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Lex Fridman PodcastLex Fridman Podcast

Donald Knuth: Programming, Algorithms, Hard Problems & the Game of Life | Lex Fridman Podcast #219

Donald Knuth is a computer scientist, Turing Award winner, father of algorithm analysis, author of The Art of Computer Programming, and creator of TeX.

Lex FridmanhostDonald Knuthguest
Sep 9, 20212h 21mWatch on YouTube ↗

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Episode Details

EPISODE INFO

Released
September 9, 2021
Duration
2h 21m
Channel
Lex Fridman Podcast
Watch on YouTube
▶ Open ↗

EPISODE DESCRIPTION

Donald Knuth is a computer scientist, Turing Award winner, father of algorithm analysis, author of The Art of Computer Programming, and creator of TeX. Please support this podcast by checking out our sponsors:

EPISODE LINKS: Donald's Stanford Page: https://profiles.stanford.edu/donald-knuth Donald's Books: https://amzn.to/3heyBsC PODCAST INFO: Podcast website: https://lexfridman.com/podcast Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/2lwqZIr Spotify: https://spoti.fi/2nEwCF8 RSS: https://lexfridman.com/feed/podcast/ Full episodes playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrAXtmErZgOdP_8GztsuKi9nrraNbKKp4 Clips playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrAXtmErZgOeciFP3CBCIEElOJeitOr41 OUTLINE: 0:00 - Introduction 0:48 - First programs 24:11 - Literate programming 27:20 - Beauty in programming 33:15 - OpenAI 42:26 - Optimization 48:31 - Consciousness 57:14 - Conway's game of life 1:10:01 - Stable marriage 1:13:21 - Richard Feynman 1:24:15 - Knuth-Morris-Pratt Algorithm 1:33:47 - Hardest problem 1:51:26 - Open source 1:56:39 - Favorite symbols 2:06:12 - Productivity 2:13:53 - Meaning of life SOCIAL:

SPEAKERS

  • Lex Fridman

    host
  • Donald Knuth

    guest
  • Narrator

    other
  • Narrator

    other
  • Narrator

    other
  • Narrator

    other

EPISODE SUMMARY

In this episode of Lex Fridman Podcast, featuring Lex Fridman and Donald Knuth, Donald Knuth: Programming, Algorithms, Hard Problems & the Game of Life | Lex Fridman Podcast #219 explores Donald Knuth on Programming Craft, Beauty, Faith, and Future Machines Donald Knuth reflects on his early days programming the IBM 650 in raw decimal machine code, using stories about factoring numbers and a learning tic-tac-toe program to illustrate how he discovered debugging, algorithms, and even primitive machine learning.

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