AI’s founding research proposal had room for creativity, language and self-improvement. Dated 31 August 1955, it proposed a two-month, ten-person study at Dartmouth in the summer of 1956. Its authors were John McCarthy, Marvin Minsky, Nathaniel Rochester and Claude Shannon. The 70th anniversary marks that summer project, rather than the proposal’s publication.[1]
Their conjecture was expansive: aspects of learning and intelligence could be described precisely enough for machines to simulate. Their immediate ambition was narrower—progress on one or more specified problems. One proposed line of inquiry linked creativity to guided randomness, an early research question rather than a demonstration that probabilistic computation produces creativity.[1]
Dartmouth’s 29–31 October conference, “What Must Remain Human?”, places responsibility alongside capability. An engineering session asks “Who Signs the Drawing?” Other sessions address energy use, medicine and AI in writing.[2][3]
The comparison suggests a shift in emphasis. The proposal asks how to simulate intelligent activity; the conference also asks who answers for decisions made with that capability. Producing a drawing or a medical suggestion and deciding who takes responsibility for using it are separate problems.[1][2]
The programme also includes the Dartmouth AI Survey on 30 October, focused on how young people think, learn and work. Dartmouth advertises free public livestreams of the conference sessions.[2][3]
Sources & further reading
- A proposal for the Dartmouth summer research project on artificial intelligence McCarthy et al. · 31 Aug 1955 · Accessed 30 Oct 2026
- What Must Remain Human? conference schedule Dartmouth · Accessed 30 Oct 2026
- What Must Remain Human? Dartmouth AI at 70 conference Dartmouth · Accessed 30 Oct 2026
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