Teaching

Computer Science

The University of Edinburgh created a Computer Unit in 1963. Its founding Director was Dr Sidney Michaelson. The responsibilities of the Unit were to provide computing services, to teach about computing, and to carry out research. In 1966 there was a restructuring, with the creation of the Department of Computer Science (DCS, with Michaelson as Head of Department) and the Edinburgh Regional Computing Centre (ERCC) with Dr G E (Tommy) Thomas as Director.

Teaching began in 1964 with the introduction of a Postgraduate Diploma in Computer Science. The four-year undergraduate degree in Edinburgh was (and is) made up of two pre-honours years (years 1 and 2), and two honours years (years 3 and 4). Undergraduate teaching in Computer Science began in 1965 with the setting up of the Computer Science 1 course. A follow-on course, Computer Science 2 was introduced in 1968 and Computer Science 3 followed in 1970. The first undergraduate degree, in CS & Mathematics, was created in 1971. Following the creation of Computer Science 4 in 1972, the Department was able to offer a Single Honours Computer Science degree starting in 1973.

The above information was obtained from Ibbett (2025).

Artificial Intelligence

A Diploma course in Machine Intelligence Studies was first delivered in 1965 under the direction of Dr Donald Michie (Alonso 2024), and continued for many years.

The Department of Artificial Intelligence (DAI) was created in 1974, and committed itself to contributing to undergraduate teaching. The first undergraduate course offered was AI2 (a second year course) in 1974/75. The material was published in a book (Bundy et al. 1978), one of the first undergraduate AI courses in the world. Subsequently an introductory course, AI1, was introduced in 1978/79.

In 1982 DAI launched its first joint degree Linguistics with Artificial Intelligence, Artificial Intelligence and Computer Science was started in 1987, and Artificial Intelligence and Mathematics in 1992. A number of other joint degrees were developed, as well as a single-honours degree in Artificial Intelligence.

A Masters degree in Knowledge Based Systems was established in 1983. This offered specialisms in the Foundations of AI, Expert Systems, Intelligent Robotics and Natural Language Processing. There were 40-50 graduates produced annually from this course, with many of the Department's PhD students coming from its ranks.

The above information was obtained mainly from Howe (2007).

Cognitive Science

In 1969 Christopher Longuet-Higgins founded the School of Epistemics, an interdisciplinary group which brought together people with an interest in the mind. A Postgraduate Programme in Epistemics was introduced in 1978, leading to the MPhil and PhD degrees. A MSc degree was added in 1981. In 1985 the School of Epistemics became the Centre for Cognitive Science within the Faculty of Science, which continued the interdisciplinary focus, and was devoted exclusively to research and postgraduate teaching.

The above information was obtained mainly from Birse (1994) pp 186-187.

This website has been built by Prof Chris Williams , Dr Vassilis Galanos and Ms Xiao Yang, as part of the Edinburgh AI&CS History Project. This work is funded by the School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh, February-July 2024.

We thank everyone who has contributed to the collection of information, documents, web links etc for their help in preserving the history. We welcome additonal information and/or corrections about the the history of Artificial Intelligence, Computer Science and Cognitive Science in Edinburgh.

• Xiao.Yang@ed.ac.uk
• C.K.I.Williams@ed.ac.uk