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30-448: Sir Michael James Lighthill FRS FRAeS (23 January 1924 – 17 July 1998) was a British applied mathematician , known for his pioneering work in the field of aeroacoustics and for writing the Lighthill report , which pessimistically stated that "In no part of the field (of AI) have the discoveries made so far produced the major impact that was then promised", contributing to

60-534: A Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Cambridge where he was an undergraduate student of Trinity College, Cambridge in 1943. Lighthill specialised in fluid dynamics , and worked at the National Physical Laboratory at Trinity. Between 1946 and 1959 he was Beyer Professor of Applied Mathematics at the University of Manchester . Lighthill then moved from Manchester to become director of

90-1607: A "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural knowledge , including mathematics , engineering science , and medical science ". Fellowship of the Society, the oldest known scientific academy in continuous existence, is a significant honour. It has been awarded to many eminent scientists throughout history, including Isaac Newton (1672), Benjamin Franklin (1756), Charles Babbage (1816), Michael Faraday (1824), Charles Darwin (1839), Ernest Rutherford (1903), Srinivasa Ramanujan (1918), Jagadish Chandra Bose (1920), Albert Einstein (1921), Paul Dirac (1930), Winston Churchill (1941), Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar (1944), Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis (1945), Dorothy Hodgkin (1947), Alan Turing (1951), Lise Meitner (1955), Satyendra Nath Bose (1958), and Francis Crick (1959). More recently, fellowship has been awarded to Stephen Hawking (1974), David Attenborough (1983), Tim Hunt (1991), Elizabeth Blackburn (1992), Raghunath Mashelkar (1998), Tim Berners-Lee (2001), Venki Ramakrishnan (2003), Atta-ur-Rahman (2006), Andre Geim (2007), Bai Chunli (2014), James Dyson (2015), Ajay Kumar Sood (2015), Subhash Khot (2017), Elon Musk (2018), Elaine Fuchs (2019) and around 8,000 others in total, including over 280 Nobel Laureates since 1900. As of October 2018 , there are approximately 1,689 living Fellows, Foreign and Honorary Members, of whom 85 are Nobel Laureates. Fellowship of

120-685: A Chair (all of whom are Fellows of the Royal Society ). Members of the 10 Sectional Committees change every three years to mitigate in-group bias . Each Sectional Committee covers different specialist areas including: New Fellows are admitted to the Society at a formal admissions day ceremony held annually in July, when they sign the Charter Book and the Obligation which reads: "We who have hereunto subscribed, do hereby promise, that we will endeavour to promote

150-457: A chair he held until 1979, when he was succeeded by Stephen Hawking . Lighthill then became Provost of University College London (UCL) – a post he held until 1989. Lighthill founded the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications (IMA) in 1964, alongside Professor Sir Bryan Thwaites . In 1968, he was awarded an Honorary Degree (Doctor of Science) by the University of Bath . In 1972 he

180-625: A subject vital to the reduction of noise in jet engines . Lighthill's eighth power law states that the acoustic power radiated by a jet engine is proportional to the eighth power of the jet speed. He also founded non-linear acoustics, and showed that the same non-linear differential equations could model both flood waves in rivers and traffic flow in highways. In 1964 he became the Royal Society 's resident professor at Imperial College London , before returning to Trinity College, Cambridge, five years later as Lucasian Professor of Mathematics ,

210-725: Is confirmed by the Council in April, and a secret ballot of Fellows is held at a meeting in May. A candidate is elected if they secure two-thirds of votes of those Fellows voting. An indicative allocation of 18 Fellowships can be allocated to candidates from Physical Sciences and Biological Sciences; and up to 10 from Applied Sciences, Human Sciences and Joint Physical and Biological Sciences. A further maximum of six can be 'Honorary', 'General' or 'Royal' Fellows. Nominations for Fellowship are peer reviewed by Sectional Committees, each with at least 12 members and

