Past Public Lectures

Spring 2023

Theoretically Speaking — What Do Theory of Computation and the Movies Have in Common?
Speaker: Alvy Ray Smith (Co-Founder of Pixar)
Feb. 21, 2023

Fall 2022

Theoretically Speaking at the Brower Center — PACE Tech: Physics and Algorithms Coupled to Enhance Technology
Speaker: Yonina Eldar (Weizmann Institute of Science)
Dec. 7, 2022
CANCELED: Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Learning-Augmented Algorithms for Safety-Critical Systems
Speaker: Adam Wierman (Caltech)
Dec. 6, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Panel
Speaker: Panel featuring Steve Flammia (AWS), Venkat Guruswami (UC Berkeley), and Debbie Leung (University of Waterloo); Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Dec. 6, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Approaching the Quantum Singleton Bound with Approximate Error Correction
Speaker: Sam Gunn (UC Berkeley)
Dec. 6, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Panel
Speaker: Panel featuring Adam Bouland (Stanford), Scott Aaronson (UT Austin), and Sergio Boixo (Google); Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Nov. 29, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – A Polynomial-Time Classical Algorithm for Noisy Random Circuit Sampling
Speaker: Yunchao Liu (UC Berkeley)
Nov. 29, 2022
Law & Society Fellow Talk — Using Theories of Decision-Making Under Uncertainty to Improve Data Visualization
Speaker: Jessica Hullman (Northwestern University)
Nov. 15, 2022
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Graphons and Graphexes as Models of Large Sparse Networks
Speaker: Jennifer Chayes (UC Berkeley)
Nov. 14, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Panel
Speaker: Panel featuring Nathan Wiebe (University of Toronto), Ryan O'Donnell (Carnegie Mellon University), and Tom Gur (University of Warwick); Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Nov. 8, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Learning to Predict Arbitrary Quantum Processes
Speaker: Hsin-Yuan Huang (Caltech)
Nov. 8, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Panel
Speaker: Panel featuring Nick Hunter-Jones (Stanford), Nicole Yunger Halpern (University of Maryland), Scott Aaronson (UT Austin), and Vijay Balasubramanian (University of Pennsylvania); Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Oct. 25, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Linear Growth of Quantum Circuit Complexity
Speaker: Jens Eisert (Free University of Berlin)
Oct. 25, 2022
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Pandora’s Box: Learning to Leverage Costly Information
Speaker: Shuchi Chawla (University of Texas at Austin)
Oct. 20, 2022
Breakthroughs — Thresholds
Speaker: Jinyoung Park (Stanford)
Oct. 19, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Panel
Speaker: Panel featuring Anand Natarajan (MIT), Dorit Aharonov (Hebrew University) and Matt Hastings (Microsoft Research); Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Oct. 18, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – NLTS Hamiltonians from Codes
Speaker: Chinmay Nirkhe (IBM Research)
Oct. 18, 2022
Simons Institute Special Lecture - An Introduction to the Broadway Musical
Speaker: Armando Fox (EECS UC Berkeley)
Oct. 3, 2022
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Birds of a Feather Flock Together: How Homophily Leads to Segregation, Inequality, and Inefficiency and What We Can Do About It
Speaker: Nicole Immorlica (Microsoft Research)
Sep. 7, 2022

Summer 2022

Theoretically Speaking — Adversarial Examples in Deep Learning
Speaker: Anil Ananthaswamy (freelance journalist, moderator) Panelists: Sébastien Bubeck (Microsoft Research), Melanie Mitchell (Santa Fe Institute), and Laurens van der Maaten (Meta AI Research)
Jul. 22, 2022

