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19681960s
SHRDLU
An early natural language understanding computer program in a 'blocks world'.
Why It Was Important
Developed by Terry Winograd, SHRDLU could understand complex English commands to interact with a virtual simulation of blocks of various shapes and colors. It proved that deep semantic understanding was possible within a highly constrained 'micro-world', though it failed to scale to ambiguous real-world language.
Who Invented It
Terry Winograd
Researcher at MIT AI Lab; later a professor at Stanford specializing in HCI.
Applications
- Natural Language Understanding
- Micro-world Simulations
- Semantic Parsing
Key Papers
- Understanding Natural Language
Terry Winograd · Cognitive Psychology · 1972
Videos
[Lecture] How did computers answer questions before Siri and Alexa? BASEBALL, LUNAR, and SHRDLU
Jordan Boyd-Graber
SHRDLU in Action
Alec Julien