Big Numbers

Vision without categories? November 17, 2010

I’d just like to mention that I’ve come across Tomasz Malisiewicz’s blog on machine learning and computer vision, and I’m hooked. You should be too.

There’s the usual panoply of links to interesting papers, but then there’s also Tomasz’s radical idea for reimagining computer vision using a memex instead of a set of categories. He thinks that the “vision problem” will be solved by something much closer to actual AI than is generally considered necessary today. His ideas are informed by Wittgenstein and Vannevar Bush as well as contemporary research. It sounds interesting, to say the least. Then there’s also Tomasz’s stirring (if somewhat intimidating) advice to students and researchers to be Renaissance men and look beyond the A+ and the well-received publication. All in all, very worth reading.

(Sensible Sarah says: “Hey, wait a minute! I thought I was a math student — what’s up with all this vision stuff? And I have a qual to pass in a month!” Sensible Sarah throws up her hands in dismay.)