Englebart [*] takes a system-approach to developing a tool for augmenting human intelligence.  The H-LAM/T (Human using Language, Artifacts, Methodology, in which he is Trained), using this tool, is better able to operate with complex information structures.

As a pre-computer H-LAM/T, Engelbart used writing, in the form of edge-notched index cards to record, manipulate and retrieve information.  He concedes that he could accomplish this without the index cards, but he would do this work “with my feet up on the artifacts and my eyes closed”.  We can see that this posture would give him access to the spatial associations and navigation system used by the trained memory.

The spatial model of memory is also apparent when Englebart writes of complex problems that involve factors that “are too much for me to hold and manipulate within my mind”.  The NLS (oN-Line System) computer system is designed to give these multiple factors a physical form outside the mind so they can be manipulated by the researcher.

Engelbart describes how the NLS can help the knowledge worker; the researcher jots down his initial thoughts about a complex problem as they occur to him, and then he uses the computer to move the statements and reorder them into a coherent written argument.  This allows the researcher to  address more complex problems than he could without the computer.

“By outsourcing a cognitive function onto a physical medium, reading and writing operations replace the need to keep in mind the contents of the message with the less demanding task of remembering the code used to encode the information and physically keeping the support.” (Quaggiotto [*])

The H-LAM/T is not so manifestly political as the Cyborg [*], but how does he define himself?