LI B R.AR.Y 
 
 OF THE 
 
 U N I VLR.SITY 
 
 Of ILLINOIS 
 
 510.84 
 I«6r 
 no. ^50^^56 
 cop. 2. 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2013 
 
 http://archive.org/details/somethoughtsondi251canc 
 
^Report No. 251 
 
 ^>?z.^c^ 
 
 SOME THOUGHTS ON DISPLAYS 
 
 by 
 Robert Cancro and D. L. Slotnick 
 
 November 12, I967 
 
 THE LIBRARY Of THE 
 
 AUG lo r:j 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF ILUNOIS 
 
 Presented at the Computer Graphics Conference which was sponsored by the 
 University of Illinois, Urbana, Illinois, November 5, 6, 7; 8, 1967" 
 
Report No. 251 
 
 SOME THOUGHTS ON DISPLAYS 
 
 by 
 Robert Cancro* and D. L. Slotnick** 
 
 Presented at the Computer Graphics Conference which was sponsored by 
 the University of Illinois, Urbana, Illinois, November 5^ 6, 7^ 8^ 1967' 
 
 November 12, I967 
 
 Department of Computer Science 
 University of Illinois 
 Urbana, Illinois 618OI 
 
 ^^ Research Department, The Menninger Foundation, Topeka, Kansas. 
 
 Professor of Computer Science, University of Illinois, Urbana, Illinois. 
 
 (This work was supported in part by the Department of Computer Science, 
 University of Illinois, Urbana, Illinois, and in part by the advanced 
 Research Projects Agency as administered by the Rome Air Development Center 
 Under Contract No. US AJ 30(602)UlUU. ) 
 
The purpose of graphics is to alter meaningfully and positively 
 the dialogue between man and machine so that the working relationship 
 between them will be more productive. The means of increasing the use- 
 fulness of the machine to the man, is by allowing him to converse with it, 
 or perhaps more accurately, control it in ways which are more natural and 
 customary for him. Many would consider the optimum to be a situation in 
 which the machine and the man could converse and interact in a mode which 
 would be no different than that used by two ordinary men. 
 
 Some workers in this area are convinced that we can achieve much 
 better use of a machine through developing new modes of interacting with 
 it. This is a scientific position with which one cannot disagree in theory, 
 but whether these specific new modes of interacting fulfill the messianic 
 prophecy is still to be decided. Let us examine seA/"eral display applications 
 in some detail. In geophysical exploration seismic traces are produced by 
 patterns of test charges detonated in the earth. These are used in order 
 to construct a picture of the substructure in areas where exploration is 
 going on. At the present time these pictures are made meekly available to 
 geophysicists and other scientists who apply deeply inscrutable techniques 
 in determining whether the area under examination possesses the appropriate 
 properties for trapping deposits of oil. When questioned as to the par- 
 ticular formations they look for, the replies are surprisingly simple, for 
 example, "a hole in a rock." 
 
 It is perfectly clear that the computer could look for a hole in 
 a rock all by itself and that the more subtle factors that the scientists 
 do look for are perfectly expres sable within the confines of our natural 
 language, and in fact the computer's language. The possibility exists with 
 the next generation of machines to store large numbers of trial results 
 and to use the machine in an inefficient way to go through a new example 
 on the basis of detailed correlation with large files. If it is possible 
 to do this in a manner which permits the program to waste less time as it 
 goes through subsequent trials, so much the better, but this is not abso- 
 lutely necessary in view of the capacity that is available to "waste." 
 Finally, it must be pointed out that the geologist, geophysicist and other 
 
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magicians are wrong nine out of ten times in the exploration business 
 
 so that it would be unreasonable to apply a radically different definition 
 
 of "success" to the machine, although certainly this will be done- 
 
 In making a mathematical model, for example, of atmospheric flow, 
 using Partial Differential Equations and anything else that is handy, one 
 
 codes the d out of it and ultimately runs the rascal on a big machine. 
 
 Starting with some initial values, real or invented, one integrates in the 
 time direction for hours or days of problem time and then gets a print or 
 picture of the result. Enter again, the magician. He looks and he says, 
 "it is weather," or "it ain't weather." If it ain't weather, he meddles 
 with the model and repeats the process. If it is weather, he commences a 
 more refined set of trials and starts trying to get "the" weather. In doing 
 this, he makes more detailed changes in the model altering parameters and 
 coefficients, and taking in higher order effects in a process which has not 
 yet converged on this planet, thus making it difficult to assess the efficacy 
 of the refinement processes. The point is, that what he is doing is, in 
 fact, simple and understandable and thus absolutely capable of being pro- 
 grammed. There is no theoretical reason why computers, if given a push or 
 two in the right direction could not produce models of the atmosphere just 
 as publishable and just as inaccurate as those produced by others. What is 
 said above for modeling the atmosphere does not require radical alteration 
 in order to apply to other publishable, inaccurate models of different 
 things. 
 
