The following paper is an attempt to capture the circumstances, conepts, and events that led to the formulation of Human Factors. Born in the wake of the second world war, it was implimented to help people cope with the complex “war machines” of the day. Human Factors served as a meeting ground for several discliplines, that were all bound together in single endeavor to improve the effectiveness, effieciency and safety of human in systems. Since the war's close, the field has been expanded to include many non-military applications. Despite its new found diversity, it continues to employ the same guiding principle of incorporating psychological and physiological characteristics of people into interface designs. It is this phenomena which distinguishes Human Factors as a unique paradigm with its own antecedental roots and disciplinary matrix. Furthermore, its proliferation in recent years denotes a science that has transcended a revolutionary stage of development to a normal one in a Kuhnian perspective. It is contended that a recognition of these factors would facilitate a novice's understanding of the field, recognition of where the discipline presently is and where it is headed.
