John McCarthy

The study of intelligence is the study of how to make machines do what minds do.

Artificial intelligence is the science and engineering of making intelligent machines, especially intelligent computer programs. It is related to the similar task of using computers to understand human intelligence, but AI does not have to confine itself to methods that are biologically observable.

LISP is not just a programming language, it's a way of life.

The purpose of computing is insight, not numbers.

AI is a field that has always been about making machines do things that, if done by humans, would be considered intelligent.

The idea of time-sharing was to make computers more accessible to more people.

If LISP is so great, why isn't everyone using it?

We need to make computers that are more like people, not people more like computers.

The biggest problem in AI is not making machines intelligent, but making them useful.

Common sense is not a simple thing. It's a vast collection of knowledge and reasoning abilities.

The ultimate goal of AI is to create machines that can think for themselves.

LISP is the most powerful programming language ever designed.

The ability to learn is a key aspect of intelligence.

We are trying to make machines that can solve problems that are currently solved by humans.

The future of AI is in making machines that can reason about the world.

AI is not about replacing humans, but about augmenting human intelligence.

The main difficulty in artificial intelligence is that we don't really understand what intelligence is.

A computer program is a theory about how to solve a problem.

The goal of AI is to understand the mechanisms of intelligence.

LISP is a language for manipulating symbolic expressions.