Terrence L. Fine
{{Short description|American mathematician (1939–2021)}}
Terrence L. Fine (March 9, 1939 {{ndash}} January 31, 2021){{cite web |date=February 1, 2021 |title=Terrence L. Fine |work=Rochester Democrat and Chronicle |url=https://obits.democratandchronicle.com/obituaries/democratandchronicle/obituary.aspx?n=terrence-l-fine&pid=197657765 |accessdate=February 4, 2021}} was an American scientist, engineer and philosopher. He is known{{cite book|author1=Henry E. Kyburg, Jr|author2=Choh Man Teng|title=Uncertain Inference|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CicvkPZhohEC&pg=PA94|accessdate=2013-11-12|date=6 August 2001|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-00101-4|pages=113–114}}{{cite book|author1=Patrick Suppes|author2=Paul Humphreys|title=Patrick Suppes: Scientific Philosopher: Volume 1. Probability and Probabilistic Causality|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Lp2paRJB3qYC&pg=PP4|accessdate=2013-11-12|date=1 January 1994|publisher=Springer|isbn=978-0-7923-2552-9|page=132}}{{cite web | title =Fellows - F | work =IEEE: Membership & Services | publisher =IEEE | url =http://www.ieee.org/membership_services/membership/fellows/alphabetical/ffellows.html | accessdate =2013-11-12 | url-status =dead | archiveurl =https://web.archive.org/web/20131112201704/http://www.ieee.org/membership_services/membership/fellows/alphabetical/ffellows.html | archivedate =2013-11-12 }} especially for his contributions to the defense and development of alternatives to the classical calculus for probabilistic modeling and decision-making. Other contributions include Fine's theorem,{{cite book|author=Ming Li|title=An Introduction to Kolmogorov Complexity and Its Applications|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LKEmB_GQ53QC|accessdate=2013-11-12|year=1997|publisher=Springer|isbn=978-0-387-94868-3|page=135}} the Fine numbersDeutsch, E. and Shapiro, L., "A survey of the Fine numbers", Discrete Mathematics, 241, 241–265, 2001. and the Fine–McMillan quantizer.{{cite book|author1=G. Gabor|author2=Z. Györfi|title=Recursive source coding: a theory for the practice of waveform coding|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=vPlSAAAAMAAJ|accessdate=2013-11-12|year=1986|publisher=Springer-Verlag|isbn=978-0-387-96309-9}} He was the recipient of the first patent awarded in the area of statistical delta modulation.{{cite patent|country=US|inventor1-last=Fine|inventor1-first =Terrence L.|pubdate=1968-07-16|title=Statistical delta modulation system|number =3393364|assign1=Signatron Inc.}}
Biography
Fine was born in New York City on March 9, 1939. His academic degrees were from the City College of New York (B.E.E.) and from Harvard University (S.M., Ph.D.). He was awarded a Miller Research Fellowship at the University of California Berkeley for the period 1964 to 1966, after which he joined the faculty of Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, where he remained until his retirement in 2010. There he served as Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering; concurrently, as Professor in the Department of Statistical Sciences; and from 1999 to 2004, as Director of the university's multidisciplinary Center for Applied Mathematics. He was a Professor Emeritus at Cornell. He was a Life Fellow and Third Millennium Medalist of the IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers).{{cite web|url=http://www.ece.cornell.edu/fine |accessdate=August 13, 2012 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20120822071415/http://www.ece.cornell.edu/fine/ |archivedate=August 22, 2012 |title=Cornell ECE Faculty Emeritus Profile, Terrence Fine }}
Selected publications
- Theories of Probability: An Examination of Foundations, Academic Press, 1973. A study of mathematical and interpretive alternatives to the standard framework for mathematical probability.
- Feedforward Neural Network Methodology, Series on Statistics for Engineering and Information Science, Springer-Verlag, 1999.
- Probability and Probabilistic Reasoning for Electrical Engineering, Pearson/Prentice-Hall, 2006.
- "An argument for comparative probability", in R. Butts, J. Hintikka, eds., Basic Problems in Methodology and Linguistics III, Univ. Western Ontario Ser. Philosophy of Science, 11, D. Reidel, Dordrecht, 105–119, 1977.
- "On the apparent convergence of relative frequency and its implications", IEEE Transactions on Information Theory, IT-16, 251–257, 1970. Source of Fine's Theorem.
- "Extrapolation when very little is known about the source", Information and Control, 16, 331–359, 1970. A non-statistical approach to extrapolation, and source of the Fine numbers.
References
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Category:20th-century American mathematicians
Category:21st-century American mathematicians
Category:Philosophers of probability
Category:Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences alumni