Figure 4.

Learning means inferring the grammar of a domain. At MIT, two computer scientists invented an algorithm that discovers the hidden structure of a scientific field. The system is endowed with a grammar of rules whose combinations generate all kinds of new structures: lines, planes, circles, cylinders. . . . By selecting the structure that best fits the data, the algorithm makes discoveries that took scientists years: the tree of animal species (Darwin, 1859), the roundness of the earth (Parmenides, 600 BCE), and the circle of colors (Newton, 1675).