Dr. James Cooke Brown (July 21, 1921 – February 13, 2000) was a sociologist and science fiction author. He created the artificial language Loglan, and designed the Parker Brothers board game Careers. His novel The Troika Incident (Doubleday, 1970) describes a world-wide free knowledge base similar to the Internet, which resonates well with the overt aims of Wikipedia. The novel begins with the belief that the world is on the eve of self-destruction but then presents a world about a century from now which is a paradise of peace and prosperity, all based on ideas, movements, and knowledge presently available in the world. In its metafictional structure the novel is a call for social change, not through revolution but through free education and the resilience of human ingenuity.

1921 births | 2000 deaths | American sociologists | American science fiction writers

James Cooke Brown | James Cooke Brown | James Cooke Brown | James Cooke Brown