Donald Knuth: Algorithms, TeX, Life, and The Art of Computer Programming

About this episode

<p>Donald Knuth is one of the greatest and most impactful computer scientists and mathematicians ever. He is the recipient in 1974 of the Turing Award, considered the Nobel Prize of computing. He is the author of the multi-volume work, the magnum opus, The Art of Computer Programming. He made several key contributions to the rigorous analysis of the computational complexity of algorithms. He popularized asymptotic notation, that we all affectionately know as the big-O notation. He also created the TeX typesetting which most computer scientists, physicists, mathematicians, and scientists and engineers use to write technical papers and make them look beautiful.</p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">This conversation is part of the Artificial Intelligence podcast.</span>&#160;If you would like to get more information about this podcast go to <a href="https://lexfridman.com/ai">https://lexfridman.com/ai</a> or connect with @lexfridman on <a href="https://twitter.com/lexfridman">Twitter</a>, <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/lexfridman/">LinkedIn</a>, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/lexfridman">Facebook</a>, <a href="https://medium.com/@lexfridman">Medium</a>, or <a href="https://www.youtube.com/lexfridman">YouTube</a> where you can watch the video versions of these conversations. If you enjoy the podcast, please rate it 5 stars on <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/artificial-intelligence/id1434243584">Apple Podcasts</a>, follow on <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/2MAi0BvDc6GTFvKFPXnkCL">Spotify</a>, or support it on <a href="https://www.patreon.com/lexfridman">Patreon</a>.</p> <p>This episode is presented by Cash App. Download it (<a href="https://apps.apple.com/us/app/cash-app/id711923939">App Store</a>, <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.squareup.cash&#38;hl=en_US">Google Play</a>), use code &#8220;LexPodcast&#8221;.&#160;</p> <p>Episode Links:<br /> <a href="https://amzn.to/39kxRwB">The Art of Computer Programming (book set)</a></p> <p>Here&#8217;s the outline of the episode. On some podcast players you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that time.</p> <p>00:00 &#8211; Introduction<br /> 03:45 &#8211; IBM 650<br /> 07:51 &#8211; Geeks<br /> 12:29 &#8211; Alan Turing<br /> 14:26 &#8211; My life is a convex combination of english and mathematics<br /> 24:00 &#8211; Japanese arrow puzzle example<br /> 25:42 &#8211; Neural networks and machine learning<br /> 27:59 &#8211; The Art of Computer Programming<br /> 36:49 &#8211; Combinatorics<br /> 39:16 &#8211; Writing process<br /> 42:10 &#8211; Are some days harder than others?<br /> 48:36 &#8211; What&#8217;s the &#8220;Art&#8221; in the Art of Computer Programming<br /> 50:21 &#8211; Binary (boolean) decision diagram<br /> 55:06 &#8211; Big-O notation<br /> 58:02 &#8211; P=NP<br /> 1:10:05 &#8211; Artificial intelligence<br /> 1:13:26 &#8211; Ant colonies and human cognition<br /> 1:17:11 &#8211; God and the Bible<br /> 1:24:28 &#8211; Reflection on life<br /> 1:28:25 &#8211; Facing mortality<br /> 1:33:40 &#8211; TeX and beautiful typography<br /> 1:39:23 &#8211; How much of the world do we understand?<br /> 1:44:17 &#8211; Question for God</p>