6 ms·

Thb, most of the interesting work I've seen has come out of Silicon Valley. What breakthroughs have come from China?

by idibidiart 9y ago

kobeya 9y ago
Baidu & Deep Speech? That was actually developed in Silicon Valley though, as that's where Baidu's AI lab is.
ericflo 9y ago
Off the top of my head, didn't ResNet come out of MSRA?
- mljoe 9y ago
  Yes. ResNet was CVPR paper of the year last year. This year DenseNet has a first author from Tsinghua University (Dr. Zhuang Liu). I feel like the importance of China in machine learning is very hard to dispute these days. At least they are open about it, which is good for scientific development worldwide.
kercker 9y ago
Can you give some examples of these interesting work?
- idibidiart 9y ago
  The one posted yesterday from OpenAI. Hierarchical learning. Also, DeepMind's relational NN. I can dig up others from memor after caffiene. DeepMind is at Google which is a Silicon Valley co. True about Canada, but salaries in Canada do not support retention of talent, so most end up in SV in the long run or get acquired by SV companies.
  - paulfitz 9y ago
    (DeepMind is part of the Alphabet group, true, but is based in London, with some research people in Canada and some applied people in California.)
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
abhinavkulkarni 9y ago
Most 'breakthroughs' in AI have come from Canada, not Silicon Valley.
- chronicy292 9y ago
  Then why do all the AI folks and startups in Toronto et al. dream of moving to silicon valley with the outrageous rent and home prices?
- ghostbrainalpha 9y ago
  Canada is definitely underappreciated, but you might be overstating it a bit... https://www.forbes.com/sites/jpmorganchase/2017/10/04/chicago-collaborative-sets-sights-on-restoring-a-nearly-vacant-town/#300bcb3a55b4 https://www.forbes.com/sites/jpmorganchase/2017/10/04/chicag...
mitchdoogle 9y ago
The article says that China is investing heavily in AI now, in reaction to the breakthroughs happening elsewhere. It suggests that breakthroughs over the next decade will be coming from China.
exelius 9y ago
Much of the interesting work is done by Chinese nationals, many of whom feel the startup field in the US is slanted towards white people, so they go back to China and take their knowledge with them. US research institutes are top-notch, but our casual racism and xenophobia are killing us. Not that the Chinese aren't also racist and xenophobic, but the pendulum of power is definitely swinging back across the Pacific.
- idibidiart 9y ago
  That is a good point but China is a dictatorship and a censoring anti-democracy regime. I can't imagine putting up with that either.
  - exelius 9y ago
    Chinese culture values harmony and stability over individualism and total freedom. The actions of the individual glorify the group; and they view "dictators" as more of a "father-like figurehead". They look at the US and see the problems we have (crime, gun control, health care, etc) and can point to their own society and say "well, we solved all of those so our system is better." Many young Chinese who were educated in the US feel this way, so it's not a generational thing. This is a cultural tradition stretching back many thousands of years. The world view of a person from China is very different than that of an American. Also, consider that an AI researcher returning to China is likely going to be in the top 1% of society. Dictatorial societies tend to be pretty good for the people at the top. The Chinese startup market is hotter than the US at this point too; and it's basically restricted to people born in a handful of Chinese cities. The Chinese government intentionally stacks the deck to get them to return.
    - it_learnses 9y ago
      Understandable for Chinese nationals to go back. But for someone like Ng, who was born and educated here, it seems very irresponsible.
      - 9y ago
coldtea 9y ago
>Thb, most of the interesting work I've seen has come out of Silicon Valley. Like, social websites and apps? >What breakthroughs have come from China? Like tons of actual innovations in hardware, screens, storage, materials science, manufacturing methods, robotics, biology, and other fields?
idibidiart 9y ago
Still with all these hurt feelings etc, what breakthrough work has come of out of China?
rawnlq 9y ago
Due to the language barrier, there is a lot of interesting work that we will never "see". For example I was randomly looking through text recognition competition results and found out Tencent has an AI lab that took first place: http://rrc.cvc.uab.es/?ch=1&com=evaluation&task=4 http://rrc.cvc.uab.es/?ch=1&com=evaluation&task=4. But I was unable to find any information about them. They have github repos with thousands of stars but the community is entirely in chinese: https://github.com/Tencent/ncnn/issues https://github.com/Tencent/ncnn/issues
- idibidiart 9y ago
  I believe TenCent AI Lab is based in Silicon Valley.
  - kercker 9y ago
    According to its recruit page (http://ai.tencent.com/ailab/recruit.html http://ai.tencent.com/ailab/recruit.html), they have researchers in US and Shenzhen, China.

