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AIList Digest Volume 2 Issue 120
AIList Digest Wednesday, 19 Sep 1984 Volume 2 : Issue 120
Today's Topics:
AI Tools - Micro Production Systems,
Professional Societies - AI SIG in San Diego,
Books - Publisher Info for The Second Self,
Scientific Method - Swans & Induction,
AI and Society - CPSR,
Robotics - Kitchen Robots,
Pattern Recognition - Maximum Window Sum,
Course - Decision Systems,
Games - Computer Chess Championship
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 18 September 1984 1053-EDT
From: Peter Pirolli at CMU-CS-A
Subject: micro production systems
[Forwarded from the CMU bboard by Laws@SRI-AI.]
A friend of mine is looking for a production system language (however simple)
that runs on an Apple (preferably) or any other micro. He basically wants to
use the system to give some hands-on experience to fellow faculty members
at a small university where main-frame resources are too scarce to run a
full-blown production system. Any pointers to micro-based systems would be
greatly appreciated.
Send mail to pirolli@cmpsya or pirolli@cmua.
------------------------------
Date: 17 Sep 84 07:16 PDT
From: Tom Perrine <tom@LOGICON.ARPA>
Subject: AI SIG in San Diego
I have an off-net friend who is interested in starting (or finding) a
Special Interest Group for AI in San Diego. It would appear that if
ACM or IEEE knows about such a group, "they ain't talking." Is there
anyone else in S.D. who would be interested in such a group? Please
reply to me, not the Digest, of course.
Please include name, address and a daytime phone.
Thanks,
Tom Perrine
Logicon - OSD
San Diego, CA
------------------------------
Date: Mon 17 Sep 84 12:41:04-MDT
From: Stan Shebs <SHEBS@UTAH-20.ARPA>
Subject: Publisher Info for The Second Self
I neglected to provide the details...
The publisher is Simon & Schuster, ISBN is 0-671-46848-0, and
LC number is QA76.T85 1984 (or something like that). The book is available
in quite a few bookstores, including the big chains, so try there first.
stan shebs
------------------------------
Date: 17 Sep 1984 08:47:02-EDT
From: sde@Mitre-Bedford
Subject: Swans:
At least during the latter part of March, 1980, the statement,
"all swans are white," was false; those familiar with Heinlein's
"fair witness" concept will recognize the phrasing; I say it
having witnessed black or near-black swans in Perth during the
aforementioned time.
Granting that the facts have little to do with the principle of
the argument, I thought folks might nonetheless be amused.
David sde@mitre-bedford
------------------------------
Date: 12 Sep 84 9:11:34-PDT (Wed)
From: hplabs!tektronix!bennety @ Ucb-Vax.arpa
Subject: Re: Now and Then
Article-I.D.: tektroni.3588
Toby Robison's comment on Mark Chilenska's discussion on inductive
proof was quite apt -- however, we should note that induction is
limited to statements on a countably infinite set. That is, induction
can only work with integers.
-bsy
tektronix!bennety
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 17 Sep 84 11:01:17 PDT
From: Charlie Crummer <crummer@AEROSPACE>
Subject: Uhrig's Stream of Consciousness in V2 #112
With regard to Werner's concern about unethical or immoral applications of
AI: Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility (CPSR) is very concerned
with this issue as am I.
Please give me feedback on this. Perhaps the surest death-knell for the
outrageous-dangerous stuff ("Intelligent Computers" that would make life-or-
death decisions for the human race) is to require that they pass rigorous
tests. If it is required that they actually work the way they are supposed to
many of the systems will die a natural (and deserved) death. A comprehensive
and rigorous top-down (parallel with the top-down design) testing program may
be the answer.
--Charlie
------------------------------
Date: 17 Sep 84 09:20:20 PDT (Monday)
From: Hoffman.es@XEROX.ARPA
Subject: AI in the kitchen, continued
The article in V2,#118, "Robot cooks if it finds the beef", reminded me
of the following:
"....
