Norbert Wiener 63185 224856292 2008-07-10T18:46:19Z Cydebot 1215485 Robot - Moving category Polish-Americans to Americans of Polish descent per [[WP:CFD|CFD]] at [[Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2008 June 29]]. {{Infobox Scientist |name = Norbert Wiener |box_width = |image = Norbert Wiener 3.JPG |image_width = |caption = |birth_date = {{birth date|1894|11|26}} |birth_place = [[Columbia, Missouri]], [[U.S.]] |death_date = {{death date and age|1964|3|18|1894|11|26}} |death_place = [[Stockholm]], [[Sweden]] |residence = |citizenship = |nationality = [[United States|American]] |ethnicity = |field = [[Mathematics]]<br/>[[Cybernetics]] |work_institutions = [[Massachusetts Institute of Technology]] |alma_mater = [[Tufts College]] BA 1909 <br/>[[Harvard University]] PhD 1912 |doctoral_advisor = [[Karl Schmidt]]<br/>[[Josiah Royce]] |doctoral_students = [[Amar Bose]]<br/>[[Shikao Ikehara]]<br/>[[Norman Levinson]] |known_for = |author_abbrev_bot = |author_abbrev_zoo = |influences = |influenced = |prizes = |religion = |footnotes = }} '''Norbert Wiener''' ([[November 26]], [[1894]], [[Columbia, Missouri]] – [[March 18]], [[1964]], [[Stockholm]] [[Sweden]]) was an [[United States|American]] theoretical and [[applied math|applied]] [[mathematician]]. Wiener was a pioneer in the study of [[stochastic processes|stochastic]] and [[noise]] processes, contributing work relevant to [[electronic engineering]], [[electronic communication]], and [[control system]]s. Wiener also founded [[cybernetics]], a field that formalizes the notion of [[feedback]] and has implications for [[engineering]], [[systems control]], [[computer science]], [[biology]], [[philosophy]], and the organization of [[society]]. ==Biography== === Youth === Wiener was the first child of [[Leo Wiener]], a [[Poland|Polish]]-[[Jew]]ish immigrant, and Bertha Kahn, of [[Germans|German]]-[[Jewish]] descent. Employing teaching methods of his own invention, Leo educated Norbert at home until 1903, except for a brief interlude when Norbert was 7 years of age. Thanks to his father's tutelage and his own abilities, Wiener became a [[child prodigy]]. Earning his living teaching [[German language|German]] and [[Slavic languages]], Leo read widely and accumulated a personal library from which the young Norbert benefited much. Leo also had ample ability in mathematics, and tutored his son in the subject until he left home. After graduating from [[Ayer High School]] in 1906 at 11 years of age, Wiener entered [[Tufts College]]. He was awarded a [[Bachelor of Arts|BA]] in mathematics in 1909 at the age of 14, whereupon he began graduate studies in [[zoology]] at [[Harvard]]. In 1910 he transferred to [[Cornell University|Cornell]] to study philosophy. === Harvard === The next year he returned to Harvard, while still continuing his philosophical studies. Back at Harvard, Wiener came under the influence of [[Edward Vermilye Huntington]], whose mathematical interests ranged from axiomatic foundations to problems posed by engineering. Harvard awarded Wiener a [[Ph.D.]] in 1912, when he was a mere 18, for a dissertation on [[mathematical logic]], supervised by [[Karl Schmidt]], whose essential results were published as Wiener (1914). In that dissertation, he was the first to see that the [[ordered pair]] can be defined in terms of elementary [[set theory]]. Hence [[relation (mathematics)|relations]] can be wholly grounded in [[set theory]], so that the theory of relations does not require any axioms or primitive notions distinct from those of set theory. In 1921, [[Kuratowski]] proposed a simplification of Wiener's definition of the ordered pair, and that simplification has been in common use ever since. In 1914, Wiener travelled to Europe, to study under [[Bertrand Russell]] and [[G. H. Hardy]] at [[University of Cambridge|Cambridge University]], and under [[David Hilbert]] and [[Edmund Landau]] at