♫MUSIC♫
SHWETAK PATEL: I mean, there's
many ways to have impact in the
world and you know, I - it was
interesting, when I was young I
could have been a lawyer or a
doctor; in fact, I thought about
being a doctor for, for a little
bit. But I think computer
science can play this role where
it can have impact across many
different areas of society, you
know, energy, health,
sustainability in general.
DAVID FERRUCCI: I was in high
school and I was, actually
wanted to become a medical
doctor, originally; and I got
exposed to a computer science
class they were teaching at the
local college one summer. And I
didn't, I didn't know what to
expect but I got a chance to
actually program a computer for
the first time, and I was
completely blown away.
FRANCINE BERMAN: There are many
ways of coming at computer
science. Many people come from
a very hands-on engineering
space. Lots of us come from a
mathematical space.
Surprisingly, a lot of people
come because they have an
interest in music and other
kinds of things.
SHWETAK PATEL: So, often we're
actually, we're actually wearing
many different hats that go
beyond just being in the lab,
and I think that's actually the
exciting part of research is,
is being able to make
an impact across
very different disciplines.
FRANCINE BERMAN: It's fun to
collaborate. It's fun to be
creative. You meet incredibly
interesting people. What you do
is never boring. Never boring.
ROSALIND PICARD: I get to do
and learn about things freely
like, it's this enormous freedom
to just explore and go where
your mind wants to go.
DAVID FERRUCCI: Whatever you
can imagine, whatever you can
imagine; how to solve a problem,
how to compute, how to think,
you can get this computer to
follow that program that you
could imagine. It was just an
amazing thing.
SHWETAK PATEL: Taking advantage
of that platform, to really
improve people's daily lives is
something that really excites
me about it.
TERESA DAHLBERG: I would really
challenge you to name an area
today that isn't informed
and innovation isn't
spurred by computing.
ROSALIND PICARD: What it's
really about is the people.
It's not about making computers
that are smarter, it's about
making technology that helps all
of us have better experiences.
TERESA DAHLBERG: I realized
that I could meet my interests
of wanting to help people and
wanting to build things through
computing, where I'm developing
software that's really the
interface to people.
JUAN E. GILBERT: So all the
things we work on are - have a
social impact and a social
context; so when you look at it
from that perspective of doing
research in that area, whenever
you make a discovery, whenever
you invent something or you have
a breakthrough, it's really
exciting because you know it can
actually change the world and
help people.