Spring 2022

Quantum Colloquium – Panel
Speaker: Panel featuring Scott Aaronson (UT Austin), Geoffrey Penington (UC Berkeley), and Edward Witten (IAS); Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
May 10, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Black Holes and the Quantum-Extended Church-Turing Thesis
Speaker: Leonard Susskind (Stanford University)
May 10, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Panel
Speaker: Panel featuring Kenneth Brown (Duke University), Ignacio Cirac (Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics), Liang Jiang (University of Chicago), and Mark Saffman (UW Madison); Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
May 3, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Efficient Error Correction in Neutral Atoms via Erasure Conversion
Speaker: Jeff Thompson (Princeton)
May 3, 2022
Theoretically Speaking — Noncausal Dependence and Why It Matters for Causal Reasoning
Speaker: Issa Kohler-Hausmann (Professor of Law at Yale Law School) Panelists: Shamik Dasgupta (UC Berkeley), Robin Dembroff (Yale), & Maegan Fairchild (University of Michigan)  
Apr. 26, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Panel
Speaker: Panel featuring Daniel Gottesman (University of Maryland), Matt Hastings (Microsoft Research), and Barbara Terhal (TU Delft); Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Apr. 26, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – The Quantum LDPC Manifesto
Speaker: Anthony Leverrier (INRIA)
Apr. 26, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Panel
Speaker: Panel featuring Yael Kalai (Microsoft Research), Vinod Vaikuntanathan (MIT), and Thomas Vidick (Caltech); Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Apr. 19, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Verifiable Quantum Advantage Without Structure
Speaker: Mark Zhandry (Princeton)
Apr. 19, 2022
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Equilibrium Computation and Machine Learning
Speaker: Constantinos Daskalakis (MIT)
Apr. 18, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Panel
Speaker: Panel featuring Lin Lin (UC Berkeley), Birgitta Whaley (UC Berkeley), James Whitfield (Dartmouth), and Nathan Wiebe (University of Toronto); Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Apr. 12, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Is There Evidence of Exponential Quantum Advantage in Quantum Chemistry?
Speaker: Garnet Chan (Caltech)
Apr. 12, 2022
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Stability and Learning in Repeated Games
Speaker: Éva Tardos (Cornell University)
Apr. 11, 2022
Theoretically Speaking — The Science of Cause and Effect: From Deep Learning to Deep Understanding
Speaker: Judea Pearl (UCLA) (Speaker presenting remotely)
Apr. 6, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – Panel
Speaker: Panel featuring Sergio Boixo (Google), Soonwon Choi (MIT), and Bill Fefferman (University of Chicago); Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Apr. 5, 2022
Quantum Colloquium – On the Limits for Certifying Quantum Speedups for Noisy Circuits
Speaker: Boaz Barak (Harvard University)
Apr. 5, 2022
CANCELED: Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — From Statistical to Causal Machine Learning
Speaker: Bernhard Schölkopf (Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems)
Apr. 4, 2022
Theoretically Speaking — Opportunities for the Application of Quantitative Models in a Fully Integrated Healthcare System
Speaker: Noam Barda (Harvard, Tel-HaShomer Medical Center and Ben-Gurion University) Noa Dagan (Harvard, Clalit Research Institute and Ben-Gurion University)
Mar. 23, 2022
Theoretically Speaking — Monitoring People and Their Vital Signs Using Radio Signals and Machine Learning
Speaker: Dina Katabi (MIT)  (Speaker presenting remotely)
Mar. 9, 2022
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Causality and Autoencoders in Light of Drug Repurposing for COVID-19
Speaker: Caroline Uhler (MIT)
Mar. 7, 2022
Thinking Like a Journalist — Science Communicator in Residence Talk
Speaker: Nathaniel Popper (Science Communicator in Residence, Simons Institute)
Mar. 4, 2022

