 In the late 60s , Marvin Minsky and Seymour Papert of the MIT AI Laboratory proposed that AI research should focus on artificially simple situations known as micro @-@ worlds . They pointed out that in successful sciences like physics , basic principles were often best understood using simplified models like <unk> planes or perfectly rigid bodies . Much of the research focused on a " blocks world , " which consists of colored blocks of various shapes and sizes <unk> on a flat surface . 
