:Marvin Minsky

{{Short description|American cognitive scientist (1927–2016)}}

{{Use mdy dates|date=January 2016}}

{{Infobox scientist

| name = Marvin Minsky

| image = Marvin Minsky at OLPCb.jpg

| caption = Minsky in 2008

| birth_name = Marvin Lee Minsky

| birth_date = {{birth date|1927|8|9}}

| birth_place = New York City, New York, U.S.

| death_date = {{Death date and age|2016|1|24|1927|8|9}}

| death_place = Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.

| spouse = {{marriage|Gloria Rudisch|1952}}

| children = 3

| field = {{Plainlist|

| workplaces = Massachusetts Institute of Technology

| education = Harvard University (BA)
Princeton University (MA, PhD)

| doctoral_advisor = Albert W. Tucker{{MathGenealogy |id=6869 |title=Marvin Lee Minsky}}{{AIGenealogy |id=21 |title=Marvin Lee Minsky}}

| thesis_title = Theory of Neural-Analog Reinforcement Systems and Its Application to the Brain Model Problem

| thesis_year = 1954

| thesis_url = https://www.proquest.com/docview/301998727

| doctoral_students = {{Plainlist|

}}

| known_for = {{Plainlist|

  • Artificial intelligence{{Cite journal |last=Minsky |first=Marvin |doi=10.1109/JRPROC.1961.287775 |title=Steps toward Artificial Intelligence |url=http://courses.csail.mit.edu/6.803/pdf/steps.pdf |journal=Proceedings of the IRE |volume=49 |pages=8–30 |year=1961 |citeseerx=10.1.1.79.7413|s2cid=14250548 }}
    Confocal microscope{{Cite journal |last=Minsky |first=Marvin |title=Memoir on inventing the confocal scanning microscope |doi=10.1002/sca.4950100403 |journal=Scanning |volume=10 |issue=4 |pages=128–138 |year=1988 }}
  • Useless machine{{cite news|last=Pesta|first=A|title=Looking for Something Useful to Do With Your Time? Don't Try This|url=https://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424127887323628804578348572687608806|access-date=March 24, 2014|newspaper=WSJ|date=March 12, 2014}}
  • Triadex Muse{{cite journal|last1=Hillis|first1=Danny|author-link=Danny Hillis|last2=McCarthy|first2=John|author2-link=John McCarthy (computer scientist)|last3=Mitchell|first3=Tom M.|last4=Mueller|first4=Erik T.|last5=Riecken|first5=Doug|last6=Sloman|first6=Aaron|last7=Winston|first7=Patrick Henry|title=In Honor of Marvin Minsky's Contributions on his 80th Birthday|journal=AI Magazine|date=2007|volume=28|issue=4|page=109|doi=10.1609/aimag.v28i4.2064}}
  • Perceptrons{{cite book |last1=Papert |first1=Seymour |author-link=Seymour Papert |last2=Minsky |first2=Marvin Lee |title=Perceptrons: an introduction to computational geometry |publisher=MIT Press |location=Cambridge, Massachusetts |year=1988 |isbn=978-0-262-63111-2 |url=https://archive.org/details/perceptronsintro00mins }}
    The Society of Mind{{cite book |last=Minsky |first=Marvin Lee |title=The Society of Mind |publisher=Simon and Schuster |location=New York |year=1986 |isbn=978-0-671-60740-1 |url=https://archive.org/details/societyofmind00marv }} 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.
  • The Emotion Machine{{cite book |last=Minsky |first=Marvin Lee |title=The Emotion Machine: Commonsense Thinking, Artificial Intelligence, and the Future of the Human Mind |publisher=Simon & Schuster |location=New York |year=2007 |isbn=978-0-7432-7664-1 }}
  • Frames
  • SNARC
  • Dartmouth workshop}}

| prizes = {{Plainlist|

| footnotes =

| website = {{URL|http://web.media.mit.edu/~minsky}}

}}

Marvin Lee Minsky (August 9, 1927 – January 24, 2016) was an American cognitive and computer scientist concerned largely with research in artificial intelligence (AI). He co-founded the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's AI laboratory and wrote extensively about AI and philosophy.{{DBLP|name=Marvin Minsky}}{{AcademicSearch|771410}}{{Cite web|url=https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=marvin+minsky|title=Google Scholar|website=scholar.google.com}}{{cite journal |last=Winston |first=Patrick Henry |author-link=Patrick Winston |title=Marvin L. Minsky (1927–2016) |journal=Nature |volume=530 |issue=7590 |year=2016 |page=282 |pmid=26887486|doi=10.1038/530282a |bibcode=2016Natur.530..282W|doi-access=free }}

Minsky received many accolades and honors, including the 1969 Turing Award.

