Lex Fridman

Lex Fridman (/ˈfriːdmən/; born 15 August 1983[2][3]) is a Russian-American computer scientist and podcaster. He hosts the Lex Fridman Podcast.

Not to be confused with Lex Friedman.

Lex Fridman
Fridman in 2018
Born
Alexey Fedotov, Russian: Алексей Федотов

(1983-08-15) 15 August 1983
Chkalovsk, Tajik SSR, Soviet Union (now Buston, Tajikistan)
EducationDrexel University (BS, MS, PhD)
Occupation(s)Computer scientist, podcaster, writer
Scientific career
FieldsComputer science, artificial intelligence
InstitutionsMassachusetts Institute of Technology
ThesisLearning of Identity from Behavioral Biometrics for Active Authentication (2014)
Doctoral advisorMoshe Kam, Steven Weber
YouTube information
Channels
Years active2006–present
Genre(s)Talk, Technology
Subscribers
  • 3.03 million[1]
Total views
  • 450.2 million[1]
100,000 subscribers2019
1,000,000 subscribers2021
Last updated: June 14, 2023
Websitelexfridman.com

Early life and education

Fridman was born in Chkalovsk, Tajikistan (at that point the Tajik SSR was part of the Soviet Union). He is of Jewish descent.[4][5][6] His father is plasma physicist Alexander Fridman, a professor at Drexel University.[7][8] His brother is Gregory Fridman, also a researcher in plasma physics.[9]

When he was about 11, Fridman's family moved from Russia to the Chicago area.[2] He attended Neuqua Valley High School in Naperville, Illinois.[10] He then went on to obtain BS and MS degrees in computer science at Drexel University in 2010,[11] and completed his PhD in electrical and computer engineering at Drexel in 2014.[12] His PhD dissertation, Learning of Identity from Behavioral Biometrics for Active Authentication, was completed under the advisement of engineering educators Moshe Kam and Steven Weber and sought to "investigate the problem of active authentication on desktop computers and mobile devices".[13]

Career

MIT

In 2014, Fridman joined Google but left the company after six months. In 2015, he moved to MIT's AgeLab to work on "psychology and big-data analytics to understand driver behavior."[2]

In 2019, Fridman published a study on Tesla Autopilot finding that drivers using semi-autonomous vehicles stayed focused, contrasting with established research on how humans interact with automated systems. The study's methodology was criticized by Missy Cummings, a professor at Duke University and advisor for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, who described it as "deeply flawed".[2] Cummings was a board member of Veoneer, a Swedish company that sells car sensors.[14] AI researcher Anima Anandkumar suggested Fridman should submit his study for peer review before seeking press coverage.[2] Following his Tesla Autopilot study, Fridman was invited to Tesla office's for an interview with Elon Musk.[2] The study was later removed from MIT's website.[2]

In 2019, he left AgeLab and took up an unpaid role in the department of aeronautics and astronautics.[2] As of 2023, he is a research scientist at the MIT Laboratory for Information and Decision Systems.[15][16]

Lex Fridman Podcast

Fridman began his podcast in 2018. It was originally titled The Artificial Intelligence Podcast, but changed to The Lex Fridman Podcast in 2020. By April 2023, Fridman had recorded more than 350 episodes which have been described as "hourslong conversations" by Business Insider.[2] Episodes of the podcast have featured, among others, Elon Musk, Kanye West, Benjamin Netanyahu,[17] Yuval Noah Harari and Mohammed El-Kurd. [18]

Reception

According to research experts interviewed by Business Insider in April 2023, Fridman "lacks the publications, citations and conference appearances required to be taken seriously in the hypercompetitive world of academia".[2] Computational biologist Lior Pachter said "some scientists and academics fear Fridman is contributing to the 'cacophony of misinformation'", while another AI researcher thought that Fridman may have "abandoned academic rigor in pursuit of fame". In contrast, his former colleague Sertac Karaman, LIDS's director, stated: "Dr. Fridman has been a research scientist at MIT LIDS and in our research group. I have known him for many years, and been very impressed by his ideas and his research accomplishments."[2]

