[bonoboTP]

In fact, the first thing you learn in an introductory computer vision class is that Marvin Minsky assigned "computer vision" to an undergrad as a summer project in 1966 (wire up a camera to a computer and write a program to understand images). It was the opposite of a holy grail.

Even today, it's hard to make laymen appreciate the advancements in computer vision because for them "seeing" doesn't seem like a difficult thing. Even stupid chickens can see. A chess program is much more impressive to laypeople.