Early life and education

Marvin Lee Minsky was born in New York City, to Henry, an eye surgeon, and Fannie (Reiser), a Zionist activist.{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/scienceincontemp0000swed|url-access=registration|page=[https://archive.org/details/scienceincontemp0000swed/page/188 188]|quote=marvin minsky jewish.|title=Science in the Contemporary World: An Encyclopedia|first=Eric Gottfrid|last=Swedin|date=August 10, 2005|publisher=ABC-CLIO|via=Internet Archive}}{{Cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/feb/03/marvin-minsky-obituary|title=Marvin Minsky obituary|first=Martin|last=Campbell-Kelly|newspaper=The Guardian |date=February 3, 2016|via=www.theguardian.com}} 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 in 1950 and a Ph.D. in mathematics from Princeton University in 1954. His doctoral dissertation was titled "Theory of neural-analog reinforcement systems and its application to the brain-model problem."{{Cite web|url=https://catalog.princeton.edu/catalog/SCSB-4802106|title=Theory of neural-analog reinforcement systems and its application to the brain-model problem|first=Marvin|last=Minsky|date=July 31, 1954|via=catalog.princeton.edu}}{{cite thesis |degree=PhD |first=Marvin Lee |last=Minsky |title=Theory of Neural-Analog Reinforcement Systems and Its Application to the Brain Model Problem |publisher=Princeton University |date=1954 |author-link=Marvin Minsky|oclc=3020680|id={{ProQuest|301998727}} }}{{cite journal

|last1=Hillis

|first1=Danny

|author-link=Danny Hillis

|last2=McCarthy |first2=John |author2-link=John McCarthy (computer scientist) |last3=Mitchell |first3=Tom M. |last4=Mueller |first4=Erik T. |last5=Riecken |first5=Doug |last6=Sloman |first6=Aaron |last7=Winston |first7=Patrick Henry

|title=In Honor of Marvin Minsky's Contributions on his 80th Birthday

|journal=AI Magazine

|volume=28

|issue=4

|pages=103–110

|year=2007

|url=http://www.aaai.org/ojs/index.php/aimagazine/article/view/2064/2058

|access-date=November 24, 2010}} He was a Junior Fellow of the Harvard Society of Fellows from 1954 to 1957.[https://socfell.fas.harvard.edu/listed-term-0 Society of Fellows, Listed by Term]{{cite web|title= Marvin Minsky, Ph.D. Biography and Interview |website=www.achievement.org|publisher=American Academy of Achievement|url= https://achievement.org/achiever/marvin-minsky-ph-d/#interview}}

Minsky was on the MIT faculty from 1958 to his death. He joined the staff at MIT Lincoln Laboratory in 1958; a year later, he and John McCarthy initiated what was, {{as of|2003|lc=y}}, named the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory.{{cite journal |last=Horgan |first=John |date=November 1993 |title=Profile: Marvin L. Minsky: The Mastermind of Artificial Intelligence |journal=Scientific American |volume=269|issue=5 |pages=14–15 |doi=10.1038/scientificamerican1193-35 |bibcode=1993SciAm.269e..35H}}{{cite web|last=Rifkin|first=Glenn|title=Marvin Minsky, pioneer in artificial intelligence, dies at 88|url=http://tech.mit.edu/V135/N38/minsky.html|website=The Tech|publisher=MIT|access-date=20 July 2017|date=28 January 2016|archive-date=November 21, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171121131830/http://tech.mit.edu/V135/N38/minsky.html|url-status=dead}} He was the Toshiba Professor of Media Arts and Sciences as well as professor of electrical engineering and computer science at MIT.

