29 thinkers, books, and ideas connected to this field.
Israeli-American psychologist and cognitive scientist — co-creator with Kahneman of prospect theory and the heuristics-and-biases research program — the most brilliant of the behavioral economics founders — who died of cancer at 59 before the Nobel was awarded.
American neuroscientist — Stanford School of Medicine (associate professor) — host of Huberman Lab podcast — who became the most widely listened-to science communicator in the US by 2023 through translating neuroscience research into daily protocols.
American NFL quarterback — Indianapolis Colts (2012–2019) — Stanford graduate — who retired abruptly at age 29 at the height of his powers, citing physical and mental exhaustion — the most famous premature retirement in recent NFL history.
American psychiatrist — Stanford Medical School — chief of the Stanford Addiction Medicine Dual Diagnosis Clinic — author of Dopamine Nation — who became one of the most prominent public voices on addiction and the opioid epidemic.
American professor at Stanford Graduate School of Business who wrote Made to Stick, Switch, Decisive, and The Power of Moments with his brother Dan Heath — translating academic research on cognition, decision-making, and persuasion into practical frameworks for business.
Australian-American computational linguist at Stanford — co-director of Stanford HAI — known for foundational contributions to natural language processing including the Stanford NLP group, the Stanford Parser, and textbooks used globally in NLP courses.
American stateswoman — former National Security Advisor (2001–2005) and Secretary of State (2005–2009) under George W. Bush — Hoover Institution senior fellow — former Provost of Stanford — one of the most accomplished women in American government history.
Bill Burnett and Dave Evans's 2016 application of Stanford's design thinking methodology to career and life decisions — using prototyping, iteration, and reframing techniques to help readers design a meaningful life, becoming the most popular book based on a Stanford course.
Chinese-American computer scientist at Stanford — creator of ImageNet (the massive labeled image dataset that enabled the deep learning revolution) — co-director of Stanford HAI — former Chief Scientist of AI/ML at Google Cloud — author of The Worlds I See.
Computer scientist at Stanford specializing in human-computer interaction — affiliated with Stanford HAI — known for research on sketch-based interfaces, mobile computing, and AI-powered user interfaces.
American physician and health economist at Stanford — co-author of the Great Barrington Declaration — director of NIH (2025–) — who challenged lockdown policies and argued for focused protection of the vulnerable rather than society-wide restrictions during COVID.
American philosopher — Provost of Stanford (2000–2017) — co-founder of Stanford's Human-Centered AI Institute (HAI) with Fei-Fei Li — logician who has been at the center of Stanford's AI governance efforts.
American computer scientist — President of Stanford University (2000–2016) — co-inventor of the RISC architecture — co-author of Computer Architecture: A Quantitative Approach — Chairman of Alphabet — one of the most influential figures in both computer architecture and university leadership.
AI researcher and educator known for creating CS231n (Convolutional Neural Networks for Visual Recognition) at Stanford — one of the most widely watched computer vision courses in the world — and for research on visual reasoning, image generation, and 3D scene understanding.
American communication coach and Stanford GSB lecturer — host of Think Fast Talk Smart podcast — author of Think Faster Talk Smarter — who teaches spontaneous speaking and communication skills to MBA students and executives.
American political scientist at Stanford and Hoover Institution — former US Ambassador to Russia (2012–2014) — author of From Cold War to Hot Peace — the leading American analyst of Putin's Russia from a democratic-promotion perspective.
American economist — Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences (2001) with George Akerlof and Joseph Stiglitz — for his work on markets with asymmetric information — former Dean of Stanford Business School — author of The Next Convergence.
American historian at Stanford and Hoover Institution — author of Fires of Hatred (on ethnic cleansing in 20th century Europe) and Stalin's Genocides — a leading scholar of 20th century European ethnic violence.
American biologist — Stanford — whose The Population Bomb (1968) predicted mass starvation by the 1980s from overpopulation — which proved incorrect — making him the most cited example of catastrophist scientific prediction failure.
Stanford AI professor affiliated with HAI — known for creating HELM (Holistic Evaluation of Language Models), the Center for Research on Foundation Models (CRFM), and research on NLP, program synthesis, and AI transparency and evaluation.
American economist at Hoover Institution — the leading researcher on the economic returns to educational quality — whose work quantifies how teacher quality affects student lifetime earnings.
American organizational psychologist — Stanford — co-author of The Friction Project and Scaling Up Excellence — whose The No Asshole Rule became a management bestseller for naming a workplace phenomenon.
American neuroendocrinologist — Stanford (biology and neuroscience) — author of Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst, and Determined: A Science of Life Without Free Will — who studies stress hormones in baboons and writes the most accessible synthesis of biology and human behavior.
American physicist at SLAC and Hoover Institution — who combined high-energy physics with arms control advocacy — one of the most respected physics voices on nuclear weapons policy — worked with the President's Science Advisory Committee.
Stanford University's interdisciplinary AI research institute — focused on the development and deployment of human-centered AI — producing influential AI Index reports and research on AI ethics, policy, and safety.
American psychophysiologist at Stanford who scientifically verified lucid dreaming — using pre-arranged eye movement signals to communicate from within REM sleep — and developed MILD and WILD techniques for inducing lucid dreams, founding the scientific study of lucid dreaming.
Matt Abrahams's Stanford Graduate School of Business podcast — providing practical communication skills advice through interviews and instruction — one of the most downloaded business communication podcasts.
Stanford Graduate School of Business podcast hosted by Matt Abrahams — covering communication, public speaking, and professional presence — which has become one of the most listened-to business communication podcasts.
American economist at Hoover Institution — former Marxist turned free-market conservative — author of over 30 books including A Conflict of Visions, The Vision of the Anointed, and Discrimination and Disparities — one of the most consequential public intellectuals of the 20th and 21st centuries.