Germogen Pospelov
Also known as Гермоген Сергеевич Поспелов
Germogen Pospelov was a Soviet control engineer and academician who headed the first official bodies for artificial intelligence research in the USSR Academy of Sciences. After graduating from the Moscow Power Engineering Institute in 1940, he served as an aviation regiment engineer from 1941 to 1946, taught at the Zhukovsky Air Force Engineering Academy until 1964 and received the USSR State Prize in 1972. From 1973, he led the Academy's AI council and section, co-initiated a 1977 international AI meeting in Repino with Donald Michie, and advised Leonid Khachiyan, whose doctoral degrees came in 1978 and 1984. His 1986 report led the Academy's Presidium to create a Council for Artificial Intelligence. He died in Moscow in 1998.
Timeline
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1914–1946
Engineer of an aviation regiment
Born in Orekhovo-Zuyevo in 1914, he graduates with honors from the Moscow Power Engineering Institute in 1940. From 1941 to 1946, he is an engineer of an aviation regiment.
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1946–1964
Teaching at the Zhukovsky Academy
From 1946 to 1964, he teaches at the Zhukovsky Air Force Engineering Academy, earning a Candidate of Sciences degree in 1949, a Doctor of Sciences in technical sciences in 1956 and the title of professor in 1957. He rises to the rank of major general.
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1966–1969
A department at MIPT
After retiring from the military, the air force general and automatic control specialist turns to applying cybernetics to the national economy. He is elected a corresponding member of the USSR Academy of Sciences in 1966, and from 1969 he heads a department at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT).
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1972
A USSR State Prize
He receives the USSR State Prize in 1972.
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1973–1977
Heading Soviet AI councils
In 1973, AI first appears as a distinct label in official Soviet academic structures with a Scientific Council on AI in the Academy's Committee on Systems Analysis, and through his efforts an AI section of the Council for Cybernetics follows in 1974; he heads both. He also becomes head of a laboratory at the Dorodnitsyn Computing Centre in 1974. In 1977, he and the British scientist Donald Michie jointly initiate an international AI meeting in Repino, near Leningrad, which brings together Soviet and Western AI specialists.
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1978–1984
Advising Leonid Khachiyan
Leonid Khachiyan becomes his doctoral student, completing degrees under him in 1978 and 1984.
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1984–1987
A Council for Artificial Intelligence
He becomes a full academician in 1984, and during the 1980s he pilots Granite, a collective problem-solving system meant to link the automated management systems of Soviet industry into one computer network. In a 1986 report, he estimates that 250 people work on AI in the USSR and argues for a scientific Council on Artificial Intelligence, pointing to how far Soviet research in new information technologies lags behind capitalist countries. The Academy's Presidium turns the AI section of the Council for Cybernetics into a new Council for Artificial Intelligence, established in 1987.
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1998
Death in Moscow
He dies in Moscow in 1998 and is buried at Vostryakovo Cemetery.
Colleagues
Sources and credits
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