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AIList Digest Volume 5 Issue 275
AIList Digest Tuesday, 1 Dec 1987 Volume 5 : Issue 275
Today's Topics:
Queries - STRIPS and its Derivatives & VM/CMS Software &
ES Tools for the Mac,
Binding - Cugini Mailer Problem,
Pattern Recognition - Recognizing Humpback Fins,
Application - NCR VLSI Design Expert System,
Philosophy - Research Methodology,
Law - Software Ownership
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Date: 24 Nov 87 21:45:09 GMT
From: steve@hubcap.clemson.edu ("Steve" Stevenson)
Subject: STRIPS and its derivatives
I am interested in finding out the current status of the
STRIPS model (Fike and Nilsson) and its successors. Any
help would be appreciated. Any compiler/interpreters?
--
Steve (really "D. E.") Stevenson steve@hubcap.clemson.edu
Department of Computer Science, (803)656-5880.mabell
Clemson University, Clemson, SC 29634-1906
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 27 Nov 87 14:28:10 EST
From: Jim Buchanan <ACAD8005%RYERSON.BITNET@wiscvm.wisc.edu>
Subject: Looking for software
I would appreciate any information or leads on the following software:
1) LISP for an IBM VM/CMS system
I have copies of XLISP(version 1.4) and MTS lisp and know about IBM's
LISP/VM but I am looking for the latest XLISP (that will run on VM/CMS)
or other Public domain or inexpensive Lisps
2) Smalltalk for IBM VM/CMS
Again Public Domain or cheap would be best.
Thanks again for any information
Jim Buchanan
Supervisor, Academic Computing Services
Ryerson Polytechnical Institute
Toronto, Ontario
Canada
------------------------------
Date: 30 Nov 87 14:16:19 EST
From: Mary.Lou.Maher@CIVE.RI.CMU.EDU
Subject: ES tools for Mac
I have to give a tutorial and workshop on Expert Systems at an engineering
conference and would like to use the Mac since it has relatively little
start up time. I am interested in simple rule based tools and object
oriented tools that run on a Mac. Simplicity is more important
than sophistication. Can anyone help? Mary Lou Maher maher@cive.ri.cmu.edu
------------------------------
Date: 30 Nov 87 06:58:00 EST
From: cugini@icst-ecf.arpa
Reply-to: <cugini@icst-ecf.arpa>
Subject: mailer problem
My mailer hasn't been able to receive any mail for the past 2-3 weeks.
If anyone has tried to mail me something, apologies, and please try again.
John Cugini <Cugini@icst-ecf.arpa>
------------------------------
Date: 23 Nov 87 02:57:54 GMT
From: nosc!humu!uhccux!cs313s19@sdcsvax.ucsd.edu (Mike Morton)
Subject: pattern recognition software (recognizing humpback fins!)
wanted
A friend does research work spotting humpbacks by recognizing their
dorsal fins. The researchers finish each day by comparing the day's
photos with 300-400 photos of known whales to recognize individuals.
They're looking for a way to do this with a computer database.
They could code the data and enter them as numbers: size and shape of
fins, etc. Then the database just needs to search for close matches.
This could be done with a simple Basic program or spreadsheet macro; any
suggestions for a turnkey system which does this?
Better, but presumably harder to find or implement, would be a graphics
recognition system, scanning images or allowing them to be traced by
hand and entered. I doubt there's anything like this available off-the-
shelf, but would be interested to hear about it if there is.
Solutions for the Mac are especially of interest, but any micro is OK.
Please reply by email. Thanks in advance.
-- Mike Morton // P.O. Box 11378, Honolulu, HI 96878, (808) 456-8455 HST
INTERNET: cs313s19@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu
UUCP: {ihnp4,uunet,dcdwest,ucbvax}!sdcsvax!nosc!uhccux!cs313s19
BITNET: cs313s19%uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu@rutgers.edu
------------------------------
Date: 25 Nov 87 16:19:38 GMT
From: uh2@psuvm.bitnet (Lee Sailer)
Subject: Re: pattern recognition software (recognizing humpback
fins!) wanted
I can think of some pretty good ways to do this, but not with
database software, unless the matching problem is really simple.
The current masters of *sequence matching* are the molecular biologists,
who spend a lot of time matching LONG sequences of RNA, DNA, etc.
One approach
Can the fins be described with a simple sequence of tokens or symbols, like
<big gap> <small notch> <small gap> <big notch> <tip> ? If so, then you've
got the DWIM (do what I mean) or spelling correction problem. Given a
sequence of symbols, find the set of legal sequences that are close.
This turns out to be a graph search.
Another approach
Are accurate measurements needed to distinguish nearly identical fins?
