AI Seminar Series 2023: Hongyuan Mei

The AI Seminar is a weekly meeting at the University of Alberta where researchers interested in artificial intelligence (AI) can share their research. Presenters include both local speakers from the University of Alberta and visitors from other institutions. Topics can be related in any way to artificial intelligence, from foundational theoretical work to innovative applications of AI techniques to new fields and problems.

On November 28, Dr. Hongyuan Mei —Research Assistant Professor at Toyota Technological Institute at Chicago — presented “Language Models as Lego Blocks of Reasoning" at the AI Seminar.

Abstract:
In recent years, language models (LMs) have emerged as transformative tools in the realm of artificial intelligence. They show strong language understanding and reasoning capabilities, presenting a wealth of opportunities for solving challenging problems. However, deploying them as independent problem solvers - even with sophisticated prompting techniques - often ends up with unsatisfactory results.  

In this talk, Mei introduces an alternative approach, which incorporates LMs within a larger framework for complex reasoning. Here, LMs propose solutions or logical pathways, which are then analyzed and utilized by the framework. They showcase two challenging problems effectively addressed using this paradigm. The first is text-based logical reasoning, in which one has to determine the truth value of a statement given a set of rules and facts, expressed in human natural language. The second is event prediction, the task of reasoning about future events given the past. For both problems, the LM-in-the-loop frameworks learn to provide high-quality output beyond what an LM can offer as a standalone problem solver.

Mei sketches a few future research directions for improving the fundamental reasoning capabilities of LMs, including embedding an LM within a reinforcement learning framework to develop foundation world models.

Watch the full presentation below:

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