Geoffrey Hinton
(Photos by Johnny Guatto)
‘Godfather of deep learning’ and U of T University Professor Emeritus Geoffrey Hinton has been announced as the 2021 recipient of the Dickson Prize in Science from Carnegie Mellon University (CMU).
The prize, one of the most prestigious awards bestowed by CMU, recognizes substantial achievements or sustained progress in engineering, the natural sciences, computer science or mathematics.
In announcing Hinton as the recipient of this year’s prize, Carnegie Mellon wrote:
“Over the past four decades, his pioneering research in neural networks has helped us understand how machines can learn from experience. His work contributed to technology that has enabled many recent successes in artificial intelligence, including speech recognition, language translation and computer vision, among others.”
Before joining U of T’s Department of Computer Science in 1987, Hinton was a professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon.
He is the recipient of some of the highest honours in computer science, including the 2018 A.M. Turing Award, often referred to as ‘the Nobel Prize of computing.’
“I want to congratulate Geoff on this prestigious award that recognizes the transformative impact of his decades of research and applications in the field of deep learning,” said Marsha Chechik, professor and chair of the Department of Computer Science. “The advancements made possible by his pioneering work have touched the lives of billions of people around the world, and we’re proud to call him our colleague.”
As part of CMU’s University Lecture Series, Hinton will receive his award and present the annual Dickson Prize in Science lecture in the spring of 2022.