George A. Miller

George A. Miller, Princeton’s James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor of Psychology Emeritus and a pioneer in cognitive science, died of natural causes Sunday, July 22, at his home in Plainsboro, He was 92 years old.

Miller, who joined the faculty in 1979, was an innovator in the study of language and cognition, helping to establish psycholinguistics as an independent field of research in psychology. In 1991, he was awarded the National Medal of Science, the highest scientific honor awarded by the United States, in recognition of his contributions to understanding processes of the human mind. He did receive an honorary doctor of science degree from Princeton in 1996.

Miller, together with Jerome Bruner and Noam Chomsky, led the “cognitive revolution” that replaced behaviorism as the leading psychological approach to understanding the mind in the 1950s, said Christiane Fellbaum, senior research scholar in computer science who worked closely with Miller at Princeton. “George believed that the human mind in all its aspects was interesting and worth studying — believe it or not, that was revolutionary at the time,” she said.

Philip Johnson-Laird, the Stuart Professor of Psychology Emeritus and senior scholar at Princeton, said Miller’s work has made a permanent impression on cognitive science.

“As long scientists study the mind, they will honor ideas that he was first to formulate,” said Johnson-Laird, who collaborated with Miller on the 1976 book Language and Perception.

Miller’s work spanned more than five decades. An early work, his 1951 book, Language and Communication, helped establish the field of psycholinguistics, a collaboration between linguistics and psychology.

In 1956, he was the author of The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two, a paper that, in part, proposed new ideas about the way immediate memory works, suggesting that people can retain about seven “chunks” of information in what is commonly known as short-term memory. The paper became one of the most frequently quoted papers in the field. (And, as Miller often noted, also one of the most misquoted papers.)

Johnson-Laird said the paper reflected several of Miller’s important skills. “He could think more deeply than others, and he could put his thoughts into beautiful transparent prose,” he said.

The paper’s attention-grabbing opening lines are well known in psychology: “My problem is that I have been persecuted by an integer. For seven years this number has followed me around, has intruded in my most private data, and has assaulted me from the pages of our most public journals.”

He was also the main author of Plans and the Structure of Behavior, a 1960 book that was a catalyst for the cognitive revolution in psychology.

Beginning in 1986 and continuing for many years, Miller helped oversee development of WordNet, a large-scale electronic reference that helps computers understand human language and continues to influence applications such as search engines.

Miller was born in Charleston, W.Va., and earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Alabama in 1940 and 1941, respectively. While an undergraduate at the University of Alabama, he met and married Katherine James, who was his wife for more than half a century.

During World War II, he worked on military voice communications at the Harvard University Psycho-Acoustic Laboratory. He earned his doctorate at Harvard in 1946.

He was an assistant professor of psychology at Harvard from 1948 to 1951, when he went to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as an associate professor for four years. He returned to Harvard for the next 12 years. Named professor in 1958, he served as chair of the psychology department from 1964 to 1967.

Miller taught and studied at Rockefeller University from 1968 to 1982 and was twice appointed as a visitor of the Institute for Advanced Study.

He joined the Princeton faculty in 1979 and was named the McDonnell Distinguished Professor of Psychology in 1982. He and Gilbert Harman, the James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy, established the Cognitive Science Laboratory at Princeton. Miller was director of the McDonnell-Pew Program in Cognitive Neuroscience from 1989 to 1994. He transferred to emeritus status in 1990.

Fellbaum said Miller was a gentleman noted for his kindness to graduate students. Miller’s son, Donnally, said that he remembers his family always opening its home to foreign graduate students at Thanksgiving, when they otherwise wouldn’t have had anywhere to go.

“He was the sort of man who was generous with his time and took a lot of care with his students,” Donnally Miller said.

Among his awards, Miller received the American Psychological Foundation’s Life Achievement Award in 1990 and the Louis E. Levy Medal in 1991. He was a Fulbright research fellow at the University of Oxford and served as president of the American Psychological Association in 1969. He was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1957, the National Academy of Sciences in 1962, and the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1985.

