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[[File:Confocal measurement of 1-euro-star 3d and euro.png|thumb|left|3D profile of a coin (partial) measured with a modern [[confocal microscope|confocal white light microscope.]]]]
[[File:Confocal measurement of 1-euro-star 3d and euro.png|thumb|left|3D profile of a coin (partial) measured with a modern [[confocal microscope|confocal white light microscope.]]]]
Minsky's inventions include the first [[head-mounted graphical display]] (1963)<ref name=brief>{{cite web|url=http://web.media.mit.edu/~minsky/minskybiog.html |title=Brief Academic Biography of Marvin Minsky |publisher=Web.media.mit.edu |date= |accessdate=January 26, 2016}}</ref> and the [[confocal microscope]]<ref name="confocal"/><ref>The patent for Minsky's Microscopy Apparatus was applied for in 1957, and subsequently granted US Patent Number 3,013,467 in 1961. According to his published biography on the MIT Media Lab webpage, "In 1956, when a Junior Fellow at Harvard, Minsky invented and built the first Confocal Scanning Microscope, an optical instrument with unprecedented resolution and image quality".</ref> (1957, a predecessor to today's widely used [[confocal laser scanning microscope]]). He developed, with [[Seymour Papert]], the first [[Logo programming language|Logo]] "[[turtle (robot)|turtle]]". Minsky also built, in 1951, the first randomly wired neural network learning machine, [[Stochastic neural analog reinforcement calculator|SNARC]].
Minsky's inventions include the first [[head-mounted graphical display]] (1963)<ref name=brief>{{cite web|url=http://web.media.mit.edu/~minsky/minskybiog.html |title=Brief Academic Biography of Marvin Minsky |publisher=Web.media.mit.edu |date= |accessdate=January 26, 2016}}</ref> and the [[confocal microscope]]<ref name="confocal"/><ref>The patent for Minsky's Microscopy Apparatus was applied for in 1957, and subsequently granted US Patent Number 3,013,467 in 1961. According to his published biography on the MIT Media Lab webpage, "In 1956, when a Junior Fellow at Harvard, Minsky invented and built the first Confocal Scanning Microscope, an optical instrument with unprecedented resolution and image quality".</ref> (1957, a predecessor to today's widely used [[confocal laser scanning microscope]]). He developed, with [[Seymour Papert]], the first [[Logo programming language|Logo]] "[[turtle (robot)|turtle]]". Minsky also built, in 1951, the first randomly wired neural network learning machine, [[Stochastic neural analog reinforcement calculator|SNARC]].

In 1962, Minsky came up with a 7,4 [[Turing machine]] that he was able to prove to be universal. At that point in time, it was known to be the simplest universal Turing machine–a record that stood for approximately 40 years until [[Stephen Wolfram]] published a 2,5 universal Turing machine in his 2002 book, ''[[A New Kind of Science]]''.<ref>{{cite book|last=Wolfram|first=Stephen|title=Idea Makers: Personal Perspectives on the Lives & Ideas of Some Notable People|publisher=Wolfram Media, Inc.|year=2016|page=140|isbn=978-1-5795-5-003-5}}</ref>


