WINNI WINTERMEYER
A BEAUTIFUL
MIND
and the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology to provide instruction online. And 2tor is working
with a growing roster of universities to offer online graduate degrees in business, law and nursing, among other fields.
Thrun says he welcomes these
rivals because more choice is
the best thing that could happen
to students.
Udacity looks to be a breeding ground for cultivating the
talents of the young Thruns of
the world: motivated individuals who want to learn, know what
subjects they care about, seek a
braniac community and are determined to teach themselves, no
matter what. It’s the experience
Thrun didn’t have growing up,
but would have wanted. Classes
are structured around solving a
problem — building a search engine, programming a robotic car
— rather than mastering theory
or reviewing a canon. The thirteencourses offered so far cover
programming physics, math, statistics and artificial intelligence.
“It’s opening up the chances
for other people to also become
innovators,” Zachary, the venture
capitalist, says of Udacity and
Thrun. “It is passing forward his
HUFFINGTON
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spirit of innovation.”
Thrun considers Udacity his
most important undertaking and
it will perhaps prove his most
challenging one. Regardless, he
doesn’t think about his legacy
and he doesn’t imagine he’ll be
remembered in a generation. After all, he’s only human.
“I screw up every day,” he says.
“I have a broken piece of glass in
my car. I almost got a ticket this
morning.” In the meantime, he
plans to keep aiming high.
“Question every assumption
and go towards the problem, like
the way they flew to the moon,”
he says. “We should have more
moon shots and flights to the
moon in areas of societal
importance.”
Thrun shows
off Jeeves
the Tennis
Rover, his
machine
which
collects
tennis balls.