John McCarthy, one of the founders of the field of artificial
intelligence, is fond of talking of the day when we'll have 'kitchen
robots' to do chores for us, such as fixing a lovely shrimp creole.
Such a robot would, in his view, be exploitable like a slave because it
would not be conscious in the slightest. To me, this is
incomprehensible. Anything that could get along in the unpredictable
kitchen world would be as worthy of being considered conscious as would
a robot that could survive for a week in the Rockies. To me, both
worlds are incredibly subtle and potentially surprise-filled. Yet I
suspect that McCarthy thinks of a kitchen as ... some sort of simple and
'closed' world, in contrast to 'open-ended' worlds, such as the Rockies.
This is just another example, in my opinion, of vastly under-estimating
the complexity of a world we take for granted, and thus under-estimating
the complexity of the beings that could get along in such a world.
Ultimately, the only way to be convinced of these kinds of things is to
try to write a computer program to get along in a kitchen...."
Excerpted from a letter by DOUG HOFSTADTER in 'Visible Language',
V17,#4, Autumn 1983. (In 1983, that periodical carried, in successive
issues, an extensive piece by Knuth on his Meta-Font, a lengthy review
by Hofstadter, and letters from both of them and from others.)
--Rodney Hoffman
------------------------------
Date: 14 Sep 1984 16:36-EDT
From: Dan Hoey <hoey@NRL-AIC>
Subject: Maximum window sum, in AIList V2 #117
Ken,
Bentley's problem 7 asks for the complexity of the maximum
subarray sum problem. I would advise you to call your algorithm a
solution to the maximum subarray sum problem, rather than a solution to
problem 7. You have given an upper bound for the complexity, but
barring an equal lower bound problem 7 is still unsolved. I know of
no lower bound larger than the size of the input.
In case you're interested, here's another maximum subarray sum
algorithm with the same time complexity, using less working storage.
See the comments for a description of its working. Enjoy.
Dan
[The following is simpler, more efficient, and uses less auxilliary
storage than the version I gave (although it does require buffering
the full input array). I can't think of any improvement. -- KIL]
