Humans of SymSys: Matthew Libby

"I'm really interested in the ways that emerging tech, the human brain, and art can interact. Tech has already revolutionized everything from film to music to sculpture -- but what happens when those human-computer artistic teams become more computer than human?"

Matthew is a recent grad who majored in Symbolic Systems with a concentration in Cognitive Science and a strong interest in the arts.

Introduce yourself: I graduated from Stanford in June, and am now living in Los Angeles. On campus, I acted and directed for Shakes, worked on Gaieties, was a tour guide, and RA'ed in Burbank. These days, I'm pursuing a career in the film industry.

What drew you to the SymSys major? Why did you pick SymSys as opposed to other (especially, related) majors?

I've always been someone who loved both STEM and the humanities. Though I've wanted to work in the arts professionally as long as I can remember, I loved taking math classes and others that are more analytic in nature. I knew I wanted to continue that at Stanford -- and in SymSys I found a program that combined subjects I was interested in, in ways that I knew would satiate my intellectual curiosity.

What’s your favorite SymSys-related class that you’ve taken so far?

Human Behavioral Biology with Robert Sapolsky was my favorite class I took at Stanford, period. Not only was the material fascinating, but it exemplified the interdisciplinary mindset that made me enjoy SymSys so much: in that class, looking at a subject from multiple points of view gave me a clearer sense of the subject than looking at it from just one would have.

Are you involved in research? If so, tell us about a project you are working on:

I never did research in the SymSys department, but my senior year I participated in the Arts Institute's Honors in the Arts program, where I wrote a full-length stage play for my thesis. The play was about artificial intelligence, namely artificial creativity, and speculates a future in which we can't tell human art from machine art. I did a lot of research for the project -- mostly into Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs), which are super cool -- and my SymSys education was instrumental into creating it.

What underlying questions and issues do you hope to tackle/learn more about through SymSys?

As my thesis might indicate, I'm really interested in the ways that emerging tech, the human brain, and art can interact. Tech has already revolutionized everything from film to music to sculpture -- but what happens when those human-computer artistic teams become more computer than human?

What’s the coolest (loosely) SymSys-related topic that you’re excited about right now?

With all my newfound time post-graduation, I recently started reading Douglas Hofstadter's insane 750-page opus Gödel, Escher, Bach. It's a great SymSys supplement if you have the time to dig into it!

Matthew is one of many profiles featuring selected alumni, undergraduates and graduates who are involved in the Symbolic Systems community.

Coffee chats: Chris Piech

Coffee chats: Judith Degen

Judith Degen, Assistant Professor of Linguistics, spoke with us on Thursday about her research in psycholinguistics, semantics, and pragmatics, her advice for those interested in graduate school, and the value of “taking joy in the discovery process.” 

Professor Degen’s current research investigates questions of how speakers decide what to say when, and how listeners know exactly what they mean by “reading between the lines” over the course of a conversation. She integrates computational modeling approaches with methods in psycholinguistics in order to form a more complete picture of how listeners make pragmatic inferences both correctly and quickly. She also teaches at both the graduate and undergraduate level about the theory and methods of psycholinguistics. 

Before becoming the director of the interActive Language Processing Lab at Stanford (ALPS), she was a postdoctoral researcher in Noah Goodman’s CoCoLab at Stanford. She has lived all over the world, from South America to Europe to upstate New York, and stressed to us the importance of taking opportunities to study and live abroad. 

When asked about what tips she had for surviving graduate school, Degen shared stories of her time as a graduate student at the University of Rochester, where she made lifelong friends and learned how to become comfortable with being wrong. She also talked about celebrating the small victories and how it is inadvisable to go to graduate school just for the sake of getting a doctorate. 

Towards the end of the afternoon the conversation took a turn towards questions related to how to choose a major of study, the serendipity that plays a part in that decision, and the necessity of taking advantage of the large variety of classes that Stanford has to offer. Specifically, Dr. Degen emphasized that while technical skill is extremely valuable, in order to build a more well-rounded world view, an education in the humanities is indispensable. 

Written by Pratyusha Javangula

Humans of SymSys: Beata Petkowa

"There are people who thrive in their fields of expertise, but find it challenging to think cross-contextually. I am the opposite. I was born in a multicultural and multilingual family, moreover raised in 5 different countries and exposed to 5 different educational systems. It felt thus natural for me to chose an interdisciplinary major like Symbolic Systems..."

