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Patrick Billingsley

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Patrick P. Billingsley
Billingsley in 1961
Born(1925-05-03)May 3, 1925
DiedApril 22, 2011(2011-04-22) (aged 85)
NationalityUnited States
Alma materPrinceton University
Scientific career
FieldsStatistics
InstitutionsUniversity of Chicago
Doctoral advisorWilliam Feller

Patrick Paul Billingsley (May 3, 1925 – April 22, 2011[1][2]) was an American mathematician and stage and screen actor, noted for his books in advanced probability theory and statistics. He was born and raised in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and graduated from the United States Naval Academy in 1946.

Academic career

After earning a Ph.D. in mathematics at Princeton University in 1955, he was attached to the NSA until his discharge from the Navy in 1957. In 1958 he became a professor of mathematics and statistics at the University of Chicago, where he served as chair of the Department of Statistics from 1980 to 1983, and retired in 1994. In 1964–65 he was a Fulbright Fellow and visiting professor at the University of Copenhagen. In 1971–72 he was a Guggenheim Fellow and visiting professor at the University of Cambridge (Peterhouse). From 1976 to 1979 he edited the Annals of Probability. In 1983 he was president of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics. He was given the Lester R. Ford Award for his article "Prime Numbers and Brownian Motion."[3] He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1986.[4]

He starred in a number of plays at Court Theatre and Body Politic Theatre in Chicago and appeared in at least nine films.[citation needed]

In Young Men and Fire, fellow University of Chicago professor Norman Maclean wrote about Billingsley that "he is a distinguished statistician and one of the best amateur actors I have ever seen".[citation needed]

Books

  • Statistical Inference for Markov Processes (1961)
  • Ergodic Theory and Information (1965)[5]
  • Convergence of Probability Measures (1st Edition 1968, 2nd Edition 1999)[6]
  • The Elements of Statistical Inference (with David L. Huntsberger, 1986)
  • Probability and Measure (1st Edition 1976, 2nd Edition 1986, 3rd Edition, 1995, Anniversary Edition 2012 )

Stage plays

Films

Television

Death

He died in 2011, aged 85, in his Hyde Park, Chicago home. He was survived by his children, Franny, Patty, Julie, Marty and Paul, and his companion, Florence Weisblatt. His wife of nearly 50 years, social activist Ruth Billingsley, died in 2000.

References

  1. ^ Mathematician-Actor Patrick Billingsley Dies at 85
  2. ^ Patrick Billingsley, probability theorist and actor, 1925–2011
  3. ^ Patrick Billingsley, "Prime Numbers and Brownian Motion", American Mathematical Monthly, 1973, volume 80, pp. 1099–1115
  4. ^ "Book of Members, 1780–2010: Chapter B" (PDF). American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Retrieved July 20, 2011.
  5. ^ Hajian, Arshag (1967). "Review: Patrick Billingsley, Ergodic and Information". Annals of Mathematical Statistics. 38 (1): 285–286. doi:10.1214/aoms/1177699086.
  6. ^ Dudley, R. M. (1971). "Review: P. Billingsley, Convergence of probability measures". Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. 77 (1): 25–27. doi:10.1090/s0002-9904-1971-12602-2.
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