Well, strictly speaking if neither Yahoo nor Microsoft were able to compete with Google previously, this would mean Google effectively had no other competitors. If after the merger they become a viable competitor, then Google obviously now have one competitor. Then again, I'm no economist.
Actually Kripkenstein, support vector machines with a Gaussian kernel are equivalent to a neural network with one hidden layer (with fixed connections to the inputs) and an infinite number of neurons, in the case where each neuron is a radial basis function (a simple exponential distance measure). Thus, you could arguably draw a parallel between the SVM and a certain approximation of 'brain-like' activity involving billions and billions of neurons. Although you're right to observe that neural networks have become largely obsolete, I think the direction of advancements in machine learning has perhaps not veered as far from brain-like computations as it might seem.
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Well, strictly speaking if neither Yahoo nor Microsoft were able to compete with Google previously, this would mean Google effectively had no other competitors. If after the merger they become a viable competitor, then Google obviously now have one competitor. Then again, I'm no economist.
If it can withstand a fearsome onslaught by a mighty computer science researcher, I'd say it's just about ready for the battlefield.
Actually Kripkenstein, support vector machines with a Gaussian kernel are equivalent to a neural network with one hidden layer (with fixed connections to the inputs) and an infinite number of neurons, in the case where each neuron is a radial basis function (a simple exponential distance measure). Thus, you could arguably draw a parallel between the SVM and a certain approximation of 'brain-like' activity involving billions and billions of neurons. Although you're right to observe that neural networks have become largely obsolete, I think the direction of advancements in machine learning has perhaps not veered as far from brain-like computations as it might seem.
pigeons control YOU.