“I have a simple algorithm, which is, wherever you see paid researchers instead of grad students, that's not where you want to be doing research.” WantSimpleStudentsResearchPaidResearchersAlgorithmsGrad Author:Larry Page
“Anyone, from the most clueless amateur to the best cryptographer, can create an algorithm that he himself can't break.” BreakAlgorithmsClueless Author:Bruce Schneier
“My experience is that journalists report on the nearest-cliche algorithm, which is extremely uninformative because there aren't many cliches, the truth is often quite distant from any cliche, and the only thing you can infer about the actual event was that this was the closest cliche. It is simply not possible to appreciate the sheer awfulness of mainstream media reporting until someone has actually reported on you. It is so much worse than you think.” ThinkingMediaEventsTruth IsAppreciateJournalistReportsMainstreamClosestSheerClicheAlgorithmsMainstream MediaAwfulness Author:Eliezer Yudkowsky
“Someone from the Internet Writing Workshop sent me a link to the Gender Genie, where you paste in a section of text and it uses an algorithm to detect whether the author is male or female. Or, if you're an author, you can tell whether you're really nailing your opposite-sex characters. I mean, nailing their dialog.” IfsWritingMeanCharacterUseSexInternetFemaleOppositesMalesGenderLinksSectionsWorkshopsAlgorithmsGeniesWriting Workshop Author:Max Barry
“Mathematics my foot! Algorithms are mathematics too, and often more interesting and definitely more useful.” InterestingFeetMathematicsAlgorithms Author:Doron Zeilberger
“My particular focus at the moment is on the development of genetic algorithms and neural networks that work together to create computer architectural systems.” MomentsTogetherFocusParticularDevelopmentComputerWorking TogetherRamaAlgorithmsNeural Networks Author:Frederick Lenz
“I design genetic algorithms, neural network and artificial intelligence systems.” DesignArtificial IntelligenceArtificialRamaAlgorithmsNeural Networks Author:Frederick Lenz
“The emphasis on mathematical methods seems to be shifted more towards combinatorics and set theory - and away from the algorithm of differential equations which dominates mathematical physics.” SeemsTheoryMathematicsMethodPhysicsMathematicalEmphasisEquationsAlgorithmsDifferential Equations Book:The Neumann Compendium Source: The Neumann Compendium
“Algorithms don't do a good job of detecting their own flaws.” JobsFlawsGood JobAlgorithms Author:Clay Shirky
“Trees and bones are constantly reforming themselves along lines of stress. This algorithm has been put into a software program that's now being used to make bridges lightweight, to make building beams lightweight.” Has BeensUsedLinesTreeBuildingProgramStressBonesBridgesSoftwareBeamAlgorithms Author:Janine Benyus
“It is cheaper to pay mathematicians and computer scientists to design algorithms that will eliminate webspamming, rather than to pay lawyers to do lawsuits.” SciencePayDesignComputerScientistMathematicsLawyerMathematicianCheaperAlgorithmsLawsuit Author:Jennifer Tour Chayes
“I described to my patent lawyer our new algorithm-that I was hoping to patent- about detecting clustering, that involved three probabilities α , β, γ that add-up to 1, and mentioned that it is like "a three-sided coin". A few days later he came up with a patent application for a "three-sided-coin".” ScienceThreeInvolvedMathematicsAddLawyerApplicationProbabilityCoinsPatentsAlgorithms Author:Jennifer Tour Chayes
“Nothing will ever replace the experience of wandering haphazardly through a great bookstore, no matter how many algorithms are developed to find matches for our tastes. That's because not only is there no accounting for taste, there is no predicting it either.” MatterTasteWanderAccountingBookstoresGreat BookAlgorithmsPredicting Author:Dominique Browning
“No one knows what the right algorithm is, but it gives us hope that if we can discover some crude approximation of whatever this algorithm is and implement it on a computer, that can help us make a lot of progress.” IfsKnowsGivingHelpingProgressComputerCrudeAlgorithmsApproximation Author:Andrew Ng
“Nature doesn't feel compelled to stick to a mathematically precise algorithm; in fact, nature probably can't stick to an algorithm.” FeelsFactsSticksPreciseCompelledAlgorithms Author:Margaret Wertheim
