Coffee chat with Tadashi Tokieda

Professor Tadashi Tokieda joined us over coffee and tea last week. Professor Tokieda was previously the Director of Studies in Mathematics at Trinity Hall, Cambridge, and is currently a Professor of Mathematics at Stanford. He will be teaching Math 53: Ordinary Differential Equations with Linear Algebra in the spring. Professor Tokieda began by describing his transition from being a painter in Japan to a classical philologist in France. Despite his love for linguistic quirks -- he casually explained to us the geographical origin of the word “apricot”, which happens to have the same root as the word “precocious”, Professor Tokieda was one day inspired by a biography of a Russian physicist, Lev Landau, to pursue mathematics. He then learned basic math from a Russian textbook (requiring him to learn math and Russian at the same time) and enrolled in a math degree at Oxford (requiring him to learn English over the course of a few months). At the end of our chat, Professor Tokieda emphasized the important distinction between “doing what you really like” and “doing things that you are influenced to think that you ought to like”. And when asked what the most important topic in today’s mathematics is, Professor Tokieda suggested that the question is not a valid one. To him, “mathematical topics are like friends” that he has accumulated over the years -- he possibly could not choose the most important one!

Written by Megumi Sano.

Coffee Chat with Mehran Sahami

This past Monday, SymSys Society members sat down with Professor Mehran Sahami of the Computer Science department, to chat over coffee. The conversation ranged from discussing the intersection of CS and Education to reminiscing on his experience taking CS229 (when there were less than 10 students in the class!). Excitingly, Mehran will be teaming up with professors in the political science department to teach a course on computer science and ethics next year. If you're interested in issues like bias in decision making algorithms, keep an eye out for that!

Humans of SymSys: Paul Gregg

"Get a Master's if you want to play with magma."

Paul is a recent grad who got his undergraduate degree in Symbolic Systems with a concentration in Decision Making and Rationality. 

Introduce yourself: I graduated in 2017, have since been taking really great "gap" time, and am now looking to settle into a job. Some of my fondest memories at Stanford were made with Fleet Street, Camp Kesem, my quarter with BOSP Australia, and being an RA in Roble. I love making music and running around outside (ocean, mountains, you name it)!

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

I've always considered myself a generalist, and throughout college my interests were always pretty varied and hard to narrow down. Freshman and sophomore year I tried to pick classes based purely on interest, and when I looked back after a few quarters, my transcript screamed SymSys. I guess I chose Symsys over related majors because I wanted a sense of breadth/a "liberal arts" education, but also liked the sense of cohesion Symsys offered.

What is your concentration and why did you choose it?

I concentrated in Decision Making & Rationality! I started off in Learning, because I've always loved working with kids and have been fascinated by their brains, but changed course once I discovered that the "other" learning — machine — was not my passion. I chose DM&R because I felt like I could spend another 4 years at Stanford taking just classes from the concentration list. I think the concentration is so applicable to life: it helped me to understand myself and other people as decision-making agents from multiple points of view. After all, life is just a series of decisions!

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

I think Moral and Character Education was my favorite Symsys class I took. I took it senior year, and it really clicked as something I genuinely loved and found really important, not just a class I felt like I had to take for "skills." Some other contenders are CS 103, Johan Ugander's networks class, Brian Knutson's neuroeconomics class, POLISCI 356A, and the developmental psych Bing observation lab.

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

Don't treat college as just laying the groundwork for your career. Life is about finding balance between working towards long-term goals and enjoying the now. At Stanford, it's really easy to be poorly balanced. Sleep more. Don't let self-care be a productivity tool. Make time to do nothing with your friends -- that's when you create the memories that'll last. You've already shown that you have the brains and the dedication to achieve; those won't go away overnight. Your chances at the many other rich and meaningful experiences that only college offers will. And support your friends at it too! It's tough to fight the duck syndrome alone, but if you encourage others, they'll find the courage to support you too.

As a diverse major with a lot of flexibility, many students struggle to find continuity across their coursework. (How) do you address this?

I'd say there are multiple flavors of continuity. Say I love to dig. I could pick up a shovel one day and dig one continuous hole through all of earth's layers until I hit the middle and finally figure out what's hiding down there. Or, I could dig a bunch of small holes all over the place and discover "whoa! There's dirt here, there, AND over there. They're all kinda different, this one's gravelly and that one's loamy, but they're all dirt! Who knew?" Both are pretty neat, and I think both offer some version of continuity. Symsys really only offers the latter kind. Get a Master's if you want to play with magma.

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

Well, this prompt reminded me that I haven't checked in on the whole full-body transplant saga in a while. I was bummed to google it and find out it (maybe?) happened and sorta fizzled out. I think the experiment has fascinating repercussions for the whole "who am I, really" philosophy of mind debate. Also, as trite as it is, I think the impending age of AI and automation of the workforce is really important for everyone to think and talk about!

