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Is Time Moving Forward Or Backward? Computers Learn To Spot the Difference
sciencehabit (1205606) writes For the first time, scientists have taught computers to figure out the direction of time in videos, a result that could help researchers better understand our own perception of time. Regardless of any possible applications, "we just thought it was a great problem," says one of the study's authors. Teaching computers to see the arrow of time combines computer science, physics, and human perception to get at the heart of the question, "How do we understand the visual world?"
The researchers "broke down 180 YouTube videos into square patches of a few hundred pixels, which they further divided into four-by-four grids. Combining standard techniques for discovering objects in still photographs with motion detection algorithms, the researchers identified 4000 typical patterns of motion, or 'flow words,' across a grid’s 16 cells. ... When they tested their program on the remaining 60 videos, the trained computers could correctly determine whether a video ran forward or backward 80% of the time."
hey guys..
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
(and..."Europe on 5 Quaaludes a Day," forward version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
!!
This saves us from the terrorists how?
This sounds like the beginning of evil technology so that I can't use my DVR to skip commercials.
I'm a satanic clam.
I will call you yesterday and let you know.
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
This means nothing. It is not detecting time per se. It is detecting things violations like objects don't fall up, or other such experienced pattern that is the result of time.
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
Mission accomplished?
If I close my eyes and say "forward" what percentage do I get right?
Events unfold in time, but time itself doesn't move. Substitute space for time to make the absurdity clearer: "Is space moving forwards or backwards?" Space isn't moving, we move through space.
Can we stop the lazy AI experiments which required zero effort?
You tube videos? And analysation on block level?
Won't the fact that the video codec has a direct timeline (with predictive frames, etc) override the rsults?
HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
Otherwise I would have gotten first post.
Hard Mode: Test it on Back to the Future.
Content ID has been foiled by silly tricks in the past like mirroring videos, adding new frames and letterboxing before.
The political videos that people like to link to from here often praise the past, and demonize the present. While they leave me wishing I could have my time back I would love to know if the comptuers could recognize time as moving forward.
(That said, as they are mostly political speeches with no significant moving object the identification could be done by speech pattern recognition)
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
who's time is it? do we need have our time divided into minutes or is that our worth as a commodity can be enforced? the spirit of creation may be tiring of our tardy way of ignoring our undeniable obligations to each other, starving people etc...? time's up for being heartless? see you there.... thanks again moms
Have they tried their software on the music video Amish Paradise by "Weird Al" Yankovic?
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Behold, the first piece of the the trans-dimensional Hitchhiker's Guide. One of the first things it has to do is figure out is which way time runs in whatever reality it finds itself in.
Seriously, the poster was presented yesterday at CVPR and ends up on /. today. There is nothing sensational about it. I'm getting sick of science turning into PR stunts all the time.
Video of some good progressive thrash music
We can't even make machines that can figure out if entropy is increasing or decreasing in a video recording (something most humans can do unsciously). But we'll have human-equivalent AI is in our grasp within 10 years. And the singularity is coming within 20.
Sure.
If he explores all forms and substances Straight homeward to their symbol-essences; He shall not die.
But would it recognize the time flow of a movie like Memento? Every sequence moves forward, but each subsequent sequence predates the previous one, with overlap. There are also flashback sequences.
"Love heals scars love left." -- Henry Rollins
That being the label we apply to the direction we observe time to be moving in. If there is some other direction time could be moving in, please demonstrate it so we could label it appropriately.
Odds are it's probably cheating somehow, eg discovered which direction based on text fading/scrolling, or backwards voice, or something. Also, 80% success rate is rather poor, though I suppose some sort of things would be hard to tell (if they have little change in entropy).
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
It would seem that before you could make a computer detect time moving backwards, you would first have to devise a way to actually make time move backwards. Running a video in reverse still occurs with time moving forward. That's nothing new. VCRs did this with a little LED. DVDs do it with an on-screen display.
Now, if they found a way to actually make time move backwards, that would be something.
In what way does this aid anyone in better understanding human perception of time? I mean, fuck, bravo on the pure computer science of it all, but these sorts of lofty interdisciplinary tie-ins reek terribly of hyperbole.
To really confuse it, point it out the window of an apartment complex anywhere in China. At any given time at least one retiree is walking around the grounds backwards as a form of exercise and or coordination boost (I haven't figured out which yet).
Dr Freeman spoke about this work at CVPR this week. In the videos I saw he identified small markers of temporal transition as indicative of moving forward or backward. Those they labeled as backward appeared to recognize asymmetric movement -- as in gradual acceleration followed by sudden deceleration as uniquely forward flow (as when a hand swings down and strickes a table top) -- an asymmetry that cannot occur in reverse (as in sudden acceleration followed by gradual deceleration).
Dr Freeman did not propose this as the causal phenomenon in question, but that made the most sense to me in light of the motions he identified as evidence for backward motion.
it only depends on the way you look at things
.. tend to move from left to right, since we so used to read that way, movie makers are used to it to. .. tend to move against us, people shoot movies of people moving against us, much more boring to see something moving away.
Do I get 80% correct, on Youtube movies?
FTS: "[...] broke down 180 YouTube videos [... then ...] tested their program on the remaining 60 videos"
Whoah. They used all 240 YouTube videos?! That's, like, insane!