A Thought About Marvin Minsky

One day before the sudden death of Jeff Epstein (I refuse to call it a suicide before evidence to that effect is made public), one heard of the unsealing of a lot of the records that led to Epstein's imprisonment and so, likely, through one causal link or another, to his death.

THAT material, unsealed, showed that the late Marvin Minsky, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) was one of the clients to whom Epstein allegedly trafficked underaged girls.

Minsky can no longer be hurt by this disclosure. He has been dead for three years.

It is worth saying here too what I said in connection with John Searle not long ago, although the two are on opposite sides of at least one philosophically important debate: No wrong Minsky may have committed diminishes the value of his contributions to cognitive science, philosophy of mind, and related fields.

Minsky was on the faculty at MIT from 1958 until his death, which is a heck of a time to stay at one job. He was a pioneer on computer science and AI.

It is odd to bracket Minsky and Searle because they are one opposite sides of what was THE big debate in the late 20th century philosophy of mind. Minsky was close to the Ur-functionalist, the true believer in Strong AI. Searle of course was on exactly the opposite side of those views. Still, they both left formidable bodies of work.

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