One quite probable use for computers is medical diagnosis and prescription of treatment. Electronic equipment can already monitor an ailing patient, and send an alarm when help is needed. We may one day see computers with a built-in bedside manner aiding the family doctor.
The accomplished inroads of computing machines in business are as nothing to what will eventually take place. Already computer “game-playing” has extended to business management, and serious executives participate to improve their administrative ability. We speak of decision-making machines; business decisions are logical applications for this ability. Computers have been given the job of evaluating personnel and assigning salaries on a strictly logical basis. Perhaps this is why in surveys questioning increased use of the machines, each executive level in general tends to rate the machine’s ability just below its own.
Other games played by the computer are war games, and computers like SAGE are well known. This system not only monitors all air activity but also makes decisions, assigns targets, and then even flies the interceptor planes and guided missiles on their missions. Again in the sky, the increase of commercial air traffic has perhaps reached the limit of human ability to control it. Computers are beginning to take over here too, planning flights and literally flying the planes.
Surface transport can also be computer-controlled. Railroads are beginning to use the computer techniques, and automatic highways are inevitable. Ships also benefit, and special systems coupled to radar can predict courses and take corrective action when necessary.
Men seem to have temporarily given up trying to control the weather, but using computers, meteorologists can take the huge mass of data from all over the world and make predictions rapidly enough to be of use.
We have talked of the computer’s giant strides in banking. Its wide use in stores is not far off. An English computer firm has designed an automatic supermarket that assembles ordered items, prices them, and delivers them to the check stand. At the same time it keeps a running inventory, price record, and profit and loss statement, besides billing the customer with periodic statements. The storekeeper will have only to wash the windows and pay his electric power bill.
Even trading stamps may be superseded by computer techniques that keep track of customer purchases and credit him with premiums as he earns them. Credit cards have helped pioneer computer use in billing; it is not farfetched to foresee the day when we are issued a lifetime, all-inclusive credit card—perhaps with our birth certificate!—a card with our thumbprint on it, that will buy our food, pay our rent and utilities and other bills. A central computer system will balance our expenses against deposits and from time to time let us know how we stand financially.
As with many other important inventions, the computer and its technology were spurred by war and are aided now by continuing threats of war. It is therefore pleasant to think on the possibilities of a computer system “programmed” for peace: a gigantic, worldwide system whose input includes all recorded history of all nations, all economic and cultural data, all weather information and other scientific knowledge. The output of such a machine hopefully would be a “best plan” for all of us. Such a computer would have no ax to grind and no selfish interests unless they were fed into it.
Given all the facts, it would punch out for us a set of instructions that would guarantee us the best life possible. This has long been a dream of science writers. H. G. Wells was one of these, suggesting a world clearinghouse of information in his book World Brain written in the thirties. In this country, scientist Vannevar Bush suggested a similar computer called “Memex” which could store huge amounts of data and answer questions put to it.
The huge amounts of information—books, articles, speeches, and records of all sorts—are beginning to make it absolutely necessary for an efficient information retrieval system. Many cases have been noted in which much time and effort are spent on a project which has already been completed but then has become lost in the welter of literature crammed into libraries. The computer is a logical device for such work; in a recent test such a machine scored 86 per cent in its efforts to locate specific data on file. Trained workers rated only 38 per cent in the same test!