Fall 2021

Theoretically Speaking — Foundations for a Democratic Metaverse
Speaker: Ehud Shapiro (Weizmann Institute and Columbia University)
Dec. 10, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Panel on Making Predictions in a Quantum World
Speaker: Panel featuring Scott Aaronson (UT Austin), Dorit Aharonov (Hebrew University), Ignacio Cirac (Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics), Elad Hazan (Princeton). Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Nov. 30, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Making Predictions in a Quantum World
Speaker: Hsin-Yuan Huang (Caltech)
Nov. 30, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Panel on Verifiable Quantum Advantage
Speaker: Panel featuring Chris Monroe (Duke University), Lieven Vandersypen (TU Delft), Mark Zhandry (Princeton University), and Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Nov. 16, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Interactive Protocols for Classically-Verifiable Quantum Advantage with an Ion-Trap Quantum Computer
Speaker: Andru Gheorghiu (ETH Zürich) and Daiwei Zhu (University of Maryland)
Nov. 16, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Panel on Achieving Quantum Advantage in the NISQ Era
Speaker: Panel featuring Andrew Childs (University of Maryland), Norman Yao (UC Berkeley), Markus Greiner (Harvard University), Monika Aidelsburger (University of Munich), and Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Nov. 9, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Exploring New Scientific Frontiers with Programmable Quantum Simulators
Speaker: Mikhail Lukin (Harvard University)
Nov. 9, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Panel on Novel Fault-Tolerant Qubits
Speaker: Panel featuring Amir Safavi-Naeini (Stanford University), Daniel Litinski (PsiQuantum), Robert Raussendorf (University of British Columbia), and Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Nov. 2, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Simple Architecture for a Fault-Tolerant Qubit
Speaker: Patrick Hayden (Stanford University) 
Nov. 2, 2021
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Finding Large Cliques in Random and Semi-Random Graphs
Speaker: Uriel Feige (Weizmann Institute of Science)
Nov. 1, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Panel on Bosonic Error Correction Codes
Speaker: Panel featuring Daniel Gottesman (University of Maryland), Shruti Puri (Yale University), Jonathan Home (ETH Zurich), Chen Wang (UMass Amherst), and Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Oct. 26, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – An Error-Corrected Logical Quantum Bit Encoded in Grid States of a Superconducting Cavity
Speaker: Michel Devoret (Yale University)
Oct. 26, 2021
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Mathematical Imaging: From Geometric PDEs and Variational Modeling to Deep Learning for Images
Speaker: Carola-Bibiane Schönlieb (University of Cambridge) (Speaker presenting remotely)
Oct. 21, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Panel on Quantum Machine Learning and Barren Plateaus
Speaker: Panel featuring Patrick Coles (Los Alamos National Labs), Aram Harrow (MIT), Maria Schuld (UKZN and Xanadu), Jarrod McClean (Google), and Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Oct. 19, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Barren Plateaus and Quantum Generative Training Using Rényi Divergences
Speaker: Nathan Wiebe (University of Toronto)
Oct. 19, 2021
Theoretically Speaking — Deep Nets and the Primate Visual System
Speaker: Anil Ananthaswamy (Simons Institute, moderator) Panelists: James DiCarlo (MIT), Grace Lindsay (University College London), Jitendra Malik (UC Berkeley), and Santosh Vempala (Georgia Tech)
Oct. 18, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Panel on Securing Cryptography Against Quantum Adversaries
Speaker: Panel featuring Zvika Brakerski (Weizmann Institute), Anne Broadbent (U. Ottawa), Yael Kalai (Microsoft Research) and Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Oct. 12, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Post-Quantum Succinct Arguments: Breaking the Quantum Rewinding Barrier
Speaker: Fermi Ma (Simons Institute)
Oct. 12, 2021
Breakthroughs — Locally Testable Codes with Constant Rate, Distance, and Locality
Speaker: Irit Dinur (Weizmann Institute of Science) 
Oct. 6, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Panel on Quantum Interactive Dynamics
Speaker: Panel featuring Adam Nahum (I'Ecole Normale Supérieure), Pedram Roushan (Google), Barbara Terhal (TU Delft), and Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Oct. 5, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Towards a Quantum Interactive Dynamics
Speaker: Shivaji Sondhi (Oxford University)
Oct. 5, 2021
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Computational Barriers in Statistical Estimation and Learning
Speaker: Andrea Montanari (Stanford)
Oct. 4, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – Panel on Lattice Algorithms and Cryptography
Speaker: Panel featuring Lior Eldar (MIT), Vinod Vaikuntanathan (MIT), Daniel Apon (NIST), Umesh Vazirani (UC Berkeley; moderator).
Sep. 21, 2021
Quantum Colloquium – An Efficient Quantum Algorithm for Lattice Problems Achieving Subexponential Approximation Factor
Speaker: Sean Hallgren (Penn State University & Senior Visitor at Simons Institute 2021-22)
Sep. 21, 2021
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — On Some Optimization Problems Involving a Large Number of Matrices
Speaker: Wilfrid Gangbo (UCLA)
Sep. 20, 2021

Summer 2021

Breakthroughs — An Almost Constant Lower Bound of the Isoperimetric Coefficient in the KLS Conjecture
Speaker: Yuansi Chen (Duke University)
Aug. 5, 2021
Breakthroughs — A Refined Laser Method and Faster Matrix Multiplication
Speaker: Virginia Vassilevska Williams (MIT)
Jun. 16, 2021

Spring 2021

Theoretically Speaking — A Panel Discussion on the Film Coded Bias
Speaker: Ashia Wilson (MIT, moderator) Panelists: Seny Kamara (Brown University Department of Computer Science and Aroki Systems), Shalini Kantayya (7th Empire Media and UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism), Sendhil Mullainathan (University of Chicago Booth School of Business), Omer Reingold (Stanford University Computer Science Department), and Patricia Williams (Northeastern University School of Law)
May 7, 2021
A New Theory of Adversarial Examples in Machine Learning
Speaker: Adi Shamir (Weizmann Institute)
May 6, 2021
Theoretically Speaking — Market Design through the Lens of Approximation
Speaker: Michal Feldman (Tel Aviv University)
Apr. 28, 2021
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — How Difficult Is It to Certify That a Random SAT Formula Is Unsatisfiable?
Speaker: Toniann Pitassi (University of Toronto)
Apr. 19, 2021
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Back to the Future: A Fresh Look at Linear Temporal Logic
Speaker: Javier Esparza (Technical University of Munich)
Mar. 31, 2021
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Trustworthy and Distributed Automated Reasoning
Speaker: Marijn Heule (Carnegie Mellon University)
Mar. 19, 2021
Science Communicator in Residence – Embracing the Uncertainties
Speaker: Siobhan Roberts
Mar. 2, 2021
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Automated Formal Program Repair
Speaker: Orna Grumberg (Technion - Israel Institute of Technology)
Feb. 25, 2021