240-421: Is nominated by two Fellows of the Royal Society (a proposer and a seconder), who sign a certificate of proposal. Previously, nominations required at least five fellows to support each nomination by the proposer, which was criticised for supposedly establishing an old boy network and elitist gentlemen's club . The certificate of election (see for example ) includes a statement of the principal grounds on which

270-704: The American Philosophical Society in 1970. In 1971 Lighthill was made knight in the New Year's Honours. In 1976, Lighthill was elected a Member of the National Academy of Sciences , one of at least nine such foreign academies to elect him, including the French and Russian. Lighthill was also made an honorary member of many bodies, and received twenty-four honorary doctorates. He was invited to give, and delivered, many prize and plenary lectures. His hobby

300-520: The Royal Aircraft Establishment at Farnborough . There he worked on the development of television and communications satellites , and on the development of crewed spacecraft . This latter work was used in the development of the Concorde supersonic airliner. In 1955, together with Gerald B. Whitham , Lighthill set out the first comprehensive theory of kinematic waves (an application of

330-421: The method of characteristics ), with a multitude of applications, prime among them fluid flow and traffic flow . Lighthill's early work included two-dimensional aerofoil theory, and supersonic flow around solids of revolution . In addition to the dynamics of gas at high speeds, he studied shock and blast waves and introduced the squirmer model. He is credited with founding the subject of aeroacoustics ,

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360-426: The post-nominal letters FRS . Every year, fellows elect up to ten new foreign members. Like fellows, foreign members are elected for life through peer review on the basis of excellence in science. As of 2016 , there are around 165 foreign members, who are entitled to use the post-nominal ForMemRS . Honorary Fellowship is an honorary academic title awarded to candidates who have given distinguished service to

390-439: The Royal Society has been described by The Guardian as "the equivalent of a lifetime achievement Oscar " with several institutions celebrating their announcement each year. Up to 60 new Fellows (FRS), honorary (HonFRS) and foreign members (ForMemRS) are elected annually in late April or early May, from a pool of around 700 proposed candidates each year. New Fellows can only be nominated by existing Fellows for one of

420-678: The Science and Engineering Research Council. In 1994, the new Director General of Research Councils was charged with reorganization of the four existing research councils, and this resulted in the SERC being split three bodies: The two Observatories were moved under the aegis of PPARC, and the Laboratories initially into EPSRC and later into their own organization, the Council for the Central Laboratory of

450-655: The Society, we shall be free from this Obligation for the future". Since 2014, portraits of Fellows at the admissions ceremony have been published without copyright restrictions in Wikimedia Commons under a more permissive Creative Commons license which allows wider re-use. In addition to the main fellowships of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS & HonFRS), other fellowships are available which are applied for by individuals, rather than through election. These fellowships are research grant awards and holders are known as Royal Society Research Fellows . In addition to

480-608: The Trend Committee enquiry into the organisation of civil science in the UK. Previously the Minister for Science had been responsible for various research activities in the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research (DSIR) and more loosely with a variety of agencies concerned with the formulation of civil scientific policy. One of the main problems addressed by the enquiry was how to decide

510-535: The award of Fellowship (FRS, HonFRS & ForMemRS) and the Research Fellowships described above, several other awards, lectures and medals of the Royal Society are also given. Science and Engineering Research Council The SERC also had oversight of: From its formation in 1965 until 1981 it was known as the Science Research Council (SRC). The SRC had been formed in 1965 as a result of

540-597: The cause of science, but do not have the kind of scientific achievements required of Fellows or Foreign Members. Honorary Fellows include the World Health Organization's Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (2022), Bill Bryson (2013), Melvyn Bragg (2010), Robin Saxby (2015), David Sainsbury, Baron Sainsbury of Turville (2008), Onora O'Neill (2007), John Maddox (2000), Patrick Moore (2001) and Lisa Jardine (2015). Honorary Fellows are entitled to use

570-515: The fellowships described below: Every year, up to 52 new fellows are elected from the United Kingdom, the rest of the Commonwealth of Nations , and Ireland, which make up around 90% of the society. Each candidate is considered on their merits and can be proposed from any sector of the scientific community. Fellows are elected for life on the basis of excellence in science and are entitled to use

