An architecture for the simulation of human movement

We wish to enable a digital computer to translate movement notation into an animated display of human figures performing the represented movements. To this end we have postulated a model of the human body as a network of special-purpose processors—one processor situated at each joint of the body—each with an instruction set designed around a set of “primitive movement concepts.” The translation process may then be divided into two stages: a compilation stage in which the movement notation gets translated into programs for these special-purpose processors, and a simulation stage which simulates the behavior of these processors as they interpret their respective programs. We shall describe the instruction set for these processors and discuss how these instructions may be interpreted.