Artificial and Natural Intelligence 🧠🤖

What does it mean for a machine to be intelligent, how does current artificial intelligence compare with animal intelligence, and should we be worried?

Instructor: Professor Venkatesh Murthy (vnmurthy@fas.harvard.edu)
Head TF: Kumaresh Krishnan (kumaresh_krishnan@g.harvard.edu)
Lecture: M/W 3-4:15PM | Location: NW B103
Section times: M: 4:30, 6:00; W: 4:30; R: 10:30, 1:30, 3:00; F: 1:30
Announcements (Links to Canvas)
Office Hours Prof. Murthy Tue 3:00-4:30pm, Biolabs 4027 (16 Divinity Ave) Thurs 9:00-10:00am Zoom

Quick Links

PDF version of the course schedule and syllabus.
Course Preview Zoom Recording, where Prof. Murthy gives an overview of the course (Recorded for Spring 2022).
Final paper guidelines
Grading rubric
Midterm Key

Week 1 - Introduction

Jan 22

LEC 1 What is Intelligence? 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Jan 24

LEC 2 With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Healthcare_bias

Week 2 - The Building Blocks of Biological and Artificial Intelligence

Jan 29

LEC 3 The Building Blocks of the Brain 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Intro_to_neurons

Jan 31

LEC 4 Guest Lecture - Prof. Jeff Lichtman 🎥

Readings (some papers mentioned in the guest lecture) 📖

Technicolor_neurons

Muscle_connectome

NMJ_development

PSET 1 handed out Covers lectures 1-4: Pdf LaTeX

Reading Responses Due (Week 1): Submission

Feb 03

Reading Responses Due (Week 2): Submission

Section: Section begins this week!

Week 3 - The Building Blocks of Biological and Artificial Intelligence (Cont'd)

Feb 5

LEC 5 The Architecture of the Brain - I 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Ballard_chapter_draft

Feb 7

LEC 6 The Architecture of the Brain - II 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖 - Same as Lecture 5

Feb 09

PSET 1 DUE @ 11:59: Submission Key

Feb 11

Reading Responses Due (Week 3): Submission

Week 4 - The Building Blocks of Biological and Artificial Intelligence (Cont'd)

Feb 12

LEC 7 The Building Blocks of Neural Networks 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Nielsen_book_Chap1

Feb 14

LEC 8 How Networks Learn🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

DeepLearning_book_Chap1

Intro_to_backprop

Data_annotation

PSET 2 handed out Covers lectures 5-8: PDF / LaTeX

Feb 18

Reading Responses Due (Week 4): Submission

Week 5 - Learning to Represent

Feb 19

No Class – President’s Day

Feb 21

LEC 9 Primary Visual Cortex Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

The Neuroscience of Vision

Neural Networks and Deep Learning

Feb 23

PSET 2 DUE @ 11:59PM: Submit PSet 2

Feb 25

Reading Response Due (Week 5): Submission

Week 6 - Learning Complex Representations

Feb 26

LEC 10 Dimensionality Reduction and Invariant Representations 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Dimension_reduction

Face_recognition_review (optional)

Feb 28

LEC 11 Guest Lecturer: Talia Konkle 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Mar 3

Reading Response Due (Week 6): Submission

Week 7 - Representation To Action

Mar 4

LEC 12 Moving in the world 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Hierarchical_models

Mar 6

In class mid term exam: Midterm Key

Spring Break - Mar 09 to Mar 17

Week 8 - Learning In The Brain

Mar 18

LEC 13 Types of Learning 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

LearningandMemory_Review

Mar 20

LEC 14 Guest Lecturer: Adam Lowet (Uchida Lab) - Reinforcement Learning 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Mar 24

Reading Responses Due - Week 8: Submission

Week 9 - Language and Learning

Mar 25

LEC 15 Natural Language 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Bird_communication

ML_to_animalcommunication

Mar 27

LEC 16 Language and Machines 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Natural_Language_Processing

ChatGPT_explained detailed explanation, optional reading!

PSET 3 handed out Covers lectures 13-16: pdf / LaTeX

Mar 29

Final Paper - deliverable 1 due

Mar 31

Reading Response Due - Week 9: Submission

Week 10 - Applications

Apr 1

- No Lecture: Slides

Readings 📖

Apr 3

LEC 17 Learning To Play Complex Games 🎥

Readings 📖

Deepmind_strategy

Apr 5

PSET 3 DUE @ 11:59PM: Submit / Key

Apr 7

Reading Response Due - Week 10: Submission

Week 11 - Autonomous vehicles + reading minds

Apr 8

LEC 18 Learning How To Drive A Car 🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

NHTSA vehicle safety

Self-driving Cars Blog

Stanley_DARPA_Challenge

Apr 10

LEC 19 Mind-Reading🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Brain_computer_interface

Apr 10

PSET 4 handed out Covers lectures 16-20: Pdf / LaTeX

Apr 14

Reading Response Due - Week 11: Submission

Week 12 - Biases and Reality

Apr 15

LEC 21 Human & Algorithmic Biases🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Final Paper - deliverable 2 due: Submission

Apr 17

LEC 22 Generative AI🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Apr 19

PSET 4 DUE @ 11:59PM: PSet4 Key

Apr 21

Reading Response Due - Week 12: Submission

Week 13 - Final thoughts

Apr 22

LEC 23 Guest Lecture - Prof. Josh Tenenbaum🎥: Slides

Readings 📖

Building_machines

Apr 24

Course Summary & Feedback

FEEDBACK End-of-year course feedback

May 6

FINAL PAPER DUE @ 11:59pm

Section