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Neural Task Graphs: Generalizing to Unseen Tasks from a Single Video Demonstration

arXiv.org Artificial Intelligence

Our goal is for a robot to execute a previously unseen task based on a single video demonstration of the task. The success of our approach relies on the principle of transferring knowledge from seen tasks to unseen ones with similar semantics. More importantly, we hypothesize that to successfully execute a complex task from a single video demonstration, it is necessary to explicitly incorporate compositionality to the model. To test our hypothesis, we propose Neural Task Graph (NTG) Networks, which use task graph as the intermediate representation to modularize the representations of both the video demonstration and the derived policy. We show this formulation achieves strong inter-task generalization on two complex tasks: Block Stacking in BulletPhysics and Object Collection in AI2-THOR. We further show that the same principle is applicable to real-world videos. We show that NTG can improve data efficiency of few-shot activity understanding in the Breakfast Dataset.


Symbol Emergence in Cognitive Developmental Systems: a Survey

arXiv.org Artificial Intelligence

Humans use signs, e.g., sentences in a spoken language, for communication and thought. Hence, symbol systems like language are crucial for our communication with other agents and adaptation to our real-world environment. The symbol systems we use in our human society adaptively and dynamically change over time. In the context of artificial intelligence (AI) and cognitive systems, the symbol grounding problem has been regarded as one of the central problems related to {\it symbols}. However, the symbol grounding problem was originally posed to connect symbolic AI and sensorimotor information and did not consider many interdisciplinary phenomena in human communication and dynamic symbol systems in our society, which semiotics considered. In this paper, we focus on the symbol emergence problem, addressing not only cognitive dynamics but also the dynamics of symbol systems in society, rather than the symbol grounding problem. We first introduce the notion of a symbol in semiotics from the humanities, to leave the very narrow idea of symbols in symbolic AI. Furthermore, over the years, it became more and more clear that symbol emergence has to be regarded as a multifaceted problem. Therefore, secondly, we review the history of the symbol emergence problem in different fields, including both biological and artificial systems, showing their mutual relations. We summarize the discussion and provide an integrative viewpoint and comprehensive overview of symbol emergence in cognitive systems. Additionally, we describe the challenges facing the creation of cognitive systems that can be part of symbol emergence systems.


Dual optimization for convex constrained objectives without the gradient-Lipschitz assumption

arXiv.org Machine Learning

The minimization of convex objectives coming from linear supervised learning problems, such as penalized generalized linear models, can be formulated as finite sums of convex functions. For such problems, a large set of stochastic first-order solvers based on the idea of variance reduction are available and combine both computational efficiency and sound theoretical guarantees (linear convergence rates). Such rates are obtained under both gradient-Lipschitz and strong convexity assumptions. Motivated by learning problems that do not meet the gradient-Lipschitz assumption, such as linear Poisson regression, we work under another smoothness assumption, and obtain a linear convergence rate for a shifted version of Stochastic Dual Coordinate Ascent (SDCA) that improves the current state-of-the-art. Our motivation for considering a solver working on the Fenchel-dual problem comes from the fact that such objectives include many linear constraints, that are easier to deal with in the dual. Our approach and theoretical findings are validated on several datasets, for Poisson regression and another objective coming from the negative log-likelihood of the Hawkes process, which is a family of models which proves extremely useful for the modeling of information propagation in social networks and causality inference.


2 Companies Bringing Artificial Intelligence to the Classroom

#artificialintelligence

I really like their forward use of technology in that they have applied artificial intelligence to tutoring. One example is an app that they have called RealSkill. RealSkill helps Chinese students learn English. If you're going on to further education, you're going to get a PhD, or perhaps even be in trade, any type of global commerce that you might participate in in the Chinese workforce, you'll need to speak English. This app, RealSkill, helps Chinese students learn English by looking at essays that the students write.


The Push For A Gender-Neutral Siri

NPR Technology

Siri, Alexa and Cortana all started out as female. Now a group of marketing executives, tech experts and academics are trying to make virtual assistants more egalitarian. Siri, Alexa and Cortana all started out as female. Now a group of marketing executives, tech experts and academics are trying to make virtual assistants more egalitarian. Have you ever noticed something most virtual assistants have in common?


Commentary: Industry, Education Needed to Bridge STEM Skills Gap

U.S. News

To operate robotic arms, students are required to know a small amount of coding. STEM Education Works has traveled to the Lafayette, Indiana, CoderDojo several times to teach students how to program the Dobot Magician robotic arms. The lessons involve real-world actions that make sense to young students. When using the visual programming language Blockly in May, students directed the robots to run bases in a mock baseball game. At Subaru of Indiana Automotive, the students programed the scaled-down robotic arms to write their names before learning about the larger, industrial robots, providing a real-world application for the activity they completed.


Five expert tips to make Machine Learning development work for you

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We can see a lot of hype about AI and Machine Learning, and its potential to transform businesses. More and more ัompanies are adopting machine learning solutions, setting up accelerators, opening R&D centers, and investing into startups. On the other hand, there are many companies that are using old-fashioned data analytics tools and labeling them as AI. Also,there is a large number of reports with AI market estimates and forecasts. However, it's challenging to get the right information on machine learning development that will actually work for your business. As a company that has delivered successful Machine Learning and Data Science solutions across such industries as Healthcare, Aviation, Media and Entertainment, and Technology, we've decided to talk with our experts and collect top guidelines for making your machine learning development project work.


The achievement gap and AI augmented online tutoring

#artificialintelligence

The achievement gap between students who come from different socio-economic backgrounds is a well-known and persistent problem in education. Disparities in achievements between high and low socio-economic groups are evident in children as young as age 3 years and seem to be a problem the world over. Despite pupils' overall attainment scores rising over the last decade or so, the gap between students from different socio-economic groups remains intractably present and widespread. Family finances play a big part amongst the various reasons for this disparity. Pupils from low socio-economic backgrounds (SEBs) are often only able to attend a few, if any of the extra-curricular activities enjoyed by their more affluent peers. Access to good schools for pupils from SEBs is often reduced as is their access to the educational and occupational aspirations which can impact children's academic achievement.


Using AI, Big Data To Design The Right Curriculum - CXOtoday.com

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The world is evolving faster than ever thanks to the proliferation of technology brought about by an increasingly connected global market. And while the changes in education system was slow a few decades ago, the course curriculum was not required to be updated frequently. However, with today's fast pace changes in market needs, new curriculum is required almost every few months. This is primarily due to the fact that while technology, knowledge, and the job market can and do change almost overnight, the education system is rigid, often bureaucratic, and in many cases even resistant to change. This ever expanding gap between academia and the real world has resulted in a whole generation of students who while undoubtedly talented, intelligent, and hardworking simply do not have the skillsets required for employment.


Samsung Electronics Wins at Two Top Global AI Machine Reading Comprehension Challenges

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Samsung Research, the advanced R&D hub of Samsung Electronics' SET (end-products) business, has ranked first in two of the world's top global artificial intelligence (AI) machine reading comprehension competitions. Samsung Research recently placed first in the MAchine Reading COmprehension (MS MARCO) Competition held by Microsoft (MS), as well as showing the best performance in TriviaQA* hosted by the University of Washington, proving the excellence of its AI algorithm. With intense competition in developing AI technologies globally, machine reading comprehension competitions such as MS MARCO are booming around the world. MS MARCO and TriviaQA are among the actively researched and used machine reading comprehension competitions along with SQuAD of Stanford University and NarrativeQA of DeepMind. Distinguished universities around the world and global AI firms including Samsung are competing in these challenges.