The History And Future Of Brain Implants - EP 31 Sumner Norman

**Ashlee Vance** (0:00)
It's kind of cool, right? I can just do it myself. Usually, there's like four people to do all this stuff.

**Sumner Norman** (0:05)
Let's pretend that there is, though. Just be like, hey, John, Bob, you guys ready?

**Ashlee Vance** (0:10)
Guys.

**Sumner Norman** (0:11)
We're rolling.

**Ashlee Vance** (0:11)
Be quiet. Be quiet.

**Sumner Norman** (0:13)
Keep the cat down.

**Ashlee Vance** (0:14)
Be quiet. If you're ready, do you want to chill or are you good?

**Sumner Norman** (0:22)
I think I'm, I don't know what I would do in the chill time.

**Ashlee Vance** (0:26)
We are just talking. So it's not, it's not overly complicated. Otherwise, okay, well then I will introduce you. Okay. Sumner Norman, you're a co-founder and CEO of Forest Neuro. More than that, you are, you're someone I met, I feel like, I don't know, three, four years ago now?

**Sumner Norman** (1:06)
It's either six months or six years, but either way, the time dilation is real.

**Ashlee Vance** (1:11)
One of those, but you, we got introduced, I suspect, kind of through Adam Marblestone and James Fickle, or some brain network, and then you're someone I just ended up discussing. You've been immensely helpful in so many things I do in the BCI Brain Computer Interface space.

**Sumner Norman** (1:32)
That's all any of us hope to be is helpful. I think I just like nerding out with you. We did some good nerding out.

**Ashlee Vance** (1:38)
We've done good nerding out, but I always feel like there's so many things going on in this brain implant, brain computer interface world. I always feel like you have a balanced take on things. And so it's been helpful to me to calibrate what is going on. And then, so we'll get into Forest Neuro in a second. And, but I always like to let people get to know folks a little bit, you know? And, and, and so I was going to dive in a little, little biographical journey for a second. One thing I, when I was, I had never, I hadn't like properly researched you in a while. I'm sure I did the first time I was coming down to LA to interview you. But then, yeah, there's something, I don't know, I just had not filed this away properly, but you were, you're like a mechanical engineer by training as opposed to neuroscience. And then you seem to know like everything about neuroscience as well.

**Sumner Norman** (2:34)
Yeah, I don't know everything about neuroscience. And luckily for us, actually, the neuroscientists also don't know everything about neuroscience. That's how I get away with it. But yeah, I was actually trained as a mechanical and aerospace engineer and some background in physics as well.

**Ashlee Vance** (2:49)
And you got like all the way up to a PhD in mechanical engineering.

**Sumner Norman** (2:54)
Yeah. So yeah, undergrad in physics and mechanical specifically, and then my master's and PhD were in mechanical and aerospace by division, like the actual department of the school. But my focus is in control theory and brain computer interfaces. And where that really marries is the control of exoskeleton robotics with brain computer interfaces for therapeutic use.

**Ashlee Vance** (3:16)
Well, when you were either high school years or the beginning of college years, did you know you were going to brain stuff or you thought you would be making rockets then?

**Sumner Norman** (3:26)
I thought I'd be making rockets. Okay. Yeah, I think, so just like I'll back way up.

**Ashlee Vance** (3:32)
Yeah, yeah, let's do it.

**Sumner Norman** (3:33)
I grew up in a very, very small town in Utah, something like 5,000 people. It's like Mormons, cows, and then this one nerdy brown kid that didn't fit in.
So I was the first person in my family to go to college. I was trying to find my bearings, and one thing I knew I loved was math. So I was just a huge math nerd. I knew I wanted to be a mechanical engineer because we went on a family trip to the Boeing factory when I was 11 years old. My dad was a pilot, and so I met a mechanical engineer, and I remember this, and I was like, that guy's got powers because there's something on his computer screen and on his desk is the thing he designed.

**Ashlee Vance** (4:10)
Okay.

**Sumner Norman** (4:11)
These days, it's like green lines on black screen. So I had my mom write it down, mechanical engineer, and I was like, that's what I'm going to do.

**Ashlee Vance** (4:17)
Was your dad a professional pilot or a hobbyist pilot?

**Sumner Norman** (4:21)