A celebration of Miller’s life will be held at 7 p.m., Thursday, August 9, at the Windrows retirement community, 2000 Windrow Drive, Princeton.

Miller is survived by his second wife, Margaret Page; two children, Nancy and Donnally; and three grandsons, Gavin Murray-Miller, Morgan Murray-Miller, and Nathaniel James Miller.

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Elizabeth Robertson

Elizabeth Robertson died peacefully at home in Princeton on July 21.

Born August 12, 1919, Betty grew up in Elizabeth, New Jersey. During the war she worked in Washington as a cryptanalyst, breaking German and Japanese codes.

She was an avid golfer who played at Springdale Country Club into her eighties, and was active in the alumnae association of Mount Holyoke College, the Present Day Club, and Women’s College Club.

She was married for 61 years to the late Nat Robertson; and is survived by her children, Henry, Mandy, and Paul Robertson; granddaughters, Julia Cavalier and Elinor Keith; and great granddaughter, Amanda Cavalier.

A memorial service will be held at the Presbyterian Church of Lawrenceville on Saturday, August 4 at 11:30 a.m., followed by a reception at Princeton Windrows. No flowers, please.

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Donald C. Cox

Donald Charles Cox, of Princeton, died Friday, July 27, 2012 after a long and valiant battle with esophageal cancer.

Born in 1943 in Pontiac, Mich., to Charles and the late Anne Cox, he received a BS in mathematics from Western Michigan in 1965 and an MBA from the University of Michigan in 1970. He was a lifelong, die-hard Wolverine fan.

Don served as an officer in the U.S. Navy aboard the U.S.S. Conway during the Vietnam War. He was a proud resident of Princeton, an active swimmer and an avid lover of trains. Professionally, Don was passionate about his work as an IT executive for such companies as Bristol-Myers Squibb, Oracle, and Hotwire.

Don had an incredible mind and his combined intelligence and photographic memory resulted in banishment from family games of Trivial Pursuit. He was very proud of his large family and talked often about how lucky he was to have lived long enough to know his 9 grandchildren.

In addition to his father and grandchildren, he is survived by his wife, Sharon, of 27 years; his sister, Shirley Cox; his beloved sons, Kevin and Patrick Cox; his stepdaughters, Sarah, Rachel & Gabby Kachur; his stepson, Matthew Kachur; and their spouses.

A committal of ashes will take place in Arlington Cemetery in Washington, D.C. Donations in Don’s memory may be made to the YWCA of Princeton, 59 Paul Robeson Place, Princeton, N.J. 08540. www.ywcaprinceton.org.

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Francesca Delneso

Francesca Delneso, 98, of Princeton, died Friday, July 20, 2012 at Merwick Care and Rehab Center of Plainsboro. Francesca was born in Manhattan, N.Y. and resided in New York until age 6 before moving to Ischia, Italy, and then returned back to Princeton at the age of 20.

She was a member of St. Paul’s Church of Princeton. Francesca enjoyed writing, and would send birthday and anniversary cards to all her family and friends.

Francesca was the daughter of the late Salvatore and Teresa Trani, wife of the late Francesco Delneso; and mother of the late Francesco Delneso. She was also predeceased by three sisters and three brothers. She is survived by two sons and a daughter-in-law, John L. Delneso and Salvatore and Antonietta Delneso, all of Princeton; a daughter, Maria and Robert Merrick of Pennington; four grandchildren, Frank Delneso, Theresa Helper, Julianna Delneso, and Andrea Merrick; two great grandchildren, Steven and Michael Helper; and many nieces and nephews here and in Italy.

Memorial contributions may be made to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, 501 St. Jude Place, Memphis, Tenn., 38105; or St. Paul’s Church, 214 Nassau Street, Princeton, N.J. 08542.

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Sung Hyok Yi

Sung Hyok Yi was born on August 21, 1921 in Kanggye, North Pyongyang province, modern-day North Korea, as the first of four children of Jungwon and Myungsun Yi. His father was a successful businessman in Kanggye, running several businesses as diversified as lumber manufacturing and rice distribution. His mother was a devout Christian, eventually holding the highest positions in Saemoonan Presbyterian Church in Seoul, which was founded in 1887 by the American missionary Horace Underwood.

