Sohum Banerjea

—Computer Linguist

It’s a pun, of course it is. I’m interested both in investigating and developing computer languages, and in using computational techniques inspired by natural languages.

There are so many fascinating modelling processes involved in our brains and our agents when using any kind of language, and language reveals so much about the ways this modelling works. There’s implications for machine learning, natural language processing, and semantics, and I'm eager to dive into them!

Professionally Speaking

I’m currently tackling the problem of modelling in language from the field of probabilistic programming languages, along the lines of Infer.NET and Anglican.

I’m exploring the question of what happens when a reasoning process can reason about its own functioning. I think closing this self-referential loop allows us to access more expressivity in our modelling agents, though of course not strictly more power.

I’m aiming to develop a probabilistic programming language that can support this, and then explore what kind of expressivity and conceptual modelling can develop inside it.

And In Person...

I'm interested in any and all forms of interaction design (modelling, again!), which gives me a broad interest across board, card, and pen and paper games.

If you are powered by the apocalypse, or enjoy playing 2/2s for two, come talk to me!

Papers I Enjoy

  • Jacobs, B. (2016). A Categorical Basis for Conditional Probability.
  • Adams, R., & Jacobs, B. (2015). A Type Theory for Probabilistic and Bayesian Reasoning.
  • Levy, S. D., Lowney, C., Meroney, W., & Gayler, R. W. (2014). Bracketing the beetle: How Wittgenstein’s understanding of language can guide our practice in AGI and cognitive science.
  • Wissner-Gross, A., & Freer, C. (2013). Causal Entropic Forces.
  • Knuth, K. H., & Skilling, J. (2012). Foundations of Inference.
  • Cox, R. (1946). Probability, frequency and reasonable expectation.

Work and Experience

  • Bitbrew: Distributed systems, realtime processing, internal dsls
  • Franq: React, isomorphic web development
  • An Equational Theory For Inference Programming Languages: Masters thesis, University of Cambridge
  • Fluid Analysis for Aesthetic Judgement of Mondrian Images: Bachelors thesis, Australian National Univeristy