Depth Degeneracy in Neural Networks: Vanishing Angles in Fully Connected ReLU Networks on Initialization

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Hauptverfasser: Jakub, Cameron, Nica, Mihai
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2023
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author Jakub, Cameron
Nica, Mihai
author_facet Jakub, Cameron
Nica, Mihai
contents Despite remarkable performance on a variety of tasks, many properties of deep neural networks are not yet theoretically understood. One such mystery is the depth degeneracy phenomenon: the deeper you make your network, the closer your network is to a constant function on initialization. In this paper, we examine the evolution of the angle between two inputs to a ReLU neural network as a function of the number of layers. By using combinatorial expansions, we find precise formulas for how fast this angle goes to zero as depth increases. These formulas capture microscopic fluctuations that are not visible in the popular framework of infinite width limits, and leads to qualitatively different predictions. We validate our theoretical results with Monte Carlo experiments and show that our results accurately approximate finite network behaviour. \review{We also empirically investigate how the depth degeneracy phenomenon can negatively impact training of real networks.} The formulas are given in terms of the mixed moments of correlated Gaussians passed through the ReLU function. We also find a surprising combinatorial connection between these mixed moments and the Bessel numbers that allows us to explicitly evaluate these moments.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2302_09712
institution arXiv
publishDate 2023
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Depth Degeneracy in Neural Networks: Vanishing Angles in Fully Connected ReLU Networks on Initialization
Jakub, Cameron
Nica, Mihai
Machine Learning
Probability
Despite remarkable performance on a variety of tasks, many properties of deep neural networks are not yet theoretically understood. One such mystery is the depth degeneracy phenomenon: the deeper you make your network, the closer your network is to a constant function on initialization. In this paper, we examine the evolution of the angle between two inputs to a ReLU neural network as a function of the number of layers. By using combinatorial expansions, we find precise formulas for how fast this angle goes to zero as depth increases. These formulas capture microscopic fluctuations that are not visible in the popular framework of infinite width limits, and leads to qualitatively different predictions. We validate our theoretical results with Monte Carlo experiments and show that our results accurately approximate finite network behaviour. \review{We also empirically investigate how the depth degeneracy phenomenon can negatively impact training of real networks.} The formulas are given in terms of the mixed moments of correlated Gaussians passed through the ReLU function. We also find a surprising combinatorial connection between these mixed moments and the Bessel numbers that allows us to explicitly evaluate these moments.
title Depth Degeneracy in Neural Networks: Vanishing Angles in Fully Connected ReLU Networks on Initialization
topic Machine Learning
Probability
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2302.09712