Baby Robot Learns Its First Words

Baby Robot Learns Its First Words


At team of scientists lead by the Caroline Lyon at the University of Hertfordshire, UK have developed a “baby robot” that learns human speech in much the same way a human child learns. The robot converses with a human teacher and soon a string of incoherent babble from the robot beings forming actual words, in the same way a baby’s noises come together to form speech.
The project may lead to robots and AI that form words and sentences on their own, actually learning a language in the same way humans do. This would lead to more natural responses in AI and less errors when using programs like Siri.

It can also be very helpful in understanding how humans learn language in a more profound way. It is known that between the ages of 6 and 14 months, children begin to go from babbling strings of nonsensical syllables to actually forming words. Once they have a few base words, these then provide contextual clues for learning other words, eventually giving children a full vocabulary of words to choose from and form complete sentences.
The team at Hertfordshire was motivated by their understanding of this process to program a humanoid robot called iCub with all of the syllables in the English language. This allows the robot (who they call DeeChee) to babble (rather creepily) like a baby. Researchers then treated DeeChee like a child, speaking and attempting to teach the robot about rudimentary ideas like color and shape.
DeeChee was programmed in listen to the teacher and then respond with its own syllables. Each time it heard a syllable repeated by the teacher it would give that syllable a higher score in its 40,000 syllable lexicon. It would then use these syllables more often, and even begin forming words to match what the teacher said.
When the teacher showed approval for recognizable words, these syllables where given even more value in the computers programming. As the process continued, more and more recognizable words would begin to show up amid the babble. The scientists believe this closely replicates the early stages of speech development. Babies often become sensitive to repeat words and attempt to replicate them in their own speech.
“That words can emerge from babble using a statistical learning process not specific to language demonstrates that this stage of language acquisition does not require hard-wired grammar faculties”, said Lyon in the research publication PLoS One. In other words, this method is the absolute first step humans take in the process of learning speech. Grammar and the cognitive association of words follow in humans, but not with DeeChee, who will never use those syllables to form complete sentences or understand their meaning.
But it is the first step in what could eventually lead to advanced AI that develops its own language from the ground up. As Lyons puts it: “If you want the robot to work with natural speech, then you might need to teach it from the very beginning.”


Reid offers new plan on student loan deadlock


 -- Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is suggesting a new way to break a standoff in Congress and prevent student loan costs from doubling next month for 7.4 million students.
In a letter to Republican leaders Thursday, Reid is proposing to pay for an extension of student loan rates by charging employers higher pension insurance premiums. The proposal would raise about $8 billion. Another Reid proposal could raise almost $10 billion by easing pension funding rules for businesses that would result in companies taking fewer tax deductions for pension contributions.
Reid's letter highlights the pressure facing lawmakers to strike a deal on student loan rates before they expire July 1. GOP leaders have suggested instead raising money by making it harder for states to collect some federal Medicaid reimbursements.


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Read more here: http://www.modbee.com/2012/06/06/2230832/obama-highlighting-student-loan.html#storylink=cpy









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Talk Fusion has what is called the Fusion wall but with 2 distinct differences; the first is that only members can post on the Fusion Wall. The second is that only your videos pull up when someone finds your videos. Oh ,yes and really a 3rd element is that you have a lot more options in video.

Video is become accessible online and is becoming more user friendly everyday. You owe it to yourself to check out how you can use video, make money with video or both. 

The world of video is served in many ways. Their are social media sites Facebook, twitter and Linkedin where you can post your video. With Talk Fusion, they have a social media share button on everyone of your videos. There there are video sites like YouTube, vimeo and Fusion Wall where you can post and tag your videos. You can embed videos directly on any of your websites. This has been made simple by taking an html code and placing on your site. The video is hosted elsewhere but you get the use of the video. You can send video emails to your clinets, prospects, friends, family and more. Their is video webinars where you can meet with multiple people. Companies like go to webinar, skype, Webex and Talk Fusion allow you to have virtual meetings. Save time, gas and expense by holding a meeting online. Create a video blog and tell your story like you are in person. There is so much that can be done with video and the possibilities are endless.

Some of the services offer an incentive to introduce their product to people. Some have a full business opportunity to put you in your own video marketing business. No matter what you are looking to do with video, there is a plan or platform out there waiting for you. 
Video is the latest rage on the internet and you have figured out that you need to embed or integrate video into your website, video marketing and email campaigns. 

But if you were to ask me. Skip Talkfusion and go with Skype. Skype is Free. Talkfusion may have alot more options, but it is not worth it. Skype and YouTube are all free but they don’t offer what Talk Fusion does. VP stands for video-phone. Which is phone calls between deaf people or operators to interpret sign language. Skype is similiar to VP except it is more internet based. YouTube has tons of videos that has been downloaded, recorded, and is able to share on some networks, and e-mails.

Video e-mail isn’t the only cool thing that Talk Fusion offers. We can share our video emails on over 200 networking sites. I don’t see any other video source offering that many networks. Also you can form a video blog through Talk Fusion. Pretty cool huh? We also have the “Fusion wall” which all of the videos you have created or uploaded to Talk Fusion can be stored on. You also can make your 
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