the [[University of Göttingen]]. In 1915-16, he taught philosophy at Harvard, then worked for [[General Electric]] and wrote for the [[Encyclopedia Americana]]. When [[World War I]] broke out, [[Oswald Veblen]] invited him to work on [[ballistics]] at the [[Aberdeen Proving Ground]] in Maryland. Thus Wiener, an eventual pacifist, wore a uniform 1917-18. Living and working with other mathematicians strengthened and deepened his interest in mathematics. === After the war=== After the war, Wiener was unable to secure a position at Harvard because he was Jewish (despite his father being the first tenured Jew at Harvard), and was rejected for a position at the [[University of Melbourne]]. At [[William Fogg Osgood|W. F. Osgood]]'s invitation, Wiener became an instructor in mathematics at [[Massachusetts Institute of Technology|MIT]], where he spent the remainder of his career, rising to Professor. In 1926, Wiener returned to Europe as a [[Guggenheim scholar]]. He spent most of his time at Göttingen and with Hardy at Cambridge, working on [[Brownian motion]], the [[Fourier integral]], [[Dirichlet's problem]], harmonic analysis, and the [[Tauberian theorems]]. In 1926, Wiener's parents arranged his marriage to a German immigrant, Margaret Engemann, who was not Jewish; they had two daughters. === During and after World War II === During [[World War II]], his work on the automatic aiming and firing of [[anti-aircraft gun]]s led Wiener to [[communication theory]] and eventually to formulate [[cybernetics]]. After the war, his prominence helped MIT to recruit a research team in [[cognitive science]], made up of researchers in [[neuropsychology]] and the mathematics and [[biophysics]] of the nervous system, including [[Warren Sturgis McCulloch]] and [[Walter Pitts]]. These men went on to make pioneering contributions to [[computer science]] and [[artificial intelligence]]. Shortly after the group was formed, Wiener broke off all contact with its members. Speculation still flourishes as to why this split occurred. Wiener went on to break new ground in cybernetics, [[robotics]], computer control, and [[automation]]. He shared his theories and findings with other researchers, and credited the contributions of others. These included [[Soviet Union|Soviet]] researchers and their findings. Wiener's connections with them placed him under suspicion during the [[Cold War]]. He was a strong advocate of automation to improve the standard of living, and to overcome economic underdevelopment. His ideas became influential in [[India]], whose government he advised during the 1950s. Wiener declined an invitation to join the [[Manhattan Project]]. After the war, he became increasingly concerned with what he saw as political interference in scientific research, and the militarization of science. His article "A Scientist Rebels" in the January 1947 issue of ''[[The Atlantic Monthly]]'' urged scientists to consider the ethical implications of their work. After the war, he refused to accept any government funding or to work on military projects. The way Wiener's stance towards nuclear weapons and the Cold War contrasted with that of [[John von Neumann]] is the central theme of Heims (1980). === Awards and honors === *Wiener won the [[Bôcher Prize]] in 1933 and the [[National Medal of Science]] in 1963 (Presented by President Johnson at a White House Ceremony in January 1964.), shortly before his death. *The [[Norbert Wiener Prize in Applied Mathematics]] was endowed in 1967 in honor of Norbert Wiener by MIT's mathematics department and is provided jointly by the [[American Mathematical Society]] and [[Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics]]. *The [[Norbert Wiener Award for Social and Professional Responsibility]] awarded annually by [[CPSR]], was established in 1987 in honor of Wiener to recognize contributions by computer professionals to socially responsible