MPPSC 2022 Prelims Q46: Who is known as the 'Father of Artificial

Q: What is the answer to MPPSC 2022 Prelims Q46?

B. Correct — B, John McCarthy. He coined the term 'Artificial Intelligence' in 1955 and organized the 1956 Dartmouth Conference, the event widely regarded as the founding moment of AI as an academic field. He later created the LISP programming language, foundational to early AI research.

MPPSC 2022 Prelims Paper-I · Question 46 of 100

Verified against the official question paper. Answer as per the official MPPSC answer key.

Who is known as the 'Father of Artificial Intelligence'?

(a)Alan Turing
(b)John McCarthy
(c)Blaise Pascal
(d)Dartmouth

Answer

Why

Correct — B, John McCarthy. He coined the term 'Artificial Intelligence' in 1955 and organized the 1956 Dartmouth Conference, the event widely regarded as the founding moment of AI as an academic field. He later created the LISP programming language, foundational to early AI research.

Why the others are wrong

(a)Alan Turing — Turing pioneered machine-intelligence theory with the Turing Test (1950) and is often called the 'father of computer science,' but it was McCarthy who coined the actual term 'Artificial Intelligence' — the specific fact this question tests.
(c)Blaise Pascal — A 17th-century mathematician who built an early mechanical calculator (the Pascaline); centuries before AI existed as a concept.
(d)Dartmouth — Not a person — it is the college/conference (Dartmouth Conference, 1956) where McCarthy proposed the term, not itself a candidate for 'father of AI'.

Concept

John McCarthy, a computer scientist, coined the term 'Artificial Intelligence' in 1955 and organized the 1956 Dartmouth Summer Research Conference, which formally launched AI as a distinct academic discipline. He went on to develop the LISP programming language (1958), long a primary tool for AI research.

The classic trap is confusing McCarthy with Alan Turing — Turing proposed the Turing Test (1950) and is a towering figure in computing theory, but the specific act of coining the term 'Artificial Intelligence' and launching the field under that name belongs to McCarthy.

Key facts

John McCarthy coined the term 'Artificial Intelligence' in 1955
He organized the 1956 Dartmouth Conference, the founding event of AI as a field
McCarthy created the LISP programming language (1958)
Alan Turing proposed the Turing Test (1950) — often confused with McCarthy in this context

Study next

The Dartmouth Conference (1956) and the birth of AI as a disciplineAlan Turing and the Turing TestLISP programming languageAI vs Machine Learning vs Deep LearningOther AI pioneers: Marvin Minsky, Herbert Simon, Allen Newell

Common traps

Confusing McCarthy (coined the term 'AI') with Turing (proposed the Turing Test, often titled 'father of computer science')
Treating Dartmouth, a place/conference, as if it were a person

A direct one-line factual recall — 'Who coined the term AI' or 'Father of AI' — appears almost verbatim across MPPSC and other state PCS exams.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.

Practice

practice — not a real PYQ
The term 'Artificial Intelligence' was formally proposed at which conference?
- (a)Dartmouth Conference (1956)
- (b)Macy Conferences
- (c)Turing Symposium
- (d)MIT AI Lab founding
Answer(a) Dartmouth Conference (1956) — where John McCarthy coined the term.
practice — not a real PYQ
Which programming language, closely associated with early AI research, was created by John McCarthy?
- (a)FORTRAN
- (b)LISP
- (c)COBOL
- (d)BASIC
Answer(b) LISP — created by McCarthy in 1958, a foundational AI programming language.