Nathan J. Robinson of Current Affairs wrote, "Fridman is not an idealogue and seems genuine in his desire to empathetically understand leftists (he has also interviewed Richard Wolff, Steve Keen, and Noam Chomsky) and to be fair to all sides, he has hosted a debate between 'skeptical environmentalist' Bjorn Lomborg and climate journalist Andrew Revkin.” However, Robinson goes on to criticize Fridman, saying that “the Fridman podcast is an excellent way to see how the posture of neutrality actually fails to adequately challenge falsehoods and toxic beliefs.”[19]

References
  1. "Lex Fridman's YouTube Stats (Summary Profile) - Social Blade Stats". SocialBlade.com. Retrieved 14 June 2023.
  2. Black, Julia. "Peace, love, and Hitler: How Lex Fridman's podcast became a safe space for the anti-woke tech elite". Business Insider. Retrieved 1 October 2023.
  3. "Thank you for the birthday wishes..." X (formerly Twitter). Retrieved 12 October 2023.
  4. Fridman, Lex (18 June 2023). "Transcript for Jimmy Wales: Wikipedia | Lex Fridman Podcast #385". Lex Fridman. Retrieved 18 June 2023.
  5. "Lex Fridman statement on Vladimir Putin and War in Ukraine". Youtube. Archived from the original on 17 March 2022. Retrieved 17 March 2022.
  6. Anca Dragan: Human-Robot Interaction and Reward Engineering | Lex Fridman Podcast #81, retrieved 31 May 2023
  7. "Alexander Fridman: My Dad, the Plasma Physicist". Lex Fridman. Retrieved 9 March 2022.
  8. "Alexander Fridman". Drexel University College of Engineering. 3 May 2021. Retrieved 10 September 2023.
  9. "Alexander Fridman Earns Plasma Field's Highest Honor". Drexel University College of Engineering. 23 January 2019. See 2nd to last paragraph for relation to Alexander Fridman. Archived from the original on 22 March 2023. Retrieved 22 March 2023.
  10. "Alex Fridman - About". lexfridman.com. Archived from the original on 2 October 2012. Retrieved 18 July 2022.
  11. Adams, Christine (8 June 2017). "AgeLab researching autonomous vehicle systems in ongoing collaboration with Toyota". MIT News. Archived from the original on 4 January 2022. Retrieved 10 January 2022.
  12. Plumb, Wendy (2 October 2018). "Alum Lex Fridman Visits From MIT To Lead Public "AI" Lecture". Drexel University College of Engineering. Drexel University. Archived from the original on 12 February 2021. Retrieved 24 April 2022.
  13. Fridman, Lex (2014). "Learning of Identity from Behavioral Biometrics for Active Authentication". Dissertation, Drexel University. Archived from the original on 4 December 2022. Retrieved 24 April 2022.
  14. Metz, Cade (15 February 2023). "Carmakers Are Pushing Autonomous Tech. This Engineer Wants Limits". The New York Times. Retrieved 16 October 2023. she was serving as a board member of Veoneer, a Swedish company that sells sensors to Tesla and other automakers
  15. "Research Staff". MIT LIDS. Retrieved 8 October 2023.
  16. Fridman, Lex (18 June 2023). "Transcript for Jimmy Wales: Wikipedia | Lex Fridman Podcast #385". Lex Fridman. Retrieved 8 October 2023.
  17. Samuels, Ben (13 July 2023). "Netanyahu Uses Podcast Appearance to Denigrate Protests, Float Conspiracy". Haaretz. Retrieved 15 July 2023.
  18. Ahmed, Nasim (27 July 2023). "What did we learn from Fridman's podcast with Netanyahu, Harari and El-Kurd?". Middle East Monitor.
  19. Robinson, Nathan (5 January 2023). "The Guy Who Just Loves Everyone". Current Affairs. Retrieved 9 October 2023.
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