John G. Taylor

British physicist and author

John Gerald Taylor (18 August 1931 – 10 March 2012) was a British physicist and author. He is notable for writing a book critical of paranormal phenomena.

Taylor attended King Edward VI Grammar School, Chelmsford, and Mid Essex Polytechnic, before gaining MA (Cantab) and PhD degrees from Christ's College, Cambridge (1950–1956). He had a wide ranging academic career in mathematical physics and artificial intelligence. He was an emeritus professor and Director of the centre for Neural Networks at King's College London and guest scientist of the Research Centre at the Institute of Medicine in Jülich, Germany. From 2007 to 2012, Taylor led a unique research program at Commerzbank's Alternative Investment Strategies (COMAS) Group. The program used artificial intelligence techniques to create portfolios of hedge funds. This is the first program of its kind in the fund of hedge funds industry. In 2011, Taylor co founded Commonwealth Capital Management LLP together with Nathaniel Rothschild and Mehraj Mattoo. The company launched its first systematic fund of CTAs on Deutsche Bank's dbSelect platform based on Taylor's artificial intelligence models developed while he worked at COMAS. His previous positions and interests, while still at King's College, were in mathematics and physics. He was the author of many popular books. Taylor also trained as an actor and performed in plays and films, wrote several science fiction plays and directed stage productions in Oxford and Cambridge.