MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE LABORATORY

AI Working Paper 316 October, 1988

How to do Research At the MIT AI Lab

by:

a whole bunch of current, former, and honorary MIT AI Lab graduate students

David Chapman, Editor

September, 1988.

Abstract:

This document presumptuously purports to explain how to do research. We give heuristics that may be useful in picking up the specific skills needed for research (reading, writing, programming) and for understanding and enjoying the process itself (methodology, topic and advisor selection, and emotional factors).

Copyright 1987, 1988 by the authors.

A. I. Laboratory Working Papers are produced for internal circulation, and may contain information that is, for example, too preliminary or too detailed for formal publication. It is not intended that they should be considered papers to which reference can be made in the literature.

• Contents
• Introduction
  • What is this?
  • Who's it for?
  • How do I use it?
• Reading AI
• Getting connected
• Learning other fields
• Notebooks
• Writing
• Talks
• Programming
• Advisors
• The thesis
• Research methodology
• Emotional factors
• Endnote

A whole lot of people at MIT