Edward Feigenbaum
In plain wordsAn American computer scientist who pioneered expert systems, programs that capture specialists' knowledge as rules to solve problems in fields such as chemistry and medicine.
American computer scientist at Stanford University, the leading early builder and champion of expert systemsexpert system, n.: A program that stores a human specialist's know-how as many if–then rules and uses them to give advice or make decisions in a narrow field, such as diagnosing infections or configuring computers.. A student of Herbert A. SimonHerbert A. Simon, prop. n.: An American scientist of decision-making who, with Allen Newell, wrote some of the first AI programs and argued that minds and computers both think by manipulating symbols. at the Carnegie Institute of Technology, where he built the EPAM model of human verbal learning, he co-edited 'Computers and Thought' (1963), the first anthology of AI research. From 1965, with Joshua Lederberg, Bruce Buchanan and Carl Djerassi, he led DENDRALDENDRAL, prop. n.: A program begun at Stanford in 1965 that worked out the structure of chemical molecules from laboratory measurements using rules taken from expert chemists. It is usually called the first expert system., which inferred molecular structures from mass-spectrometry data, and his Heuristic Programming Project went on to produce MYCINMYCIN, prop. n.: A 1970s Stanford program that advised doctors on blood infections and antibiotics by applying hundreds of if–then rules from specialists. It performed about as well as experts but was never used on patients. and other systems. From this work he drew the 'knowledge principle' — that a program's power comes mainly from the specialized knowledge in its knowledge baseknowledge base, n.: A store of facts and rules that a program can reason with: like a database, but organized so that new conclusions can be worked out from it, not just looked up. rather than from its inference methods — and promoted knowledge engineering as a discipline. He co-wrote 'The Fifth Generation' (1983) about Japan's Fifth Generation Computer Systems projectFifth Generation Computer Systems project, prop. n.: Japan's government-backed effort, from 1982 to 1992, to build a new kind of computer that reasons with logic using many processors at once. It fell short, but it alarmed other countries into launching AI programs of their own. and was chief scientist of the US Air Force (1994–97). Turing AwardTuring Award, prop. n.: Nicknamed the 'Nobel Prize of computing', the top honor in computer science, awarded each year since 1966 by the Association for Computing Machinery. Several AI pioneers have received it. 1994, shared with Raj ReddyRaj Reddy, prop. n.: An Indian-American computer scientist who pioneered computer speech recognition and large AI systems at Carnegie Mellon University, and shared the 1994 Turing Award..
Related
- expert systemexpert system, n.: A program that stores a human specialist's know-how as many if–then rules and uses them to give advice or make decisions in a narrow field, such as diagnosing infections or configuring computers.
- DENDRALDENDRAL, prop. n.: A program begun at Stanford in 1965 that worked out the structure of chemical molecules from laboratory measurements using rules taken from expert chemists. It is usually called the first expert system.
- MYCINMYCIN, prop. n.: A 1970s Stanford program that advised doctors on blood infections and antibiotics by applying hundreds of if–then rules from specialists. It performed about as well as experts but was never used on patients.
- knowledge baseknowledge base, n.: A store of facts and rules that a program can reason with: like a database, but organized so that new conclusions can be worked out from it, not just looked up.
- Fifth Generation Computer Systems projectFifth Generation Computer Systems project, prop. n.: Japan's government-backed effort, from 1982 to 1992, to build a new kind of computer that reasons with logic using many processors at once. It fell short, but it alarmed other countries into launching AI programs of their own.
- Herbert A. SimonHerbert A. Simon, prop. n.: An American scientist of decision-making who, with Allen Newell, wrote some of the first AI programs and argued that minds and computers both think by manipulating symbols.
Sources
- Feigenbaum, E. A. & Feldman, J. (eds.) (1963). Computers and Thought. McGraw-Hill.
- Lindsay, R. K., Buchanan, B. G., Feigenbaum, E. A. & Lederberg, J. (1980). Applications of Artificial Intelligence for Organic Chemistry: The DENDRAL Project. McGraw-Hill.
Mentioned in
Turing AwardTuring Award, prop. n.: Nicknamed the 'Nobel Prize of computing', the top honor in computer science, awarded each year since 1966 by the Association for Computing Machinery. Several AI pioneers have received it., DENDRALDENDRAL, prop. n.: A program begun at Stanford in 1965 that worked out the structure of chemical molecules from laboratory measurements using rules taken from expert chemists. It is usually called the first expert system., knowledge engineeringknowledge engineering, n.: The craft of collecting what human experts know — through interviews, observation and documents — and turning it into rules or structured data that a computer system can use., Raj ReddyRaj Reddy, prop. n.: An Indian-American computer scientist who pioneered computer speech recognition and large AI systems at Carnegie Mellon University, and shared the 1994 Turing Award.