Charles Archibald Blake (November 24, 1906 - January 7, 1971), name officially changed to Archie Blake was an American mathematician. He is well known for the Blake canonical form, a normal form for expressions in

propositional logic The propositional calculus is a branch of logic. It is also called propositional logic, statement logic, sentential calculus, sentential logic, or sometimes zeroth-order logic. Sometimes, it is called ''first-order'' propositional logic to contra ...

. In order to compute the canonical form, he moreover introduced the concept of consensus, which was a precursor of the resolution principle, today a common technique in

automated theorem proving Automated theorem proving (also known as ATP or automated deduction) is a subfield of automated reasoning and mathematical logic dealing with proving mathematical theorems by computer programs. Automated reasoning over mathematical proof was a majo ...

Career

In 1930, he became a member of the

American Mathematical Society The American Mathematical Society (AMS) is an association of professional mathematicians dedicated to the interests of mathematical research and scholarship, and serves the national and international community through its publications, meetings, ...

(AMS). He presented his canonical form at the AMS meeting at

Columbia University Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...

on 29 Oct 1932. In 1937, this work lead to a Ph.D. from the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...

, supervised by Raymond Walter Barnard. He worked for the

United States Coast and Geodetic Survey The United States Coast and Geodetic Survey ( USC&GS; known as the Survey of the Coast from 1807 to 1836, and as the United States Coast Survey from 1836 until 1878) was the first scientific agency of the Federal government of the United State ...

Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...

, from 1936 (or earlier) as a

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, mathematical structure, structure, space, Mathematica ...

, since 1938 as an Assistant Mathematician, and since 1939 as an Associated Mathematician. In 1946, he was appointed a Senior Statistician in the Office of the Army Surgeon General,

He also worked for the Cornell Aeronautical Laboratory in

Buffalo, New York Buffalo is a Administrative divisions of New York (state), city in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York and county seat of Erie County, New York, Erie County. It lies in Western New York at the eastern end of Lake Erie, at the head of ...

. From there, he changed in 1954 to the

Westinghouse Electric Corporation The Westinghouse Electric Corporation was an American manufacturing company founded in 1886 by George Westinghouse and headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It was originally named "Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company" and was ...

in Baltimore, Md., where he became an Advisory Engineer. In 1956, he moved from Westinghouse to the

Bendix Aviation Corporation Bendix Corporation is an American manufacturing and engineering company founded in 1924 and subsidiary of Knorr-Bremse since 2002. During various times in its existence, Bendix made Automotive industry, automotive brake shoes and systems, vacu ...

, as a Systems Staff Mathematician. In 1960, he became a Manager of the Analysis Section of

Raytheon Raytheon is a business unit of RTX Corporation and is a major U.S. defense contractor and industrial corporation with manufacturing concentrations in weapons and military and commercial electronics. Founded in 1922, it merged in 2020 with Unite ...

in Sudbury, Massachusetts.

Publications

* * &mdash
Review
in the

Journal of Symbolic Logic The '' Journal of Symbolic Logic'' is a peer-reviewed mathematics journal published quarterly by Association for Symbolic Logic. It was established in 1936 and covers mathematical logic. The journal is indexed by '' Mathematical Reviews'', Zent ...

&mdash
Abstract
in '' Bulletin of the AMS'', Vol.38, No.11, Nov 1932, p.6(805) * — Also presented at the AMS 46th annual meeting, 26-29 Dec 1939 at the Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio''Bulletin of the AMS'', Vol.46, No.3
"The annual meeting of the Society"
p.3 (189) * * *

References

1906 births Year of death missing University of Chicago alumni 20th-century American mathematicians Bendix Corporation people {{mathematician-stub