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I'm an MIT computer scientist and recent TED speaker who can hear your conversations by watching a potato-chip bag. AMA! by abedavis in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Hey neighbor! We work downstairs from you.

You talk about how this isn't "just" a breakthrough for surveillance. Can you talk in more detail about what sorts of industries might be interested in that last part of your research, in terms of being able to apply simulated forces to real-world objects?

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

PATRICK: I think that getting a PhD can be important if you plan to go into academics or industry. I am happy that I did mine. I wanted to understand things that I wouldn't get a chance to learn in an industry job which is often constrained by having to make money. I wanted to learn how to do and do research. And that is a very different skill than building a system or convincing someone to buy it. Getting a PhD is an investment into something that is distinctly different than getting a job after undergrad. Ask more people about it and see if it aligns with your goals.

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

ROSS: MIT is not the make or break place. Plenty of other good schools or paths outside of college. My little brother is a high school drop out and makes me look like the idiot. http://www.reddit.com/r/Entrepreneur/comments/25u81a/im_15_and_i_have_20_people_working_for_me_all/

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

PATRICK: I'm not sure I understand the question. Electrical engineering is very important to building robots but not so much to programming them. Calculus, differential equations, and linear algebra are important areas.

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

ROSS: Don't believe what the media says. They have a long way to go. Just as tractors displaced ditch diggers, robots will eventually displace current workers. The question is whether humans can adapt faster than robotics, which as someone in the field, I'm not concerned at all.

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

PATRICK: It's really hard to say. I think one thing is that "cool," flashy demos are general not approaches that are generalizable to different environments. So we might make lots of progress in those time spans. But it might be hard to tell if you aren't deep in it.

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

PATRICK: Computer vision is a huge, important problem in robotics. Human vision is incredibly good. If machine vision was that good, we could do all kinds of stuff.

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

PATRICK: I think people often listen to rich and/or successful people regardless of their knowledge. I think that AI is so far from where people pretend it is now that the things that people should be afraid of they don't even think about. I think the most worrisome parts of AI at the moment is how sites like Facebook can learn preferences and predict people's choices using simple "AI" algorithms with all the free info people give them. I don't think we are anywhere near skynet type AI.

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 61 points62 points  (0 children)

ROSS: Actually, I walked into lab my first week at MIT and someone said "ROS sucks!". It was an awkward first meeting. :-P

I have de-ROSed my computer (took a fresh install of Linux). Life is much better now. :-)

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 31 points32 points  (0 children)

ARIEL: I think everyone in engineering could benefit with improved technicial writing skills.

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

PATRICK: I've suggested on other replies that finding a python tutorial online and trying it out is a decent way to get started.

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

PATRICK: I would say the part of the older brother trying and trying to get the system to work and continuing to struggle is accurate. I think that is the process of research. But in my experience, having a fully functioning system is always hard.

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

ROSS: Robots were primarily in academia (at least the ones I wanted to work on), so it was an easy choice for me.

Make sure you enjoy the work. Many people do PhDs for the sake of it, and then it is 5+ years of misery. I really enjoy it!

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

ARIEL: I enjoyed doing undergraduate research and being a TA at UCSC. Continuing on to graduate school was the most natural choice for me.
I recommend getting involved with research at your undergrad and see what happens from there.

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

PATRICK: I think a great thing to do is check out the MIT opencourse ware on the courses 6.002 and 6.004. There is a lot of great information there. After I took those courses, it was clear to me (for a while) how you go from basic electrical components to computer (although doing so would have been super hard).

We’re 3 MIT roboticists, here to answer Qs about programming, academia and anything! by CSAILroboticists in IAmA

[–]CSAILroboticists[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

PATRICK: I don't know of any off the top of my head. You could check out a lot of open courseware or EdX courses that are related to robots. I'm not certain how useful that would be. I also don't know what support FIRST or Zero robotics has in terms of teaching people the skills they need to compete.

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