Machine 'learns' like a human

Scientists have invented a machine that imitates the way the human brain learns new information, a step forward for artificial intelligence, researchers reported.
The system described in the journal Science is a computer model "that captures humans' unique ability to learn new concepts from a single example," the study said.
"Though the model is only capable of learning handwritten characters from alphabets, the approach underlying it could be broadened to have applications for other symbol-based systems, like gestures, dance moves, and the words of spoken and signed languages."

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Picture taken at the permanent exhibition "C3RV34U" at the "Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie" in Paris, dedicated to the human brain

Joshua Tenenbaum, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute for Technology (MIT), said he wanted to build a machine that could mimic the mental abilities of young children.
"Before they get to kindergarten, children learn to recognize new concepts from just a single example, and can even imagine new examples they haven't seen," said Tenenbaum.
"We are still far from building machines as smart as a human child, but this is the first time we have had a machine able to learn and use a large class of real-world concepts -- even simple visual concepts such as handwritten characters -- in ways that are hard to tell apart from humans."
The system is a called a "Bayesian Program Learning" (BPL) framework, where concepts are represented as simple computer programs.
Researchers showed that the model could use "knowledge from previous concepts to speed learning on new concepts," such as building on knowledge of the Latin alphabet to learn letters in the Greek alphabet.
"The authors applied their model to over 1,600 types of handwritten characters in 50 of the world's writing systems, including Sanskrit, Tibetan, Gujarati, Glagolitic -- and even invented characters such as those from the television series Futurama," said the study.
Since humans require very little data to learn a new concept, the research could lead to new advances in artificial intelligence, the study authors said.
"It has been very difficult to build machines that require as little data as humans when learning a new concept," said Ruslan Salakhutdinov, an assistant professor of computer science at the University of Toronto.
"Replicating these abilities is an exciting area of research connecting machine learning, statistics, computer vision, and cognitive science."

The machine that learns like a CHILD: Algorithm recognises and scribbles symbols that look identical to those produced by humans

• Software has been called the Bayesian Program Learning framework
• It recognises a symbol by looking at it once and copying its general shape
• The framework can even draw symbols that are hard to spot by humans
• Machines usually take hundreds of attempts to memorise visual concepts

When children are shown a new object, such as letter in the alphabet, a picture or a real-world item, they generally only need a couple of instances to be able to identify it accurately.

Machines, by comparison, have to be trained hundreds and thousands of times to not only identify an object, but also to recognise it from different angles.

But researchers have designed an algorithm to solve this problem by allowing computers to learn visually in the same way as humans do.

Scroll down for video 

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A computer algorithm that memorises general shapes of objects and can draw them out again has shown computers can learn visually in the same way as young children. The images above were drawn by a the computer and by a human. The machine generated symbols 1 and 2 in the top row and 2 and 1 in the second

This has allowed the machines to not only identify an object from its shape, but also draw it for themselves - much in the same way young children do when they are learning.

For example the machine can be shown a letter of the alphabet or a symbol and then draw it.

The resulting sketches were almost indistinguishable from those drawn by humans. 

Professor Joshua Tenenbaum, a cognitive scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who was one of the researchers involved in the study, said: 'Before they get to kindergarten, children learn to recognise new concepts from just a single example, and can even imagine new examples they haven't seen'

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Humans need a couple of instances to be able to identify a symbol. It takes thousands of examples for a machine to learn one (artist's impression)

'We are still far from building machines as smart as a human child, but this is the first time we have had a machine able to learn and use a large class of real-world concepts - even simple visual concepts such as handwritten characters - in ways that are hard to tell apart from humans.'

The algorithm was created along with Dr Brenden Lake, a cognitive scientist from New York University.

When a child is shown the letter A, for example, they can identify the same shape even when it is written by different people in slightly different ways. 

Equally, showing someone a single picture of a kettle will likely be enough for that person to recognise other non-identical kettles, of different shapes and colours.

The team's program, called 'Bayesian Program Learning' (BPL) framework, was developed to work in a similar way.

When the computer is presented with a symbol - for instance, the letter A - it starts randomly generating different examples of that symbol, in various ways it could have been drawn.

Rather than looking at the symbol as a cluster of pixels, BPL memorises it as the result of a 'generative process'. 