Contributions in computer science

File:Confocal measurement of 1-euro-star 3d and euro.png]]

Minsky's inventions include the first head-mounted graphical display (1963){{cite web |url = http://web.media.mit.edu/~minsky/minskybiog.html |title = Brief Academic Biography of Marvin Minsky |website = Web.media.mit.edu |access-date = January 26, 2016 |archive-date = May 16, 2018 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20180516142208/http://web.media.mit.edu/~minsky/minskybiog.html |url-status = dead }} and the confocal microscope{{NoteTag|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".}} (1957, a predecessor to today's widely used confocal laser scanning microscope). With Seymour Papert, he developed the first Logo "turtle". In 1951, Minsky built the first randomly wired neural network learning machine, SNARC. In 1962, he worked on small universal Turing machines and published his well-known 7-state, 4-symbol machine.Turlough Neary, Damien Woods, "Small Weakly Universal Turing Machines", Machines, Computations, and Universality 2007, proceedings, Orleans, France, September 10–13, 2007, {{isbn|3540745920}}, p. 262-263

Minsky's book Perceptrons (written with Papert) attacked the work of Frank Rosenblatt, and became the foundational work in the analysis of artificial neural networks. The book is the center of a controversy in the history of AI, as some claim it greatly discouraged research on neural networks in the 1970s and contributed to the so-called "AI winter".{{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 |s2cid=16786738}} Minsky also founded several other AI models. His paper "A framework for representing knowledge"Minsky, M. (1975). A framework for representing knowledge. In P. H. Winston (Ed.), The psychology of computer vision. New York: McGraw-Hill Book. created a new paradigm in knowledge representation. Perceptrons is now more a historical than practical book, but the theory of frames is in wide use.{{cite book |author= |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 |s2cid=1870840 }} Minsky also wrote of the possibility that extraterrestrial life may think like humans, thus permitting communication.{{cite magazine |last=Minsky |first=Marvin |date=April 1985 |title = Communication with Alien Intelligence |url = https://archive.org/stream/byte-magazine-1985-04/1985_04_BYTE_10-04_Artificial_Intelligence#page/n127/mode/2up |magazine=Byte |location=Peterborough, New Hampshire |publisher=UBM Technology Group |volume=10 |issue=4 |page=127 |access-date=July 30, 2019 }}

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 for the theory came from his work in trying to create a machine that uses a robotic arm, a videocamera, and a computer to build with children's blocks. In 1986, he 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.

{{Gallery

|title=The MA-3 Robotic Manipulator Arm, on display at MIT Museum

|align=center

|MA-3 Robotic Manipulator Arm-IMG 6023-white.jpg|General view

|MA-3 Robotic Manipulator Arm-IMG 6021-white.jpg|The Belgrade Hand

}}

In 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. Drafts of the book are available on his website.{{Cite web|url=http://web.media.mit.edu/~minsky/|title=Marvin Minsky's Home Page|website=web.media.mit.edu|access-date=January 26, 2016|archive-date=August 3, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080803231734/http://web.media.mit.edu/~minsky/|url-status=dead}}

Minsky also invented a "gravity machine" that will ring a bell if the gravitational constant changes, a theoretical possibility that is not expected to occur in the foreseeable future.

Personal life

File:Minskytron-PDP-1-20070512.jpg's PDP-1, 2007]]

In 1952, Minsky married pediatrician Gloria Rudisch; together they had three children.{{cite news|title=R.I.P. Marvin Minsky|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2016/01/25/marvin-minsky-1927-2016/|access-date=28 January 2016|newspaper=Washington Post|date=26 January 2016}} Minsky was a talented improvisational pianist{{cite news|title=Obituary: Marvin Minsky, 88; MIT professor helped found field of artificial intelligence|url=https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2016/01/25/marvin-minsky-dies-mit-professor-helped-found-field-artificial-intelligence/A8y6ey8S0QAaao463Z2ooO/story.html|access-date=28 January 2016|work=Boston Globe|date=26 January 2016}} who published musings on the relations between music and psychology.

=Opinions=

Minsky was an atheist.{{cite book|title=Portraits of Great American Scientists|year=2001|publisher=Prometheus Books|isbn=9781573929325|page=[https://archive.org/details/portraitsofgreat00judi/page/74 74]|last1=Lederman|first1=Leon M.|author-link=Leon M. Lederman|last2=Scheppler|first2=Judith A.|chapter=Marvin Minsky: Mind Maker|quote=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.|chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/portraitsofgreat00judi/page/74}} He was a signatory to the Scientists' Open Letter on Cryonics.{{cite web | title = SCIENTISTS' OPEN LETTER ON CRYONICS | work = The Science of Cryonics | publisher = Biostasis.com | date = March 19, 2004 | url = https://www.biostasis.com/scientists-open-letter-on-cryonics/ | access-date = 2020-05-06 }}

