
Artificial intelligence is quietly disrupting the fragrance development process - prostoalex
https://www.glossy.co/beauty/artificial-intelligence-is-quietly-disrupting-the-fragrance-development-process
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galacticaactual
It's curious to me that whenever these kinds of stories emerge the arguments
of "why don't we spend the time/money being expended on this frivolous
activity on more useful problems" are nonexistent. Contrast this with stories
involving higher order aspirations (like space exploration) and those comments
are legion. It's like we are drawn to the mundane out of comfort and shirk the
aspirational out of fear.

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camillomiller
If you think that fashion and perfumery are “the mundane” you are sorely
wrong. They are the most anthropologically interesting endeavor I can think
of, except for maybe more formally studying remote tribes. Scents in
particular is an extremely fascinating industry, marketing the invisible and
crafting cultural narratives around the most primal and underrated sense we
have.

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galacticaactual
To each our own. I don't think work in this area serves humanity one iota. But
that's my opinion and I respect yours.

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Erlich_Bachman
What exactly is your opinion, out of interest, like how does it work? Do all
the miriads of people who buy fragrances or fragrant-induced products (not to
mention all the workers of that industry) just spend their money and resources
on something that makes them no benefit whatsoever because they are what, too
stupid? Or like they don't understand what they like? Or can't form their own
decisions? In what way do those numbers not speak of some amount of "serving"
these people receive from the fragrance industry? Since they keep using it,
keep pouring their resources into it?

Also where do you draw the line? How about video games? Do they really serve
humanity after all? Porn? Christmas lights? All the work spent on designing
and constructing beautiful buildings? Should all buildings just be efficient
faceless boxes because it saves more resources?

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natch
>because they are what, too stupid?

Because they are inconsiderate of others who do not want to smell the
fragrances.

Think of it like smoking. Annoying and offensive to people nearby. No need to
hone this.

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DeathArrow
I wonder how can you produce data to train ML models. Take some combo of
chemicals and ask people to smell and rate it?

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youngprogrammer
You could do something similar to how they trained a ML model to find
antibiotics compounds:
[https://www.cell.com/action/showPdf?pii=S0092-8674%2820%2930...](https://www.cell.com/action/showPdf?pii=S0092-8674%2820%2930102-1).
First, train a deep learning model to learn a representation of molecules from
their molecule structures. Then feed in the thousand or so known compounds
that produce pleasant or unpleasant smells as training data with some score of
"pleasantness". We can then use this model to quickly score millions of
compounds and select candidates to test.

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r0b05
I love the explanation.

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papandada
The article so far just seems to be the usual AI wishful thinking from people
who hope to profit from it and no disruption to speak of as yet.

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Lapsa
Reminds me of AI generated music which usually sounds a lot like some kind of
Frankenstein - sort of recognizable bits and bytes mashed together in barely
acceptable composition.

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luckyscs
I've been experimenting with using Google's midi generation to be as a
starting point for phrases. It's not great but can be a useful starting point.
Like radiology, it seems ai can be good enough to prepare work and then have
it finished by a human expert. We don't need this stuff to be human, we just
need it to complement our own skills and unlock productivity/creativity that
we then refine with a human context/touch.

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yalogin
This is quite fascinating. There are a lot of fragrances out there released
over the years. So there is a lot of data to create models.

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Avernar
Not my comment, but exactly my thoughts:

 _AI is a buzzword with no meaning behind it used by every idiot that runs a
script on a big CSV file, so far outside of IT it can 't be any less of a
meme. I can already see them "analyzing" these "top 10 compliment beast"
listicles and creating "sex in a bottle" and it's going to be Secretions
Magnifiques II._

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allears
I struggle to think of any artificial "fragrance" that's anything other than
an annoyance to me. I include perfumes, colognes, and various kinds of masking
scents that are supposed to make other products smell better. If this
"industry" is "disrupted," I doubt that I would know or care. (Words in quote
marks indicate cynical bemusement and a lack of time to expound on them.)

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toomanybeersies
A properly worn fragrance doesn't "mask" your scent, any more than jewellery
doesn't mask your appearance.

Fragrances shouldn't be so strong as to be particularly noticeable or
overpowering, it's supposed to be subtle. In the same way as jewellery, it
should complement your appearance.

You wouldn't really particularly notice if someone wasn't wearing jewellery or
cologne, and you definitely notice when it's garish and overpowering or tacky,
but properly applied it's stunning (both jewellery and fragrance).