Minsky wrote the book ''[[Perceptrons (book)|Perceptrons]]'' (with Seymour Papert), which became the foundational work in the analysis of [[artificial neural network]]s. This book is the center of a controversy in the history of AI, as some claim it to have had great importance in discouraging research of neural networks in the 1970s, and contributing to the so-called "[[AI winter]]".<ref>{{cite journal|last=Olazaran|first=Mikel|title=A Sociological Study of the Official History of the Perceptrons Controversy|journal=Social Studies of Science|date=August 1996|volume=26|issue=3|pages=611–659|jstor=285702|doi=10.1177/030631296026003005}}</ref> He also founded several other famous AI models. His book ''A framework for representing knowledge'' created a new paradigm in programming. While his ''Perceptrons'' is now more a historical than practical book, the theory of frames is in wide use.<ref name="frames">{{Cite book | last1 = Unknown | doi = 10.3115/980190.980222 | chapter = Minsky's frame system theory | title = Proceedings of the 1975 workshop on Theoretical issues in natural language processing – TINLAP '75 | pages = 104–116 | year = 1975 | pmid = | pmc = }}</ref> Minsky has also written on the possibility that [[extraterrestrial life]] may think like humans, permitting communication.<ref name="minsky198504">{{cite news | url=https://archive.org/stream/byte-magazine-1985-04/1985_04_BYTE_10-04_Artificial_Intelligence#page/n127/mode/2up | title=Communication with Alien Intelligence | work=BYTE | date=April 1985 | accessdate=October 27, 2013 | author=Minsky, Marvin | page=127}}</ref>
Minsky wrote the book ''[[Perceptrons (book)|Perceptrons]]'' (with Seymour Papert), which became the foundational work in the analysis of [[artificial neural network]]s. This book is the center of a controversy in the history of AI, as some claim it to have had great importance in discouraging research of neural networks in the 1970s, and contributing to the so-called "[[AI winter]]".<ref>{{cite journal|last=Olazaran|first=Mikel|title=A Sociological Study of the Official History of the Perceptrons Controversy|journal=Social Studies of Science|date=August 1996|volume=26|issue=3|pages=611–659|jstor=285702|doi=10.1177/030631296026003005}}</ref> He also founded several other famous AI models. His book ''A framework for representing knowledge'' created a new paradigm in programming. While his ''Perceptrons'' is now more a historical than practical book, the theory of frames is in wide use.<ref name="frames">{{Cite book | last1 = Unknown | doi = 10.3115/980190.980222 | chapter = Minsky's frame system theory | title = Proceedings of the 1975 workshop on Theoretical issues in natural language processing – TINLAP '75 | pages = 104–116 | year = 1975 | pmid = | pmc = }}</ref> Minsky has also written on the possibility that [[extraterrestrial life]] may think like humans, permitting communication.<ref name="minsky198504">{{cite news | url=https://archive.org/stream/byte-magazine-1985-04/1985_04_BYTE_10-04_Artificial_Intelligence#page/n127/mode/2up | title=Communication with Alien Intelligence | work=BYTE | date=April 1985 | accessdate=October 27, 2013 | author=Minsky, Marvin | page=127}}</ref>

Revision as of 16:11, 3 August 2018

Marvin Minsky
Minsky in 2008
Born
Marvin Lee Minsky

(1927-08-09)August 9, 1927
New York City, New York, U.S.
DiedJanuary 24, 2016(2016-01-24) (aged 88)
Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
NationalityAmerican
Alma materPhillips Academy
Harvard University (B.A., 1950)
Princeton University (Ph.D., 1954)
Known for
Awards
Scientific career
Fields
InstitutionsMassachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
ThesisTheory of Neural-Analog Reinforcement Systems and Its Application to the Brain Model Problem (1954)
Doctoral advisorAlbert W. Tucker[2][3]
Doctoral students
Websiteweb.media.mit.edu/~minsky

Marvin Lee Minsky (August 9, 1927 – January 24, 2016) was an American

cognitive scientist concerned largely with research of artificial intelligence (AI), co-founder of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's AI laboratory, and author of several texts concerning AI and philosophy.[12][13][14][15]

Biography

Marvin Lee Minsky was born in New York City, to an

eye surgeon father, Henry, and to a mother, Fannie, who was an activist of Zionist affairs.[15][16] His family was Jewish. He attended the Ethical Culture Fieldston School and the Bronx High School of Science. He later attended Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts. He then served in the US Navy from 1944 to 1945. He received a B.A. in mathematics from Harvard University (1950) and a Ph.D. in mathematics from Princeton University (1954).[17][18]

He was on the

Media Arts and Sciences, and professor of electrical engineering and computer science
.

Contributions in computer science

confocal white light microscope.

Minsky's inventions include the first

SNARC
.

In 1962, Minsky came up with a 7,4 Turing machine that he was able to prove to be universal. At that point in time, it was known to be the simplest universal Turing machine–a record that stood for approximately 40 years until Stephen Wolfram published a 2,5 universal Turing machine in his 2002 book, A New Kind of Science.[23]

Minsky wrote the book

artificial neural networks. This book is the center of a controversy in the history of AI, as some claim it to have had great importance in discouraging research of neural networks in the 1970s, and contributing to the so-called "AI winter".[24] He also founded several other famous AI models. His book A framework for representing knowledge created a new paradigm in programming. While his Perceptrons is now more a historical than practical book, the theory of frames is in wide use.[25] Minsky has also written on the possibility that extraterrestrial life may think like humans, permitting communication.[26]

In the early 1970s, at the

MIT Artificial Intelligence Lab, Minsky and Papert started developing what came to be known as the Society of Mind
theory. The theory attempts to explain how what we call intelligence could be a product of the interaction of non-intelligent parts. Minsky says that the biggest source of ideas about the theory came from his work in trying to create a machine that uses a robotic arm, a video camera, and a computer to build with children's blocks. In 1986, Minsky published The Society of Mind, a comprehensive book on the theory which, unlike most of his previously published work, was written for the general public.