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

Coffee Chat with Josiah Ober

Josiah Ober, Mitsotakis Tsakopoulos-Kounalakis Professor in Honor of Constantine Mitsotakis Professor of Political Science and Classics, about his work on political theory and the lessons that modern society can learn from the practices of the ancient Greek world. 

Professor Ober’s current research investigates the conditions which must be met in order for a democracy to rise and thrive, with specific reference to Greco-Roman antiquity. Over the course of the afternoon, he gave us his take on the "rational ignorance" problem in a democracy as it scales up to include hundreds of millions of citizens (as is the case in the United States), if a democracy should selectively weight the voices of citizens who would openly use their voice towards a hateful end, and what problems arise when liberalism is intersected with democracy. 

Before becoming a professor at Stanford, Professor Ober was a Professor of Politics and Classics at Princeton University, prior to which he was a Professor of History and Philosophy at Montana State University. 

When asked about if he finds any troublesome aspects of the United States' democracy today compared to those of the ancient Greek world, Dr. Ober said that he certainly finds some. However, he clarified that in assessing the state of our democracy, it is imperative not to get bogged down in the daily news cycle. He also mentioned that it is altogether too easy to drive oneself crazy trying to take in every opinion and "hot take" available via news outlets and social media, to the point of unproductivity. 

Towards the end of the afternoon the conversation took a turn towards questions related to the difference between applied and theoretical political science in terms of what can be learned by studying each subfield. In addition, we spoke with Dr. Ober about how politics interacts with scientific discovery, and if there are any answers to be found in studying the ancient Greek world and its reconciliation of new science with new political systems. 

To learn more about Josiah Ober, visit his profile on the Stanford Classics Department Website at https://classics.stanford.edu/people/josiah-ober. 

Written by Pratyusha Javangula

Humans of SymSys: Devangi Vivrekar

"The systems we study, whether they are languages, computers, or minds, are all different layers of the way we understand the world, and I like reflecting on which part of the biological or technical stack I’m learning about..."

Devangi is a Symbolic Systems coterm who got her undergraduate degree in Physics. 

Introduce yourself: Hi! My name is Devangi and I’m a SymSys coterm. I recently finished my undergrad degree in Physics with a notation in Science Communication. I’m currently researching the theory behind persuasive design techniques under my advisor, James Landay. I’m also working with Paul Fuoss at SLAC to understand the user experience of scientists conducting experiments using the LCLS x-ray laser. I like solving problems using technology, studying how interfaces affect cognition, and attempting to understand the universe from first principles.

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

I’ve always been a very interdisciplinary person, and as an undergrad, I naturally gravitated towards classes in over fifteen departments on campus. SymSys was the major that best fit the classes that I would have taken anyway, which is how I knew it would be a good fit!

What is your concentration and why did you choose it?

Although I don’t have an official concentration, most of my SymSys classes have been related to human-computer interaction. I chose to study this field because I wanted to understand how minds and machines complement and affect each other, and how they can work together synergistically to create positive change at both an individual and societal level.

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

My favorite SymSys-related class so far has been SymSys 115: Critique of Technology! It was an amazing seminar taught by Damon Horowitz, who is both a philosopher and a technologist. We read essays ranging from Aristotle to Heidegger in order to understand the various definitions of technology, the line between the natural world and the humanmade, and the ways our minds “enframe” technology. It was a great way to step back and look at some of the larger questions about the way technology is embedded into our lives.

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

Yes! I’m interested in how social media websites often manipulate and persuade us to do things they want (click this! watch this!) by benefitting from some of our cognitive and social biases. In my HCI research class, we wanted to see whether whether revealing to people in real time the little ways they were being manipulated by Facebook could do a better job teaching them about persuasive design techniques than traditional teaching methods. We built a Google Chrome extension that annotated people’s Facebook feeds to point out these manipulations, and found that people using the extension had significantly better transfer knowledge about persuasive design techniques.  

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

Let yourself take whatever courses really pique your interest even if you can’t see how they all relate right now. Looking back, you will definitely see a way they connect and your diverse background will actually be an asset for whatever you choose to work on next!

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

One of my underlying interests since high school has been the study of consciousness. I want to learn more about phenomenology and interdisciplinary approaches to tackling things like the hard problem of consciousness: why is the “what-it’s-like”-ness of experience the way it is?

As a diverse major with a lot of flexibility, many students struggle to find continuity across their coursework. (How) do you address this?

I’ve tried to embrace the eclectic nature of our coursework and trust that meaning will eventually emerge. The systems we study, whether they are languages, computers, or minds, are all different layers of the way we understand the world, and I like reflecting on which part of the biological or technical stack I’m learning about.

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

I’m really excited about the ethics of technology design. There is an important movement gaining traction in Silicon Valley right now regarding the ethical responsibility that large, monopolistic mass consumer websites have towards their users. The attention economy incentivizes such companies to capture the most eyeballs for the longest time, which leads them to use techniques that “race to the bottom of the brainstem,” as people like Tristan Harris have put it. How might we encourage the designers of these technologies to be more mindful of their user’s attention, intentions, and cognitive resources?

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