17 AUGUST 1951, Page 4

Readers of the striking article " Can Machines Think ?

" by Dr. M. V. Wilkes in last week's Spectator will hardly be surprised at the official announcement that " the Trustees of the Nuffield. Foundation have made a grant of £25,000 spread over five years for the development and construction of a new electronic calculating machine under the direction of Dr. M. V. Wilkes." It would be agreeable if it could be demonstrated that the grant was the result of the article, but chronology as at present accepted precludes the assumption. But Dr. Wilkes, who is Director of the University Mathematical Laboratory at Cambridge, will no doubt soon invent a time-machine that will alter all that.

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