John Venn

For other people named John Venn, see John Venn (disambiguation).

John Venn
FRS FSA
Born(1834-08-04)4 August 1834
Kingston upon Hull, Yorkshire, England
Died4 April 1923(1923-04-04) (aged 88)
Cambridge, England
Alma materGonville and Caius College, Cambridge
Known for
AwardsFellow of the Royal Society (1883)
Scientific career
Fields
InstitutionsGonville and Caius College, Cambridge
Signature
The Venn Building, University of Hull
Stained glass window at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, commemorating Venn and the Venn diagram
Plaque in the form of a Venn diagram with one set labelled 'Mathematician, Philosopher & Anglican priest', a second set labelled 'Really strong beard game' with the overlapping area labelled 'John Venn'
Alternative heritage plaque for John Venn in Hull

John Venn, FRS,[2][3] FSA[4] (4 August 1834 – 4 April 1923) was an English mathematician, logician and philosopher noted for introducing Venn diagrams, which are used in logic, set theory, probability, statistics, and computer science. In 1866, Venn published The Logic of Chance, a groundbreaking book which espoused the frequency theory of probability, arguing that probability should be determined by how often something is forecast to occur as opposed to "educated" assumptions. Venn then further developed George Boole's theories in the 1881 work Symbolic Logic, where he highlighted what would become known as Venn diagrams.

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