Technology / Science / Human possibility
From pioneering technology and building organizations to exploring the foundations of science, Joseph P. Firmage's journey has been driven by a continuing interest in what humanity can create and understand.
J.P. FirmagePortrait, 2025
02The throughline
Across nearly four decades, Joseph P. Firmage's work has moved through component-based software, Internet professional services, public knowledge platforms and, since 1998, research in physics and the space sciences.
Seen side by side, the chapters share a recurring question: how new kinds of structure — in code, in organizations, in knowledge and in nature — can widen what people are able to build and understand.
“His mission is to catalyze and help lead a New Renaissance for Humanity.”
JPF CV & Biography Summary, 2026
03A journey across technology
Six chapters, in sequence. Select a chapter to open its record.
Chapter 011989–1993
Founder, CEO, CTO
Serius became a pioneer in component-based software development tools, shaped by the ObjecTalk project — a natural language programming system begun around 1990 that let developers describe software behavior in everyday language. Serius was acquired by Novell in 1993 for $24 million.
Chapter 021993–1995
VP Strategic Planning, Novell
After the acquisition, the Serius platform launched as Novell AppWare — letting programmers visually assemble applications from reusable components bound with natural-language-like instructions, long before "low-code" became a category. Its source code was licensed to Intermetrics, a DARPA general contractor, leading to its use in U.S. Navy systems including RangeWare.
Chapter 031995–1998
Co-Founder & CEO
Co-founded in 1995, USWeb became one of the world's first and largest Internet professional services firms, providing web strategy, design, development and integration as the Web became a commercial medium. USWeb went public in 1997 and merged with CKS Group in 1998 to form USWeb/CKS. Firmage passed on leadership in late 1998.
Chapter 041998–2001
Founder
After his 1998 public stand urging transparency about UFO research and advanced propulsion, Firmage founded ISSO and CalPhysics.org — the California Institute for Physics & Astrophysics — and began assembling a network of physicists, engineers and theorists willing to push beyond the margins of accepted models.
Photo: Chronicle / Michael Maloney
Chapter 052001–Present
Founder & Chairman
Emerging from his OneCosmos vision — a web structured as a trustworthy, navigable commons — Firmage conceived the Digital Universe, a federation of expert-led portals including the Earth Portal and Encyclopedia of Earth, a Cosmos Portal and a Health Portal, each built for citation, revision history and accountable authorship.
Explore the archived ManyOne timeline
Chapter 061998–Present
Founder, Chairman, Chief Scientist
An umbrella for advanced R&D in propulsion, energy generation, materials science and next-generation Internet systems. Its lineage runs through ISSO, CalPhysics, the Los Gatos Materials Sciences Laboratory, Motion Sciences, Motion Physics and Science Invents — each iteration refining the theoretical and experimental program.
04The shift from technology to science
Then — Code
Now — Matter
The fallout from his 1998 public stand redirected Joseph's life into deep scientific inquiry. The architectural instinct behind AppWare — structure, components, composition — reappears in his research into the geometry of atomic structure.
At its heart is the Geometric Atom Model, which correlates nested Platonic solids to the observed "magic numbers" of nuclear stability, and which Firmage proposes points toward unifications in nuclear physics, spectroscopy and cosmology. These are Firmage's own theoretical proposals, set out in his published papers.
05The Academy
Joseph P. Firmage is Founder, Chairman and Chief Scientist of the Academy of Science and Arts — an umbrella that brings his theoretical and experimental programs under a single strategic framework.
His biography describes it as akin to his own version of Alphabet — diverse breakthrough initiatives in physics, technology and economics, formally unified after 28 years of research and development.
Research themes
06Ideas, papers & publications
Papers, reports and essays published on JosephFirmage.com. Each opens the original PDF.
On the shelf
Covers · open the PDF
07Presentations & film
11films, addresses
& lectures
New Renaissance Addresses · Episode IV
Browse by series
08A personal statement
The future is not something we watch. It is something we help build.
