Mazes
From Maze
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In 1959, one of the earliest computer programs written for fun - an example of "recreational computing" - depicted an experimenter's maze. The program, which is possibly the first computer program to draw a maze of any sort, was written for the TX-0 at MIT by Douglas T. Ross and John E. Ward. The TX-0 was an experimental computer that, when loaned out from MIT's Lincoln Laboratories, provided one of the first opportunities for people to program when not working on an official project. It also allowed programmers to work on the machine interactively, much as Commodore 64 programmers later would, rather than submitting batch jobs in the form of decks of punched cards. In the program that became known as "Mouse in the Maze," a mouse would move through a maze, eating cheese. The mouse could also consume martinis, which would cause it to become disoriented. Here, the environment implemented was not the hedge maze of diversion and fun, but a more staid experimenter's maze. This was then made playful by the implementation of an amusing reward for the mouse and the simulation of appropriate behavior. | In 1959, one of the earliest computer programs written for fun - an example of "recreational computing" - depicted an experimenter's maze. The program, which is possibly the first computer program to draw a maze of any sort, was written for the TX-0 at MIT by Douglas T. Ross and John E. Ward. The TX-0 was an experimental computer that, when loaned out from MIT's Lincoln Laboratories, provided one of the first opportunities for people to program when not working on an official project. It also allowed programmers to work on the machine interactively, much as Commodore 64 programmers later would, rather than submitting batch jobs in the form of decks of punched cards. In the program that became known as "Mouse in the Maze," a mouse would move through a maze, eating cheese. The mouse could also consume martinis, which would cause it to become disoriented. Here, the environment implemented was not the hedge maze of diversion and fun, but a more staid experimenter's maze. This was then made playful by the implementation of an amusing reward for the mouse and the simulation of appropriate behavior. | ||
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10 PRINT's output is a regular arrangement of "walls" in a grid -- akin to the arrangement of the stereotypical laboratory maze. Instead of suggesting that the computer is creating structures like an inspired Daedalus, the maze becomes metanymic of a challenge to intelligence; not a romantic, riddling intelligence, but a classically conditioned, animal kind. It also brings in the idea of the experimenter -- indifferent to the struggles of the creatures lost in the maze, at least, and perhaps cruelly impairing those creatures -- and the subject of the experiment, trapped in a bewildering structure created by powers and for purposes beyond comprehension. | 10 PRINT's output is a regular arrangement of "walls" in a grid -- akin to the arrangement of the stereotypical laboratory maze. Instead of suggesting that the computer is creating structures like an inspired Daedalus, the maze becomes metanymic of a challenge to intelligence; not a romantic, riddling intelligence, but a classically conditioned, animal kind. It also brings in the idea of the experimenter -- indifferent to the struggles of the creatures lost in the maze, at least, and perhaps cruelly impairing those creatures -- and the subject of the experiment, trapped in a bewildering structure created by powers and for purposes beyond comprehension. | ||
| − | But who is the user at the interface of 10 Print, the scientist or the rodent? When 10 PRINT runs, it relentlessly provides a maze, but it does not trap the user like a rat. Instead, given the top-down view and the lack of a user-controlled maze walker, the computer presents the programmer with the point of view of the maze designer, offering in a sense to collaborate with the user in creating a new design. As novice programmers can attest, however, making one’s way through the introductory steps of acquiring the syntax and structures can only pursue that whiff of cheese. In this way, amid the playful and religious connotations of the maze are those things the experimenter's maze hints at: That the computer is a scientific instrument, for instance, and the role of the traveler slaying the beast to a hungry little mouse. This dehumanization continues in the next development as the mouse becomes mechanized. | + | But who is the user at the interface of 10 Print, the scientist or the rodent? When 10 PRINT runs, it relentlessly provides a maze, but it does not trap the user like a rat. Instead, given the top-down view and the lack of a user-controlled maze walker, the computer presents the programmer with the point of view of the maze designer, offering in a sense to collaborate with the user in creating a new design. As novice programmers can attest, however, making one’s way through the introductory steps of acquiring the syntax and structures can only pursue that whiff of cheese. In this way, amid the playful and religious connotations of the maze are those things the experimenter's maze hints at: That the computer is a scientific instrument, for instance, and the role of the traveler slaying the beast to a hungry little mouse. This dehumanization continues in the next development as the mouse becomes mechanized. |
==== Claude Shannon's Theseus ==== | ==== Claude Shannon's Theseus ==== | ||
