Dan Hon recently set out out to do something rather fun with artificial intelligence. <\/p>\n
The director of content at Code for America took a bunch of existing British placenamesand, with a method that goes overour heads somewhat, managed to train an AI to generate some new ones. <\/p>\n
His results are so fantasticthat they sound like any number of drizzly English villages you may have driven through looking for a half hidden wedding venue. <\/p>\n
Check out Dan's working out, andall the incrediblyconvincing sounding British placenamesbelow. <\/p>\n
I trained an A.I. to generate British placenames <\/p>\n
The results were predictable. <\/p>\n
(Inspired in part by Janelle Shanes New paint colors invented by neural network. Tom Taylor did similar work in 2016, generating English village names.) <\/p>\n
Method: <\/p>\n
1.Find a list of British placenames. Heres one you can download as a CSV. You just need the names, so strip out all the other columns. To save some time, you can use the one I prepared earlier. <\/p>\n
2.Pick a multi-layer recurrent neural network to use. The first time I did this, Karpathys char-rnn was all the rage, this time I used jcjohnsons torch-rnn. <\/p>\n
3.If youre using a Mac, dont bother trying to get OpenCL GPU support working. I wasted 3 hours. Just use crisbals CPU-based docker image. (If you know what youre doing, then youre already comfortable doing this all on AWS or youve got an nVidia GPU). <\/p>\n
4.Follow jcjohnsons instructions in the readme (pre-process your data, etc.) <\/p>\n
5. Go and have a cup of tea while you train your model. <\/p>\n
6. Mess around with the temperature when you sample based on your model. <\/p>\n
7.Take a look at some of my favourite neural network generated British placenames (and if youd like more, heres 50,000 characters worth): <\/p>\n
root@themachine:~\/torch-rnn# th sample.lua -checkpoint cv\/checkpoint_8450.t7 -length 1000 -gpu -1 <\/p>\n
Ospley <\/p>\n
Stoke Carrston <\/p>\n
Elfordbion <\/p>\n
Hevermilley <\/p>\n
Ell <\/p>\n
Elles Chorels <\/p>\n
Ellers Green <\/p>\n
Heaton on Westom <\/p>\n
Hadford Hill <\/p>\n
Hambate Combe <\/p>\n
Manory Somerstow <\/p>\n
Buchraston-on-Ter-Sey <\/p>\n
Brotters Common <\/p>\n
Normannegg <\/p>\n
Twettle Row <\/p>\n
North Hill Row St Marne <\/p>\n
Torston-le Taney <\/p>\n
North Praftton <\/p>\n
Tontons Coss <\/p>\n
Topswick End <\/p>\n
Brumlington <\/p>\n
Boll of Binclestead <\/p>\n
Farton Green Pear End <\/p>\n
Wadworth Mayshyns Wiwton <\/p>\n
Wader Bridge <\/p>\n
Weston Parpenham <\/p>\n
Oarden of Land Park <\/p>\n
Batchington Crunnerton <\/p>\n
Larebridge Heath Brook <\/p>\n
Capton Briins Forehouint Eftte Green <\/p>\n
Waryburn Torner Midlwood <\/p>\n
Wasts Halkstack <\/p>\n
Maggington Common <\/p>\n
Stach Helland Neston <\/p>\n
Stoke Hills <\/p>\n
Sutsy Compton <\/p>\n
Stoke of Inch <\/p>\n
Upper Somefield <\/p>\n
Rastan-on-croan <\/p>\n
Wadway Dynd-Rott End <\/p>\n
Wattings Ward <\/p>\n
Harhester Willey <\/p>\n
Marrock <\/p>\n
Saxford <\/p>\n
Salton Southens Hovers <\/p>\n
Salt, Earth <\/p>\n
Stamorn Vale <\/p>\n
Stouth Wiesleyt Bhampton <\/p>\n
Upper Brynton <\/p>\n
Kniness Gartes <\/p>\n
Webury Hill <\/p>\n
Eastbridge Brook <\/p>\n
Wallow Manworth <\/p>\n
East Holmsley Anby <\/p>\n
Hallaid or Humme <\/p>\n
Galling Compton <\/p>\n
Hampers Hill <\/p>\n
Hangyds Hain <\/p>\n
Wasland Commone <\/p>\n
Wantham Mount on-by Langham <\/p>\n
Kinindworthorpe Marmile <\/p>\n
Dompton Ole <\/p>\n
Dimmer Common <\/p>\n
Keston Upper Rhington <\/p>\n
Towerhaite Mank <\/p>\n
Cockhanford Vales <\/p>\n
Porcoft Green <\/p>\n
Newtons St Pethen <\/p>\n
Silmers Hill <\/p>\n
Crocken-ons Clow <\/p>\n
Prrighstock Tabergate <\/p>\n
Crisklethes Chorn <\/p>\n
Cross Gorburster <\/p>\n
Storton of Brook <\/p>\n
Cartswood Csters <\/p>\n
New Amherston <\/p>\n
Wascood Woots Corner <\/p>\n
West Dottisley <\/p>\n
Westovel (Blingwars <\/p>\n
Sandeside Backton <\/p>\n
Waledon of Bandsead <\/p>\n
Rald Bockan-Sea <\/p>\n
Boleland Brase <\/p>\n
Stoop Heath <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
See the article here: <\/p>\n
This man trained an artificial intelligence to generate the most British sounding place names - The indy100<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Dan Hon recently set out out to do something rather fun with artificial intelligence. Continue reading