“Why is an accountant who knows the regulation and codes and takes advantage of tax loopholes that save you thousands of dollars each year good, But SEO's who take advantages of loopholes and flaws in Google's algorithm to bring you traffic that makes you thousands of dollars bad?” KnowsYearsTaxesAdvantageDollarsMarketingCodeOnlineFlawsRegulationGoogleTrafficAccountantsAlgorithmsLoopholesSeoOnline Marketing Author:Michael Gray
“Klout and various measurements of influence are fun. I love to see where I score on them, but there's a computer algorithm behind the calculation. If there's an algorithm, it can be gamed. Even if it's not gameable, you have to take a leap of faith that the number of followers, retweets, mentions, whatever really mean something.” IfsMeanFunNumbersBehindsInfluenceComputerVariousScoreLeapFollowersReally MeanMeasurementCalculationsAlgorithmsLeap Of FaithRetweet Author:Guy Kawasaki
“Humans are very good at making algorithms work eventually.” HumansVery GoodAlgorithms Author:Usama Fayyad
“We want people doing white hat search engine optimization (or even no search engine optimization at all) to be free to focus on creating amazing, compelling web sites. As always, we’ll keep our ears open for feedback on ways to iterate and improve our ranking algorithms toward that goal.” PeopleWayWantGoalWhiteFocusCreatingEarsHatsEnginesCompellingSiteFeedbackAlgorithmsRankingSearch EngineOptimization Author:Matt Cutts
“Genetic algorithms (GAs) are defined as search procedures based on the mechanics of natural selection and genetics, and we think we know what innovation is - at least in some sort of qualitative way - but what does one have to do with the other?” ThinkingKnowsWayDoeNaturalInnovationDefinedGasMechanicSelectionProceduresGeneticsNatural SelectionAlgorithmsQualitative Author:David Edward
“The classes of problems which are respectively known and not known to have good algorithms are of great theoretical interest. [...] I conjecture that there is no good algorithm for the traveling salesman problem. My reasons are the same as for any mathematical conjecture: (1) It is a legitimate mathematical possibility, and (2) I do not know.” KnowsReasonProblemInterestKnownClassPossibilityMathematicalTheoreticalSalesmanAlgorithmsConjecture Author:Jack Edmonds
“I remember that mathematicians were telling me in the 1960s that they would recognize computer science as a mature discipline when it had 1,000 deep algorithms. I think we've probably reached 500.” ThinkingRememberDisciplineComputerMatureMathematician1960sComputer ScienceAlgorithms Author:Donald Knuth
“[With AI] Somebody's going to have to think of a completely new algorithm, a new way of doing goal-based planning.” ThinkingWayGoalPlanningNew WaysAlgorithms Author:Tim Berners-Lee
“Netflix will know everything. Netflix will know when a person stops watching it. They have all of their algorithms and will know that this person watched five minutes of a show and then stopped. They can tell by the behavior and the time of day that they are going to come back to it, based on their history.” KnowsPersonsShowsFiveMinutesBehaviorFive MinutesAlgorithmsNetflixTime Of Day Author:Mitchell Hurwitz
“We have a lot of argument about laws but none of it solves the problem. Let's examine what happened, why did we miss the Tsarnaev brothers, why did we miss the San Bernardino couple? It wasn't because we had stopped collected metadata it was because, I think, as someone who comes from the technology world, we were using the wrong algorithms.” ThinkingWorldProblemLawTechnologyHappenedMissingBrotherCoupleArgumentSolveAlgorithmsMetadata Author:Carly Fiorina
“When we miss with all the metadata collection we've had, the San Bernardino couple and the Tsarnaev brothers, what that suggests to me is that we are using the wrong algorithms to search through all this data.” MissingBrotherCoupleDataCollectionsAlgorithmsMetadata Author:Carly Fiorina
“There's a whole company called Palantir that does nothing but derive and create algorithms riches to search through big data. We're not using their capabilities. For heaven's sake, some of this is just ineptitude.” DoeWholeBigsHeavenCompanySakeRichesDataCapabilityAlgorithmsIneptitude Author:Carly Fiorina
“In popular books and articles, information technology writer Carr has worried over the ways that algorithms like those employed by Google are reshaping the ways we think.” ThinkingWayBookTechnologyInformationWorriedArticlesGoogleEmployedInformation TechnologyAlgorithmsPopular Book Author:Nicholas G. Carr