This involves establishing which specific strokes were made to draw it. 

This approach allows the machine to recognise the letter in various guises, such as the differences between how two people draw the letter for example.

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In what they called a 'Visual Turing Test', the researchers showed both the handwritten and the machine-generated doodles to a group of people. Fewer than 25 per cent could spot the computer generated doodles. In the picture above the machine generated symbols are B and A in the top row and A and B in the bottom

The model was tested on more than 1,600 types of handwritten symbols in 50 different alphabets or codes. 

These included Sanskrit, Tibetan, Gujarati, Glagolitic, and even imaginary letters shown in the television series Futurama.

THE VISUAL TURING TEST 

Taking a leaf out of Alan Turing - the British computer scientist who devised a question-based test to tell the difference between a man and a machine-  the researchers asked their program and some human volunteers to invent new characters in the style of those they had been shown.

Then, in what they called a 'Visual Turing Test', both the handwritten and the machine-generated symbols were shown to another group of people, who were asked to identify which symbols had been created by the program.

 The researchers reported that fewer than 25 percent of the 'judges' managed to guess which symbols were computer-generated at a percentage significantly better than chance.

The program was consistently able to reproduce the characters after being shown only one example for each of them.

Taking it a step further, the researchers asked the machine as well as human volunteers to invent new characters in the style of those they had been shown. 

Then, in what the researchers called a 'visual Turing Test', both the handwritten and the machine-generated symbols were shown to another group of people, who were asked to identify which symbols had been created by the program. 

The researchers reported that fewer than 25 per cent of the 'judges' managed to guess which symbols were computer-generated at a percentage significantly better than chance.

'Our results show that by reverse engineering how people think about a problem, we can develop better algorithms,' explained Dr Lake, who was the lead author on the study, which is published in the journal Science.

'Moreover, this work points to promising methods to narrow the gap for other machine learning tasks.

India's Sanskrit speakers seek to revive 'dead' language

In a tiny flat in a rundown alley in New Delhi, Rakesh Kumar Misra is working against the odds to bring India's ancient Sanskrit language to the country's millions.
The 4,000-year-old classical language was traditionally used by Brahmin intellectuals and Hindu priests. Rarely spoken as a mother tongue in India, Sanskrit is often dismissed as a dead language.
But Misra is undeterred, spending up to 12 hours a day hunched over his computer, translating and writing articles for a weekly 16-page newspaper in the script.

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An Indian priest reads a Sanskrit newspaper as he sits inside a temple in New Delhi

"My aim is to take Sanskrit to the masses, to make it accessible to everyone," Misra, who has a masters in Sanskrit studies and sees the language as indelibly linked to India's heritage, told AFP.
Hopes of a Sanskrit revival, long pushed by Hindu hardliners, have been rising since India's Hindu nationalist Prime Minister Narendra Modi stormed to power at last year's general election.
Several ministers, although not Modi himself, took an oath of office in the revered language and a national "Sanskrit week" was later declared to promote its teaching in schools.
The first Sanskrit movie made in more than two decades (and only the third ever) was shown at a leading film festival in November in the tourism state of Goa.
Vinod Mankara, director of "Priyamanasam", about a 17th century-poet from the southern state of Kerala, said he hoped to secure government help to show the film overseas to "mesmerise foreigners" with the language.
"It's been my desire from long back to propagate the beauty of the Sanskrit language," he told AFP.
- Intolerance rising -
But the focus on Sanskrit has sparked a debate about its role in India, which has 22 official languages, many spoken by sizeable minorities.
Critics fear Hindu hardliners are promoting Sanskrit as a way of imposing Hindu superiority on the country's religious and linguistic minorities.
Mankara has rejected criticism that his film promotes Hindu ideology, calling it "pure art".
It comes at a time of raging controversy over whether the Modi government is failing to uphold India's tradition of secularism and diversity, amid rising fears of growing intolerance towards Muslims and others.
Education Minister Smriti Irani, responsible for promoting the language, denies the right-wing government has any hidden agenda and describes Sanskrit as the "voice of India's soul and wisdom".
But she faces an uphill battle popularising it in schools, where it is offered as an optional language, and where some believe it's linked with India's past not its future.
"There are a lot of languages on offer and it's difficult to deliver it everywhere," KC Tripathi, head of languages at the National Council of Educational Research and Training, a government body that advises on school curriculums.
Tripathi said the council was forming a new education policy, at the Modi government's request, that includes updating and improving the way Sanskrit is taught in schools.
- India's heritage -
Only 14,100 people speak Sanskrit as their main language, according to the latest census figures, less than one percent of India's 1.25 billion population.
Still used in Hindu prayers and chants in temples, Sanskrit is the root of many but not all Indian languages and descends from the Indo-Aryans.
It was used thousands of years ago by India's intellectuals whose manuscripts covered everything from philosophy to astronomy and medicine, not unlike Latin or Greek in the West.
"You can't think about India without thinking of Sanskrit. The intellectual heritage of India for the last 5,000 years is rooted in Sanskrit," said Ramesh Bhardwaj, head of Delhi University's Sanskrit department, the world's largest with 4,000 undergraduate students.
"This is not a dead language," he added.
Bhardwaj said he is disappointed the government has not done more to revive Sanskrit, including making it compulsory in schools, so younger generations can understand India's roots.
"They (the government) came to power in the name of nationalism which includes Sanskrit, but nothing has been done," the professor said.
Misra, who draws no salary for producing his newspaper, one of only a handful in India and distributed mainly outside Hindu temples, is under no illusions about the scale of his task.
But he said India, like any country, cannot progress without all its people, not just its elite, understanding its past.
"It shouldn't just end up becoming a language of textbooks and research."

