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Richard Sutton
Pioneers

Richard Sutton

Father of reinforcement learning; wrote The Bitter Lesson.

b. 1957United StatesProfessor, University of AlbertaResearch Scientist, Keen Technologies
WebsiteWikipedia

Co-authored the field's standard RL text and, in a 2019 essay, argued that general methods leveraging computation beat handcrafted knowledge every time — a claim the scaling era proved emphatically.

Known for
Temporal-difference learningThe Bitter LessonTuring Award 2024

3 CareerEvery role we can document, most recent first

  1. 2023–now3 yrsKeen TechnologiesResearch Scientist
  2. 2003–now23 yrsUniversity of AlbertaProfessor
  3. 2017–20236 yrsDeepMindDistinguished Research Scientist

1 Books & papersPublished work, oldest first

  1. 1998Reinforcement Learning: An Introduction

LineageWho taught whom. Most of this field descends from a handful of laboratories, and the shortest path between two researchers is usually an advisor.

Studied underdoctoral or postdoctoral advisors
Andrew Barto

More in Pioneers

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Portrait by https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/diffusion/GOJU/browse/master/AUTHORS.txt, PD, via Wikimedia Commons. Roles and dates are drawn from public professional records. Where a current role is listed, it reflects the most recent information available and may have changed.