Conclusions

My strategy for CS101 been to spend time playing with code, seeing how computers work and what they can do. Today I want to zoom out and talk about what that all means.

Big Ideas

• Algorithm
• Expressing an algorithm with code and data
• Code elements:
• -for (pixel: image) {
• -pixel.setRed(100);
• -count = count +1;
• Said on the first day: code is mechanical
• Computer systems are obviously incredibly useful .. so how is that?
• Answer: Human creativity to write code, computer dumb power - a good marriage!

Example - Cancer Cell Grading

• How can computers be intelligent?
• Cancer cell grading research Daphne Koller of Stanford
• Show the computer many example cell slides
• Program the computer to break out many different metrics of each slide
  --dark/light, dark/light of boundaries, colors, number of cells, texture, ...
• Do not pre-bias the computer about the meaning of the various metrics
• Also give the computer the survival data associated with each slide
• Let the computer recombine all the data, sift out the patterns
• "Intelligence" by looking at masses of data, guided by a human plan
• This is also basically how search engines work -- vast amounts of data (billions of web pages), run through a algorithm to figure out which pages are best for each search

Example - Cochlear Implant

• Treatment for some forms of deafness
  --Doesn't work for everyone, controversy in the deaf community
  --That said, this is an amazing use of technology
• Microphone takes in sound
• Computer/electronics processes the sound into separate electrical signals
• Electrodes surgically implanted in the cochlea in the ear ... user perceives "sound"
• Researchers had the vision, the computer is just one piece
• Even from our for-loop image stuff, you can imagine a computer loop that takes in a sound signal, reconfigures it in a complex way into a series of signals for the electrodes
• deaf baby with cochlear implant hears mother's voice for the first time.
• I would be proud to work on research or technology or anything that changes people's lives like that -- wow
• I like this as a vivid example of a computer system -- marriage of the human vision of an important problem and how to solve it combined with the computer cheap/fast/available processing

Example - Self Driving Car

• Self Driving Car
• Nick prediction: self-driving cars are going to happen!
• Real time "seeing" and decision making - hard problems
• Self Driving Car
• It saves time which everybody values
• Suppose you just kick back in your car and read while it drives

Stanford CS101 Conclusions

• In first lecture, claimed something like "CS101 teaches the essential qualities of computers by playing with code"
• My hope is that people may have seen the computer as sort of opaque and impossible, but now they can see through that barrier, see the strengths and limitations of computers
• Confidence and patience
• I hope CS101 gives you confidence and patience to work with them. They are so stupid, but they are so useful.
• And if you find that you like code, take CS106A .. you've got great prep for it