Olaf Helmer (June 4, 1910 – April 14, 2011) was a German-American

logic Logic is the study of correct reasoning. It includes both formal and informal logic. Formal logic is the science of deductively valid inferences or of logical truths. It is a formal science investigating how conclusions follow from premise ...

ian and futurologist. He was a researcher at the RAND Corporation from 1946 to 1968 and a co-founder of the

Institute for the Future The Institute for the Future (IFTF) is a Palo Alto, California, US–based not-for-profit think tank. It was established, in 1968, as a spin-off from the RAND Corporation to help organizations plan for the long-term future, a subject known as ...

Biography

Born in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and List of cities in Germany by population, largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European Union by population within ci ...

, Helmer studied mathematics and logic at the

University of Berlin Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (german: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a German public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin. It was established by Frederick William III on the initiative ...

. He earned his doctorate there in 1934, under direction from philosopher Hans Reichenbach. That year he moved to London where he began a second doctorate study, on

Russell's paradox In mathematical logic, Russell's paradox (also known as Russell's antinomy) is a set-theoretic paradox discovered by the British philosopher and mathematician Bertrand Russell in 1901. Russell's paradox shows that every set theory that contains ...

, under direction from

Susan Stebbing Lizzie Susan Stebbing (2 December 1885 – 11 September 1943) was a British philosopher. She belonged to the 1930s generation of analytic philosophy, and was a founder in 1933 of the journal ''Analysis.'' Stebbing was the first woman to hold a p ...

at the

University of London The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in post-nominals) is a federal public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The university was established by royal charter in 1836 as a degree ...

. Russell himself was one of Helmer's examiners. Helmer moved to the United States in 1937, first working as a research assistant to Rudolf Carnap at the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chic ...

, then as a teacher of mathematics. Beginning 1944, Helmer was involved in work for the National Defense Research Council under John Williams. He would join Williams at the newly formed RAND Corporation in 1946. Helmer's interests later turned towards forecasting and prediction. Collaborating with colleagues Norman Dalkey, and

Nicholas Rescher Nicholas Rescher (; ; born 15 July 1928) is a German-American philosopher, polymath, and author, who has been a professor of philosophy at the University of Pittsburgh since 1961. He is chairman of the Center for Philosophy of Science and was fo ...

, his work led to the development of the

Delphi method } The Delphi method or Delphi technique ( ; also known as Estimate-Talk-Estimate or ETE) is a structured communication technique or method, originally developed as a systematic, interactive forecasting method which relies on a panel of experts. The ...

forecasting technique, also known as ETE (Estimate/Talk/Estimate). In 1968, Helmer left RAND to co-found the

. In 1973 he was appointed Professor of Futuristics at the School of Business Administration at the University of Southern California.

References

* German logicians 1910 births 1976 deaths German male writers RAND Corporation people German emigrants to England German emigrants to the United States Humboldt University of Berlin alumni 20th-century German philosophers Writers from Berlin {{germany-mathematician-stub