“I'm less interested in uniqueness than in goodness. I see so many concerts where the program notes are more interesting than the music. I remember talking to one composer who went through the most complicated mathematical algorithm to generate some material from scratch. It took weeks and weeks, and he came up with a C major chord. For me, honesty is more interesting than originality.” RememberInterestingTalkingWeekHonestyMaterialsGoodnessMajorsProgramNotesComplicatedMathematicalConcertsComposerOriginalityUniquenessScratchesChordsAlgorithms Author:Anna Meredith
“What geographic profiling does is it takes a look at the locations of a connected series of incidents - say murders in a serial murder case or robberies in a serial bank robber case - and it spatially analyzes the point pattern of incidents, and creates a probability surface from those, working from the basis of an algorithm that says people offend close to where they live, but not too close.” PeopleLooksDoeCasesBasesMurderSeriesPatternsConnectedSurfaceLocationProbabilityIncidentsSerialsRobbersRobberyAlgorithms Author:Kim Rossmo
“In deep learning, the algorithms we use now are versions of the algorithms we were developing in the 1980s, the 1990s. People were very optimistic about them, but it turns out they didn't work too well.” PeopleWellsUseTurnsVersionsOptimisticDevelopingAlgorithmsDeep Learning Author:Geoffrey Hinton
“Randomness has an incredibly powerful place in our culture. If you think about it, you can see it driving the algorithms that run our information economy, patterns that make up the traffic of our cities, and on over to the way the stars and galaxies formed.” IfsThinkingWayRunningCultureStarsPowerfulCitiesEconomyInformationPatternsDrivingTrafficGalaxyAlgorithmsRandomness Author:DJ Spooky
“Mathematics is not about numbers, equations, computations, or algorithms: it is about understanding.” ScienceUnderstandingNumbersMathematicsEquationsAlgorithmsComputation Author:William Thurston
“Some people have set up sort of "gotcha" algorithms that apparently crawl through psychology articles and look for fraudulent p-values [a measure of the likelihood that experimental results weren't a fluke]. But they're including rounding errors that don't change the significance levels of the results, and they're doing it anonymously.” PeopleLooksValuesLevelsResultsPsychologyErrorsIncludingSignificanceArticlesDon't ChangeLikelihoodAlgorithmsFlukes Author:Susan Fiske
“I did once leave one of [my kid] watching something on YouTube, something completely innocuous, and I went out of the room and the algorithm kept playing the next thing and the next thing and somehow worked its way around to showing him the trailer for John Carpenter's The Thing - at which point I walked back in. He wasn't happy.” WayKidsNextRoomsYoutubeTrailersCarpenterAlgorithms Author:Charlie Brooker
“Google has - at least at this point - maintained the line where it keeps organic results separate from the advertisements. But over time - so in other words, you still get the - there still are honest to goodness results which are based on an algorithm which is based on how important or how many people link to that particular site, so there's that. At the very beginning, there were unobtrusive advertisements on the side that sort of showed up when you typed in certain phrases. Over time, the amount of real estate that those ads take up has increased.” PeopleStillsImportantRealCertainSidesLinesResultsHonestParticularAmountGoodnessPhrasesLinksAdsGoogleSiteEstatesAdvertisementsAlgorithms Author:Tim Wu
“The most important goal I had in mind was to convince people to stop blindly trusting algorithms and assuming that they are inherently fair and objective.” PeopleMindImportantGoalFairsAssumingObjectivesConvinceAlgorithms Author:Cathy O'Neil
“I would argue that one of the major problems with our blind trust in algorithms is that we can propagate discriminatory patterns without acknowledging any kind of intent.” KindProblemMajorsBlindPatternsArguingAlgorithmsMajor ProblemsBlind Trust Author:Cathy O'Neil
“I know how models are built, because I build them myself, so I know that I'm embedding my values into every single algorithm I create and I am projecting my agenda onto those algorithms.” KnowsValuesKnow HowModelsBuiltAgendasAlgorithmsEmbedding Author:Cathy O'Neil
“People are starting to be very skeptical of the Facebook algorithm and all kinds of data surveillance.” PeopleKindStartingAll KindsDataSkepticalSurveillanceAlgorithms Author:Cathy O'Neil
