Back from IJCAI05

After 7 days in Edinburgh, I finally came back in Paris. IJCAI05 is the most prestigious AI conference happening every two years. This year, I am proud of both China and Canada. Two out of the three best papers are from U of Albert. The Excellent Achievement Award is to Geoffrey Hinton in U of T. It shows a strong position of Canadian AI community. The Chinese is on the stage now. The first best paper is from a Chinese girl in University of Albert. We are around 30 Chinese people in this conference and about 10 papers are authored by Chinese, including 3 papers from Chinese universities. I can predict that China will become a very strong country in research.

On the other side, I want to absurd this career a little bit. Some people might think they are too smart for their surrounding people, and some people look like not so happy. I perfectly know how the research people want to be excellent and how they push the limits to extreme. It is like Olympic game. Sport is for fun, competition makes sport ugly. When one’s research career is evaluated by publications, publishing is like a game to play. I do not think some of the papers are interesting. They are just technical blabla, though this kind of blabla needs a lot of training. For me, scientists should do something better than that. Even though, I still prepare my guns and bullets for the next shoot. Big laugh.

I am thinking about my two co-authors. They are my favorite collaborators. Smart people, and also wise. I am thinking Daniel is with his baby in the garden and Martin is playing his cello or playing the million dollar toys in his studio. They are cool guys and found their very true life. I am interested in looking around and being stressed in the trip. But now I am going to leave for my vacation with my chaton.