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AIList Digest Volume 2 Issue 154
AIList Digest Thursday, 15 Nov 1984 Volume 2 : Issue 154
Today's Topics:
Pattern Recognition - Partial Matching,
LISP - Lisp Mailing Lists? & Conversion Between Dialects,
Conference - IJCAI-85,
AI Tools - LM-Prolog and DCG's,
Perception - Dialectics,
Linguistics - Mel'cuk's Dictionary & Aymara & Language Evolution,
Humor - Artificial Poetry,
Seminars - Speech Acts
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Date: Wed, 7 Nov 84 08:20:48 cst
From: Mohd Nasiruddin <nasir%lsu.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa>
Subject: Partial Matching
I am interested in finding information on the extent of
work done in partial matching.
If anyone can point me towards research in this area,
or references, please respond as early as possible.
Thanks in advance.
---Mohd. Nasiruddin
Dept. Of Computer Science,
Louisiana State University,
Baton Rouge, La 70893.
CSNET: <nasir%lsu@csnet-relay>
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 13 Nov 84 15:02:33 -0200
From: jaakov%wisdom.BITNET@Berkeley (Jacob Levy)
Subject: Is there a Lisp mailing lists?
I know of franz-friends@berkeley. Is there some other list of people
who have Symbolics 3600, Maclisp, etc? Thanks for the info,
Rusty Red (AKA Jacob Levy)
BITNET: jaakov@wisdom
CSNET and ARPA: jaakov%wisdom.bitnet@wiscvm.ARPA
UUCP: (if all else fails..) ..!decvax!humus!wisdom!jaakov
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 Nov 84 13:56 MST
From: May%pco@CISL-SERVICE-MULTICS.ARPA
Subject: Conversion Between Dialects of Lisp
I'm looking for tools to convert among the following Lisp dialects, with
the potential for going in any direction. Any replies sent to me will
be published collectively. Thanks.
Maclisp, the Multics version
Interlisp, the GCOS version from the U. of Waterloo
Franz Lisp
Common Lisp
Bob May
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Nov 84 10:28 EST
From: Tim Finin <Tim%upenn.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa>
Subject: IJCAI-85
_________________________ IJCAI-85 ____________________________________
The call for papers for IJCAI-85 has already been issued. The deadline
is January 7, 1985. Please send your suggestions for invited speakers,
panels, or any other aspects concerning the technical program to:
Aravind Joshi, Program Chair IJCAI-85
Department of Computer and Information Science
University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA 19104
USA
Clearly, it is impossible to accept all suggestions. However, your
suggestions are very essential and will be carefully considered by the
Program Committee.
------------------------------
Date: 12 Nov 84 11:06 PST
From: Kahn.pa@XEROX.ARPA
Subject: LM-Prolog and DCG's
[Forwarded from the Prolog Digest by Laws@SRI-AI.]
In answer to John Burge's questions in V2 #33 [AIList V2 #136]:
My experiences using LM-Prolog have been very positive
but I am surely not an un-biased judge (being one of the
co-authors of the system). (I am tempted to give a
little ad for LM-Prolog here, but will refrain. Interested
parties can contact me directly.)
Regarding the Grammar Kit, the main thing that distinguishes
it from other DCGs is that it can continuously maintain a
parse tree. The tree is drawn as parses are considered and
parts of it disappear upon backtracking. I have found this
kind of dynamic graphic display very useful for explaining
Prolog and DCGs to people as well as debugging specific
grammars.
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Nov 84 16:41:37 est
From: FRAWLEY <20568%vax1%udel-cc-relay.delaware@udel-relay.ARPA>
Subject: Dialectics & Mel'cuk's Dictionary
Two things:
1. Isaacson has discussed dialectical image processing. There is a considerable
body of information on dialectical psychology and psycholinguistics which
may be of some help theoretically. The work by Klaus Riegel is seminal, as is
the work of the Soviets (esp. Vygotsky and cohorts). Though I know of no work
on vision using dialectical psychology, their work on the dialectics of
perception and cognition might be of use.
