Patrick Henry Winston is Ford Professor of Artificial Intelligence and MacVicar Faculty
Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His Genesis research group focuses
on developing a computational account of human intelligence and how human intelligence
differs from that of other species, with special attention to modeling human story
comprehension. Eventual applications include precedent-based advisory systems and
self-aware machines.
Winston served for 25 years as Director of the MIT Artificial intelligence Laboratory (now part of MIT's CSAIL Laboratory).
Winston is chairman and cofounder of Ascent Technology, Inc., which produces sophisticated scheduling, resource allocation, schedule recovery, and workforce management applications, all enabled by AI technology and in use throughout the world in major airports.
Winston is a past president of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence. He is a member of the Massport Security Advisory Committee, has served as a member of the Defense Intelligence Agency Advisory Board, and in recognition of his service as member and chair of the Naval Research Advisory Committee, he received a Meritorious Public Service Award.
Winston has written and edited numerous books, including Artificial Intelligence. An online version of his artificial intelligence subject is among the top 10 most visited of the nearly 3,000 subjects offered by MIT's OpenCourseWare program. Winston has received a MacVicar Faculty Fellowship, the Eta Kappa Nu Teaching Award for excellence in instruction, the Baker Award for undergraduate teaching, and the Graduate Student Council Teaching Award.