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AIList Digest Volume 4 Issue 015
AIList Digest Friday, 24 Jan 1986 Volume 4 : Issue 15
Today's Topics:
Query - RT/PC Common Lisp,
Binding - Robert Leary @ San Diego Supercomputer Center,
Corrections - "Meta" Quote & MRS,
AI Tools - Representation of Uncertainty in MRS,
Policy - Gatewaying of AIList from Usenet Net.AI &
Relevance of Theoretical Computer Science to AI
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Date: 22 Jan 1986 19:14-EST
From: NGALL@G.BBN.COM
Subject: RT/PC Common Lisp Query
Has anyone heard anything about a Common Lisp for the RT/PC (IBM's
new Risc Engineering Workstation)? (By Lucid perhaps?)
-- Nick
------------------------------
Date: 22 January 1986 1326-PST (Wednesday)
From: west@nprdc.arpa (Larry West)
Subject: Robert Leary @ San Diego Supercomputer Center
In re Dallas Webster's short note about Dr. Robert Leary [AIList V4 #11]:
First, a minor correction: UCSD's zip code is 92093, not 92903.
Dr. Leary is with GA Technologies (San Diego) which operates the
Supercomputer center for the University. You might be able to reach
him thru UCSD, but I think GA Technologies would be a better bet.
The phone book lists:
GA Technologies, Inc.
10955 John Jay Hopkins Dr.
and this is my guess:
La Jolla, CA 92037
Phone (general info): 619-455-3000
An old, but possibly still valid, net address for him is:
leary%gav@lll-mfe.ARPA
Larry West, UCSD Institute for Cognitive Science, west@nprdc.ARPA
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 23 Jan 1986 08:31:26
From: rjb%allegra.btl.csnet@CSNET-RELAY.ARPA
Subject: V4 #11: Quote about "meta"
(Regarding W. Hamscher's response in V4 #11 to a query about MRS:)
Please - let's give credit where it's deserved: "Anything you can do,
I can do meta" should be attributed to David Levy (via Brian Smith).
I merely used it in a talk at AAAI-80 (hopefully attributing it
to David).
Ron Brachman
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 23 Jan 86 17:13:58 CST
From: veach%ukans.csnet@CSNET-RELAY.ARPA
Subject: Correction.
In a recent issue the full name MRS was incorrectly reported.
MRS = "Modifiable Representation System"
(source - "MRS Manual", Michael R. Genesereth, et. al.
1980, Stanford Heuristic Programming Project)
------------------------------
Date: Thu 23 Jan 86 16:30:46-PST
From: Yung-Jen Hsu <Hsu@SU-SUSHI.ARPA>
Subject: MRS distribution & maintenance
Walter,
Contrary to what you said in your recent message, which appeared in
AILIST V4 #11, about the distribution and maintenace of MRS, I'm NOT the
person in charge of the matter. If anyone would like to get a copy of
the MRS system, I believe that the best person(s) to contact is Arthur
Whitney (whitney@sumex) and/or Michael Genesereth (genesereth@sumex).
Best regards.
Jane Hsu
------------------------------
Date: 22 Jan 86 16:00:21 PST (Wed)
From: whiting@sri-spam
Subject: MRS info.
Re:
Date: Fri, 17 Jan 86
From: Tom Scott
Subject: MRS
Can it (MRS) handle ... Certainty factors?
The MRS that is available for common distribution doesn't have the
facility for dealing with uncertainty. An implementation of Dempster's
Rule has been incorporated into a non-official version. There are some
fairly strong restrictions on this version, but an application using
this version has been implemented. It seems the situation is more
"MRS's official release doesn't include the ability to deal with
uncertainty, YET", than "MRS can't handle certainty factors".
[Note: "Can it handle Certainty factors?" has been generalized to "Does
MRS have the ability to deal with uncertainty?". Certainty factors are
generally associated with MYCIN/E-MYCIN's methodology for dealing with
uncertainty.]
As an aside, Stuart Russell Esq., has put together a manual which is
quite good, "The Compleat (sic) Guide to MRS", Stanford Knowledge
Systems Laboratory Report No. KSL-85-12.
Kevin Whiting
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 22 Jan 86 16:40:07 PST
From: Kenneth I. Laws <AIList-Request@SRI-AI>
Subject: Resumption of AIList Gatewaying
Eric Fair, the Berkeley Postmaster, has been handling the gatewaying
of AIList to the Usenet mod.ai distribution. [The "mod" stands for
"moderated".] He has offered to gateway net.ai submissions back to
AIList if we wish.
AIList used to have such an arrangement until our SRI-UNIX gateway
broke. At that time AIList traffic dropped by about 50%, primarily
through the loss of cross-net discussions (as opposed to seminar
and conference announcements). I do not know whether net.ai continues
to carry a great deal of non-AIList traffic, nor whether there would
be an increase in useful interchanges if we again make it easy for
academic/foreign Usenet readers to submit material to AIList. I do not
know whether Usenet readers >>like<< having a "private" discussion
channel in addition to the AIList stream that they get.
