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Patrick Winston has died

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Re: Patrick Winston has died

#61

Post by dano »

kennethfriedman wrote: post #17
tjr wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

About a year ago, he shared that he had a draft of a new book on "Communication": https://people.csail.mit.edu/phw/favorites.html Was this ever finished?

It was! It's in the final stages of publication — I've seen an editor's print in its final form — although I'm not sure what will happen to it now. I would guess it will still be published.

You seem close to someone who will announce the publication. I would be grateful if you would post their announcement on HN when the time comes.

Re: Patrick Winston has died

#62

Post by gugagore »

woofie11 wrote: post #59
nikofeyn wrote: post #24

i wonder what it must feel like at mit with two of its titans gone (minksy and winston). are there others stepping in their place? abelson and sussman are still there. in a world where machine learning has taken over "ai", it doesn't feel there are many left who have the ability and interest in researching general artificial intelligence.

They are there, but they're largely marginalized by the newcomers. I think the deeper problems -- than ML taking over AI -- is the commitment to students, to scientific integrity, and to substance over hype and self-promotion.

Up until around five years ago, the course 6.034 had a Fall version and a Spring version. They were substantially different. In the Fall it was taught by Patrick Winston, and in the Spring it was taught by other professors who were 10-20 years younger than Winston.

It's my understanding that the Spring professors really disagreed with the content in the Fall version. It was too old-school AI and they believed it was a disservice to students to teach them AI in that way. I believe they marginalized Winston.

To be honest, I cannot tell if they are right or wrong. I am not familiar with the curriculum in Winston's 6.034. How much does it look like an AI textbook from the 90s? I know that he included topics such as SVM, which is, relative to Winston, newer AI.

But, in any case, I do wish that the two philosophies didn't butt heads. Especially because I have no doubt that Winston's course was better organized, and had more enjoyable lectures.

Re: Patrick Winston has died

#63

Post by Gene_Parmesan »

billfruit wrote: post #57
sillypudding wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A “recitation” session is generally a regularly scheduled classroom session that is not led by the professor or lecturer but by a teaching assistant (TA). These are along the same lines as a “lab” sessions used alongside Chemistry or Physics lectures.

May be it is an Americanism, never heard of the word used in that manner before(as a non American).

I think it is rather an American tradition, and it's not not even present at every university here (or at least by that name), but it's also not recent. I've found references going at least to the 1910s.

Re: Patrick Winston has died

#66

Post by sgt101 »

nikofeyn wrote: post #24

i wonder what it must feel like at mit with two of its titans gone (minksy and winston). are there others stepping in their place? abelson and sussman are still there. in a world where machine learning has taken over "ai", it doesn't feel there are many left who have the ability and interest in researching general artificial intelligence.

I was very privileged to meet both Prof. Winston and Prof. Josh Tenenbaum briefly a couple of years ago. This brought home to me the plurality and strength of the MIT faculty. There are many amazing people at CSAIL, some of them are focused on specific issues of engineering, maths or neuroscience, but there are still a core of people (Prof. Tenenbaum is not alone in this) who I think are looking very widely and deeply at fundamental issues of cognition and mind.

Re: Patrick Winston has died

#67

Post by sgt101 »

I remember him telling a story about his Racoon, and thinking that a famous and busy man who was kind enough to adopt and love a Racoon, and wise and humble enough to consider it and to try to understand how it thought, was a very great human.

Re: Patrick Winston has died

#68

Post by sweettea »

woofie11 wrote: post #58

Patrick Winston was one of the last of the old-guard of MIT -- the type of professor who genuinely cared about students, acted with integrity, scientific progress, and was the soul of the old Institute. A few remain, but not many. I'm deeply saddened by each loss. The soul of the Institute dies a little bit more each time.

The only exemplar I can recall right now still living is Merritt Roe Smith, historian of technology. Do you know of more?

Re: Patrick Winston has died

#69

Post by mennis16 »

gugagore wrote: post #62
woofie11 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are there, but they're largely marginalized by the newcomers. I think the deeper problems -- than ML taking over AI -- is the commitment to students, to scientific integrity, and to substance over hype and self-promotion.

Up until around five years ago, the course 6.034 had a Fall version and a Spring version. They were substantially different. In the Fall it was taught by Patrick Winston, and in the Spring it was taught by other professors who were 10-20 years younger than Winston. It's my understanding that the Spring professors really disagreed with the content in the Fall version. It was too old-school AI and they believed it was…

I think this sentiment certainly existed among some of the younger CSAIL professors- in fact I interviewed for a UROP once with an unnamed professor and they asked "what related classes have you taken so far?" And as soon as I said 6.034 (before I could even finish the list) they said "I'm sure that class is fun but so is a cooking class, it isn't relevant here".

But I'd like to think it wasn't the prevailing sentiment in the department. I actually think a little bit of it stemmed from jealousy about the student praise PHW received. Because I know plenty of students that are now doing more "modern" or "hardcore" ML research that praise 6.034 highly.

It's true that 6.034 did not teach enough math to jump right into theory research, and it's true it didn't teach enough modern implementation to go right into an industry application. But it certainly didn't look like a textbook from the 90s! Professor Winston reworked the course a little bit every year. He gave excellent lectures on the concepts behind deep learning and reinforcement learning. He brought in current professors to present their research goals almost every Friday.

It covered plenty of modern topics, just in a more abstract sense. Which is perfect for an intro course, especially one that is taken by not just CS students but those from many departments (even graduate students in architecture, business, etc.). I think it's so helpful to start with understanding these concepts and then work through the details, rather than start in the weeds like many other courses do.

He did also spend time covering older concepts, which are still good to know, especially when presented through the lense of the history of the field (in academia and business). That's just not something available in any other courses that I'm aware of. Same thing with his amazing communication advice and his sharing of interesting biology, psychology, and neuroscience research.

I sincerely hope 6.034 will continue on somehow in the spirit of the original course. It was inspiring to many students, with life/career lessons that are memorable well beyond school. MIT has plenty of good more traditional ML courses, as do many schools. What I haven't heard of elsewhere is something like 6.034. It was one thing that made MIT unique I think.

Anyway, that is rambly, but I just wanted to defend not only the execution, but the philosophy of 034 (or my take on it anyway, can't speak for PHW). And I hope that the minority that dislikes it doesn't try to take over the course now.

Re: Patrick Winston has died

#70

Post by [deleted] »

rick22 wrote: post #43
youareawesome wrote: post #42

Many years ago, My TA in 6.034 for some reason gave me a C for the semester. This made no sense because I was 80% sure I was supposed to get an A. I was hesitant to get in touch with the head TA for the class because I wasn't the sort of student to complain about a grade, but I did it anyway. He told me to come in and talk to PHW himself. I came in and he asked me why my TA would give me a C and I told him I had no i…

> He asked me if I came into recitation, I said yes. He asked me if I participated in recitation and I said yes. Non native English speaker here. What does "came in to recitation" mean. Recitation is the act of repeating something. What was the Recitation about and how can you go in to recitation. Could you please explain ?

[deleted]
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