Interesting question, Chris.

In a sense, Alan's work and vision have become so foundational to both
computing and to computers in education that he has attained the ubiquity,
and therefore the sort of "familiar imperceptibility," of the ground beneath
us or the air around us -- without them or him we wouldn't be where we are
but we also wouldn't know what we'd missed.  Think of how the Macintosh
computer, for example, has changed the world, and then step back to see that
the Mac was a feeble effort to approach a vision Alan had set out and, with
associates like Dan Ingalls, demonstrated years earlier, yet which, fully
realized, is still just a little beyond us today -- and still being
shepherded by Dr. Alan Kay.

In education, you will find computers used (by students) in one of two ways;
either the unsuccessful "trade school" model where kids are lashed to a
machine and forced to do office work (though even that is thoroughly and
thankfully infused with user interface models we owe to Dr. Kay) or the
highly successful "human augmentation" model in which computers become tools
to free and even to inspire understanding and intelligent imagination in
young minds.  This second model, which is in use today at schools all over
the world, can unquestionably be traced to Dr. Kay's work with students at
Jordan Junior High in 1973 (at a time when few students beneath the graduate
school level had even seen, much less been permitted to use, any computer at
all) -- and is still benefitting from Alan's constant efforts.

The Dynabook, Alan's 1968 proposal for a computer powerful, portable and
inexpensive enough to become an interactive textbook and tool for students
from the elementary school level on up, is quite clearly the underlying
concept behind today's initiative (www.laptop.org) to put such tools in the
hands of children, especially in those countries where educational
opportunities have for so long lagged behind -- and Dr. Alan Kay is an
advisor to that iniative.

Dr. Kay's comment that ". . . if you are immersed in a context you can't
even see it" ironically applies to himself with regard to your question, for
in many ways Alan Kay has *become* context in his field.  Alan Kay is
relevant as visionary and pioneer, yes, but also as organizer, encourager,
leader, promoter -- in short, as teacher to those of us who try, and hope
someday to catch and then to carry his vision, not just for the means
represented by superior programming languages and intuitive user interfaces
but for the goal of helping the next generations to truly make the world a
better place.

Gary


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Chris Cunnington" <cunnington at sympatico.ca>
To: "The general-purpose Squeak developers list"
<squeak-dev at lists.squeakfoundation.org>
Sent: Thursday, July 06, 2006 8:37 PM
Subject: Re: Alan Kay's EuroPython Keynote


How, exactly, is Alan Kay still relevant?

Chris Cunnington
Toronto




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