Patrick Winston: Difference between revisions

{{Short description|American computer scientist (1943–2019)}}

{{other uses|Patrick Henry Winston (disambiguation)}}

{{Infobox scientist

| name = Patrick Henry Winston

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| image = Patrick Winston 2018.jpg

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| birth_date = {{Birth date|1943|02|05}}

| birth_place = [[Peoria, Illinois]], U.S.

| death_date = {{Death date and age|2019|07|19|1943|02|05}}

| death_place = [[Boston, Massachusetts]], U.S.

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| resting_place_coordinates = <!-- {{Coord|LAT|LONG|type:landmark|display=inline,title}} -->

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| nationality = [[United States|American]]

| fields = [[Artificial Intelligence]] <br> [[Computer Science]]

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| alma_mater = [[MIT]] (BS 1965, MS 1967, PhD 1970) <ref>[http://people.csail.mit.edu/phw/vitae.html CV of Winston]</ref>

| thesis_title = Learning Structural Descriptions from Examples

| thesis_url = http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/6884

| thesis_year = 1970

| doctoral_advisor = [[Marvin Minsky]]

| academic_advisors =

| doctoral_students = [[David Waltz]]<br/>[[Philip Greenspun]]

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| awards = [[IJCAI Computers and Thought Award]]

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| website = {{URL|http://people.csail.mit.edu/phw/index.html|Personal homepage}}

| footnotes =

| spouse = Karen Prendergast<ref>{{cite web|title=Professor Patrick Winston, former director of MIT's Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, dies at 76| date=19 July 2019 |url=https://news.mit.edu/2019/patrick-winston-professor-obituary-0719#:~:text=Outside%20of%20the%20lab%20he,Prendergast%20and%20his%20daughter%20Sarah.|publisher=MIT news|access-date=20 June 2020}}</ref>

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}}

'''Patrick Henry Winston''' (February 5, 1943 – July 19, 2019) was an American computer scientist and professor at the [[Massachusetts Institute of Technology]]. Winston was director of the [[MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory]] from 1972 to 1997, succeeding [[Marvin Minsky]], who left to help found the [[MIT Media Lab]]. Winston was succeeded as director by [[Rodney Brooks]].

After graduating from high school, Winston left East Peoria, a suburb of Peoria, IL, to come to MIT by train. He received his undergraduate degree from MIT in 1965, where he was a member of [[Phi Delta Theta]] fraternity, and went on to complete his Masters and PhD there as well, finalizing his PhD in 1970. His research interests included [[machine learning]] and [[human intelligence]]. Winston was known within the MIT community for his excellent teaching and strong commitment to supporting MIT undergraduate culture.<ref>{{cite web|last1=Schaffer|first1=Amanda|last2=Knight|first2=Will|title=Patrick Winston '65, SM '67, PhD '70|url=https://www.technologyreview.com/2019/08/21/133494/patrick-winston-65-sm-67-phd-70/|date=August 21, 2019|access-date=Jan 14, 2022|website=MIT Technology Review}}</ref>

At MIT, Winston taught 6.034: Artificial Intelligence and 6.803/6.833: [[Human intelligence|Human Intelligence]] Enterprise. Winston's ''How to Speak'' talk was an MIT tradition for over 40 years. "Offered every January, the talk is intended to improve your speaking ability in critical situations by teaching you a few heuristic rules."<ref>{{cite web|last1=Winston|first1=Patrick|title=How to Speak|url=https://ocw.mit.edu/how_to_speak|website=MIT OpenCourseWare|language=en|accessdate=Aug 11, 2020}}</ref> A book with his insights and teachings on [[Communication theory|communication]] was published in 2020 by the MIT Press: "Make It Clear: Speak and Write to Persuade and Inform".<ref>{{Cite book|last=Patrick|first=Winston|url=https://direct.mit.edu/books/book/4874/Make-It-ClearSpeak-and-Write-to-Persuade-and|title=Make It Clear: Speak and Write to Persuade and Inform|publisher=The MIT Press|year=2020|isbn=9780262360395|language=en}}</ref>

Winston served as president of the [[Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence]] from 1985–1987.

Winston died in Boston on July 19, 2019.<ref>{{cite press release |title=Professor Patrick Winston, former director of MIT's Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, dies at 76 |author1=Conner-Simons, Adam |author2=Gordon, Rachel |publisher=MIT |url=https://news.mit.edu/2019/patrick-winston-professor-obituary-0719 |date=July 19, 2019}}</ref>

== Bibliography and publications ==

Winston authored a number of computer science and AI textbooks, including:

* ''[[Artificial Intelligence (book)|Artificial Intelligence]]'' {{ISBN|0201533774}}

* ''The Psychology of Computer Vision'' {{ISBN|0070710481}}

* ''[[Lisp (book)|Lisp]]'' (with [[Berthold K.P. Horn]]) {{ISBN|0201083191}}

* ''On to C'' {{ISBN|020158042X}}

* ''On to C++'' {{ISBN|0201580438}}

* ''On to Java'' (with [[Sundar Narasimhan]]) {{ISBN|0201725932}}

* ''On to Smalltalk'' {{ISBN|0201498278}}

==References==

{{reflist}}

* {{cite web |last1=Winston |first1=Patrick |title=How to Speak |url=<!-- https://ocw.mit.edu/how_to_speak -->https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Unzc731iCUY |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211221/Unzc731iCUY |archive-date=2021-12-21 |url-status=live|website=MIT OpenCourseWare |via=[[YouTube]] |accessdate=11 August 2020 |language=en}}{{cbignore}}

* [http://purl.umn.edu/107719 Oral History with Patrick H. Winston], [[Charles Babbage Institute]], University of Minnesota, Minneapolis.

{{Authority control}}

[[Category:1943 births]]

[[Category:2019 deaths]]

[[Category:Scientists from Illinois]]

[[Category:Writers from Peoria, Illinois]]

[[Category:American artificial intelligence researchers]]

[[Category:American cognitive scientists]]

[[Category:MIT SchoolofEngineering alumni]]

[[Category:Lisp (programming language) people]]

[[Category:Presidents of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence]]