At Rutgers University, Jeff Robbins teaches upper level research writing courses on a wide spectrum of topics including “Technology”, “Order, Chaos, and the Universe”, “The Corporation”, and “Biosphere Politics”. He has a Bachelor’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University and a Master’s / A.B.D. in Physics from the University of New Mexico. Before coming to Rutgers in 2002, his professional career ranged from research engineering on the Apollo Saturn V rocket to automated testing of electronic and fibre optic systems. His research interests stem from an ongoing concern for the, too often swept aside, bite backs of rising technical order.
In support of his concern, Jeff has moderated forums on the future of artificial intelligence, computers, and robotics, and media’s increasing role in childhood and adolescence. He has been invited to speak on the impacts of GPS navigation dependency, marketing to children, and high definition television. In addition to presentations at International Society for the Systems Sciences sponsored conferences, beginning with the 1985 Carnahan Conference held at the University of Kentucky, he has presented 10 papers at IEEE Society on Social Implications of Technology conferences and international symposiums.
His papers and articles have been published in Technology and Society Magazine, The Journal of Cases on Information Technology, and The New Atlantis. His essay, “Humanities’ tears” appears as a chapter in Exact Methods in the Study of Language and Text. “An Eastern Exposure on the West,” won the $10,000 First Prize in a national essay competition. The prize was presented at the U.S. National Press Club. He recently completed a book manuscript with the working title Shortcut: Technology and the Trap of Losing It For Not Using It. His first book, On Balance and Higher Education: A Gesture to the Second Law of Thermodynamics, was published by Philosophical Library. It is available in 94 research libraries worldwide.
Publications:
“Standing in the Way: Sustainable Future vs. Sloth, Genes, and Entropy”. Fall 2010 issue of Technology and Society Magazine. .
“Missing the Big Picture: Studies of TV’s Effects Should Consider How HDTV Is Different”, Spring 2010 issue of The New Atlantis: A Journal of Technology and Society. .
“CANNIBALIZING CHILDHOOD’S FUTURE AS RISING TO FALLING ROPE”, 2008 International Society for the Systems Sciences conference held at the University of Wisconsin. .
“GPS Navigation…But What is it Doing to Us?” presentation at the Long Island section of the SSIT, based on a paper presented at 2010 ISTAS
“The Causal-Compositional Concept of Information Part I. Elementary Theory: From Decompositional Physics to Compositional Information” (whew) by Gerhard Luhn cited my work. It
appeared in the Journal of Information 2012, 3, 151-174;
doi:10.3390/info3010151. The URL is
Book chapter: In Glottometrics 5, 2002, 81-96 To honor G.K. Zipf, my paper
“Technology, Ease, and Entropy: A Testimonial to Zipf’s Principle of Least
Effort” appears. The URL is
Frank Tetard and Mikael Collan cite two of his IEEE published papers in
“Lazy User Theory: A Dynamic Model to Understand User Selection of
Products and Services” at
“An analysis on predicting thermal stratification in liquid hydrogen”. Journal of Spacecraft, vol. 3 No. 1. .