 During several orbits, we encountered earthlings interested in 
 planning cubes, buildings, cities, silos and hen houses with computers. 
 Here also, subassemblies of the whatnot are operated upon by a code and a 
 picture produced. The artist or architect br artisan looks at the picture. 
 He looks to see if the computer has placed the potted palm upside down in 
 the lobby. If it has, he takes up his trusty light pen and with a depre- 
 catory word and a deft slash or two sets it right side up--if the light 
 pen is working. He then examines the structure to see if it is 
 
 NJ^-^?^'"^ 
 
 beautiful 
 
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When questioned as to his standards of beauty, he responds with a mixture 
 of violence and condescension, the exact proportions of which are age- 
 determined, that humiliates the questioner for having momentarily dared 
 to think that standards of beauty are expressable m this finite universe. 
 It is the unutterable word for the God of the Hebrews. 
 
 If we concede that the man-machine interaction can be improved, 
 why the preferential interest on output and the not-so-intense interest 
 on improvement at the input end? The enormous interest that graphics has 
 generated, certainly at the present time, is all out of proportion to any 
 positive yield that it has as yet returned. Other questions turn up to 
 plague us, such as why the interest m graphics now and not in the past? 
 It seems logical that we should have placed such an emphasis when machines 
 were slower and would not be hindered by the intrusion of the man into their 
 workings. Of course one can resolve the relative disparity in speed by 
 allowing the machine to perform a multitude of other useful tasks while the 
 man is muddling his way through- Despite this pseudosolution, it still 
 seems strange that we did not have the same degree of interest in the pro- 
 blem at a time when we would not have had to face the extraordinary machine 
 speeds. 
 
 These bothersome questions and concerns suggest that a new 
 examination of the situation might afford us another, more satisfying 
 explanation. In a man-machine interaction there are only two units in- 
 volved, so let us look to the man. The attitude of the general public and 
 many scientists as well towards computers is one of intense ambivalence. 
 Anyone who has been defeated at checkers by a machine is quite able to tell 
 you of his resentments and fears, as well as the peculiar eerie feeling 
 of having a machine thank you for your somewhat second-class effort. Our 
 Jokes, cartoons, and other forms of humor endlessly comment on the computers, 
 and as we all know, humor does in part reflect and serve as an outlet for 
 our anxieties. If we study the humor we find that one of the main concerns 
 expressed in it, is fear of the machine^ We fear its taking over. We 
 fear its losing control and going berserk. Despite the lessons of exper- 
 ience, we feel more comfortable and secure when a task is performed by a 
 man rather than by a machine. This is true whether it be piloting an 
 aircraft or boring out the cylinders of an automobile engine. The 
 competitiveness with the machine comes out also quite clearly in any 
 
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examination of humor. This, too, reflects the terrible threat that the 
 machine represents to so many of us. Another dominant theme is that of 
 resentment. Who among you has not wished to fold, mutilate and spindle 
 or has not resented zip codes and area codes as well as identifying niombers? 
 
 We must then look at what it is that causes man to respond in such 
 a way to the computer. We will appear to digress for a bit in order to 
 examine man's relationship to machines m general and then it will be clear 
 that the computer is simply a special case. Just as our children simultan- 
 eously represent the fertility of our creative efforts as well as the eventual 
 replacement of ourselves, so do machines represent the issue of man's 
 ingenuity as well as his ultimate capitulation^ This is not a function of 
 time, since the threat is experienced in the same manner whether the life 
 expectsincy of the machine is greater or less than man's. We do not know the 
 origin of this peculiar ambivalence, but it may have to do with the intimate 
 historical relationship between tools and weapons. The major difference 
 between a stone axe as a tool and as a weapon, is in the choice of object 
 that we strike with it. To hunt game versus to kill an enemy with a spear 
 is a function of the object pierced. Therefore the difference between a 
 tool and a weapon is determined by man--by his mode of usage. The implement 
 represented a direct extension of the man's body and a concomitant increase 
 in his power to successfully manipulate his environment ^ The man had the 
 choice and responsibility of deciding whether this increase in his capa- 
 bilities would be used constructively or destructively. This is a responsi- 
 bility that history tells us man has borne very poorly. The distinction 
 between constructive and destructive use has been blurred, if indeed it ever 
 existed at all. Not only the history of weaponry and warfare but the pur- 
 poseless destruction of nature wrought by man's technological advances speak 
 with horrendous eloquence to how poorly suited he is to accept these respon- 
 sibilities. The increments in man's machine determined power has until 
 recently been in small quanta. This has allowed man the time to integrate, 
 as best he is able, his previous quantum leaps and to be better prepared 
 to handle the future increases. The inadequacy of man's previous efforts 
 
to cope with small increments in power over relatively long periods of 
 time, does not auger well for his ability to deal with large increments 
 in very short periods of time. 
 
