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Combining Induction and Transduction for Abstract Reasoning (arxiv.org)
2 points by lnyan on Nov 11, 2024 | hide | past | pdf | discuss on HN

In plain words: One model infers the rule behind a few examples and applies it; the other predicts answers directly. Trained on the same synthetic tasks, the rule-finder wins on precise, multi-step puzzles while the direct predictor handles fuzzy visual ones, and together they nearly match humans.

Abstract

When learning an input-output mapping from very few examples, is it better to first infer a latent function that explains the examples, or is it better to directly predict new test outputs, e.g. using a neural network? We study this question on ARC by training neural models for induction (inferring latent functions) and transduction (directly predicting the test output for a given test input). We train on synthetically generated variations of Python programs that solve ARC training tasks. We find inductive and transductive models solve different kinds of test problems, despite having the same training problems and sharing the same neural architecture: Inductive program synthesis excels at precise computations, and at composing multiple concepts, while transduction succeeds on fuzzier perceptual concepts. Ensembling them approaches human-level performance on ARC.

Wen-Ding Li, Keya Hu, Carter Larsen, Yuqing Wu, Simon Alford, Caleb Woo, Spencer M. Dunn, Hao Tang, Michelangelo Naim, Dat Nguyen, Wei-Long Zheng, Zenna Tavares, et al.
arXiv:2411.02272 · cs.LG, cs.AI, cs.CL · submitted Nov 4, 2024 · updated Dec 2, 2024
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