I’m Four Degrees of Separation from Bertrand Russell

Bertrand Russell taught Ludwig Wittgenstein, who in turn taught Margaret Masterman. Masterman is one of the founders of computational linguistics, as is my teacher, David Hays. I don’t know much about their intellectual relationship, but I know it was substantial. Hays had a white sweater which she had knitted for him and she was a close intellectual confidant. Hays hired one of her students, Martin Kay, to work with him at RAND.

These four relationships, 1) Russell & Wittgenstein, 2) Wittgenstein and Masterman, 3) Masterman & Hays, ...