If so, then a fin must be described something like this:
gap of 15.2mm
notch width 5mm depth 3mm
gap of 45 mm
notch width 3mm depth 5mm
tip
etc etc etc
If you think of a 'gap' as a notch with width 0, and the tip as a notch
of width and depth 0, then each feature characterized by a triple
of real numbers. Using the <start> <stop> and <tip> as
landmarks, it ought to be possible to think up some way to convert
each fin to a point in N-space, and then to compute the distance
between a new fin and the 300-400 fins already in the database.
------------------------------
Date: 25 Nov 87 23:21:55 GMT
From: portal!cup.portal.com!David_Bat_Masterson@uunet.uu.net
Subject: Re: pattern recognition software (recognizing humpback
fins!) w
This request sounds vaguely familiar. I thought I had seen a show about
a few students for a college doing a study of humpback whales. They
also were having trouble keeping track of which whales were which (maybe
it was killer whales). The way they went about handling it was to
classify the dorsal fin shape by things like size, shape, bites, extra
spots, barnacles, etc. (their fingerprint). I forget if they used a
database system to keep track of this or just a file card approach. If
you use a DB, this information could be entered into a relational database
for scanning purposes (Dbase perhaps). This would not provide an automatic
mechanism for processing the photographs, but its a start. Additional ideas
would be to implement an expert system as front end to this process. The
expert system could be trained to ask the right questions about a photograph
to get a good classification. On top of this could be added a laser scanner
(for about $3K) that would bring the photo into the database; there may be
database systems that would allow you to store the image of the whale right in
the database (I know the Amiga databases can). Think about it, you can build
up from a basic capability, but don't try to do the whole thing at once.
David_Bat_Masterson@cup.portal.com
------------------------------
Date: 27 Nov 87 03:48:33 GMT
From: portal!cup.portal.com!Bob_Robert_Brody@uunet.uu.net
Subject: Re: pattern recognition software (recognizing humpback
fins!) w
There is an organization I belong to re Moclips Cetological Society
which is non profit and centered around whales and whale sightings
and cataloging. Maybe they could be of help re using databases to
maintain the catalogs. You can call 206 378-4710.
The Whale Museum
P.O. Box 945
Friday Harbor, Washington 98250
Moclips Cetological Society is a non profit research and educational
corporation.
Bob Brody
Los Angeles
------------------------------
Date: Sat 28 Nov 87 12:09:26-CST
From: Charles Petrie <AI.PETRIE@MCC.COM>
Reply-to: Petrie@MCC.com
Subject: Re: INFO REQUESTED ON SYSTEMS DEVELOPED USING AI TOOLS/SHELLS
Robin Steele of NCR has built a commercial expert system of some note:
. It represents and reasons about real circuit designs consisting
between 10 and 20K gates
. Customers pay $4,000+ to come into NCR's shop and use the system.
Reference: "An Expert System Application in Semicuston VLSI Design",
Robin L. Steele, _Proc. 24th ACM/IEEE Design Automation Conference_,
Miami Beach, 1987.
------------------------------
Date: 23 Nov 87 22:33:55 GMT
From: honavar@speedy.wisc.edu (A Buggy AI Program)
Reply-to: honavar@speedy.wisc.edu (A Buggy AI Program)
Subject: Research methodology in AI (was Re: Success of AI)
In article <4739@wisdom.BITNET> eitan%H@wiscvm.arpa (Eitan Shterenbaum) writes:
>
>a) You can't understand the laws under which a system works without
> understanding the structure of the system ( I believe that our
> intelligence is the result of our brain's structure )
Not entirely true. We can often gain insights into what structures
are needed to produce a certain observed behavior simply by observing
the system's behavior. This would
then enable us to hypothesize about the structures that actually
produce such behavior. We would then test the hypotheses by
putting them through experimental validation. Just as one can have
several different computers that are functionally equivalent, it
is reasonable to expect that there several possible architectures (the
human brain being one of them) that are capable of intelligence.
>
>It seems to me that
> 1) You have no definition for Intelligence.
> 2) You want to have the rules of Itelligence.
> 3) Thus you build systems inorder to simulate Intelligence.
> 4) Since you don't know you're looking for and since you have no
> basic rules to simulate the intelligence on, you invent your
> own local definition and rules for Intelligence.
> 5) Then youtry to mach your results with your expectations of what
> the results should be.
This is an oversimplified view of the research methodology in AI
and Cognitive sciences.
It is true that we don't have a good definition of intelligence.
For purposes of AI, it is sufficient to say that we want to build
systems that exhibit the kinds of behavior that are believed
to require intelligence if performed by humans (I forget the author
that first suggested this definition of AI). This is an operational
definition or at least a basis for an operational definition of
artificial intelligence. Given this, there are several alternative
approaches one could adopt in building intelligent systems -
including the one of simulating a system that most of us agree is
capable of intelligence, the human brain (plus the sensory mechanisms).
