William V. Zinn

Zinn retired to the island of Jersey where he lived with his wife Monica. He died in 1989.

He travelled in the Far East in the course of his work and became interested in Buddhist philosophy, writing two books on the subject, The Global Philosophy (c.1971) and Phenomena and Noumena (1984) in which he argued for the scientific nature of certain strands of Buddhism and the falsity of the mind-brain dichotomy.

Zinn travelled extensively in the Far East in the course of his work and became interested in Buddhist philosophy, publishing The Global Philosophy in 1971 which was reprinted by Vantage Press of New York in 1984 as a companion volume to his second book, Phenomena and Noumena, also published by Vantage that year with a foreword by Colin Blakemore, professor of physiology at the University of Oxford.

Zinn practiced as a civil engineer and was qualified in Britain and France. He specialised in concrete engineering and was employed, among other places, at Truscon (the Trussed Concrete Steel Company Limited). He later formed his own practice and as William V. Zinn & Associates was the sole named consulting engineer on the construction of the Merrion Centre, Leeds, in the early 1960s. The centre was described by the builders Parkinsons as "the most advanced shopping and entertainment centre in the country" and cost £3m to build.

William Victor Zinn (1903–1989) was a British civil engineer who specialised in concrete construction methods. He served in the Royal Engineers in Burma during the Second World War and rose to the rank of Major. He worked for Truscon (the Trussed Concrete Steel Company Limited), and later formed his own practice and as William V. Zinn & Associates was the sole named consulting engineer on the construction of the Merrion Centre in Leeds.

William Zinn was born in 1903. He studied engineering at the University of London and received the degree of Bachelor of Science (Eng.)