Dear members of the Computer Science Department,

You are cordially invited to the talk of the UnRAVeL guest Guy Van den Broeck, UCLA

Title: From Probabilistic Circuits to Probabilistic Programs and Back

Abstract:
Probabilistic graphical models are a rich staple of probabilistic AI. However, they make a very specific choice of abstraction: probability distributions are represented by their variable-level (in)dependencies. In this talk I present some recent work on probabilistic models that go beyond classical PGMs, and make a radically different choice of abstraction; one that is computational. Concretely, I will discuss two classes of models: probabilistic circuits and probabilistic programs. Probabilistic circuits represent distributions through the computation graph of probabilistic inference. They move beyond PGMs by guaranteeing tractable inference for certain classes of queries. Probabilistic programs represent distributions through higher-level primitives of computation: iteration, branching, and procedural abstraction. They move beyond PGMs by looking "inside" of the dependencies. Finally, I will illustrate how these two computational abstractions are themselves closely related, by showing how the Dice probabilistic programming language compiles probabilistic programs into probabilistic circuits for inference.

Wednesday, Oct. 7^th, 5.00 pm

The talk will take place as a zoom-session: https://rwth.zoom.us/j/92047949381?pwd=LzIwUW96WEM0MkRjZ01FUmhwd1I3QT09
Meeting ID: 920 4794 9381, Password: unravel

Best regards

Helen Bolke-Hermanns

Helen Bolke-Hermanns

Fachgruppe Informatik

RWTH Aachen University

Ahornstr. 55, D-52074 Aachen

Building E3, 2nd floor, Room 9218

Telefon: +49 (241) 80-21-004

Fax:         +49 (241) 80-22 215

E-Mail: Helen.Bolke-Hermanns@Informatik.RWTH-Aachen.de