Seymour Papert

Interview

• "Learning with computer" (Venice, 07/03/1997)
• "Schools in the next millennium" (New York, 04/04/98)

Biography

Dr. Seymour Papert is a mathematician and one of the early pioneers of Artificial Intelligence. He is internationally recognised as a seminal thinker about ways in which computers can change learning. Born and educated in South Africa, where he participated actively in the anti-apartheid movement, Dr. Papert pursued mathematical research at Cambridge University from 1954-1958. From 1958 to 1963 he worked with Jean Piaget at the University of Geneva. It was this collaboration that led him to consider using mathematics in the service of understanding how children can learn and think.

In the early 1960's, Papert joined MIT (the Massachusetts Institute of Technology), where, with Marvin Minsky, he founded the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and co-authored their seminal work "Perceptrons" (1970).

Bibliography

Other publications include:

• Mindstorms: Children Computers and Powerful Ideas (1980)
• The Children's Machine: Rethinking School in the Age of the Computer (1992)
• The Connected Family: bridging the digital generation gap (1996).

He also has written numerous articles about mathematics, Artificial Intelligence, education, learning, and thinking.