Only one computer scientist in the world's top 100 public intellectuals
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Re: Only one computer scientist in the world's top 100 public intellectuals
#2... and zero mathematicians.
Re: Only one computer scientist in the world's top 100 public intellectuals
#3I don't have much faith in their selection process. Their list of economists includes the man who guided Russian economy into a 40% GDP drop.
>Yegor Gaidar, Russia, Economist, politician
>Gaidar was Boris Yeltsin’s acting prime minister from June 15 to December 14, 1992 and a proponent of “shock therapy” for the Russian economy.
Re: Only one computer scientist in the world's top 100 public intellectuals
#4So, who are some computer scientists (and mathematicians) that should be on the list? That is a loaded but honest question.
Re: Only one computer scientist in the world's top 100 public intellectuals
#5There are two biologists, one physicist, one neuroscientist, and one medical scientist. The list is dominated by individuals with careers in politics, religion, literature, philosophy, and history.
Re: Only one computer scientist in the world's top 100 public intellectuals
#6The title of the list is a gross misnomer. Half of the people on the list are political activists of some sort.
Take Barenboim. Why is he an intellectual? He is a fantastic pianist, a (IMHO) mediocre conductor and an activist for peace in the middle east.
Take Ayaan Hirsi Ali. She is a Dutch politician who build her entire career upon the fact that she has suffered a lot being raised as a female Muslim. She is definitely not what I would call an intellectual.
Re: Only one computer scientist in the world's top 100 public intellectuals
#7So, who are some computer scientists (and mathematicians) that should be on the list? That is a loaded but honest question.
Grothendieck, Knuth, Paul Cohen, Terence Tao, Shing-Tung Yao.
In my opinion Godel was the greatest mathematician of the 20th century, but he's dead.
Re: Only one computer scientist in the world's top 100 public intellectuals
#8So, who are some computer scientists (and mathematicians) that should be on the list? That is a loaded but honest question.
I'm not nominating anyone. I don't think being named to the list of "100 random names, compiled over a round of beers at a Foreign Policy office party, that make you sound sophisticated when you drop them" is a very high honor.
Re: Only one computer scientist in the world's top 100 public intellectuals
#9IMHO Mandelbrot, Prigogine, Mccarthy and Minsky should be on that list and by the way Baremboin was born in Argentina.
Re: Only one computer scientist in the world's top 100 public intellectuals
#10There's also Noam Chomsky