Emergence

“A riveting account of journeying from childhood chaos to a career studying order and disorder in neural networks.”–Kirkus Reviews”[Sussillo’s] musings offer both a stirring tribute to resilience and a humble acknowledgment of how much remains unknown about the human mind. It’s a gripping and erudite self-portrait.“–Publishers Weekly“David Sussillo writes with rare honesty about chaos, longing, and the work of making a life. Emergence is not just a memoir but an invitation to pay attention to the forces–neural and cultural, intimate and vast–that shape us, and to notice the moments when something new becomes possible.”–Sarah Sentilles, author of Stranger Care“From shattered beginnings to the cutting edge of science, Sussillo’s raw and luminous memoir charts the extraordinary journey of a child born into chaos to his eventual emergence as a pioneering scientist. This is a raw story you’ll never forget; it’s a testament to resilience, the power of curiosity, and the stubborn light of hope that illuminates even the darkest places.”–David Eagleman, neuroscientist at Stanford, author of Incognito and Livewired“In Emergence, the author beautifully weaves together the personal and the scientific, the societal and the individual, to create an emotional roadmap of one person’s journey that just happens to coincide with a technology that is reshaping society. This story could not be more timely.”–David Ambroz, author of A Place Called Home“This fascinating personal journey takes you behind the scenes of the biggest scientific and engineering revolution in our lifetime–the birth of NeuroAI.”–Terrence Sejnowski, Francis Crick Chair, Salk Institute for Biological Studies and Distinguished Professor of Neurobiology, University of California, San Diego

David Sussillo spent five years in the Albuquerque Christian Children’s Home and four years at the Milton Hershey School as a child. After graduating high school, he ultimately received a Ph.D. from Columbia University in Computational Neuroscience.

Now David is an adjunct professor at Stanford University and has been a scientist at the Google Brain group and Meta Reality Labs. In his professional pursuits, David researches brain-machine interfaces to develop the next generation of computers. David was the recipient of a Fulbright research grant and is an internationally recognized neuroscientist with over 40 publications. He works to understand the ghost in the machine - how cells in our brain collectively give rise to the computations that determine behavior.

David has been happily married these last 17 years to his wife, Robin.