Jan Lacan’s advice for students looking to get into artificial intelligence

Jan Lacan, one of the influential figures in the field of artificial intelligence and former chief scientist of Meta, has some interesting advice for those computer science students who want to enter the field of AI.

According to Business Insider, Lacan says: “If you are a computer science student and only take the minimum required math units in a typical computer science curriculum, you may have trouble adapting to the big changes in technology.”

Computer science students should focus their time on more fundamental areas

Lacan, who is a professor of computer science at New York University (NYU), recalled in a recent podcast that he sometimes describes himself by saying, “I’m a computer science professor who argues against studying computer science.” This talk refers to his emphasis that students should devote their time to more fundamental and deeper areas.

Of course, Lacan clarifies that he did not mean that young people should refrain from choosing the field of computer science; Rather, he wanted to say that instead of taking courses about trendy technologies, the largest number of units should be allocated to fundamental courses (such as mathematics, physics or electrical engineering).

The former Meta AI scientist added that his advice to students is to learn things that have a long shelf life. He also said that depending on computer science curricula, not all of these skills are necessarily included in a college degree.

Lacan said about this: “What we have to do is to somehow learn the basic foundations in mathematics and modeling; Mathematics that can be connected to the real world. “Usually, you learn this type of material in some universities in engineering fields that are related to computer science, such as electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, etc.”

However, universities and computer science students are still grappling with the question of how to adapt their educational programs to the era of generative artificial intelligence and agent-driven artificial intelligence. Earlier this year, “Honey Farid”, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, pointed out the difficulties that today’s students face in finding a job.