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Indian participants attend a class at the Sanskrit Samvadshala on the outskirts of New Delhi

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Sanskrit, a 4,000 year-old classical language, was traditionally used by Brahmin intellectuals and Hindu priests but is rarely spoken as a mother tongue in India

Sanskrit fever grips Germany: 14 universities teaching India's ancient language struggle to meet demand as students clamour for courses

Will Germans be the eventual custodians of Sanskrit, its rich heritage and culture? If the demand for Sanskrit and Indology courses in Germany is any indication, that’s what the future looks like. 

Unable to cope with the flood of applications from around the world, the South Asia Institute, University of Heidelberg, had to start a summer school in spoken Sanskrit in Switzerland, Italy and - believe it or not - India too. 

“When we started it 15 years ago, we were almost ready to shut it after a couple of years. Instead, we had to increase strength and take the course to other European countries,” said Professor Dr. Axel Michaels, head of classical Indology at the university. 

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The summer school in spoken Sanskrit at the South Asia Institute, University of Heidelberg, is attended by students from all over the world

In Germany, 14 of the top universities teach Sanskrit, classical and modern Indology compared to just four in the UK. The summer school spans a month in August every year and draws applications from across the globe. 

“So far, 254 students from 34 countries have participated in this course. Every year we have to reject many applications,” said Dr. Michaels. 

Apart from Germany, the majority of students come from the US, Italy, the UK and the rest of Europe. 

Professor Dr. Axel Michaels, Head of Classical Indology at the University of Heidelberg, says students from 34 countries have taken the course

Linking Sanskrit with religion and a certain political ideology was “stupid” and “detrimental to the cause” of its rich heritage, the professor said. 

“Even the core thoughts of Buddhism were in the Sanskrit language. To better understand the genesis of oriental philosophy, history, languages, sciences and culture, it’s essential to read the original Sanskrit texts as these are some of the earliest thoughts and discoveries,” he added. 

Francesca Lunari, a medical student who has been studying Sanskrit at Heidelberg University, agreed. 

“I am interested in psychoanalysis and must know how human thoughts originated through texts, cultures and societies. I will learn Bangla also to decipher the seminal works of Girindra Sekhar Bose, a pioneer of oriental psychiatry who has hardly been studied – even in India. Learning Sanskrit is the first step,” she said. 

Languages such as Bangla, in which Bose had written his theories challenging Freud, might face a crisis similar to Sanskrit because of the onslaught of English if these languages aren’t preserved within households, felt Dr Hans Harder, head of the department of modern South Asian languages and literatures (modern Indology), Heidelberg University. 

“A significant part of the global cultural heritage will become extinct if major languages like Hindi and Bangla fall prey to Indian English which, in the process, has only got poorer,” he added. 

An expert in Bangla, Hindi and Urdu apart from European languages, Harder cautioned against such a disaster as more upwardly mobile families stop teaching their own language to their children. 