 This has been intuitively recognized by the masses who see the 
 fruit of technology as did Eve--irresistable but disastrous. We knov/ that 
 the lot of the creative artist has been better than the creative tech- 
 nologist. While the artist may be scorned, he has not been dreaded. The 
 technological innovator has often been seen as the enemy of our heritage 
 and destroyer of our traditional values- Machines intrude into the privacy 
 of the courtroom and the pomp of public ceremony. How often have people 
 objected to the televising of a religious service or state ceremony as sacre- 
 ligious and undignified respectively. Television, rather than our failures 
 as parents, is seen as a contributor to juvenile delinquency. As if a 
 cathode ray tube could influence our character! We will return later to 
 this point of machines influencing our minds and actions. 
 
 Man despite these doubts often has strong conscious feelings of 
 love for his tools. The hunter or artisan often handles his tools in a 
 sensual manner that leaves no doubt about the strength and kind of emotion 
 it generates in him. We can see a striking mixture of intensely positive, 
 loving feelings and equally strong negative, angry feelings towards the 
 machine. The origin of this polarity remains obscure, but its existence is 
 obvious. Man has experienced the machine as an extension and mental pro- 
 jection of his body. This may be primary and contribute to the ambivalence 
 or secondary and a reaction to it. We do not know but for our purposes it 
 is not important to be able to say, since the less we are able to feel that 
 we can control this representation of ourselves the more anxious we will 
 become independent of the origin of the anxiety ■- We can deal with the dis- 
 comfort in a classic manner--deny the existence of the problem that produces 
 the discomfort. This is best typified in the school of nonthought that 
 steadfastly refuses to recognize the frightening extent of the revolution 
 that machines in general and computers in particular must of necessity effect. 
 There can be no problem in the absence of its prior recognition summarizes 
 their position. This school has a truly incredible ability to confound the 
 accommodations necessary to overcome the disruptions in society caused by 
 the coir^juter revolution with that caused by the introduction of the sewing 
 
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machine. Their nonsolution is the true product of a complete failure to 
 understand the threat posed and we would offer that ignorance is not a 
 sufficient explanation for this failure. They choose not to see, since 
 they do not want to see. 
 
 The fact that a machine can do so many things better than a man, 
 threatens the man's sense of worth and individual uniqueness. It threatens 
 the very evolutionary pinnacle that man has so painfully achieved over the 
 last two billion years, and it is not even a living thing. The rapidity of 
 this onslaught on man's smug complacency, has not allowed him the time to 
 make the necessary psychological adjustments » Our threatened self-esteem 
 has not found solace in our remaining areas of superiority, nor in the 
 inanimate source of the threat. If Anything, the sense of danger is increased 
 by the fact that the competitor is not human. 
 
 We will now turn to the special features of the computer as a 
 member of the class "machine," and will use the word machine interchangeably 
 with computer for this section of the presentation. The psychotic episode 
 for the student of man^ is what the Petrie dish is for the microbiologist. 
 It is the arena in which the object under examination can flourish and reach 
 an increased size that allows for identification and study. The classic fear 
 of the psychotic vis-a-vis machines, is that they can read as well as in- 
 fluence the content of his mind. These two closely related fears --knowing 
 and influencing our minds--are present in the nonpsychotic, but in a highly 
 diluted culture. The fear of many that they can't fool the machine, is of 
 great value to the Internal Revenue Service but as any accountant knows is 
 irrational. All the machine can do in actuality is to check more returns 
 than were checked before using the cri+eria that have been established by 
 accountants in the Internal Revenue Service. Yet the Government utilizes 
 this phantasy by trying to project an image of the machine as a relentless 
 pursuer of the tax dodger. The attitude of the public towards lie-detectors, 
 truth sera, and implanted electrodes to name a few devices that fall into 
 the knowing-controlling category substantiates our contention. The computer 
 more so than any previous device, fulfills the fears that have ever been 
 present in man's relationship to machines. It perceives, it identifies, 
 it remembers, it reasons, it acts and it may ultimately control. The failure 
 to recognize how well the computer does fulfill the fear, will only increase 
 the probability of the fear becoming realized. 
 
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There is a fundamental difference between the earlier machines 
 which were requested by man and built to perform particular tasks that were 
 cumbersome and not worthy of his efforts. They were meant to release man from 
 this burden and thereby allow his higher creative talents to emerge. As the 
 machines have evolved and developed^ this is no longer true- We can no longer 
 specify the domain of the machine and restrict it to the particular tasks that 
 we wish it to perform. We are rapidly reaching^ if not in fact have reached, 
 the point where we must look for tasks that fit the capabilities of the machine 
 and not vice versa. 
 