600-633: The first ever Gold Medal of the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications in recognition of their "outstanding contributions to mathematics and its applications over a period of years". In 1983 Lighthill was awarded the Ludwig Prandtl Ring from the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Luft- und Raumfahrt (German Society for Aeronautics and Astronautics) for "outstanding contribution in the field of aerospace engineering". His former students include Gerald B. Whitham and Steve Furber . Lighthill

630-543: The gloomy climate of AI winter . James Lighthill was born to Ernest Balzar Lichtenberg and Marjorie Holmes: an Alsatian mining engineer who changed his name to Lighthill in 1917, and the daughter of an engineer. The family lived in Paris until 1927, when the father retired and returned to live in England. As a young man, James Lighthill was known as Michael Lighthill. Lighthill was educated at Winchester College , and graduated with

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660-530: The good of the Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, and to pursue the ends for which the same was founded; that we will carry out, as far as we are able, those actions requested of us in the name of the Council; and that we will observe the Statutes and Standing Orders of the said Society. Provided that, whensoever any of us shall signify to the President under our hands, that we desire to withdraw from

690-509: The post nominal letters HonFRS . Statute 12 is a legacy mechanism for electing members before official honorary membership existed in 1997. Fellows elected under statute 12 include David Attenborough (1983) and John Palmer, 4th Earl of Selborne (1991). The Council of the Royal Society can recommend members of the British royal family for election as Royal Fellow of the Royal Society . As of 2023 there are four royal fellows: Elizabeth II

720-568: The priorities for government funding across all areas of scientific research. Previously this task had been the responsibility of the Treasury without direct scientific advice. The other Research Councils formed in 1965 were: These bodies joined the Medical Research Council (MRC) which had existed since 1920. In 1981, to reflect the increased emphasis on engineering research, the SRC was renamed

750-546: The proposal is being made. There is no limit on the number of nominations made each year. In 2015, there were 654 candidates for election as Fellows and 106 candidates for Foreign Membership. The Council of the Royal Society oversees the selection process and appoints 10 subject area committees, known as Sectional Committees, to recommend the strongest candidates for election to the Fellowship. The final list of up to 52 Fellowship candidates and up to 10 Foreign Membership candidates

780-627: Was elected FRS in 1953 and FRAS in 1961. He was awarded the Royal Medal of the Royal Society in 1964, and the Copley Medal , also of the Royal Society, posthumously, in 1998. In 1958, Lightill was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences . The James Lighthill building at the University of Manchester and James Lighthill House are named in his honour. Lighthill was elected to

810-736: Was invited to deliver the MacMillan Memorial Lecture to the Institution of Engineers and Shipbuilders in Scotland . He chose the subject "Aquatic Animal Locomotion". In the early 1970s, partly in reaction to significant internal discord within that field, the Science Research Council (SRC) , as it was then known, asked Lighthill to compile a review of academic research in Artificial Intelligence . Lighthill's report, which

840-421: Was not a Royal Fellow, but provided her patronage to the society, as all reigning British monarchs have done since Charles II of England . Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh (1951) was elected under statute 12, not as a Royal Fellow. The election of new fellows is announced annually in May, after their nomination and a period of peer-reviewed selection. Each candidate for Fellowship or Foreign Membership

870-527: Was open-water swimming. He died in the water in 1998 when the mitral valve in his heart ruptured while he was swimming round the island of Sark , a feat which he had accomplished many times before. Fellow of the Royal Society Fellowship of the Royal Society ( FRS , ForMemRS and HonFRS ) is an award granted by the Fellows of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made

900-473: Was published in 1973 and became known as the " Lighthill report ," was highly critical of basic research in foundational areas such as robotics and language processing , and "formed the basis for the decision by the British government to end support for AI research in all but two universities", starting what is sometimes referred to as the " AI winter ". In 1982, Lighthill and Alan B. Tayler were jointly awarded

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