---
title: "Seppo Linnainmaa"
type: "entity"
entity_kind: "person"
status: "hub"
canonical_name: "Seppo Linnainmaa"
aliases: ["Seppo Ilmari Linnainmaa"]
first_seen: "2026-05-31T00:00:00.000Z"
connects_to: ["reverse-mode automatic differentiation","backpropagation","priority vs paternity","numerical analysis (rounding-error accumulation)","Andreas Griewank"]
---


Finnish mathematician and computer scientist (b. 1945, Pori). His 1970
Helsinki master's thesis — a rounding-error analysis written in Finnish —
contains the earliest general, formal statement of what is now called
reverse-mode automatic differentiation, the algorithm underlying
backpropagation. First doctorate in computer science awarded by the
University of Helsinki (1974); later a visiting scholar with William Kahan's
group at Berkeley.

## References
- [[claim-linnainmaa-thesis-identity]] · [[claim-linnainmaa-rounding-error-problem]] · [[claim-linnainmaa-reverse-mode-single-pass]] · [[claim-linnainmaa-field-numerical-analysis]] · [[claim-linnainmaa-priority-not-paternity]] · [[claim-linnainmaa-copenhagen-anecdote]]
- [[myth-linnainmaa-uncited-before-2010s]] · [[moc-backpropagation-origins]]
- Published: 80-published/2026-07-06-the-floating-point-thesis.md