@lgw4 I don't think they were wrong to coin a term in 1955 with a perfectly reasonable definition, then consistently apply that definition for nearly 70 years.
It's not their fault that science fiction redefined it from under them!
@simon Machines with intelligence similar to (or better than) that of humans (that is, the current popular concept of artificial intelligence) has been present in science fiction since the 19th century. Dystopian (and utopian) fantasies of humans subjugated (or assisted) by these machine intelligences have been science fiction tropes continuously since then. I would wager that John McCarthy was aware of this fact. No one "redefined it from under them."
@lgw4 that's not an argument I'd heard before! I know science fiction had AI all the way back to Erewhon https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erewhon but I was under the impression that the term itself was first used by McCarthy