Disclaimer: machine translated by DeepL which may contain errors.
Reading and Understanding the Earth Today for the Future
Naoto Yokoya
（ Professor, Graduate School of Frontier Sciences / Department of Information Science
Naoto Yokoya graduated from the Graduate School of Engineering, The University of Tokyo in 2008, and received his Ph. D. from the Graduate School of Engineering, The University of Tokyo in 2013. He was awarded the Young Scientists' Prize by the Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology in 2024, and was a Clarivate Highly Cited Paper Author from 2022 to 2024.
Q. What was your favorite subject as a child?
A. Physical education, arts and crafts, and home economics.
It was better for me to move and try things by myself than to sit still and listen. I was the type of person who was absorbed in moving my body in physical education and creating something with my hands in arts and crafts and home economics.
Q. What were you interested in when you were in junior high and high school?
A. Track and field, the earth
I devoted myself to track and field club activities for six years in junior high and high school, but things didn't always go the way I wanted them to. On the other hand, at the time I was somewhat interested in how long the earth would last due to human activities and what kind of technology would be needed. These two things may have been the starting point that led me to where I am today.
Q. What books or textbooks would you recommend to students?
A. " Are you kidding me, Mr. Feynman?"
(written by Richard Phillips Feynman, translated by Masako Onuki). Feynman's intellectual curiosity and playful attitude convey the essential joy of learning. There are two volumes, but you can read it easily.
Q. What if you could be reincarnated, go back in time, or be reincarnated as an animal?
A. Time slip
I am interested in what humans and the earth will be like hundreds of years from now, and I would like to meet the great people of the past and experience the atmosphere of that era. If I could only choose one era, it would be really difficult.
Q. What are your hobbies?
A. Spending time with my children.
My heart is refreshed when I am with children. They have sensitivities that I don't have, and they have a heart that is full of excitement. The time I have with my children is not as long as I would like it to be.
Q. Do you think you are lucky?
A. Yes.
I think I have been blessed with the times, the environment, and the people I have met. I feel that good things are more likely to happen if you think so.
Q. What is your motto?
A. To live in the world is to do the right thing.
It is a phrase from Ryotaro Shiba's "Ryoma ga yuku" that I read when I was in junior high school. I remember that I was strangely convinced.
Message from Mr. Ryoma