use of computers. *The [[Wiener (crater)|Wiener crater]] on the [[Far side (Moon)|far side]] of the [[Moon]] was named for him. *The [[Wiener sausage]] (in mathematics) was named for him. == Work == Wiener was as a pioneer in the study of [[stochastic processes|stochastic]] and [[noise]] processes, contributing work relevant to [[electronic engineering]], [[electronic communication]], and [[control system]]s. Wiener also founded [[cybernetics]], a field that formalizes the notion of [[feedback]] and has implications for [[engineering]], [[systems control]], [[computer science]], [[biology]], [[philosophy]], and the organization of [[society]]. [[Image:Wiener_process_3d.png|thumb|230px|In the mathematical field of probability, the [[Wiener sausage]] is a neighborhood of the trace of a [[Brownian motion]] up to a time ''t'', given by taking all points within a fixed distance of Brownian motion. It can be visualized as a sausage of fixed radius whose centerline is Brownian motion.]] === Wiener equation === A simple mathematical representation of [[Brownian motion]], the [[Wiener equation]], named after Wiener, assumes the current [[velocity]] of a [[fluid]] particle fluctuates. === Wiener filter === In signal processing, the [[Wiener filter]] is a [[filter (signal processing)|filter]] proposed by Wiener during the 1940s and published in 1949. Its purpose is to reduce the amount of [[noise]] present in a signal by comparison with an estimation of the desired noiseless signal. === In mathematics === The [[Wiener process]] is a continuous-time [[stochastic process]] named in honor of Wiener. It is often called ''[[Brownian motion]]''', after [[Robert Brown (botanist)|Robert Brown]]. It is one of the best known [[Lévy process]]es, càdlàg stochastic processes with stationary statistical independence increments, and occurs frequently in pure and applied mathematics, economics and physics. [[Wiener's tauberian theorem]] is a 1932 result of Wiener. It put the capstone on the field of [[tauberian theorem]]s in [[summability theory]], on the face of it a chapter of [[real analysis]], by showing that most of the known results could be encapsulated in a principle from [[harmonic analysis]]. As now formulated, the theorem of Wiener has no obvious connection to tauberian theorems, which deal with [[infinite series]]; the translation from results formulated for integrals, or using the language of [[functional analysis]] and [[Banach algebra]]s, is however a relatively routine process once the idea is grasped. The [[Paley–Wiener theorem]] relates growth properties of [[entire function]]s on '''C'''<sup>n</sup> and Fourier transformation of Schwartz distributions of compact support. The [[Wiener–Khinchin theorem]], also known as the ''Wiener–Khintchine theorem'' and sometimes as the ''Khinchin–Kolmogorov theorem'', states that the power spectral density of a wide-sense-stationary random process is the Fourier transform of the corresponding autocorrelation function. An [[abstract Wiener space]] is a mathematical object in [[measure theory]], used to construct a "decent", strictly positive and locally finite measure on an infinite-dimensional vector space. Wiener's original construction only applied to the space of real-valued continuous paths on the unit interval, known as [[classical Wiener space]]. Leonard Gross provided the generalization to the case of a general [[separable space|separable]] [[Banach space]]. == Publications == Wiener wrote a dozen books and hundreds of articles:<ref>A full bibliography is given by the Cybernetics Society [http://www.cybsoc.org/wiener.htm Publications of Norbert Wiener]</ref> * 1914, "A simplification in the logic of relations" in [[Jean van Heijenoort]], 1967. ''From Frege to Godel: A Source Book in Mathematical Logic, 1879-1931''. Harvard Univ. Press: 224-27. * 1930, ''Extrapolation, Interpolation and Smoothing of Stationary Time Series with Engineering Applications''. MIT Press. (Originally classified, finally published in 1949; the 1942 version of this monograph was nicknamed "the yellow peril" because of the color of the cover and the difficulty of the subject. [http://jfwpage.net/works.html]) * 1948, ''Cybernetics: Or the Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine.'' Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. * 1950, ''The Human Use of Human Beings''. Da Capo Press. * 1958, ''Nonlinear Problems in Random Theory''. MIT Press & Wiley. * 1966, ''Generalized Harmonic Analysis and Tauberian Theorems''. MIT Press. * 1966, ''[[God & Golem, Inc.: A Comment on Certain Points Where Cybernetics Impinges on Religion]]''. MIT Press. * 1988, ''The Fourier Integral and Certain of its Applications'' (Cambridge Mathematical Library). Cambridge Univ. Press. * 1994, ''Invention: The Care and Feeding of Ideas''. MIT Press. Fiction: * 1959,''The Tempter''. Random House. Autobiography: * 1953. ''Ex-Prodigy: My Childhood and Youth''. MIT Press. * 1956. ''I am a Mathematician''. MIT Press. == References == {{reflist}} == Further reading == * Bynum, Terrell W., "[http://web.comlab.ox.ac.uk/oucl/research/areas/ieg/e-library/bynum.pdf Norbert Wiener's Vision: The impact of "the automatic age" on our moral lives.]" * Conway, F., and Siegelman, J., 2005. ''Dark Hero of the Information Age: in search of Norbert Wiener, the father of cybernetics''. Basic Books, New York. 423pp. ISBN 0-7382-0368-8 * [[Ivor Grattan-Guinness]], 2000. ''The Search for Mathematical Roots 1870-1940''. Princeton Uni. Press. * Bluma, Lars, 2005. ''Norbert Wiener und die Entstehung der Kybernetik im Zweiten Weltkrieg''. Münster. * Heims, Steve J., 1980. ''John von Neumann and Norbert Wiener: From Mathematics to the Technologies of Life and Death''. MIT Press. * Heims, Steve J., 1993. ''Constructing a Social Science for Postwar America. The Cybernetics Group, 1946-1953''. MIT Press. * Ilgauds, Hans Joachim, 1980. ''Norbert Wiener''. * Masani, P. Rustom, 1990. ''Norbert Wiener 1894-1964''. Birkhauser. A brief profile of Dr. Wiener is given in [[The Observer]] [[newspaper]], Sunday, 28 January 1951. == External links == {{wikiquote}} *[http://www.livinginternet.com/i/ii_wiener.htm Norbert Winer and Cybernetics] &ndash; Living Internet *{{MacTutor Biography|id=Wiener_Norbert}} *{{MathGenealogy|id=25222}} {{Cybernetics}} {{Systems}} {{Persondata |NAME=Wiener, Norbert |ALTERNATIVE NAMES= |SHORT DESCRIPTION=American mathematician |DATE OF BIRTH=[[November 26]], [[1894]] |PLACE OF BIRTH=[[Columbia, Missouri]] |DATE OF DEATH=[[March 18]], [[1964]] |PLACE OF DEATH=[[Stockholm]], [[Sweden]] }} {{DEFAULTSORT: Wiener, Norbert}} [[Category:1894 births]] [[Category:1964 deaths]] [[Category:20th century mathematicians]] [[Category:American Jews]] [[Category:Jewish American scientists]] [[Category:American mathematicians]] [[Category:American pacifists]] [[Category:Control theorists]] [[Category:Cornell University alumni]] [[Category:Cyberneticists]] [[Category:General Electric people]] [[Category:Guggenheim Fellows]] [[Category:Harvard University alumni]] [[Category:Harvard University faculty]] [[Category:National Medal of Science laureates]] [[Category:People from Columbia, Missouri]] [[Category:Americans of Polish descent]] [[Category:Systems scientists]] [[Category:Tufts University alumni]] [[ar:نوربرت فينر]] [[bg:Норберт Винер]] [[ca:Norbert Wiener]] [[cs:Norbert Wiener]] [[da:Norbert Wiener]] [[de:Norbert Wiener]] [[et:Norbert Wiener]] [[es:Norbert Wiener]] [[eo:Norbert Wiener]] [[fr:Norbert Wiener]] [[it:Norbert Wiener]] [[he:נורברט וינר]] [[ka:ნორბერტ ვინერი]] [[hu:Norbert Wiener]] [[nl:Norbert Wiener]] [[ja:ノーバート・ウィーナー]] [[pl:Norbert Wiener]] [[pt:Norbert Wiener]] [[ro:Norbert Wiener]] [[ru:Винер, Норберт]] [[sk:Norbert Wiener]] [[fi:Norbert Wiener]] [[sv:Norbert Wiener]] [[tr:Norbert Wiener]] [[zh:諾伯特·維納]]