arXiv AI
Aug 11

Linearized 2-Simplicial Attention

arXiv:2608. 09307v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: We present a linearized form of 2-simplicial attention by rewriting the trilinear score as an inner product between a composite query and a key, so that the sum over one token axis takes the same form as ordinary softmax attention.

By Aritra Das, Dhruman Gupta, Debayan Gupta
arXiv Machine Learning
2d ago

Interdomain Attention: Beyond Token-Level Key-Value Memory

The paper introduces Interdomain Attention (IA), a hybrid architecture that blends softmax attention with recurrent memory within a single layer, leveraging a kernel regression perspective to compress keys and values into a state‑space model (SSM) memory. IA reconstructs the attention matrix implicitly from memory states, preserving the computational efficiency of SSMs while achieving performance gains. Experiments on models ranging from 125 M to 1.3 B parameters show IA surpasses an S4D baseline at matched memory size, outperforms standard Transformers on perplexity and common‑sense reasoning, and matches or exceeds SSM‑based models on genomic downstream tasks.

By Naoki Kiyohara, Harrison Bo Hua Zhu, Riccardo El Hassanin, Zhuo Sun, Wenlong Chen, Samir Bhatt, Yingzhen Li
arXiv Machine Learning
4d ago

Pretraining Transformers with Quantized Softmax in Attention

The paper investigates how quantizing the softmax operation in Transformer attention affects pretraining. It explores K‑interval attention, varying grid calibration, interpolation versus hard rounding, and surrogate placement relative to normalization, deriving backward rules for each case. Experiments on a 124M‑parameter model show that choices like fixed‑window calibration with a post‑normalization surrogate or a pre‑normalization surrogate can reduce validation loss gaps compared to standard softmax.

By Shangzhen Zhu, Muyan Hu, Tomasz Kozlowski