In November 2006, Minsky published The Emotion Machine, a book that critiques many popular theories of how human minds work and suggests alternative theories, often replacing simple ideas with more complex ones. Recent drafts of the book are freely available from his webpage.[27]

Role in popular culture

Minsky was an adviser

2001: A Space Odyssey; one of the movie's characters, Victor Kaminski, was named in Minsky's honor.[29] Minsky himself is explicitly mentioned in Arthur C. Clarke's derivative novel of the same name, where he is portrayed as achieving a crucial break-through in artificial intelligence in the then-future 1980s, paving the way for HAL 9000
in the early 21st century:

In the 1980s, Minsky and

artificial neural networks could be generated automatically—self replicated—in accordance with any arbitrary learning program. Artificial brains could be grown by a process strikingly analogous to the development of a human brain. In any given case, the precise details would never be known, and even if they were, they would be millions of times too complex for human understanding.[30]

Personal life

The Minskytron or "Three Position Display" running on the Computer History Museum's PDP-1, 2007

In 1952, Minsky married pediatrician Gloria Rudisch; together they had three children.[31] Minsky was a talented improvisational pianist[32] who published musings on the relations between music and psychology.

Opinions

Minsky was an atheist[33] and a signatory to the Scientists' Open Letter on Cryonics.[34] He was a critic of the Loebner Prize for conversational robots.[35][36]

Minsky discussed the fundamental difference between humans and machines, and that humans are machines whose "intelligence" emerges from the interplay of the many unintelligent but semi-autonomous agents that comprise the brain.[37] He has stated that "somewhere down the line, some computers will become more intelligent than most people," but that it's very hard to predict how fast progress will be.[38] He has cautioned that an artificial superintelligence designed to solve an innocuous mathematical problem might decide to assume control of Earth's resources to build supercomputers to help achieve its goal,[39] but believed that such negative scenarios are "hard to take seriously" because he was confident AI would go through a lot of testing before being deployed.[40]

Death

Minsky died of a cerebral hemorrhage at the age of 88.

Advisory Board,[42] and is believed to have been cryonically preserved by Alcor,[43] presumably as 'Patient 144', whose cooling procedures began on January 27, 2016.[44]

Bibliography (selected)

Awards and affiliations

Minsky won the

BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award in the Information and Communication Technologies category.[50]

Minsky was affiliated with the following organizations:

