#148 – Charles Isbell and Michael Littman: Machine Learning and Education

Lex Fridman Podcast

Lex Fridman

Philosophy, Science, Society & Culture, Technology

4.7 • 13.6K Ratings

🗓️ 26 December 2020

⏱️ 123 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Charles Isbell is the Dean of the College of Computing at Georgia Tech. Michael Littman is a computer scientist at Brown University. Please support this podcast by checking out our sponsors:
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EPISODE LINKS:
Charles’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/isbellHFh
Charles’s Website: https://www.cc.gatech.edu/~isbell/
Michael’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/mlittmancs
Michael’s Website: https://www.littmania.com/
Michael’s YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/mlittman

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OUTLINE:
Here’s the timestamps for the episode. On some podcast players you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that time.
(00:00) – Introduction
(07:51) – Is machine learning just statistics?
(12:14) – NeurIPS vs ICML
(14:30) – Data is more important than algorithm
(20:14) – The role of hardship in education
(28:57) – How Charles and Michael met
(33:30) – Key to success: never be satisfied
(36:47) – Bell Labs
(48:15) – Teaching machine learning
(58:25) – Westworld and Ex Machina
(1:06:24) – Simulation
(1:13:14) – The college experience in the times of COVID
(1:41:52) – Advice for young people
(1:48:44) – How to learn to program
(2:00:07) – Friendship

Transcript

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0:00.0	Following is a conversation with Charles Isbel and Michael Lytman.
0:03.7	Charles is the Dean of the College of Computing at Georgia Tech, and Michael is a computer science professor at Brown University.
0:10.7	I've spoken with each of them individually on this podcast, and since they are good friends in real life,
0:17.2	we all thought it would be fun to have a conversation together.
0:21.6	Quick mention of each sponsor, followed by some thoughts related to the episode.
0:25.9	Thank you to Athletic Greens, the only one drink that I start every day with to cover all my nutritional bases,
0:33.1	8th sleep, a match that cools itself and gives me yet another reason to enjoy sleep.
0:38.8	Masterclass online courses from some of the most amazing humans in history and cash app.
0:44.5	The app I use to send money to friends.
0:47.2	Please check out the sponsors in the description to get a discount and to support this podcast.
0:52.1	As a side note, let me say that having two guests on the podcast is an experiment that I've been meaning to do for a while.
0:59.5	In particular, because down the road, I would like to occasionally be a kind of moderator for debates between people that may disagree in some interesting ways.
1:10.0	If you have suggestions for who you would like to see debate on this podcast, let me know.
1:15.4	As with all experiments as this kind, it is a learning process.
1:20.0	Both the video and the audio might need improvement.
1:23.0	I realize I think I should probably do three or more cameras next time as opposed to just two.
1:28.1	And also try different ways to mount the microphone for the third person.
1:33.6	Also, after recording the central, I'm going to have to go figure out the thumbnail for the video version of the podcast.
1:41.6	Since I usually put the guests head on the thumbnail and now there's two heads and two names to try.
1:49.9	I try to fit into the thumbnail.
1:52.4	It's a kind of bin packing problem, which in theoretical computer science happens to be an NP hard problem.
2:02.2	Whatever I come up with, if you have better ideas for the thumbnail, let me know as well.
	...

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