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posted by on Sunday November 27 2016, @06:59AM   Printer-friendly
from the one-step-closer-to-HAL-9000 dept.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

Lip-reading is notoriously difficult, depending as much on context and knowledge of language as it does on visual clues. But researchers are showing that machine learning can be used to discern speech from silent video clips more effectively than professional lip-readers can.

In one project, a team from the University of Oxford's Department of Computer Science has developed a new artificial-intelligence system called LipNet. As Quartz reported, its system was built on a data set known as GRID, which is made up of well-lit, face-forward clips of people reading three-second sentences. Each sentence is based on a string of words that follow the same pattern.

The team used that data set to train a neural network, similar to the kind often used to perform speech recognition. In this case, though, the neural network identifies variations in mouth shape over time, learning to link that information to an explanation of what's being said. The AI doesn't analyze the footage in snatches but considers the whole thing, enabling it to gain an understanding of context from the sentence being analyzed. That's important, because there are fewer mouth shapes than there are sounds produced by the human voice.

When tested, the system was able to identify 93.4 percent of words correctly. Human lip-reading volunteers asked to perform the same tasks identified just 52.3 percent of words correctly.


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  • (Score: 2) by BsAtHome on Sunday November 27 2016, @09:15AM

    by BsAtHome (889) on Sunday November 27 2016, @09:15AM (#433588)

    So now we know how HAL 9000 was able to acquire the skills to read the lips of the crew. The science fiction writers may have been off on the date when it happens, but they surely have foreseen the future. Sometimes the developments can be a bit scary when put in context of what may happen.

    What are we going to do? Use it responsibly, or are we in for a rampant new era? It reminds me of another science fiction scenario. In due time, someone is going to make a (very big) mistake and create a self-sustaining hardware system, supply it with weapons and connect it to an AI. Rise of the machines comes into mind.

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