He was a critic of the Loebner Prize for conversational robots,[http://archive.salon.com/tech/feature/2003/02/26/loebner_part_one/index4.html Salon.com Technology |Artificial stupidity] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060630001944/http://archive.salon.com/tech/feature/2003/02/26/loebner_part_one/index4.html |date=June 30, 2006}} and argued that a fundamental difference between humans and machines is that while humans are machines, they are machines in which intelligence emerges from the interplay of the many unintelligent but semi-autonomous agents the brain comprises.{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/26/business/marvin-minsky-pioneer-in-artificial-intelligence-dies-at-88.html|title=Marvin Minsky, Pioneer in Artificial Intelligence, Dies at 88|date=January 25, 2016|work=The New York Times|access-date=January 25, 2016}} He argued that "somewhere down the line, some computers will become more intelligent than most people", but that it was very hard to predict how fast progress would be.{{cite news|title=For artificial intelligence pioneer Marvin Minsky, computers have soul|url=http://www.jpost.com/Business/Business-Features/For-artificial-intelligence-pioneer-Marvin-Minsky-computers-have-soul-352076|access-date=27 January 2016|newspaper=Jerusalem Post|date=13 May 2014}} He 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,{{cite book|last1=Russell|first1=Stuart J.|author-link=Stuart J. Russell|last2=Norvig|first2=Peter|author2-link=Peter Norvig|title=Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach|date=2003|publisher=Prentice Hall|location=Upper Saddle River, N.J.|isbn=978-0137903955|chapter=Section 26.3: The Ethics and Risks of Developing Artificial Intelligence|quote=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.|title-link=Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach}} but believed that such scenarios are "hard to take seriously" because he felt confident that AI would be well tested before being deployed.{{cite news|last=Achenbach|first=Joel|title=Marvin Minsky, an architect of artificial intelligence, dies at 88|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/marvin-minsky-an-architect-of-artificial-intelligence-dies-at-88/2016/01/26/934e3d50-c430-11e5-8965-0607e0e265ce_story.html|access-date=27 January 2016|newspaper=Washington Post|date=6 January 2016}}

=Association with Jeffrey Epstein=

Minsky received a $100,000 research grant from Jeffrey Epstein in 2002, four years before Epstein's first arrest for sex offenses; it was the first from Epstein to MIT. Minsky received no further research grants from him.{{Cite journal|last=Subbaraman|first=Nidhi|date=2020-01-10|title=MIT review of Epstein donations finds "significant mistakes of judgment"|url=https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00072-x|journal=Nature|language=en|doi=10.1038/d41586-020-00072-x|pmid=33420402|s2cid=214375389}}{{cite web |title=Report Concerning Jeffrey Epstein's Interactions with the Massachusetts Institute Of Technology|url=http://factfindingjan2020.mit.edu/files/MIT-report.pdf |date=January 10, 2020 |website=mit.edu |first1=Roberto M. |last1=Braceras |first2=Jennifer L. |last2=Chunias |first3=Kevin P. |last3=Martin|pages=9, 15}}

Minsky organized two academic symposia on Epstein's private island Little Saint James, one in 2002 and another in 2011, after Epstein was a registered sex offender.{{cite news|title=AI pioneer accused of having sex with trafficking victim on Jeffrey Epstein's island|url=https://www.theverge.com/2019/8/9/20798900/marvin-minsky-jeffrey-epstein-sex-trafficking-island-court-records-unsealed |date=August 9, 2019 |access-date=8 August 2019|newspaper=The Verge}} Virginia Giuffre testified in a 2015 deposition in her defamation lawsuit against Epstein's associate Ghislaine Maxwell that Maxwell "directed" her to have sex with Minsky, among others. There has been no allegation that sex between them took place nor a lawsuit against Minsky's estate.{{cite news|last=Briquelet|first=Kate|display-authors=etal|work=The Daily Beast|date=September 16, 2019|url=https://www.thedailybeast.com/jeffrey-epstein-unsealed-documents-name-powerful-men-in-sex-ring|access-date=8 August 2019|title=Jeffrey Epstein Accuser Names Powerful Men in Alleged Sex Ring}} Minsky's widow, Gloria Rudisch, says that he could not have had sex with any of the women at Epstein's residences, as they were always together during all the visits to Epstein's residences.{{cite magazine|url=https://time.com/5651186/jeffrey-epstein-investigation-co-conspirators/ |date=August 14, 2019 |access-date=July 28, 2019 |title=The Jeffrey Epstein Investigation Continues After His Death. Here's Who Else Could Be Investigated|last1=Carlistle|first1=Madeline|last2=Mansoor|first2=Sanya|quote=Minsky’s widow, Gloria Rudisch, denied he had sex with Giuffre or any other girls|magazine=Time}}

