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Konrad Hinsen

12/01/2022, 4:58 PM
Picking the "present" channel because we don't have one for the past... I am doing some research into the history of the idea of a "computational medium". Does anyone know when and where this term was first used? The earliest reference I have found so far is a paper rom 1986: Boxer: a reconstructible computational medium. Many discussions on the topic cite Kay & Goldberg's 1977 paper "Personal Dynamic Media", but it doesn't contain the term "computational media" (though what they discuss is arguably the same idea). My question is about the specific term.
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Jack Rusher

12/02/2022, 8:13 AM
The concept appears by other names, and the phrase attached to other concepts (mainly in psychology/theory of mind), but so far as I know the use of computational medium in that sense is a coinage of diSessa's. Nearly the same phrasing occurs in the Turtle Geometry book, which was written in 1981 but not published until 1986.
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Konrad Hinsen

12/02/2022, 11:01 AM
Thanks @Jack Rusher, that confirms my impression!