This one-hour lecture by Grady Booch is a walk through history seen as an evolution toward computational thinking, which will culminate in a symbiotic relationship between people and computers/machines.

Computational thinking is the set of thought processes involved in formulating problems in a way that can be leveraged by computing agents. In other words, it’s a way of thinking that can be “computerized.”

The talk is not technical, but falls in the category of philosophy of technology. It can be useful to a general public wanting to understand the implications of the advances in computer science and engineering during the second half of the 20th century, from a positive, almost evangelical point of view.

Booch, a well-known computer scientist and one of the fathers of object-oriented design and modern software engineering, talks about three epochs of computing: mathematical, symbolic, and imagined realities. This third epoch transcends the laws of physics and is only limited by human imagination. As such, it’s the zenith of scientific and philosophical thinking.