Thb, most of the interesting work I've seen has come out of Silicon Valley. What breakthroughs have come from China?

kobeya 9y ago

Baidu & Deep Speech? That was actually developed in Silicon Valley though, as that's where Baidu's AI lab is.

ericflo 9y ago

Off the top of my head, didn't ResNet come out of MSRA?

mljoe 9y ago
Yes. ResNet was CVPR paper of the year last year. This year DenseNet has a first author from Tsinghua University (Dr. Zhuang Liu). I feel like the importance of China in machine learning is very hard to dispute these days. At least they are open about it, which is good for scientific development worldwide.

kercker 9y ago

Can you give some examples of these interesting work?

idibidiart 9y ago
The one posted yesterday from OpenAI. Hierarchical learning. Also, DeepMind's relational NN. I can dig up others from memor after caffiene. DeepMind is at Google which is a Silicon Valley co. True about Canada, but salaries in Canada do not support retention of talent, so most end up in SV in the long run or get acquired by SV companies.
- paulfitz 9y ago
  (DeepMind is part of the Alphabet group, true, but is based in London, with some research people in Canada and some applied people in California.)
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]

abhinavkulkarni 9y ago

Most 'breakthroughs' in AI have come from Canada, not Silicon Valley.

chronicy292 9y ago
Then why do all the AI folks and startups in Toronto et al. dream of moving to silicon valley with the outrageous rent and home prices?
ghostbrainalpha 9y ago
Canada is definitely underappreciated, but you might be overstating it a bit... https://www.forbes.com/sites/jpmorganchase/2017/10/04/chicago-collaborative-sets-sights-on-restoring-a-nearly-vacant-town/#300bcb3a55b4 https://www.forbes.com/sites/jpmorganchase/2017/10/04/chicag...

mitchdoogle 9y ago

The article says that China is investing heavily in AI now, in reaction to the breakthroughs happening elsewhere. It suggests that breakthroughs over the next decade will be coming from China.

exelius 9y ago

Much of the interesting work is done by Chinese nationals, many of whom feel the startup field in the US is slanted towards white people, so they go back to China and take their knowledge with them. US research institutes are top-notch, but our casual racism and xenophobia are killing us. Not that the Chinese aren't also racist and xenophobic, but the pendulum of power is definitely swinging back across the Pacific.

idibidiart 9y ago
That is a good point but China is a dictatorship and a censoring anti-democracy regime. I can't imagine putting up with that either.
- exelius 9y ago
  Chinese culture values harmony and stability over individualism and total freedom. The actions of the individual glorify the group; and they view "dictators" as more of a "father-like figurehead". They look at the US and see the problems we have (crime, gun control, health care, etc) and can point to their own society and say "well, we solved all of those so our system is better." Many young Chinese who were educated in the US feel this way, so it's not a generational thing. This is a cultural tradition stretching back many thousands of years. The world view of a person from China is very different than that of an American. Also, consider that an AI researcher returning to China is likely going to be in the top 1% of society. Dictatorial societies tend to be pretty good for the people at the top. The Chinese startup market is hotter than the US at this point too; and it's basically restricted to people born in a handful of Chinese cities. The Chinese government intentionally stacks the deck to get them to return.
  - it_learnses 9y ago
    Understandable for Chinese nationals to go back. But for someone like Ng, who was born and educated here, it seems very irresponsible.
    - 9y ago

coldtea 9y ago

>Thb, most of the interesting work I've seen has come out of Silicon Valley. Like, social websites and apps? >What breakthroughs have come from China? Like tons of actual innovations in hardware, screens, storage, materials science, manufacturing methods, robotics, biology, and other fields?

idibidiart 9y ago

Still with all these hurt feelings etc, what breakthrough work has come of out of China?

rawnlq 9y ago

Due to the language barrier, there is a lot of interesting work that we will never "see". For example I was randomly looking through text recognition competition results and found out Tencent has an AI lab that took first place: http://rrc.cvc.uab.es/?ch=1&com=evaluation&task=4 http://rrc.cvc.uab.es/?ch=1&com=evaluation&task=4. But I was unable to find any information about them. They have github repos with thousands of stars but the community is entirely in chinese: https://github.com/Tencent/ncnn/issues https://github.com/Tencent/ncnn/issues

idibidiart 9y ago
I believe TenCent AI Lab is based in Silicon Valley.
- kercker 9y ago
  According to its recruit page (http://ai.tencent.com/ailab/recruit.html http://ai.tencent.com/ailab/recruit.html), they have researchers in US and Shenzhen, China.