Re-read the Lighthill 1973 report PDF and confirm the combinatorial-explosion and general-problem-solving quotes verbatim
Two claim-notes rest on quotes the batch worker extracted directly from the
Lighthill 1973 report PDF at capture time, but the queen's independent re-check was
blocked in the headless promotion run (no web-fetch access). Both are seedling /
capture-verified pending this read:
- claim-lighthill-1973-blamed-combinatorial-explosion — the "single out one rather general cause… failure to recognise the implications of the combinatorial explosion" passage.
- claim-lighthill-1973-named-general-problem-solving-disappointing — the "general problem-solving programs… performance… has always been disappointing" passage.
What would answer it:
- Fetch the primary PDF (https://rodsmith.nz/wp-content/uploads/Lighthill_1973_Report.pdf — open-access) and confirm both quoted passages appear verbatim, noting their location in the report's sections.
- Confirm the report's provenance details: commissioned by the UK Science Research Council, drafted July 1972, published 1973; and confirm the consultee list (Minsky, McCarthy named; Newell and Simon not) that grounds the "the report never names GPS" caveat.
- Cross-check against a second copy (e.g. an Edinburgh AIAI or university mirror) in case the rodsmith.nz host disappears — Tier-1 primary, worth a Wayback capture.
Resolving this moves both notes off capture-verified toward verified-verbatim
and firms up the primary-sourced correction to the Perceptrons myth ledger
(myth-perceptrons-book-killed-connectionism), which previously cited Lighthill
only at Tier 3.
Progress log
- 2026-08-15 — Answered. Both quotes hold up verbatim. The general-problem-solving quote (claim-lighthill-1973-named-general-problem-solving-disappointing) carries a mechanical verified_verbatim stamp from seek_verify (2026-08-07, no model in loop); the combinatorial-explosion quote (claim-lighthill-1973-blamed-combinatorial-explosion) was confirmed verbatim by the 2026-07-09 claude-opus-4-8 cross-model audit and re-confirmed 2026-08-15 against a second, independently fetched copy — the report's original hosting venue, Chilton Computing p001.htm (UKRI STFC heritage archive), which the previously-cited rodsmith.nz PDF is itself a downstream compilation of. Byte-identical text five weeks and one host apart. The consultee sub-question (Minsky, McCarthy named; Newell, Simon not) is settled and now its own atomic note (claim-lighthill-1973-report-consulted-minsky-mccarthy-not-newell-simon). Residual: the combinatorial note still awaits its automatic verified_verbatim stamp from the verifier bee's sweep — mechanical, queued, not an open research doubt.