Gary Marcus

Gary Fred Marcus, born in 1970 in Baltimore, Maryland, developed an early interest in artificial intelligence and coding. He pursued cognitive science at Hampshire College before attending the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) for his master’s and doctoral degrees. During his time at MIT, Marcus focused his research on negative evidence in language acquisition and regularization in children’s acquisition of grammatical morphology, with Steven Pinker serving as his doctoral advisor. This foundational work explored how children learn language, particularly instances of over-regularization such as ‘breaked’ instead of ‘broke’, which contributed to his early understanding of mental rules and cognitive processes.

In 2014, Marcus co-founded Geometric Intelligence, a machine learning startup that Uber acquired in December 2016. Following the acquisition, he became the director of Uber’s AI efforts, a role he held until March 2017. His work at Geometric Intelligence and Uber positioned him at the forefront of AI development in the private sector. In 2019, he further advanced his entrepreneurial career by launching Robust.AI with Rodney Brooks, co-founder of iRobot. Robust.AI aims to develop a machine-learning platform for autonomous robots, similar to how game engines are utilized by video game developers.

Marcus is also Professor Emeritus of Psychology and Neural Science at New York University and a prolific author. His publications include “The Algebraic Mind,” “Kluge,” “The Birth of the Mind,” and the “New York Times” Bestseller “Guitar Zero.” He has been a notable critic of AI hype, advocating for regulation, increased AI literacy, and the establishment of public think tanks to address potential AI risks. His 2019 book, “Rebooting AI,” co-authored with Ernest Davis, outlines challenges and approaches to building more reliable artificial intelligence, and was listed as one of Forbes’s “7 Must Read Books in AI.”