Fall 2020

Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Reductionism in Reinforcement Learning
Speaker: Dale Schuurmans (Google Brain & University of Alberta)
Nov. 23, 2020
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Is Your Distribution in Shape?
Speaker: Ronitt Rubinfeld (MIT)
Nov. 9, 2020
Theoretically Speaking — The Ethical Algorithm
Speaker: Michael Kearns (University of Pennsylvania)
Oct. 14, 2020
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture – Safe Learning in Robotics
Speaker: Claire Tomlin (UC Berkeley)
Oct. 5, 2020
The Alignment Problem: Machine Learning and Human Values
Speaker: Brian Christian (UC Berkeley)
Sep. 17, 2020
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Insights on Gradient-Based Algorithms in High-Dimensional Learning
Speaker: Lenka Zdeborová (EPFL)
Sep. 14, 2020
Hard Choices in Artificial Intelligence
Speaker: Thomas Gilbert (UC Berkeley)
Sep. 10, 2020

Summer 2020

Advances in Boolean Function Analysis — Pseudorandom Generators from Polarizing Random Walks
Speaker: Pooya Hatami (Ohio State University)
Aug. 18, 2020
Advances in Boolean Function Analysis — KKL via Random Restrictions
Speaker: Esty Kelman (Tel Aviv University)
Aug. 12, 2020
Advances in Boolean Function Analysis — Concentration Inequalities for Boolean Functions via Pathwise Stochastic Analysis
Speaker: Ronen Eldan (Weizmann Institute)
Aug. 5, 2020
Advances in Boolean Function Analysis — Improved Bounds for the Sunflower Lemma
Speaker: Shachar Lovett (UC San Diego)
Aug. 3, 2020
Theoretically Speaking — The Mathematical Essence of Aging
Speaker: Uri Alon (Weizmann Institute of Science)
Jul. 30, 2020
Advances in Boolean Function Analysis — Sensitivity Conjecture and Its Applications
Speaker: Hao Huang (Emory University) & Avishay Tal (UC Berkeley)
Jul. 22, 2020
Advances in Boolean Function Analysis — On the Fourier-Entropy Influence Conjecture
Speaker: Dor Minzer (Institute of Advanced Study)
Jul. 15, 2020
Theoretically Speaking — AI for Intelligent Financial Services
Speaker: Manuela Veloso (Head of J.P. Morgan AI Research, Carnegie Mellon University)
Jun. 22, 2020

Spring 2020

Theoretically Speaking — Computational and Statistical Tools to Control a Pandemic: A Panel Discussion
Speaker: Peter Bartlett (Simons Institute for the Theory of Computing, moderator) Panelists: Klaske van Heusden (University of British Columbia), Madhav Marathe (University of Virginia), Ankur Moitra (MIT), Shai Shalev-Shwartz (Hebrew University of Jerusalem), Anil Vullikanti (University of Virginia), and Bin Yu (UC Berkeley)
May 11, 2020
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — A Tale of Turing Machines, Quantum-Entangled Particles, and Operator Algebras
Speaker: Henry Yuen (University of Toronto)
Apr. 20, 2020
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Lattices, Post-Quantum Security and Homomorphic Encryption
Speaker: Daniele Micciancio (UC San Diego)
Apr. 6, 2020
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Lattices ∩ Quantum
Speaker: Zvika Brakerski (Weizmann Institute of Science) 
Mar. 16, 2020

Fall 2019

Theoretically Speaking — Artificial Stupidity: The New AI and the Future of Fintech
Speaker: Andrew W. Lo (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
Dec. 3, 2019
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Average-Case Complexity through the Lens of Interactive Arguments
Speaker: Rafael Pass (Cornell University) 
Dec. 2, 2019
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Byzantine Fault Tolerance Meets Flexibility
Speaker: Dahlia Malkhi (Calibra) 
Nov. 4, 2019
Theoretically Speaking — Algorand's Forthcoming Blockchain Technology
Speaker: Silvio Micali (Founder of Algorand and faculty at MIT)
Oct. 30, 2019
Richard M. Karp Distinguished Lecture — Secure Multiparty Computation
Speaker: Yuval Ishai (Technion Israel Institute of Technology) 
Oct. 14, 2019

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