After graduating from Chuncheon High School in 1939, Mr. Yi went on to Tokyo, Japan, to study at Waseda University, where he completed his BS in economics and political Science in 1943. While at Waseda, Mr. Yi was a member of the varsity basketball team.

After Korea’s independence from Japan in 1945, Mr. Yi returned to Kanggye to work in his father’s lumber business. But as rising political tensions made northern Korea unsafe, he was sent south in 1948 with his mother and two of his three younger sisters to Seoul. Shortly thereafter, the border between North and South Korea was closed, leaving his father and youngest sister, Sangseon, unable to escape. Their whereabouts are still unknown.

In 1954, he married Yongcha Bae in Seoul, and had two boys, Peter and Robert Yi. Today, Peter is a medical oncologist in Princeton, and Robert is head of investor relations for Samsung Electronics in Seoul.

Once settled in Seoul, Mr. Yi entered the film industry, founding a film production company. He produced several famous films, most notably introducing Koreans to actress Um Aing-Ran, Korea’s first movie star.

Mr. Yi led another business venture as president of a Korean crafts export business, which became so successful that he was awarded a presidential medal in 1970 by the president of South Korea, Park Chung-hee.

In 1972, Mr. Yi immigrated with his family to the United States, settling in Queens, N.Y., and opening Subok Exports on 32nd St. and Broadway in Manhattan. He would become one of the first merchants to establish the region in today’s Koreatown, finally retiring in 1983. Since 1990, Mr. and Mrs. Yi have lived with their son and daughter-in-law in Princeton.

Mr. Yi was an avid golf player, stating that some of his happiest moments were on the golf course; In Seoul, he was a member of Korea’s first private golf club, Hanyang Country Club. In the United States, he was a member of the Princeton Korean Presbyterian Church in Plainsboro and Waseda University’s New York alumni association.

Mr. Yi is survived by his wife, Yongcha; two sisters, Sanggil and Sangcheon of Seoul; two sons, Peter and Robert; two daughters-in-law, Alice and Grace; and four grandchildren, Justin, Lauren, Jonathan, and Erin.

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to the Princeton Korean Presbyterian Church, 500 Plainsboro Road, Plainsboro, N.J. 08536 (www.princetonkorean.org); the Korean Community Center of Greater Princeton, P.O. Box 1128, Princeton, N.J. 08542 (www.kccprinceton.org); and Princeton Healthcare System Foundation, 629 US Route One, Princeton, N.J. 08540 (www.princetonhcs.org).

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John D. Humble

John Duncan Humble, 87, of the Deerwood Community, formerly of Princeton, passed away on Tuesday, July 24, 2012.

A native of Waco, Texas, he was the son of the late Paul M. and Pauline Duncan Humble. He graduated in 1946 from Texas A&M University with a degree in mechanical engineering. He took an engineering position with Mobil Oil Company in Beaumont, Texas, thus beginning a career with Mobil working on projects all over the world and spanning more than 4 decades. He was a U.S. Navy veteran serving during World War II and Korea.

Mr. Humble is survived by two sons, Dr. Tim Humble and his wife, Terri, of Beaumont, Texas; and Dr. Ted Humble and his wife, Dr. Nancy Humble, of Asheville, N.C. He had seven grandchildren, Daniel, Sarah, Ryan, Morgan, Kristen, Paul, and Mark; and was preceded in death by two grandchildren, Nicholas and Mary Ann.

Mr. Humble ’46 was thankful for the opportunities provided by attending Texas A&M and wanted that to be available for his sons. Tim, ’74, and Ted, ’78, both graduated there — launching careers in medicine, both as general surgeons. Ever thankful still he later established several endowed scholarships at A&M so that other young people could have access to a college education, “especially engineering”.

No local services are planned at this time.

Memorials may be made to The Association of Former Students, Texas A&M University, 505 George Bush Drive, College Station, Texas 77840.

Groce Funeral Home at Lake Julian is assisting the family and the memorial register is available at groce
funeralhome.com.

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