See also

References

  1. ^ "Marvin Minsky". Archived from the original on January 3, 2015. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  2. ^ Marvin Lee Minsky at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
  3. ^ Marvin Lee Minsky at the AI Genealogy Project.
  4. ^ "Personal page for Marvin Minsky". web.media.mit.edu. Retrieved June 23, 2016.
  5. ^
    doi:10.1109/JRPROC.1961.287775
    .
  6. ^
    doi:10.1002/sca.4950100403
    .
  7. ^ Pesta, A (March 12, 2014). "Looking for Something Useful to Do With Your Time? Don't Try This". WSJ. Retrieved March 24, 2014.
  8. doi:10.1609/aimag.v28i4.2064 (inactive January 25, 2017). Retrieved January 26, 2016.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of January 2017 (link
    )
  9. ISBN 0-262-63111-3
    .
  10. ISBN 0-671-60740-5
    . The first comprehensive description of the Society of Mind theory of intellectual structure and development. See also The Society of Mind (CD-ROM version), Voyager, 1996.
  11. ISBN 0-7432-7664-7
    .
  12. ^ Marvin Minsky at DBLP Bibliography Server Edit this at Wikidata
  13. Microsoft Academic
  14. ^ "marvin minsky – Google Scholar".
  15. ^
    PMID 26887486
    .
  16. ISBN 1851095241
  17. OCLC 3020680
    .
  18. ^ Hillis, Danny; John McCarthy; Tom M. Mitchell; Erik T. Mueller; Doug Riecken; Aaron Sloman; Patrick Henry Winston (2007). "In Honor of Marvin Minsky's Contributions on his 80th Birthday". AI Magazine. 28 (4). Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence: 103–110. Retrieved November 24, 2010.
  19. doi:10.1038/scientificamerican1193-35
    .
  20. ^ Rifkin, Glenn (January 28, 2016). "Marvin Minsky, pioneer in artificial intelligence, dies at 88". The Tech. MIT. Retrieved July 20, 2017.
  21. ^ a b c "Brief Academic Biography of Marvin Minsky". Web.media.mit.edu. Retrieved January 26, 2016.
  22. ^ The patent for Minsky's Microscopy Apparatus was applied for in 1957, and subsequently granted US Patent Number 3,013,467 in 1961. According to his published biography on the MIT Media Lab webpage, "In 1956, when a Junior Fellow at Harvard, Minsky invented and built the first Confocal Scanning Microscope, an optical instrument with unprecedented resolution and image quality".
  23. ISBN 978-1-5795-5-003-5
    .
  24. JSTOR 285702
    .
  25. doi:10.3115/980190.980222
    .
  26. ^ Minsky, Marvin (April 1985). "Communication with Alien Intelligence". BYTE. p. 127. Retrieved October 27, 2013.
  27. ^ "Marvin Minsky".
  28. ^ For more, see this interview, "Archived copy". Archived from the original on June 16, 2012. Retrieved May 11, 2014. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  29. ^ "AI pioneer Marvin Minsky dies aged 88". BBC News. January 26, 2016. Retrieved January 28, 2016.
  30. ^ Clarke, Arthur C.: "2001: A Space Odyssey"
  31. Washington Post
    . January 26, 2016. Retrieved January 28, 2016.
  32. Boston Globe
    . January 26, 2016. Retrieved January 28, 2016.
  33. ISBN 9781573929325. Another area where he "goes against the flow" is in his spiritual beliefs. As far as religion is concerned, he's a confirmed atheist. "I think it [religion] is a contagious mental disease. . . . The brain has a need to believe it knows a reason for things. {{cite book}}: Cite uses deprecated parameter |authors= (help
    )
  34. ^ Scientists' Open Letter on Cryonics, Institute for Evidence Based Cryonics, retrieved January 29, 2016
  35. ^ "Minsky -thread.html".
  36. ^ Salon.com Technology | Artificial stupidity Archived June 30, 2006, at the Wayback Machine
  37. ^ a b "Marvin Minsky, Pioneer in Artificial Intelligence, Dies at 88". The New York Times. January 25, 2016. Retrieved January 25, 2016.
  38. Jerusalem Post
    . May 13, 2014. Retrieved January 27, 2016.
  39. ISBN 0137903952
    . Similarly, Marvin Minsky once suggested that an AI program designed to solve the Riemann Hypothesis might end up taking over all the resources of Earth to build more powerful supercomputers to help achieve its goal.
  40. ^ Achenbach, Joel (January 6, 2016). "Marvin Minsky, an architect of artificial intelligence, dies at 88". Washington Post. Retrieved January 27, 2016.
  41. ^ Pearson, Michael (January 26, 2016). "Pioneering computer scientist Marvin Minsky dies at 88". CNN. pp. 12–27. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
  42. ^ a b Admin (January 14, 2016). "Alcor Scientific Advisory Board". Alcor website. Wayback Machine. Archived from the original on January 14, 2016. Retrieved April 7, 2016. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  43. ^ Kurzweil, Ray (April 4, 2016). "Ray Kurzweil Remembers Marvin Minsky". YouTube. Retrieved December 5, 2017. 10:35-11:26: "The night he died I got frantic calls from Alcor: Where's his body?... and I did hear back that they resolved the issue, although apparently on Wikipedia it says they don't know if it's resolved; do people know? It was resolved... I predict by 2045 we'll be able to revive Marvin..."
  44. ^ "A-1700, Case Summary, Patient 144". Alcor News. June 12, 2016. Retrieved December 6, 2017. On January 25, 2016, Alcor was notified... that the member had been pronounced legally dead the previous day in Massachusetts after suffering a cerebral hemorrhage... After some delays locating the member without information from the family, cooling to dry ice temperature began on January 27 followed by subsequent transport to Alcor and cooling to liquid nitrogen temperature for long-term storage.
  45. ^ Marvin Minsky – The Franklin Institute Awards – Laureate Database Archived May 26, 2011, at the Wayback Machine. Franklin Institute. Retrieved on March 25, 2008.
  46. ^ CHM. "Marvin Minsky — CHM Fellow Award Winner". Archived from the original on March 29, 2015. Retrieved March 30, 2015. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)"Archived copy". Archived from the original on January 3, 2015. Retrieved January 5, 2015. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  47. doi:10.1109/MIS.2011.64
    .
  48. PRWeb (Vocus
    ).
  49. ^ "Dan David prize 2014 winners". May 15, 2014. Retrieved May 20, 2014.
  50. BostonGlobe.com
    . August 24, 2011. Retrieved January 18, 2014.
  51. ^ "Extropy Institute Directors & Advisors".
  52. ^ "kynamatrix Research Network : About". www.kynamatrix.org. Retrieved February 9, 2018.

External links

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