Zeroing In with Prof. Debayan Gupta | On Keeping and Working with Secrets for Scaled Societies

The talks about computer science as a discipline that’s absolutely hot in trend are all pervasive. Of course, for the right reasons for most part, the field spans across the major pillars of our everyday life, and forms an inescapable basis of our present society. We deep dive with Prof. Debayan Gupta, Assistant Professor at the Ashoka University currently, on these ideas that span across a vast arena, as do his interests. Prof. Gupta completed his doctoral work at Yale University, and held an extraordinary faculty position at MIT, Boston, before moving to Ashoka, while he still acts as a visiting professor and research associate with MIT.

In this conversation where Prof. Gupta eloquently puts across the brilliance and beauty of the discipline, in context with the wider world and personal understanding thereof, the insights make for a compelling case to ask newer questions in the contemporary world to make sense of this changing playground.

We talk about the ideas of computer science that derive from mathematics, and core logic at heart, flowing in to beautiful applications as in encryption, cryptography, and digital (well, almost real) privacy.

Sit back and immerse yourself in the ideas that are almost reminiscent of the words by Bill Watterson, “To invent your own life’s meaning is not easy, but it’s still allowed and I think you’ll be happier for the trouble”, in the playfully put context of the 21st century world experienced from behind the screens.