Arthur Samuel

Arthur Lee Samuel (December 5, 1901 – July 29, 1990) was an American pioneer in the field of computer gaming and artificial intelligence. He coined the term "machine learning" in 1959. The Samuel Checkers-playing Program was among the world's first successful self-learning programs, and as such a very early demonstration of the fundamental concept of artificial intelligence (AI). He was also a senior member in the TeX community who devoted much time giving personal attention to the needs of users and wrote an early TeX manual in 1983.