=Death=

Minsky died of a cerebral hemorrhage in January 2016, at age 88.{{cite news |last=Pearson |first=Michael |title=Pioneering computer scientist Marvin Minsky dies at 88 |work=CNN |date=26 January 2016 |url=http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/26/us/marvin-minsky-obit-feat/ |access-date=2016-04-07}} Minsky was a member of Alcor Life Extension Foundation's Scientific Advisory Board.{{cite web |title=Alcor Scientific Advisory Board |website=Alcor |date=January 14, 2016 |url=http://alcor.org/AboutAlcor/meetsciadvboard.html |access-date=2016-04-07 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160114062954/http://alcor.org/AboutAlcor/meetsciadvboard.html |archive-date=January 14, 2016}} Alcor will neither confirm nor deny whether Minsky was cryonically preserved.{{cite web | title = Official Alcor Statement Concerning Marvin Minsky | work = Alcor News | publisher = Alcor Life Extension Foundation | date = January 27, 2016 | url = https://www.alcor.org/blog/official-alcor-statement-concerning-marvin-minsky/ | access-date = 2020-05-06 }}

Bibliography (selected)

Awards and affiliations

Minsky won the Turing Award (the greatest distinction in computer science) in 1969, the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement in 1982,{{cite web|title= Golden Plate Awardees of the American Academy of Achievement |website=www.achievement.org|publisher=American Academy of Achievement|url= https://achievement.org/our-history/golden-plate-awards/#science-exploration}} the Japan Prize in 1990,{{cite web |title=The Japan Prize |url=https://www.japanprize.jp/en/prize_past_1990_prize01.html |access-date=30 August 2024}} the IJCAI Award for Research Excellence for 1991, and the Benjamin Franklin Medal from the Franklin Institute for 2001.[http://www.fi.edu/winners/2001/minsky_marvin.faw?winner_id=3528 Marvin Minsky – The Franklin Institute Awards – Laureate Database] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110526130553/http://www.fi.edu/winners/2001/minsky_marvin.faw?winner_id=3528 |date=May 26, 2011}}. Franklin Institute. Retrieved on March 25, 2008. In 2006, he was inducted as a Fellow of the Computer History Museum "for co-founding the field of artificial intelligence, creating early neural networks and robots, and developing theories of human and machine cognition."{{cite web |url=https://www.computerhistory.org/fellowawards/hall/marvin-minsky/ |title=Marvin Minsky: 2006 Fellow |author= |website=Computer History Museum |access-date=July 30, 2019 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150329010955/http://www.computerhistory.org/fellowawards/hall/bios/Marvin,Minsky |archive-date=March 29, 2015 |df=mdy-all}} In 2011, Minsky was inducted into IEEE Intelligent Systems' AI Hall of Fame for the "significant contributions to the field of AI and intelligent systems".{{Cite journal |doi=10.1109/MIS.2011.64 |title=AI's Hall of Fame |url=http://www.computer.org/cms/Computer.org/ComputingNow/homepage/2011/0811/rW_IS_AIsHallofFame.pdf |journal=IEEE Intelligent Systems |volume=26 |issue=4 |pages=5–15 |year=2011 |access-date=September 4, 2015 |archive-date=December 16, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111216235804/http://www.computer.org/cms/Computer.org/ComputingNow/homepage/2011/0811/rW_IS_AIsHallofFame.pdf |url-status=dead }} In 2014, Minsky won the Dan David Prize for "Artificial Intelligence, the Digital Mind".{{cite news|url=http://english.tau.ac.il/video/dan_david_prize_2014 |title=Dan David prize 2014 winners |date=May 15, 2014 |access-date=May 20, 2014}} He was also awarded with the 2013 BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award in the Information and Communication Technologies category.{{cite news|url=https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2014/01/15/mit-professor-marvin-minsky-wins-award/aSiCSHIjlGycOGYmeLSZ5L/story.html |title=MIT artificial intelligence, robotics pioneer feted: Award celebrates Minsky's career |newspaper=BostonGlobe.com |date=August 24, 2011 |access-date=January 18, 2014}}

Minsky was affiliated with the following organizations:

Media appearances

  • Machine Dreams (1988)
  • Future Fantastic (1996)

See also

Notes

{{NoteFoot}}

References

{{Reflist}}