Professor Thrun changed my life, I and many tens of thousands around the world graduated from his classes, gaining an education that would have been impossible for many of us.<p>I am forever in his debt for his tireless work as an educator and his work on SLAM &amp; Self Driving Cars.<p>Being taught by practitioners at the cutting edge of research like Thrun, Norvig, Ng, &amp; Hinton is the education I dreamed of. I hope that Udacity develops into a full research vehicle and offers its own qualifications, the UKs Open University is a good model for this.<p>His 2015 talk on democratising education is visionary, practical and disruptive. <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=898S7o9UnPA" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=898S7o9UnPA</a>