deal with on a day-to-day basis, the idea of perception and learning is central to the scientific approach. Many "water-cooler" discussions and out-of-the-box thinking have been generated at our research center by an eminent guest lecturer such as yourself."
  
  Blaise Champagne
  Director General
  National Research Council Canada
  blaise.champagne@nrc.ca
  
  
• "A standing room only audience of the Electronic Imaging 2001 symposium delegates assembled in the San Jose Convention Center's largest meeting room were treated to an exceptionally informative, thought provoking, and entertaining plenary speech by David Stork of Ricoh Silicon Valley's California Research Center and Stanford University. It was perfect timing, January 2001, for David's well-crafted and engaging presentation entitled "The HAL 9000 Computer and the Vision of 2001: A Space Odyssey." Presented with just the right mix of facts, philosophy, and humor, Dr. Stork reviewed the vision and attention to detail of Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke which makes 2001 such a scientifically precise film. As we all know, it is exceedingly difficult to predict what will happen next year in science and engineering let alone thirty plus years into the future. David's intriguing analysis caused the audience to reflect on the many areas where Kubrick's and Clarke's vision for the future is surprisingly accurate and where science and engineering has fallen short from computer chess to computer graphics, computer speech and emotion, linguistic abilities, and machines with basic common sense. Based on the many comments received after his talk, it is clear that David's presentation was the highlight of the symposium."
  
  Marshall Weathersby
  Associate Executive Director
  SPIE - The International Society for Optical Engineering
  marshall@SPIE.org
  
  
• "The Tech Museum of Innovation (located in San Jose, California) was proud to host Dr. Stork as part of our special exhibition, "2001: Destination Space." Dr. Stork's in-depth knowledge and indisputable credibility added rich content and fine detail to our exhibit. His lecture was a uniquely valuable education experience for our guests. After hearing Dr. Stork, one listener commented, "I have a whole new appreciation for '2001'." Another said, "Dr. Stork changed the way I will look at science fiction." David helped The Tech achieve its goal of "inspiring the innovator in everyone."
  
  Greg Brown
  Vice President, Exhibits and Technology
  The Tech Museum of Innovation
  gregb@thetech.org
  
  
• "I just wanted to thank you again for your participation in ICASSP 2001. Your talk was a perfect fit for the theme of our conference, and was very well received. We had a number of people tell us that the keynote and plenary speakers for the conference were the best ever for any ICASSP. We appreciate your part in making the conference a success.
  
  V. John Mathews
  Department of Electrical Engineering
  University of Utah
  mathews@sierra.elen.utah.edu
  
  
• "Thank you so much for giving your talk on HAL's Legacy at the 17th International Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI-01) in Seattle on August 8, 2001. Your presentation was expertly done, informative, insightful, and extremely well received. The attendance of some 1000 people and their enthusiastic questions and applause speaks for itself. The coincidence of the year 2001 and the very year proclaimed in the title of the movie, "2001: A Space Odyssey," made the occasion perfect for an Artificial Intelligence audience. As you made abundantly clear in your presentation: "they got the science right." While we're not, of course, even close to inventing anything with the capabilities of the HAL 9000 (and we may never be able to do so), one can't help but be inspired by the AI vision that the movie embodies."
  
  James E. Hoard
  Senior Manager, Natural Language Processing
  Mathematics and Computing Technology
  Boeing Phantom Works
  and Local Arrangements Chair, IJCAI-01
  james.e.hoard@boeing.com
  
  
• "It was quite a treat to have Dr. Stork come to our Nichols College campus as part of our special cross-campus program on "The Future of the Internet." For two weeks in October, the college organized classes and events around the central theme. Dr. Stork was the closing speaker, and invited students to use their imagination about the future of computer technology. His was a delightful and intellectually challenging talk that brought technology assumptions made in the past to bear on technology predictions of the future. He fascinated us all with his research and his predictions of tomorrow's "Hal." Having engaged with Dr. Stork personally, we especially look forward to his documentary soon airing on PBS."
  
  Libba Moore
  Associate Professor of Human Resources
  Nichols College
  libba.moore@nichols.edu
  
  
• "Science and Engineering and humanities types alike filled the hall for your electric talk and left the room buzzing about Hal, artificial intelligence, and the future of technology. They were astounded, challenged, and, of course, entertained. Thanks for speaking to both halves of the university brain with your lecture, addressing both the technological and the human obstacles to AI. Hal lives in your talk, or at least, he's back. Surely, the multi-media presentation allowed our students to contemplate the future and the larger questions of intelligence without drifting into deep space. While chess players have watched the toppling of their idols, we, the simple, object-recognizing humans felt quite validated. Thanks from the Colleges of Science and Engineering, The Bellarmine College of Liberal Arts and the First Year Institute of Loyola Marymount University."
  
  Mark Marino
  mmarino@lmu.edu
  First Year Institute
  Loyola Marymount University
  
  
• "Thanks for giving such a fascinating keynote at the Winter Simulation Conference, 2001. Our conference has a 34 year history, and I heard from many of our long time attendees that your presentation of HAL and 2001: A Space Odyssey was the best keynote we have ever had at our conference. I received a lot of feedback with words like "spellbinding," "captivating," and "enthralling" when attendees talked about your presentation. The keynote set the tone for a very successful conference. I look forward to finishing your book now, and to watching the movie with the new insight you have given us."
  
  Matt Rohrer
  General Chair, Winter Simulation Conference 2001
  AutoMod Group, Brooks Automation
  Matt.Rohrer@Brooks.com
  
  
• "Members of the Boise section of the IEEE enjoyed your presentation on "The HAL 9000 computer and the Vision of 2001: A Space Odyssey" at our annual awards banquet. Your talk suitably wound up the year 2001 for us. It was a nice blend of general interest that entertained everyone with techincal components that the member particularly appreciated."
  
  Elisa Barney Smith
  Chair, Boise Section IEEE
  Assistant Professor, Electrical & Computer Engineering Department
  Boise State University
  EBarneySmith@boisestate.edu
  
  
• "Thanks for your talk keynoting the University of Maryland's college-wide, multi-day program on artificial intelligence. I've seen many AI talks in my 20+ years in the field, but this was one of the most enjoyable, as well as one of the most accessible to an outside audience. I first saw 2001 when I was eleven, fell in love with HAL, and wanted to be an AI researcher ever since -- your talk reminded all of us what is so special about the film, and why it inspired me and so many others to enter the field."
  
  Professor James Hendler
  Department of Computer Science
  University of Maryland
  College Park, MD
  hendler@cs.umd.edu