Gordon Pask
Born28 June 1928
Died29 March 1996 (aged 67)
London
NationalityUnited Kingdom
Alma materUniversity of Cambridge
University of London
Open University
Known forConversation theory
Interactions of actors theory
AwardsWiener Gold Medal (1984)
Scientific career
FieldsCybernetics
Psychology
InstitutionsBrunel University
University of Illinois at Chicago
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Concordia University
Georgia Institute of Technology
Architectural Association
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Andrew Gordon Speedie Pask (28 June 1928 – 29 March 1996) was an English author, inventor, educational theorist, cybernetician and psychologist who made significant contributions to cybernetics, instructional psychology, experimental epistemology and educational technology. Pask first learned about cybernetics in the early 1950s when the originator of the subject, Norbert Wiener, spoke at Cambridge University, where Pask was an undergraduate student. Pask was asked to be of assistance during Wiener's talk.[1]

Holding three doctorate degrees, Pask published more than 250 journal articles, books, patents and technical reports from funding from United States Armed Forces, the British Ministry of Defence, the British Home Office and the British Road Research Laboratory.[2] He taught at the University of Illinois, Old Dominion University, Concordia University, Open University, University of New Mexico, Architectural Association School of Architecture and MIT.[3]

Biography

Pask was born in Derby, England, in 1928, and educated at Rydal Penrhos. Before qualifying precociously as a mining engineer at Liverpool Polytechnic, now Liverpool John Moores University, Pask studied geology at Bangor University. He obtained an MA in natural sciences from Cambridge in 1952 and a PhD in psychology from the University of London in 1964. Whilst visiting professor of educational technology, he obtained the first DSc from the Open University and an ScD from his college, Downing Cambridge in 1995. From the 1960s Pask directed commercial research at System Research Ltd in Richmond, Surrey and his partnership, Pask Associates.

Pask's primary contributions to cybernetics, educational psychology, learning theory and systems theory, as well as to numerous other fields, was his emphasis on the personal nature of reality, and on the process of learning as stemming from the consensual agreement of interacting actors in a given environment ("conversation").

His work was complex, extensive, and deeply thought out, at least until late in his life, when he benefited less often from critical feedback of research peers, reviewers of proposals and reports to government bodies in the US and UK, and, perhaps most especially, the tension between experimentation and theoretical stands. His publications, however, represent a storehouse of ideas that are not fully mined.[4]

Conversation theory

Main article: Conversation theory

Pask's most well known work was the development of Conversation theory. It came out of his work on instructional design and models of individual learning styles. In regard to learning styles, he identified conditions required for concept sharing and described the learning styles holist, serialist, and their optimal mixture versatile. He proposed a rigorous model of analogy relations.

Colloquy of mobiles

Pask participated in the seminal exhibition "Cybernetic Serendipity" (ICA London, 1968) with the interactive installation "Colloquy of Mobiles", continuing his ongoing dialogue with the visual and performing arts. (cf Rosen 2008, and Dreher's History of Computer Art)

Contributions to architecture and design

Pask made a number of contributions to architecture, collaborating with architect Cedric Price on the radical Fun Palace project during the 1960s, and working as a consultant to Nicholas Negroponte's Architecture Machine Group. Pask held a teaching position at the Architectural Association in London, and many of Pask's PhD students were architects, including Ranulph Glanville.

Interactions of actors theory

Main article: Interactions of actors theory

Publications

Pask wrote several books and more than two hundred journal articles.

Selected books

Selected papers

Patent

Exhibition

Influence

Pask influenced Ted Nelson, who references Pask in Computer Lib/Dream Machines and whose interest in hypermedia is much like Pask's entailment meshes.

See also

References

  1. ^ Pickering, Andrew (2009). The Cybernetic Brain: Sketches of Another Future. University of Chicago Press. p. 313. ISBN 978-0226667904.
  2. ^ Biography at International Federation for Systems Research
  3. ^ Gordon Pask Bio: Book Chapter
  4. ^ http://pangaro.com/pask/

Further reading