Earl Isaac
Encyclopedia
Earl Judson Isaac along with friend Bill Fair
, set up the company Fair Isaac
in a small studio apartment on Lincoln Ave. in San Rafael, California
in the year 1956. He was born in Buffalo, NY and died in 1983 in Novato, California
. He graduated from Annapolis with a mathematics degree , and was stationed on the USS Missouri
while in the United States Navy
. After being discharged from the Navy and before founding Fair, Isaac and Company, he worked at SRI (then known as Stanford Research Institute), along with Bill Fair, during SRI's beginning years. While working at SRI, he was the first person to 'crash' a computer, a behemoth at SRI known as ENIAC
, by feeding it a complex mathematical problem it could not solve (he had successfully solved the problem manually). This event supported his view that computers would/will never be able to completely replace a human being. He was also of the opinion that a computer is only as smart as the person programming it. That said, he had experimented with artificial intelligence
as early as 1950.
Bill Fair
Bill Fair was one of the co-founders of the company Fair Isaac Corporation. He and his friend Earl Isaac founded Fair Isaac Corporation in the year 1956....
, set up the company Fair Isaac
Fair Isaac
Fair Isaac Corporation is a public company that provides analytics and decision making services—including credit scoring—intended to help financial services companies make complex, high-volume decisions.- History :...
in a small studio apartment on Lincoln Ave. in San Rafael, California
San Rafael, California
San Rafael is a city and the county seat of Marin County, California, United States. The city is located in the North Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area...
in the year 1956. He was born in Buffalo, NY and died in 1983 in Novato, California
Novato, California
Novato is a city located in the North Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, in northern Marin County. Novato is located about north-northwest of San Rafael, at an elevation of 30 feet above sea level . The 2010 U.S. Census estimated the city population to be about 51,904. Novato is about ...
. He graduated from Annapolis with a mathematics degree , and was stationed on the USS Missouri
USS Missouri
Four ships of the United States Navy have been named USS Missouri in honor of the state of Missouri:, a sidewheel frigate launched in 1841 and destroyed by fire in August 1843, a Maine class battleship in service from 1900 to 1922., an Iowa class battleship in service from 1944 to 1998; site of the...
while in the United States Navy
United States Navy
The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...
. After being discharged from the Navy and before founding Fair, Isaac and Company, he worked at SRI (then known as Stanford Research Institute), along with Bill Fair, during SRI's beginning years. While working at SRI, he was the first person to 'crash' a computer, a behemoth at SRI known as ENIAC
ENIAC
ENIAC was the first general-purpose electronic computer. It was a Turing-complete digital computer capable of being reprogrammed to solve a full range of computing problems....
, by feeding it a complex mathematical problem it could not solve (he had successfully solved the problem manually). This event supported his view that computers would/will never be able to completely replace a human being. He was also of the opinion that a computer is only as smart as the person programming it. That said, he had experimented with artificial intelligence
Artificial intelligence
Artificial intelligence is the intelligence of machines and the branch of computer science that aims to create it. AI textbooks define the field as "the study and design of intelligent agents" where an intelligent agent is a system that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize its...
as early as 1950.