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Richard Earl Fikes (born October 4, 1942) is a computer scientist and Professor (Research) Emeritus in the
Computer Science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to Applied science, practical discipli ...
department of
Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is conside ...
. He is professionally active as a consultant and expert witness. He led Stanford's Knowledge Systems Laboratory from 1991 to 2006, and has held appointments at Berkeley, Carnegie-Mellon,
Price Waterhouse Technology Centre A price is the (usually not negative) quantity of payment or compensation given by one party to another in return for goods or services. In some situations, the price of production has a different name. If the product is a "good" in t ...
,
Xerox PARC PARC (Palo Alto Research Center; formerly Xerox PARC) is a research and development company in Palo Alto, California. Founded in 1969 by Jacob E. "Jack" Goldman, chief scientist of Xerox Corporation, the company was originally a division of Xero ...
, and
SRI International SRI International (SRI) is an American nonprofit scientific research institute and organization headquartered in Menlo Park, California. The trustees of Stanford University established SRI in 1946 as a center of innovation to support economic ...
.


Early life and education

Fikes was born in Mobile, Alabama, and lived most of his early life in San Antonio, Texas. He graduated from
Sam Houston High School (San Antonio, Texas) Sam Houston High School, also known as Houston High School, is a public high school located in eastern San Antonio, Texas, United States, and classified as a 4A school by the UIL. This school is one of twelve schools in the San Antonio Independen ...
in 1960, received a B.A. degree in mathematics from the
University of Texas at Austin The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...
in 1963, and received an M.A. degree in mathematics from the
University of Texas at Austin The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...
in 1965. Fikes received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from
Carnegie Mellon University Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. One of its predecessors was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools; it became the Carnegie Institute of Technology ...
in 1968.


Career

Fikes' research activities have primarily been in developing techniques for effectively representing and using knowledge in computer systems—a sub-field of Artificial Intelligence generally known as KR&R, for
knowledge representation and reasoning Knowledge representation and reasoning (KRR, KR&R, KR²) is the field of artificial intelligence (AI) dedicated to representing information about the world in a form that a computer system can use to solve complex tasks such as diagnosing a medic ...
. He was a co-developer of the STRIPS automatic planning system,
Knowledge Interchange Format Knowledge Interchange Format (KIF) is a computer language designed to enable systems to share and re-use information from knowledge-based systems. KIF is similar to frame languages such as KL-One and LOOM but unlike such language its primary role i ...
language for interchange of logical knowledge bases, the Ontolingua
ontology In metaphysics, ontology is the philosophy, philosophical study of being, as well as related concepts such as existence, Becoming (philosophy), becoming, and reality. Ontology addresses questions like how entities are grouped into Category ...
engineering environment, and IntelliCorp's
Knowledge Engineering Environment Knowledge Engineering Environment (KEE) is a frame-based development tool for expert systems. It was developed and sold by IntelliCorp, and first released in 1983. It ran on Lisp machines, and was later ported to Lucid Common Lisp with the CLX ...
(KEE). He also worked on the
Shakey the Robot Shakey the Robot was the first general-purpose mobile robot able to reason about its own actions. While other robots would have to be instructed on each individual step of completing a larger task, Shakey could analyze commands and break them dow ...
project at
SRI International SRI International (SRI) is an American nonprofit scientific research institute and organization headquartered in Menlo Park, California. The trustees of Stanford University established SRI in 1946 as a center of innovation to support economic ...
. Before joining the faculty at
Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is conside ...
, he held positions at
SRI International SRI International (SRI) is an American nonprofit scientific research institute and organization headquartered in Menlo Park, California. The trustees of Stanford University established SRI in 1946 as a center of innovation to support economic ...
,
Xerox PARC PARC (Palo Alto Research Center; formerly Xerox PARC) is a research and development company in Palo Alto, California. Founded in 1969 by Jacob E. "Jack" Goldman, chief scientist of Xerox Corporation, the company was originally a division of Xero ...
, IntelliCorp, and the Price Waterhouse Technology Center. Fikes retired from his positions of Professor (Research) in the
Computer Science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to Applied science, practical discipli ...
department of
Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is conside ...
and director of Stanford's
Knowledge Systems Laboratory Knowledge Systems Laboratory (KSL) was an artificial intelligence research laboratory within the Department of Computer Science at Stanford University until 2007, located in the Gates Computer Science Building, Stanford. Work focused on knowledg ...
in 2006. He was given a retirement party that was a large gathering of early luminaries in the field of Artificial Intelligence. A video from that party showing tributes and a career reflections speech by Fikes can be found at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vl2XBb2uGLw.


Memberships and awards

Fikes has published numerous articles in journals and conference proceedings, and has also served as editor of several professional journals in Artificial Intelligence and related areas. Fikes has also chaired, co-chaired, organized, or served on the program committee of numerous professional conferences and symposia. In 1990 he was elected as a Fellow of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fikes, Richard Artificial intelligence researchers Carnegie Mellon University alumni Living people 1942 births Fellows of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence SRI International people