Also, the Soviets have made some attempts to develop dialectical logic: i.e.,
some form of a dialectical predicate calculus. I can't remember the references
for this, but I think I ran across it in the 1970 surveys of Soviet thought,
or perhaps in the Soviet studies series (Soviet Philosophy, Psychology, etc.
published by Sharpe). In any case, there have been attempts at formal
dialectic logic (though they may be ideologically charged), and these
studies may help in formalizing algorithms for low-level visual perception
in a dialectical model.
2. More generally for AI: there's a new dictionary out, written by I.A.
Mel'cuk and published by Montreal U. which is the richest formal/linguistic
representation I've seen of the encyclopedic structure of the lexicon.
It combines lexical collocation and a set of 53 relations to generate
the entire lexicon. It is very good for text-generation. But, it's in
French. Bonne chance, mes amis...
Bill Frawley
20568.ccvax1@udel
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 Nov 84 15:03 CST
From: "Brett D. Slocum" <Slocum.CSCDA@HI-MULTICS.ARPA>
Subject: Language translation
Ancient Purity and Polyglot Programs
London Sunday Times, November 4th, 1984
John Barnes
Aymara, an old South American tongue used mainly by Andean peasants and
llama-herders, has enabled a Bolivian mathematician to score a notable
first in the increasing application of the computer to language
translation. Using it as an intermediate language, Ivan Guzman de Rojas
has written the first computer program capable of translating an English
text into several other languages simultaneously, rather than one at a time
as could already be done, at speeds of up to 120 words a minute.
Aymara is spoken by 2.5 million people living around Lake Titicaca on
the border between Bolivia and Peru. There is no written form in use;
Aymara speakers who can write do so in Spanish, the country's official
language. Yet Guzman discovered that it is so logical and pure in its
syntax that it makes an ideal bridging language to a computer.
Aymara is rigorous and simple - which means that its syntactical rules
always apply, and can be written out concisely in the sort of algebraic
shorthand that computers understand. Indeed, such is its purity that some
historians think that it did not just evolve, like other languages, but was
actually constructed from scratch some 4,000 years ago. It is also so
compact that a few words in it can do the work of dozens in English.
Canadian and American experts believe Guzman's system is not only
versatile in the range of languages it can handle, but that it can also
sort out ambiguities in a language as it translates. This is because
Aymara has a sense of logic that is very different from European languages.
Guzman, who now runs a computer consultancy in the capital, La Paz,
says that while he was teaching mathematics to Aymara children he realised
that their language admitted an intermediate value of truth or falsity.
That, he said, enabled them to reason about things that were uncertain in a
way Europeans could not. He has spent the past five years developing his
translation program, which he calls Atamiri (the Aymara for interpreter).
What is even more laudable about Guzman's achievement is that he did it
in his spare time, on borrowed computers, without any commercial backing,
in one of the world's poorest countries. His clients, he says, gave him
free time on their computers at night and over the weekend.
Guzman has already turned down the commercial overtures made by one US
computer giant. Not surprisingly, he has become a staunch defender of the
Aymara language, which is not taught in Bolivian schools and is generally
discouraged as a deadend peasant tongue.
"It is a disgrace those things can happen on our planet," he says. "If
I ever make any money from this, I will see that they get books and a
newspaper in their own language."
------------------------------
Date: 12 Nov 84 16:54:43 EST
From: Allen <Lutins@RU-BLUE.ARPA>
Subject: Language Evolution
The ultimate evolution is reached when a language can
express all notions in the realms of the physical, emotional,
conceptual, and spiritual in a concise unambiguous way.
The implication here is that there is a point where language *stops*
evolving. This is not the case. One synchronic example of this diachronic
process is the presence of "dialects" within "languages" (I use these
terms cautiously, as defining them in a strict sense would be impossible
and unnecessary). Although it might be argued that a written language may
stop evolving while the spoken language went on changing, I sincerely
doubt that this would be feasable.
-Allen
------------------------------
Date: Mon 12 Nov 84 18:59:17-PST
From: BARNARD@SRI-AI.ARPA
Subject: What Racter Wrote (from Harper's Magazine, Nov. 1984)
From "The Policeman's Beard is Half Constructed," a collection of
prose and poetry written by a computer. Racter, as the computer is
called, was programmed (by William Chamberlain) with rules of English
grammer and syntax, as well as an 8000-word vocabulary. Warner Books,
publisher of "The Policeman's Beard," claims that it is the first book
written by a computer.
