John R. Pierce

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John Robinson Pierce (27 March 1910 – 2 April 2002), was an American engineer and author. He worked extensively in the fields of radio communication, microwave technology, computer music, psychoacoustics, and science fiction. Born in Des Moines, Iowa, he earned his PhD from Caltech, and died in Palo Alto, California from complications of Parkinson's Disease.

Books
  • Traveling-Wave Tubes, New York: Van Nostrand, 1950.
  • Electrons, Waves and Messages, Garden City, NY: Hanover House, 1956.
  • Symbols, Signals and Noise: The Nature and Process of Communication, New York: Harper, 1961; 2nd ed. as An Introduction to Information Theory: Symbols, Signals and Noise, New York: Dover Publications, 1980.
  • with A. Michael Noll, Signals: The Science of Telecommunications, W.H. Freeman, 1983; rev.ed., 1990, 247 pp.
    • Signale. Die Geheimnisse der Telekommunikation, Heidelberg: Spektrum Akademischer Verlag, 1992. (in German)
  • The Science of Musical Sound, W.H. Freeman, 1992, 270 pp. Review: Moore (1985).
    • Klang. Musik mit den Ohren der Physik, Heidelberg: Spektrum, 1999. (in German)
Articles
  • with B. M. Oliver and C. E. Shannon, "The Philosophy of PCM", Proc. IRE. 36 (Nov 1948), pp 1324-1331. On Pulse Code Modulation.
  • as J.J. Coupling, "Science for Art's Sake", Astounding Science Fiction, Street & Smith Publications, Nov 1950, pp 83-91.
  • "The Computer as a Musical Instrument", Journal of the Audio Engineering Society of America 8:2 (1960), pp 139ff.
  • "Portrait of the Machine as a Young Artist", Playboy 12:6 (1965), pp 124-5 & 150 & 182 & 184.
  • "Computers and Music", New Scientist 25:431 (1965), pp 423ff.
  • "The Early Days of Information Theory", IEEE Transactions of Information Theory 19:1 (Jan 1973), pp 3-8. [1]
  • with Max V. Mathews, "Some Recollections of James Tenney", Perspectives of New Music 25:1-2 (1987), pp 534-535.
  • with Max V. Mathews, "Current Directions in Computer Music Research", in Current Directions in Computer Music Research, MIT Press, 1989.
  • "Telstar, A History", SMEC Vintage Electrics (1990).
  • "ECHO - America's First Communications Satellite", SMEC Vintage Electrics 2:1 (1990).
  • "My Work With Vacuum Tubes At Bell Laboratories", SMEC Vintage Electrics 3:1 (1991).
Talks
Literature
See also
Links
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