 A variation on this same theme is that computers force us to think 
 about what we are doing and thereby also force us to think about what we are 
 failing to do. They make us examine our operation and often we discover that 
 we cannot Justify things that are being done or have been done for years in a 
 certain way. The machine often performs the task that is so well known to the 
 psychiatrist of compelling a man to look at and justify something in himself 
 that he is neither doing or not doing. It comes as no surprise that the machine 
 suffers the same fate as does the psychiatrist. It would be an interesting 
 study to see if in recent years there have been more jokes about psychiatrists 
 or computers. 
 
 We would offer that in computer science, as in all other fields of 
 human endeavor, the attitudes of m.an affect and determine what he does and 
 what he believes. An examination of these attitudes in an attempt to partition 
 out their effect, helps to clarify many observations which otherwise would be 
 obscure. Certainly the insistence of some workers that computers are nothing 
 more than fast calculators falls into this category. The scientific point at 
 which we must concede that the quantitative change in machines has effected a 
 qualitative change has been passed. The only question in a given case is 
 whether the emotional point has also been passed. There is general agreement 
 that the purpose of graphics is to achieve greater value and productivity 
 through new ways of interacting with the machine, but in fact the new ideas 
 in graphics actually represent our old ways of doing things. They are not 
 
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new ways. They are our ways. It reproduces our old ways of dealing with data 
 in a new medium, but it does not represent a new way of conceptualizing the 
 data this is unique to the assets and potentialities of the machine. If the 
 tabular presentation of data were to be introduced for the first time today, 
 it would be recognized as useful. However, this must not remain the paradigm 
 for the use of machines. One must wonder why the almost playful introduction 
 of probability left the casino and had its profound effects, whereas this 
 potentially more powerful tool has failed to produce any major intellectual 
 impact in science. Instead of revising our ways of doing and thinking about 
 things and thereby entering into a meaningful relationship with the machine, 
 we intrude our petulant selves with light pens and demonstrate our ability 
 to lead it about on a leash like a lap dog. We insist on modifying the machine 
 to meet our preconceived notions instead of modifying our approaches so as to 
 fit the machine's capacity. 
 
 In this we identify very clearly the nature of the relationship that 
 we have chosen to have with the machine. It is not the relationship between 
 colleagues but rather the relationship between a master and his slave. This 
 recognition may help us to understand the excess of emphasis on output versus 
 input and also shed some light on why so much of our effort at the input end 
 has been on making the input natural and comfortable for man^ Clearly this 
 convenience and comfort directs itself primarily to the man's psychology, rather 
 than to the effectiveness of the man-machine relationship. Let us for the 
 moment forget the first flash in the creative processes. Beyond this spark, 
 what we do to create scientific literature and occasionally science, is method- 
 ical, routine, often dull and without the smallest quantity of magic. It is 
 communicated between men and can be communicated between men and machines. It 
 is reasonable to want the direction of interaction to proceed in such a way 
 as to: 
 
 a) expose the processes we employ m doing science and 
 attempt to set them down in programs which let the 
 machine run without constantly pestering it in an attempt 
 to share its work, 
 
 B) design equipment making it possible for machines to accept 
 stimuli as close to the source as possible and in the 
 broadest possible way, and 
 
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C) match the machines output to the bandwidth of the human "being 
 
 when the human being is interested in what the machine has done, 
 
 As was put quite well by the late Norbert Wiener, "Render unto man 
 the things which are man's and unto the computer the things which are the com- 
 puter's. This would seem the intelligent policy to adopt when we employ men 
 and computers together in common undertakings." Yet we find that again and 
 again man is the model which the machine must imitate. Again and again the 
 interface is nothing more than the site where the man acts as a gate in the 
 loop. This is simultaneously man's supreme arrogance and incredible anxiety 
 manifesting itself in this arbitrary and infantile way. We have a profound 
 need to control, shape and master this demon of cur making in much the same 
 manner as Doctor Frankenstein had to control, shape and master his monster. 
 The unhappy fate of Doctor Frankenstein at the hands of the monster troubles 
 many workers within and outside the field of computer science, since they see 
 a parallel to their own situation. Whether the parallel is realistically 
 valid or true only in a deeper psychological sense is a critical question yet 
 to be resolved. However, an examination of the issues clearly reA^eals that 
 one major element which contaminates and pollutes the man-machine relation- 
 ship is man's need to insure his place in it. We act much like the labor 
 unions that keep a fireman in a railroad cab that has no fire. Being more 
 sophisticated than the average worker, we are better able to deceive ourselves 
 into believing that we are working with a machine when in reality we are often 
 only allaying our anxieties. 
 
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AUS 1 6 1958 
 
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