I recently talked with James Kuffner at the ICRA conference in Rotterdam in the Netherlands. Topics included getting into Stanford, his contributions to robot motion planning, robotics in japan, the google self-driving car project, Woven city, and his advice on becoming successful.

Content
00:00 Introduction
01:24 Background
02:38 Getting into robotics
04:55 Programming at 12 years old
05:52 Getting into Stanford
07:30 Robotics at Stanford
12:19 From computer vision to motion planning
13:59 RRT-Connect algorithm
20:31 Is research in motion planning still valuable?
22:48 Will LLMs deprecate planning?
26:23 Timeline for truly intelligent robots
28:10 Breakthroughs required for AI
32:30 Cloud robotics
34:47 Going to Japan
37:04 Technological progress and craftsmanship in Japan
39:34 Work culture in Japan
43:49 Professor at Carnegie Mellon University
46:03 Collaborations at CMU
47:25 Self-driving project at Google
51:53 Coding mastery at google
53:51 Code search tool
55:09 Vi versus Emacs
56:27 Full self-driving
58:44 Who is ahead in self-driving technology?
01:01:06 Achieving level 5 autonomy
01:04:51 Behavior of robot cars and the median driver
01:06:30 Impact of self-driving on labor
01:10:37 Biggest problems for society
01:13:36 Woven City by Toyota
01:15:41 Job loss after Fukushima earthquake
01:18:01 A city from scratch
01:19:29 Climbing mount Fuji
01:20:42 Inventor garage
01:23:11 Startup incubator and beyond
01:23:57 Success definition
01:26:18 Daily habits
01:27:59 Pulling all-nighters
01:30:00 Advanced Shakespeare
01:30:58 Advice for early career researchers
01:31:59 Value of books
01:32:31 Linus Pauling: Change fields every 7 years
01:33:37 Next big project
01:34:34 Influential books
01:36:59 The value of biographies
01:38:23 Personal goal of 50 books per year
01:39:43 Biggest contribution to science

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• 49:16 James wants to add that the CMU car went 7.32 miles and not about 17 miles in the first DARPA grand challenge.
• 1:24:13 The success quote is from Ralph Waldo Emerson and not E. Pugh. The original quote is: "What is success? To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate the beauty; to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch Or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded!" -- Ralph Waldo Emerson