I expect that the connection would increase my workload, but I am
willing to take on the moderation as long as no one objects to my just
ignoring net.ai comments that do not seem relevant. (Sending explict
rejection notices involves numerous hassles, and hardly seems worth
the effort since the submitter has already reached his net.ai audience
and would be unaware of whether AIList also carried the text.)
So, does anyone feel strongly one way or the other? The default is
to go ahead with the connection, at least until it proves unmanageable.
(I would rather drop seminar notices than lose personal interaction.)
-- Ken Laws
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 22 Jan 86 15:57:16 -0200
From: mcvax!lifia!rit@seismo.CSS.GOV (Jean-Francois Rit )
Subject: Relevance of Theoretical Computer Science to AI
To: AIList-REQUEST@SRI-AI.ARPA
In article <8601151921.AA17286@ucbvax.berkeley.edu> you write:
> Today's Topics:
> Description - European Association for Theoretical Computer Science
> ....
> In our experience the only reason that a computer
> scientist who is either actively engaged or interested in
> theoretical computer science is not a member of EATCS...
I found this message quite interesting...At least because it made me wonder
why it was in mod.ai!
Our Laboratory (LIFIA) clusters research groups in Theoretical CS and in AI.
There are many CS labs in Grenoble, and AI could have as well been separated
from TCS. However I find it quite hard to define any common interest other
than "doing the soft for the future super-computer" which hardly leads to any
tight cooperation (this is my personnal opinion only).
Furthermore, one of the leaders of EATC is M. Nivat :
>TCS Editor: M. Nivat, Paris
>Past Presidents: M. Nivat, Paris (1972-1977)
A semestrial course on CS of whom I attended, where I learnt much (:-) about
automata and grammars but never heard the words AI. (it is said in my lab that
he is not a strong supporter of AI but these are rumors that I could not
personnally verify).
So, are there any AI researchers who feel actively engaged or interested in
TCS? ^^^^^^^^
For example, in working or publishing in one of the following fields :
> Typical topics discussed during recent ICALP conferences are:
> computability, automata theory, formal language theory, analysis of
> algorithms, computational complexity, mathematical aspects of
> programming language definition, logic and semantics of programming
> languages, foundations of logic programming, theorem proving, software
> specification, computational geometry, data types and data structures,
> theory of data bases and knowledge based systems, cryptography, VLSI
> structures, parallel and distributed computing, models of concurrency
> and robotics.
^^^^^^^^ (oh oh! robotics indeed?)
> ... Behind all this lie the major problems of under-
> standing the nature of computation and its relation to computing
> methodology. While "Theoretical Computer Science" remains mathematical
> and abstract in spirit, it derives its motivation from the problems of
> practical computation.
I don't feel that a major problem for AI researchers is understanding the
nature of computation, I think the AI point of view is much (maybe too much)
broader or at least OPEN toward The "real" universe.
I repeat I'm not opposed to TCS, I just wonder which real links bound TCS and
AI. I'd like to know what other AI , and TCS (if they read mod.ai (-:)
researchers think about that (that's why I submit this to the news).
Jean-Francois Rit
Laboratoire d'Informatique Fondamentale et d'Intelligence Artificielle
BP 68
38402 Saint-Martin d'Heres cedex
Disclaimer: This is only my postal address!
UUCP: ...{mcvax,vmucnam}!lifia!rit
[I was the one who forwarded the message to AIList -- perhaps
I have been unduly influenced by the AI "neats" here at SRI-AI.
I am a "scruffy" (or hacker or pragmatist), but there seem to be
plenty of people in AI who hold that the problems will fall apart if
and only if we solve the underlying difficult cases rigorously. There
are those in the Representation and Reasoning Group here at the AI
Center who consider automata theory an appropriate basis for robotic
perception and action. Theorem proving is popular with our planning
group and also underlies part of our natural language understanding
effort. Grammar and formal language theories are used in NL
understanding, although I don't know whether they are considered AI.
Semantics of [certain] programming languages has been a topic on
AIList and on the Prolog Digest, and may generate renewed interest
when CommonLoops and other object-oriented languages become commonly
available. Foundations of logic programming is an obvious match, and
computational geometry is important to those of us in vision research.
The theory of data bases is intermingled with data abstraction and
conceptual modeling, as well as with practical development of efficient
Prolog systems; it will become more important to AI as knowledge-based
systems become larger. Parallel and distributed computing (or, at least,
problem solving) are evidently of interest to the AIers on the PARSYM
discussion list. Models of concurrency are important in multiagent
planning.
A Stanford professor has requested that I not forward any more articles
from the "Theory Net" distribution. I will comply, but I do not agree
that AI is (or should be) disjoint from CS theory. The results of
CS research will be of use in AI, and the needs an theories of AI might
well inspire further CS research. -- KIL]
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End of AIList Digest
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