Armchair Expert episode 1005

David Sussillo (on foster care and neuroscience)

David Sussillo (Emergence: A Memoir of Boyhood, Computation, and the Mysteries of Mind) is a technologist, neuroscientist, and professor at Stanford University. David joins the Armchair Expert to discuss growing up with two parents that were addicts, experiencing extreme poverty throughout his childhood, and the joy of finding a best friend during that time. David and Dax talk about how the immersion and rules of video games amid the chaos of his life became the precursor to his research today, ending up in a series of group foster homes for several years, and his dream of going to college functioning as a protective shield for his future self. David explains being orphaned by the living while in foster care, the elation of receiving a full ride to Carnegie Mellon to study computer science, and the deep learning neural network research he now leads at Stanford.

Explore episode 1005 with AI

Episode overview

David Sussillo (Emergence: A Memoir of Boyhood, Computation, and the Mysteries of Mind) is a technologist, neuroscientist, and professor at Stanford University. David joins the Armchair Expert to discuss growing up with two parents that were addicts, experiencing extreme poverty throughout his childhood, and the joy of finding a best friend during that time. David and Dax talk about how the immersion and rules of video games amid the chaos of his life became the precursor to his research today, ending up in a series of group foster homes for several years, and his dream of going to college functioning as a protective shield for his future self. David explains being orphaned by the living while in foster care, the elation of receiving a full ride to Carnegie Mellon to study computer science, and the deep learning neural network research he now leads at Stanford.

Episode descriptions and transcript text can contain errors. Verify important details against the original recording.

Short transcript highlights

These brief excerpts are navigation aids selected from different points in the transcript.

  1. 0:00I just want to say um I watched that episode with uh Claudia Ralph. What a what a great Yeah. with the foster. What...
  2. 49:44be in other boys' rooms. There were in this case at Milton at excuse me Albuquerque Christian Children's Home there were four kids per...
  3. 1:37:16It's beautifully written and very very honest. Uh it's called Emergence, a memoir of boyhood, computation, and the mysteries of the mind. Uh be...
Ask a question about this episode