Oliver Gordon Selfridge (10 May 1926 – 3 December 2008) was a mathematician and computer scientist who pioneered the early foundations of modern artificial intelligence.

He was educated at Malvern College, and, upon moving to the US, at Middlesex School in Concord, Massachusetts, before earning an S.B.

He then became a graduate student of Norbert Wiener at MIT, but did not write up his doctoral research and never earned a Ph.D. Marvin Minsky considered Selfridge to be one of his mentors,[4] and Selfridge was one of the 11 attendees, with Minsky, of the Dartmouth workshop that is considered the founding event of artificial intelligence as a field.

In 1968, in their formative paper "The Computer as a Communication Device", J. C. R. Licklider and Robert Taylor introduced a concept known as an OLIVER (On-Line Interactive Vicarious Expediter and Responder), which was named in honor of Selfridge.

[9] Selfridge also authored four children's books: Sticks, Fingers Come In Fives, All About Mud, and Trouble With Dragons.