Norman Packard
Encyclopedia
Chaos theory
Chaos theory is a field of study in mathematics, with applications in several disciplines including physics, economics, biology, and philosophy. Chaos theory studies the behavior of dynamical systems that are highly sensitive to initial conditions, an effect which is popularly referred to as the...
physicist
Physicist
A physicist is a scientist who studies or practices physics. Physicists study a wide range of physical phenomena in many branches of physics spanning all length scales: from sub-atomic particles of which all ordinary matter is made to the behavior of the material Universe as a whole...
and one of the founders of the Prediction Company
Prediction Company
Prediction Company was founded in Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA, in March 1991 by J. Doyne Farmer, Norman Packard and James McGill. The company uses various forecasting techniques to build black-box trading systems for various financial markets...
and ProtoLife
ProtoLife
ProtoLife is a startup company based in San Francisco, USA, headed by co-founder and CEO Norman Packard. Their current main area of endeavor is the development of machine-learning, statistical model-based methodologies for evolutionary design of complex, high-throughput...
. He is an alumnus of Reed College
Reed College
Reed College is a private, independent, liberal arts college located in southeast Portland, Oregon. Founded in 1908, Reed is a residential college with a campus located in Portland's Eastmoreland neighborhood, featuring architecture based on the Tudor-Gothic style, and a forested canyon wilderness...
and the University of California, Santa Cruz
University of California, Santa Cruz
The University of California, Santa Cruz, also known as UC Santa Cruz or UCSC, is a public, collegiate university; one of ten campuses in the University of California...
. Packard is known for his contributions to both chaos theory and cellular automata. He also coined the phrase "the edge of chaos".
Biography
Between 1976 and 1981, he worked with fellow graduate students in Santa Cruz, CaliforniaSanta Cruz, California
Santa Cruz is the county seat and largest city of Santa Cruz County, California in the US. As of the 2010 U.S. Census, Santa Cruz had a total population of 59,946...
, forming the Eudaemons
Eudaemons
The Eudaemons were a small group headed by graduate physics students J. Doyne Farmer and Norman Packard at the University of California Santa Cruz in the late 1970s. The group's immediate objective was to find a way to beat roulette, but a loftier objective was to use the money made from roulette...
collective with J. Doyne Farmer
J. Doyne Farmer
J. Doyne Farmer is an American physicist and entrepreneur, with interest in chaos theory and complexity. He is a professor at the Santa Fe Institute. He was also a member of Eudaemonic Enterprises.-Biography:...
and Robert Shaw
Robert Shaw (physicist)
Robert Stetson Shaw is an American physicist who was part of Eudaemonic Enterprises in Santa Cruz in the late 1970s and early 1980s. In 1988 he was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship for his work in Chaos theory.-Chaos theory:...
, to develop a strategy for beating the roulette
Roulette
Roulette is a casino game named after a French diminutive for little wheel. In the game, players may choose to place bets on either a single number or a range of numbers, the colors red or black, or whether the number is odd or even....
wheel using a toe-operated computer. The computer could, in theory, predict in what area a roulette ball would land on a wheel, giving the player a significant statistical advantage over the house. Although the project itself was a success, they ran into great practical difficulty employing the technique on-site in Las Vegas casinos, and many of the members left to pursue other fields of academia. The experiences of Norman, Doyne Farmer, and crew were later chronicled in the book The Eudaemonic Pie
Eudaemons
The Eudaemons were a small group headed by graduate physics students J. Doyne Farmer and Norman Packard at the University of California Santa Cruz in the late 1970s. The group's immediate objective was to find a way to beat roulette, but a loftier objective was to use the money made from roulette...
(1985) by Thomas Bass. Their experience was also chronicled on the television series "Breaking Vegas."
Around the same time, he formed the Dynamical Systems Collective with friends Rob Shaw
Robert Shaw (physicist)
Robert Stetson Shaw is an American physicist who was part of Eudaemonic Enterprises in Santa Cruz in the late 1970s and early 1980s. In 1988 he was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship for his work in Chaos theory.-Chaos theory:...
, Doyne Farmer
J. Doyne Farmer
J. Doyne Farmer is an American physicist and entrepreneur, with interest in chaos theory and complexity. He is a professor at the Santa Fe Institute. He was also a member of Eudaemonic Enterprises.-Biography:...
, and James Crutchfield. The collective was best known for its work in probing chaotic systems for signs of order.
In 1982, Packard left Santa Cruz for France to take a post-doctoral fellowship at the Institut des Hautes Études Scientifiques
Institut des Hautes Études Scientifiques
The Institut des Hautes Études Scientifiques is a French institute supporting advanced research in mathematics and theoretical physics...
in Bures-sur-Yvette
Bures-sur-Yvette
Bures-sur-Yvette is a commune in the Essonne department in Île-de-France in northern France.Inhabitants of Bures-sur-Yvette are known as Buressois.-Geography:...
, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
. Disappointed with the lack of technology at the institute, he left after one year and joined the Institute for Advanced Study
Institute for Advanced Study
The Institute for Advanced Study, located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States, is an independent postgraduate center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry. It was founded in 1930 by Abraham Flexner...
. At the IAS, he worked with Stephen Wolfram
Stephen Wolfram
Stephen Wolfram is a British scientist and the chief designer of the Mathematica software application and the Wolfram Alpha computational knowledge engine.- Biography :...
and friend Rob Shaw
Robert Shaw (physicist)
Robert Stetson Shaw is an American physicist who was part of Eudaemonic Enterprises in Santa Cruz in the late 1970s and early 1980s. In 1988 he was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship for his work in Chaos theory.-Chaos theory:...
to explain cellular automata and the tendency for matter to organize itself.
Prediction Company
In the spring of 1985, Packard and Doyne Farmer realized that their research in fields such as chaos, Genetic Algorithms and cellular automata could help build a system for predicting the stock marketStock market
A stock market or equity market is a public entity for the trading of company stock and derivatives at an agreed price; these are securities listed on a stock exchange as well as those only traded privately.The size of the world stock market was estimated at about $36.6 trillion...
. Five years later they founded Prediction Company
Prediction Company
Prediction Company was founded in Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA, in March 1991 by J. Doyne Farmer, Norman Packard and James McGill. The company uses various forecasting techniques to build black-box trading systems for various financial markets...
, a small company dedicated to making a model for predicting what a market would do during a certain time period. A brief outline of some of the genetic algorithm techniques he used in the early days is presented in chapter 2 of reference 5 below. In 2004, Prediction Company received the "Employer of Choice" award in the small size category for the State of New Mexico
New Mexico
New Mexico is a state located in the southwest and western regions of the United States. New Mexico is also usually considered one of the Mountain States. With a population density of 16 per square mile, New Mexico is the sixth-most sparsely inhabited U.S...
. The company still exists today as a subsidiary of Swiss bank UBS AG
UBS AG
UBS AG is a Swiss global financial services company headquartered in Basel and Zürich, Switzerland, which provides investment banking, asset management, and wealth management services for private, corporate, and institutional clients worldwide, as well as retail clients in Switzerland...
.
ProtoLife
Packard's latest project is ProtoLifeProtoLife
ProtoLife is a startup company based in San Francisco, USA, headed by co-founder and CEO Norman Packard. Their current main area of endeavor is the development of machine-learning, statistical model-based methodologies for evolutionary design of complex, high-throughput...
, the first company to capitalize on living technology. The goal of the company is to produce artificial living cells that can perform useful chemical functions. The company is based in Venice, Italy.