Oral History: Geoff Hinton On How AI Came To Be And What We're Supposed To Do With It

A couple of years ago, I had the pleasure of interviewing Geoff Hinton, who is considered one of the main figures that brought modern AI to fruition. (A very lightly edited version of our conversation follows.) Hinton, and a small group of like-minded researchers, spent decades in the backwoods of academia trying to make things called neural nets work when everyone else was sure that they never would. As it turned out, Hinton and his stubborn peers were right, and the conventional thinkers were wrong. Neural nets have transformed the technology industry and many of our lives by ushering in the modern form of Artificial Intelligence technology. In this interview, Hinton talks about his academic journey and why he believed in neural nets when so few others did. He’s insightful, controversial and funny. (If you enjoy this, there’s quite a bit more about Hinton in a new book by Cade Metz. It’s a wonderful read. There’s also an oral history I put together on Canada’s surprising role in the

A couple of years ago, I had the pleasure of interviewing Geoff Hinton, who is considered one of the main figures that brought modern AI to fruition. (A very lightly edited version of our conversation follows.) Hinton, and a small group of like-minded researchers, spent decades in the backwoods of academia trying to make things called neural nets work when everyone else was sure that they never would. As it turned out, Hinton and his stubborn peers were right, and the conventional thinkers were wrong. Neural nets have transformed the technology industry and many of our lives by ushering in the