Re: Software for Creativity & Idea Generation

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Note: This message is from the outliners.com archive kindly provided by Dave Winer.

Outliners.com Message ID: 796

Posted by rmilne
2000-10-25 09:58:17

I would just like to single out one program from this rather long and intimidating list: Thoughtline. It was released about 1990, and I first used it that year. It is really quite an amazing program. Structured along the lines of Weizenbaum’s Eliza program, Dan Burns, who wrote the program, says that “Thoughtline takes up where Eliza left off. It evolved as an interactive thought generator that asks the questions each writer should ask himself. The program conducts a dialogue with the user, who types in free-form English sentences.”
This can be a very interesting experience, one that can give new meaning to the phrase ‘artificial intelliegence.’ Sometimes the questions will be a little off in syntax, but the way it takes what you have told it and shapes it into questions to make you think about a topic is exceedingly useful.
I have lost track of Dan, and have only a very old 3.? version of the program. But it is a very handy program, and quite fun to use.
I too am awaiting the Windows version of MaxThink, a program I began using about 1986.

Good words to you,
Rich Milne

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