“I don't think anybody's ever notified that they were sentenced to an extra two years because their recidivism score had been high, or notified that this beat cop happened to be in their neighborhood checking people's pockets for pot because of a predictive policing algorithm. That's just not how it works.” PeopleThinkingYearsTwoHappenedBeatsExtrasScorePocketsNeighborhoodTwo YearsPotCopAlgorithmsRecidivism Author:Cathy O'Neil
“Obviously the more transparency we have as auditors, the more we can get, but the main goal is to understand important characteristics about a black box algorithm without necessarily having to understand every single granular detail of the algorithm.” ImportantGoalBlackDetailsBoxesCharacteristicsTransparencyAlgorithmsAuditorsBlack Boxes Author:Cathy O'Neil
“With recidivism algorithms, for example, I worry about racist outcomes. With personality tests [for hiring], I worry about filtering out people with mental health problems from jobs. And with a teacher value-added model algorithm [used in New York City to score teachers], I worry literally that it's not meaningful. That it's almost a random number generator.” PeopleProblemJobsUsedValuesNumbersCitiesWorryTeacherNew YorkExamplePersonalityModelsTestsMental HealthMeaningfulOutcomesScoreRacistNew York CityHiringAlgorithmsHealth ProblemsGeneratorRecidivism Author:Cathy O'Neil
“There are lots of different ways that algorithms can go wrong, and what we have now is a system in which we assume because it's shiny new technology with a mathematical aura that it's perfect and it doesn't require further vetting. Of course, we never have that assumption with other kinds of technology.” WayKindDifferentCoursesPerfectTechnologyAssumingMathematicalDifferent WaysAssumptionNew TechnologyAurasAlgorithms Author:Cathy O'Neil
“We don't let a car company just throw out a car and start driving it around without checking that the wheels are fastened on. We know that would result in death; but for some reason we have no hesitation at throwing out some algorithms untested and unmonitored even when they're making very important life-and-death decisions.” KnowsImportantReasonDecisionResultsCompanyCarDrivingWheelsLife And DeathThrowingHesitationAlgorithmsImportant Life Author:Cathy O'Neil
“The Facebook algorithm designers chose to let us see what our friends are talking about. They chose to show us, in some sense, more of the same. And that is the design decision that they could have decided differently. They could have said, "We're going to show you stuff that you've probably never seen before." I think they probably optimized their algorithm to make the most amount of money, and that probably meant showing people stuff that they already sort of agreed with, or were more likely to agree with.” PeopleThinkingSaidShowsStuffDecisionTalkingDesignAmountDecidedAgreeDesignerAlgorithms Author:Cathy O'Neil
“You invent things like algorithms to take care of some of the changes you want to make. The changes aren't detectable. There's all kinds of things happening as I play.” WantKindPlayCareHappeningsTake CareThings HappenAll KindsAlgorithms Author:Pauline Oliveros
“Back in the really early days, the men went out hunting, the women stayed home with the kids, and would hold the kid in one arm against the heart, so that's the left, and with the right arm they would throw. And it turns out you cannot make that calculation in real time. You have to have an algorithm set up. So these brain mechanisms evolved in order to do that, and when they evolved, the thing is that where there is a useful capability it often adapts to places it wasn't evolved for.” MenHeartRealHomeKidsOrderTurnsLeftBrainHe ManArmsCapabilityMechanismHuntingCalculationsAlgorithms Author:Howard Rheingold
“The neural network is this kind of technology that is not an algorithm, it is a network that has weights on it, and you can adjust the weights so that it learns. You teach it through trials.” KindTeachTechnologyWeightTrialsAlgorithmsNeural Networks Author:Howard Rheingold
“The single greatest business opportunity that is now emerging in the global marketplace is the ability to analyze digital log data to trace digital actions and from those traces to develop algorithms that can predict future outcomes with greater accuracy.” ActionOpportunityAbilityGreaterDataOutcomesDigitalMarketplaceEmergingAccuracyAlgorithmsBusiness Opportunity Author:Geoffrey Moore