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C00005 00003	.LTR(Professor Donald Knuth)
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%6S%5 Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, STANFORD UNIVERSITY, Stanford, California 94305
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	Douglas B. Lenat
	Artificial Intelligence Laboratory
	Stanford University
	Stanford, California  94305
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Sincerely,
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Douglas B. Lenat
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.LTR(Professor Donald Knuth)
Computer Science Department
Stanford University
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Dear Don,

I enjoyed talking to you about the "Automated Mathematician" project. Some
afterthoughts:

1) We didn't have much time to discuss your reactions to the ideas; if you
disagree with any of them, I'd greatly appreciate a note about that.
Enclosed is a fuller description of the proposed system, and a copy of the
knowledge which will be given initially to the system.

2) After reading the notes on de Bruijn's AUTOMATH lectures, I see that there really
%2is%* something there after all; the papers I had looked at earlier were by other
authors, and presupposed a working knowledge of that language.  Like Esperanto,
it is unfortunate that most scientists and mathematicians %2don't%* know
AUTOMATH;  because of that I feel I must still orient the communication to
a more traditional, math-textbook type of language.
AUTOMATH forces you to always know precisely what you're saying; this alone would
drive away most of the prospective users.
Seriously: AUTOMATH is good for proof checking, but not well suited to the
investigative flights of imagination needed to propose interesting new conjectures.

3) At the time of our  meeting, I expected that
the financial crisis here at the A.I. Lab wouldn't affect me personally
to any large extent. 
The DENDRAL project seemed willing to support me. They have just learned that
%2their%* budget has been slashed by ARPA. Although Cordell thinks there will be
enough Automatic Programming 
money for me for next year, I probably won't have any support this summer.
This would mean taking a summer job (e.g., as a programmer) and delaying work
on my dissertation. 
Is there any possibility that you could support me this summer, as an R.A.?
I am being quite satisfactorally advised by Cordell, so there need be no additional
time commitment on your part; SRI gives me computer time, and SAIL gives me an
office, so there would be no strain in that direction either.
Finally: although what I'm doing is not clearly in your area, it %2certainly%* is
closer to what you're doing than to automatic programming.

I hope to hear from you soon. In any event, I'll schedule another meeting when
the system is programmed.

.DBL