The search for architectures for intelligence is by no means an
unconstrained, blind search. The hypothesis can be constrained by
utilizing data gathered from experimental research in psychology,
neuroscience, and related areas as well as theoretical analysis
of complexity of the tasks involved and so on.
>
>Correct me if I'm wrong but I do feel that the neuro-biologists chaps are
>in the right track and that the Computer scientists should combine efforts
>with them instead of messing around with AI.
>
I agree that AI researches can benefit from the research findings in
neuroscience. It is also true that computational theories advanced
in AI can provide insights to neuroscientists as well. In fact, there
is evidence of this interaction in the works of David Marr, Shimon
Ullman, and others. Cognitive psychology is another field which
is at least as relevent as neuroscience to work in AI.
------------------------------
Date: 22 Nov 87 21:01:00 GMT
From: mnetor!utzoo!dciem!nrcaer!cognos!roberts@uunet.uu.net (Robert
Stanley)
Subject: Re: My parents own my output.
In article <7880@allegra.UUCP> jac@allegra.UUCP (Jonathan Chandross) writes:
>If I write a program that generates machine code from a high level language
>do I not own the output? Of course I own it. I also own the output from
>a theorum prover, a planner, and similar systems, no matter how elaborate.
You do indeed, unless you perform (or fail to perform) some act or acts which,
in the eyes of the Law, strip you either of your status as owner or of your
right to compensation for its use. Giving a copy to a friend without explicit
(read: a witnessed contract) injunction against passing it on, using it other
than for private purposes, etc. is just as much a reduction of your legal
writes as selling it under a contract of sale/lease. There is still some
considerable controversy as to the status of software license agreements under
a variety of legal systems, which is why no consensus has been reached on the
subject of how best to protect your software against theft.
Failing to take positive legal steps to protect your rights of ownership of a
piece of software is tantamount to surrendering those rights once you have
made, or allowed to be made, even one copy of the (suite of) programs. This
may not be fair, but it is what appears to have been established by precedent
in all the major industrialized nations where cases involving software rights
have been tried. At present, in the US and to a large degree in Canada, the
only really successful legal defences have been for ROM software, notably the
Apple Macintosh, which is why there are as yet *no* Macintosh clones in the
market place. It is rumoured (comment anyone?) that this is one of the reasons
for IBM's approach to the design of the PS2, with critical components of the
system architecture in ROM.
For those with a speculative approach to the future, it will be interesting if
history repeats itself. In the 1970's, IBM was taken to court by a number
of PCM's (Plug-Compatible Manufacturers) and eventually lost a ruling, being
forced to disclose the details of their internal architecture to a degree
sufficient to allow other manufacturers to design compatible equipment. At the
time IBM was viewed as holding a monopolistic position, which is not currently
the case with any one personal computer manufacturer nor, as yet, for any
specific piece of software.
>The alternative is to view the AI as an sentient entity with rights, that
>is, a person. Then we can view the AI as a company employee who developed
>said work on a company machine and on company time. Therefore the employer
>owns the output, just as my employer owns my output done on company time.
Whether your employer owns your output is exactly and only a matter of legal
contract. Either you have signed a legally binding contract of employment with
your employer or your (and your employer's) rights are protected by clauses in
one or more current labour relations bills. Precise terms of the latter will,
of course, vary from country to country. It is possible that some aspects of
an explicit contract of employment may be challengeable in court as being overly
restrictive; there have been several US and Canadian precedents within the last
year.
I, for instance, have a contract of emplyment into which I insisted be written
several waivers, simply because the wording of the standard contract gave my
employer the right to everything I did anywhere at any time (24 hours a day,
365.25 days per year) while I was still their employee. I doubt that the
original contract would actually have withstood a challenge in court, but that
would have taken money and time; much, much better to avoid the situation
completely.
>The real question should be: Did the AI knowlingly enter into a contract with
>the employer.
This will only be an issue if an AI can first be demonstrated to be a legal
individual within the eyes of the court. Remember, there are plenty of humans
who do not have this status, but for whom some other legal individual is deemed
to have legal responsibility: the legally insane and the under-aged, to name
but two.
>I wonder if the ACLU would take the case.
Not until there is seen to be some benefit to be gained from protecting the
rights of an AI. Let's face it, more working human beings are likely to oppose
the establishment of such precedents right now than are going to be for it.
How soon do you see this attitude changing? Especially if white-collar workers
start being displaced by intelligent management systems!
Robert_S
--
R.A. Stanley Cognos Incorporated S-mail: P.O. Box 9707
Voice: (613) 738-1440 (Research: there are 2!) 3755 Riverside Drive
FAX: (613) 738-0002 Compuserve: 76174,3024 Ottawa, Ontario
uucp: decvax!utzoo!dciem!nrcaer!cognos!roberts CANADA K1G 3Z4
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End of AIList Digest
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