/*
** maxsbasum
**
** Compute the maximum subarray sum in an array. In case all
** array elements are negative, the maximum sum is 0.0
** for an empty subarray.
**
** COMMENTS
**
** Every subarray of an array is a full-height subarray of a
** full-width subarray of the array.
**
** This routine examines each of the O(NROWS^2) full-width
** subarrays of the array. A vector containing the sum of each
** column in the full-width subarray is maintained. The maximum
** full-height subarray sum of the full-width subarray corresponds
** to the maximum subvector sum of the vector of column sums,
** found in O(NCOLS) time using Kadane's algorithm.
**
** Running time is O(NROWS^2 NCOLS). Working storage for this
** program is dominated by the O(NCOLS) vector of column sums.
**
** HISTORY
**
** 16-Sep-84 Laws at SRI-AI
** Merged innermost two loops into one.
**
** 14-Sep-84 Hoey at NRL-AIC
** Cobbled this version together.
** Comm. ACM, September 1984; Jon Bentley
** published maximum subvector code (Pascal).
** Algorithm attributed to Jay Kadane, 1977.
**
** 11-Sep-84 Laws at SRI-AI
** Wrote another program solving the same problem. Parts of
** his program, from AIList V2 #117, appear in this program.
*/
/* Sample problem. (Answer is 6.0.) */
#define NROWS 4
#define NCOLS 4
float X[NROWS][NCOLS] = {{ 1.,-2., 3.,-1.}, { 2.,-5., 1.,-1.},
{ 3., 1.,-2., 3.}, {-2., 1., 1., 0.}};
/* Macro to return the maximum of two expressions. */
#define MAX(exp1,exp2) (((exp1) > (exp2)) ? (exp1) : (exp2))
main()
{
float MaxSoFar; /* Global maximum */
float ColSum[NCOLS]; /* Column sums of full-width subarray */
float MaxEndingHere; /* For Kadane's algorithm */
int lowrow,highrow; /* Bounds of full-width subarray */
int thiscol; /* Column index */
/* Loop over bottom row of full-width subarray. */
MaxSoFar = 0.0;
for (lowrow = 0; lowrow < NROWS; lowrow++) {
/* Initialize column sums. */
for (thiscol = 0; thiscol < NCOLS; thiscol++)
ColSum[thiscol] = 0.0;
/* Loop over top row of full-width subarray. */
for (highrow = lowrow; highrow < NROWS; highrow++) {
/* Update column sum, find maximum subvector sum of ColSum. */
MaxEndingHere = 0.0;
for (thiscol = 0; thiscol < NCOLS; thiscol++) {
ColSum[thiscol] += X[highrow][thiscol];
MaxEndingHere = MAX(0.0, MaxEndingHere + ColSum[thiscol]);
MaxSoFar = MAX(MaxSoFar, MaxEndingHere);
}
}
}
/* Print the solution. */
printf("Maximum subarray sum: %g\n",MaxSoFar);
}
------------------------------
Date: Tue 18 Sep 84 15:09:58-PDT
From: Samuel Holtzman <HOLTZMAN@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA>
Subject: Course - Decision Systems
[Forwarded from the Stanford bboard by Laws@SRI-AI.]
Course Announcement
DECISION ANALYSIS AND ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
Engineering Economic Systems 234
3 units
Instructor: Samuel Holtzman
Monday and Wednesday 2:00 to 3:15 pm
Building 260, room 264
This course investigates the relationship between decision analysis
and artificial intelligence in building expert systems for decision
making in complex domains. Major topic areas include fundamentals of
artificial intelligence (production systems, search, logic
programming) and design of intelligent decision systems based on
decision analysis (use of formal methods in decision making,
represention and solution of decision problems, reasoning under
uncertainty). The course will also cover programming in Lisp for
students not familiar with the language. Course requirements include
a sustantial project based on the concepts developed in the course.
Prerequesites: EES 231 (Decision Analysis) or equivalent
and familiarity with computer programming.
For further information contact:
Samuel Holtzman
497-0486, Terman 301
HOLTZMAN@SUMEX
------------------------------
Date: Mon Sep 17 17:15:08 1984
From: mclure@sri-prism
Subject: Games - Computer Chess Championship
[Forwarded from the SRI-AI bboard by Laws@SRI-AI.]
The ACM annual North American Computer Chess Championship is a
watering-hole for computer chess researchers, devotees, and ordinary
chess players interested in what new improvements have been made in
computer chess during the past year.
Come see Ken Thompson and Belle seek out chess
truth, chess justice, and the American Way!
Watch David Levy wince as his chess program
discovers innovations in chess theory unknown even
to Grandmasters!
Marvel at Bob Hyatt's Cray Blitz program as it
slices through the opposition at many MIPS!
See the tiny Spracklen program otherwise marketed as
Prestige and Elite by Fidelity tally up points
against the "big boys!"
Gawk as ivory tower researchers such as Tony
Marsland of University of Alberta try to turn
obscure and obfuscating computer chess theory into
tangible points against opposition!
Watch in amazement as David Slate's NUCHESS program,
a descendent of the famous Northwestern University
Chess 4.5 program, tries to become the most
"human-like" of chess programs!
And strangest of all, see a chess tournament where the
noise level is immaterial to the quality of play!
The following information is from AChen at Xerox...
1) dates - 7-9 Oct, 1984
2) where - Continental Parlors at San Francisco Hilton
3) times - Sun 1300 and 1900, 7 Oct, 1984
Mon 1900, 8 Oct, 1984
Tue 1900, 9 Oct, 1984
4) who - Tournament director will be Mike Valvo
four round Swiss-style includes Cray BLITZ,
BELLE and NUCHESS.
for more information:
Professor M. Newborn
School of Computer Science, McGill University
805 Sherbrooke Street West, Montreal
Quebec, Canada H3A 2K6
note: this info can be found in July, 1984 issue of ACM Communications,
page A21.
Stuart
------------------------------
End of AIList Digest
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