Knowledge Cast by Enterprise Knowledge Paco Nathan - Principal DevRel Engineer at Senzing
Aug 26, 2025
Paco Nathan, Principal DevRel Engineer at Senzing, brings over 40 years of experience in tech and expertise in data science and graph technologies. He discusses his pioneering work in making computer science accessible to non-technical students. The conversation dives into the significance of graph technologies and the Semantic Layer in modern data management. Paco shares insights on overcoming challenges in knowledge representation and the importance of investing in semantic technologies for sectors like finance and healthcare.
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Early PCs For Poets Course
- Paco described teaching a popular 'PCs for Poets' course at Stanford, wiring dorms to the early Internet and coaching students.
- The course grew into a residential computing role and influenced peer teaching careers.
Language Leads To Graphs
- Paco traced his interest from natural language to machine learning and knowledge representation in grad school.
- That foundation later steered him toward graph technologies for representing text and relationships.
LLMs Are Models Not Understanding
- Paco argues LLMs model syntax and sequence prediction more than deep language understanding.
- He separates model capacity from true cognition and remains skeptical of AGI claims.