Bill sings to Sarah. Sarah sings to Bill. Perhaps they will do other
dangerous things together. They may eat lamb or stroke each other.
They may chant of their difficulties and their happiness. They have
love but they also have typewriters. That is interesting.
PAUL: Hello, Joan.
JOAN: Hello, Paul.
PAUL: Joan, I was fantasizing that a white crow flew across the black
sky of night.
JOAN: I too have been thinking of a white crow. It flies in the night
and it flies in the day. It incites my dreams. My fantasy is that I
can soar with it.
PAUL: A single white crow or many winging eagles. All inflame my
dreams and cogitations. A single bird or many birds are in my dreams.
JOAN: Paul, have you bolted meat today?
PAUL: I have bolted lamb and chicken.
JOAN: Have you drained sherry?
PAUL: I have sipped seltzer.
JOAN: Shall we show our love by the reflections of our desire, or
shall we dream of a white crow?
PAUL: The dream is a reflection of our passion just as the white crow
is a reflection of our ambiguity.
JOAN: My desire to incite myself in my dreaming is also a reflection
of ambiguity.
PAUL: Well chanted, Joan. I craftily desire you.
------------------------------
Date: Wed 14 Nov 84 17:55:17-PST
From: Dikran Karagueuzian <DIKRAN@SU-CSLI.ARPA>
Subject: Seminars - Speech Acts
[Forwarded from the CSLI Newsletter by Laws@SRI-AI.]
ABSTRACT OF TODAY'S SEMINAR
``Natural language from the Standpoint of Artificial Intelligence''
An intelligent individual, human or computer program, must act on the basis
of what it believes in advance modified by what it observes and what it
learns from linguistic communication. Thinking about how the achievement
of goals is helped by communication leads to a somewhat different point of
view from one derived mainly from study of the corpus of spoken and written
language. Namely,
1. Communication should be regarded as a modifier of state of mind.
2. The most basic form of communication is the single word sentence
uttered under conditions in which the speaker and hearer share enough
knowledge so that the single word suffices. The complete sentence
develops under conditions in which the speaker and the hearers share
less context.
3. Many of the characteristics of language are determined by so far
unrecognized requirements of the communication situation. They will
apply to machines as well as people.
4. An effort to make a Common Business Communication Languages for
commercial communication among machines belonging to different
organizations exhibits interesting problems of the semantics of
language.
---John McCarthy
SUMMARY OF LAST WEEK'S SEMINAR
Phil Cohen of SRI gave a seminar in which he claimed that illocutionary act
recognition is not necessary for engaging in communicative interaction.
Rather, engaging in such interaction requires intent/plan recognition. In
support of this claim, he presented a formalism, being developed with Hector
Levesque (Univ. of Toronto), that showed how illocutionary acts could be
defined in terms of plans --- i.e., as beliefs about the conversants' shared
knowledge of the speaker's and hearer's goals and the causal consequences
of achieving those goals. In this formalism, illocutionary acts are no
longer conceptually primitive, but rather amount to theorems that can be
proven about a state-of-affairs. As an illustration, the definition of a
direct request was derived from an independently-motivated theory of action,
rather than stipulated. Just as one need not determine if a proof
corresponds to a prior lemma, a hearer need not actually characterize the
consequences of each utterance in terms of the IA theorems, but can simply
infer and respond to the speaker's goals. However, the hearer could
retrospectively summarize a complex of utterances as satisfying an
illocutionary act. Moreover, it was claimed that the framework can
characterize a range of indirect speech acts as lemmas, which can be derived
from and integrated with plan-based reasoning. The discussant, Ivan Sag,
related the theory to Gricean maxims of conversation, and to the ``standard''
view of how pragmatics fits into a theory of linguistic communication.
NEW CSLI REPORT
A final edition of Report No. CSLI-9-84, ``The Implementation of Procedurally
Reflective Languages'' by Jim des Rivieres and Brian Cantwell Smith, has just
been published. Copies may be obtained by writing to Dikran Karagueuzian
at the Center (Dikran at SU-CSLI).
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End of AIList Digest
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