Jack Minker (1927- ) Papers

Professor Emeritus, Department of Computer Science, UMIACS, University of Maryland, Dr. Jack Minker is a widely-published expert in artificial intelligence, deductive databases, logic programming and nonmonotonic reasoning.

While researching the works of foreign computer scientists, Dr. Minker became acutely aware that the scientific freedom and human rights of scientists in non-democratic societies were systematically violated. He decided to take up the cause of scientific freedom and human rights and became Vice-chair, Computer Science for the Committee of Concerned Scientists (CCS), shortly after it was founded in 1972. In addition to his activities in the CCS, Dr. Minker worked with other organizations with similar missions: Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) as Vice-chair for the Committee on Scientific Freedom and Human Rights; Scientists for Sakharov, Orlov, and Sharansky; and the International Coalition in Support of Sakharov. He also became involved in the Soviet Jewry movement on a broader scale by serving as an Honorary Board member of the Washington Committee for Soviet Jewry, and collaborating with the Union of Council for Soviet Jews.

With the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), Dr. Minker published four reports that listed over 300 computer scientists whose human rights had been violated. The reports pertained predominantly to Soviet Jewish scientists, but also featured scientists from Argentina, Chile, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Iran, Kenya, Pakistan, the Peoples Republic of China, Poland, Romania, South Africa, and Uruguay.

Dr. Minker is a laureate of several awards for his work in human rights, including the ACM’s Outstanding Contribution Award in Human Rights, and the New York Academy of Sciences Human Rights Committee’s Heinz R. Pagels Award. In 2012 Jack Minker published his book Scientific Freedom and Human Rights: Scientists of Conscience During the Cold War (IEEE Computer Society Press).