Beata is a junior majoring in Symbolic Systems with an individually-designed concentration in the behavioral aspects of HCI and tech-related entrepreneurship.  

Introduce yourself: My name is Polish, my last name is Bulgarian, but I consider myself to be a rather culturally ambiguous blend. Majoring in SymSys with a self-designed concentration and minoring in Modern Art History under the awe-inspiring leadership of Alexander Nemerov. I am also working for the Stanford Technology Ventures Program on how to make their entrepreneurship courses and events more relatable to a wider spectrum of students.

What drew you to the SymSys major? Why did you pick SymSys as opposed to other (especially, related) majors?

Quite frankly, I am perfectly incapable of studying just one thing. There are people who thrive in their fields of expertise, but find it challenging to think cross-contextually. I am the opposite. I was born in a multicultural and multilingual family, moreover raised in 5 different countries and exposed to 5 different educational systems. It felt thus natural for me to chose an interdisciplinary major like Symbolic Systems and fulfill my interest in future technologies from multiple perspectives, but also belay my academic attempts with sufficient rigor.

What is your concentration and why did you choose it?

In order to escape higher level CS classes and get myself closer to what I felt truly passionate about, I decided to grab fate by its balls and self-design my concentration. I am currently tailoring it towards the behavioral aspects of Human Computer Interaction and combining it with the study of tech-related entrepreneurship. So if I ever earn the honor of becoming a true Palo Alto Mom, I'll use these insights to ponder less on the choice between Blue Bottle versus Soul Cycle, but more on the question of how to transform the Silicon Valley so that it addresses truly global problems.

What’s your favorite SymSys-related class that you’ve taken so far?

If forced to pick one class, I'd say Phil1 with Nadeem Hussain. It was a terrific introduction to Philosophy and I think that's been mostly thanks to Nadeem. Whether we considered arguments for the existence of God or argued about the body-mind problem, he would make the discussion extremely logical to follow and also exceptionally engaging.

What is one piece of advice you'd like to offer to younger students?

Just do your thing. Absorb new ways of thinking and doing, but never lose track of what makes you unique. Work on communicating your truth, so that without major compromises, you can let others believe in whatever you're trying to achieve. And if you don't know what that is yet, try the opposite of freaking out. Chill. If it's not good yet, it's not the end.

What underlying questions and issues do you hope to tackle/learn more about through SymSys?

I'm looking forward to acquiring more intellectual frameworks and practical skillsets to tackle the issue of how to humanize technology without dehumanizing ourselves.

What’s the coolest (loosely) SymSys-related topic that you’re excited about right now?

I am really curious how the application of machine learning to widely accessible devices like smartphones or home assistants will unfold for us. It's already been a while since fields like vision recognition or natural language processing have been enriched by processes underlying artificial intelligence. But the the past few years were quite different in the sense that deep learning mechanisms have slipped into our everyday lives and way more personalized contexts. And it makes me wonder. Not only about how AI will keep adapting to our token bedrooms, but also how we as humans will continue to adapt to only more complex interactions with our computer counterparts.

Beata is one of many profiles featuring selected alumni, undergraduates and graduates who are involved in the Symbolic Systems community.

Coffee chats: Jeannette Bohg

Jeannette Bohg, Assistant Professor of Robotics, chatted with us on Friday about her research, her advice for aspiring academics, and what keeps her going in her work as a professor.

Professor Bohg’s current research focuses on perception for autonomous robotic manipulation and grasping. Although she just arrived at Stanford two months ago, she is already fond of the collaborative culture she sees in the computer science department, as well as in the rest of the School of Engineering. She says she has been an academic “her whole life,” so although she has considered working in industry, she prefers the excitement of figuring out how things work by implementing the underlying principles on robots rather than building a robot that works for a specific task.

For those who are considering pursuing a career in academia, Bohg described the differences in titles such as “Assistant Professor,” “Associate Professor,” and “Lecturer.” She talked about her day-to-day life as an assistant professor and how her daily work might differ compared to that of, say, a grad student.

Bohg stressed the importance of keeping an multidisciplinary perspective throughout one’s academic journey. She studied computer science as an undergrad, but she took a detour for her master’s to explore the intersection of art and technology, because she was always interested in art but did not study it previously due to financial considerations. Bohg emphasized sticking with “what you like”, even when a clear path for the future does not materialize immediately. Without an intrinsic drive to learn more about what you are studying, she said, it’s really hard to excel in any field.

Written by Marika Buccholz