Studying ethno-Indology helps contextualise and link subjects to ancient texts. 

“One can better understand evolution of politics and economics by studying Arthashastra by Chanakya,” said Dr. Michaels. 

So this semester the institute is offering a course on ‘human physiology and psychology in the early Upanishads’ by Anand Mishra, an IIT mathematics graduate who took up the study of Sanskrit for his research on evolving a more grammatically suitable computing language. 

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PM Narendra Modi with German Chancellor Angela Merkel

“Working on Panini’s Sanskrit grammar, I realised it could be a great tool in computing language,” said Mishra. 

Dr. Michaels feels that instead of indulging in a political and religious debate, Indians should try to preserve their heritage. 

“Don’t we conserve a rare, old painting or sculpture? This is a live language…and rich cultural heritage which might become the casualty of neglect just as great civilisations like Hampi, the art of Ajanta and temples of Konark got buried in oblivion. It was up to the British to discover them later. Sanskrit, along with its culture, philosophy and science might become similarly extinct,” he claimed, adding: “On the other hand, there is so much yet to discover through Sanskrit…details of Indus Valley civilisation, for example.” 

Germany has already been a storehouse of Sanskrit scholars to the world. 

“The majority of Sanskrit scholars, including those at Harvard, California Berkeley and the UK, are Germans,” he said. 

But why? 

“Probably because we never colonised India and maintained a romantic view about it,” quipped Dr. Michaels. 

 

'Language cannot shake secularism' 

India's secularism is not so weak that it will be shaken just because of a language, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said in the backdrop of a row over Sanskrit replacing German in government-run schools in India. 

Addressing a reception for the Indian community on Monday, Modi referred to a time decades ago, when German radio had a news bulletin in Sanskrit. 

“In India, there was no news bulletin in Sanskrit at that time because perhaps it was thought that secularism would be endangered,” the prime minister said. 

Modi said India’s secularism is not so weak that it will be shaken just because of a language. One should have self-confidence. 

Self-confidence should not be shaken, he added. 

The prime minister did not elaborate, but his veiled comments assume significance as these came months after a row over replacing of German as third language in government-run Kendirya Vidyalaya schools with Sanskrit. -PTI 

 

Experts bat for Sanskrit in schools 

By Mail Today Bureau in New Delhi 

Even as the row over replacing German with Sanskrit in Kendriya Vidyalays partly resurfaced in far away in Berlin, educationists back home feel that it is very important to introduce Sanskrit at the school level to enable students have a better understanding of the subject. 

“Sanskrit is an essential part of every Indian soul. Without the language, the society loses its identity. From Raja Ram Mohan Roy to Mahatma Gandhi, everyone was inspired by the language. The whole renaissance period was based on Sanskrit literature,” Professor Ramesh Bharadwaj, head of the Sanskrit department at Delhi University, told Mail Today. 

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Educationists feel it is important to introduce Sanskrit at school level as it will enable students to have a better understanding of the subject

Historians, meanwhile, feel that successive governments have taken no initiatives to promote the language among the people. 

“The central and state governments, which came to power after Independence, have not extended their support to the language. Our country is known for its culture, religion and philosophical ideas. One cannot treat religious sentiments and Sanskrit separately,” Bharadwaj added. 

Recently, the Human Resources Development (HRD) ministry’s internal enquiry into the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Germany, making German the third language in Kendriya Vidyalayas, has revealed that neither the Kendriya Vidyalaya Sanghathan (KVS) nor the ministry realised that the move was a violation of the three-language formula. 

According to the three-language formula, schools are required to teach Hindi, English and a modern Indian language in schools. Sanskrit, however, is said to be a popular option in northern states. 

“We want all Indian languages to be promoted because only five to six per cent of people in India understand English. Most of them, even today, work in their regional language. No other language can be understood if there is no proper understanding of Sanskrit,” the HoD of the Sanskrit department said. 

Meanwhile, while on his tour to Germany, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said India’s secularism is not so weak that it could be shaken because of a language. 

Experts feel that Modi’s statement is in accordance with the Indian Constitution. Though Modi did not elaborate on the issue, his comments are being seenin context with his government’s decision to replace German with Sanskrit in over 500 schools.