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From: nagle@netcom.com (John Nagle)
Subject: Re: Question about CYC Project
Message-ID: <nagleD1LtxD.Mz@netcom.com>
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References: <3ctbqh$7ig@news2.delphi.com> <3d3r72$acm@midgard.calvacom.fr> <3d5ukt$5k@Mercury.mcs.com> <3dvr1j$a64@tribune.usask.ca>
Date: Fri, 30 Dec 1994 03:34:24 GMT
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choy@cs.usask.ca (Henry Choy) writes:
>Jorn Barger (jorn@MCS.COM) wrote:

>: The Japanese Fifth Generation Project between 1982 and 1992 failed in 
>: its goals largely because it focused on logic, eg by choosing Prolog 
>: over LISP as its implementation language (a choice that may have been 
>: simple anti-Americanism, since Prolog was developed by the French).

>Why exactly did the fifth fail?

     It succeeded in its real purpose.  MITI wanted to distract US
attention from their much larger effort to move into the IBM mainframe
business.  Fujitsu and Hitachi started building mainframe clones,
acquiring National and Amdahl to get the technology and then turning
them into shell operations that basically sell machines manufactured
in Japan.  The mainframe effort was at least ten times bigger than
the Fifth Generation effort, but received far less publicity.  And
that was the whole point of the Fifth Generation effort.  US academics
were running around screaming about the threat from the Fifth
Generation effort on TV, to Congress, and in the press.  Meanwhile,
Fujitsu and Hitachi were able to move into the US mainframe market
without significant objections being raised at political levels.
Without the Fifth Generation diversion, trade barriers might have
been raised to protect the US lead in mainframes.

     Of course, mainframes became obsolete about the time this
process was completed, and so Fujitsu and Hitachi bought into a
declining industry.

					John Nagle
