
Meta-Learners – Learning how to learn - SuperGent
https://blog.fastforwardlabs.com/2019/05/22/metalearners-learning-how-to-learn.html
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pickdenis
Here is a paper that uses meta-learning for quick imitation learning in robots
that works across domains:
[https://arxiv.org/abs/1802.01557](https://arxiv.org/abs/1802.01557)

The main sell is that it allows the robot to quickly generalize to new domains
(surroundings and objects being manipulated), albeit not tasks.

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mncharity
I enjoy taking ML work and pondering what it might look like in the context of
human education.

Imagine human physics education with meta-learning characteristics. Having to
classify problems. No more "here are numbers for _solid_ Argon... apply the
_ideal gas_ law" clueless plug-and-chug. Developing a sense for reasonable
values. Encountering unfamiliar problems. Thus developing skills of rough
quantitative reasoning, and of system decomposition and characterization.
Encountering descriptions of unfamiliar problem domains. And having to extract
understanding from them.

With human science education at present, even correct labeling and baseline
models, let alone transference, are distant, distant dreams. But even thus
shackled and buried, visualizing dance might have value, if it supports
improved recognition of opportunities and preparation for escape.

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ergothus
I was disappointed the article was about ML and not about human learning.

When I was young, I got by on picking basics up quickly. Now I'm in my forties
and I'm having to actually learn how to learn because there are no simple
basics (in my areas) left (or I'm just old and the basics no longer seem so
basic). Everything I read/listen/watch is a collection of boring rehash...and
then I'm suddenly behind because I missed something while skimming the
material I thought I knew.

The article title got me excited. :(

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ludsan
Me too. Mid 40's and trying to figure out how to make something stick,
especially with stuff I had learned years ago (linear algebra especially).

I have recently come to the revelation that the notion of "rote" that I had
always eschewed in favor of "a true and deep understanding" should no longer
be so eschewed.

I've recently adopted Anki (that other people love so much on this forum) as a
way of forcing me to catalog forevermore the inherent vocabulary of things
that cannot stick without internalizing. I now have an Anki board for Rust,
Linear Algebra and APL. Fingers crossed it will work.

Another meta-learning technique I have found extremely useful is creating an
ontology map. The act of copying down a term and relating it to others
spatially gives me so much more context. Here's a nasty one I did seven years
ago: [https://i.imgur.com/MYCsl7F.png](https://i.imgur.com/MYCsl7F.png)

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Scipio_Afri
Can you share your Anki boards for those topics?

