[Prev][Next][Index]
CSLI Calendar, 18 Jan 1996, vol.11:12
-
To: friends
-
Subject: CSLI Calendar, 18 Jan 1996, vol.11:12
-
From: Tom Burke <burke>
-
Date: Wed, 17 Jan 1996 14:20:36 -0800 (PST)
-
Flags: 000000000000
C S L I C A L E N D A R O F P U B L I C E V E N T S
______________________________________________________________________________
18 January 1996 Stanford Vol. 11, No. 12
______________________________________________________________________________
A weekly publication of the Center for the Study of Language and
Information (CSLI), Stanford University, Ventura Hall, Stanford, CA 94305-4115
____________
CSLI ACTIVITIES DURING 18 -- 26 JANUARY 1996
THURSDAY, 18 JANUARY
10:00 - STASS Seminar
Cordura Hall, Room 100
Applying Situation Theory to Study Communication
in the Workplace
Keith Devlin, CSLI & St.Mary's College
and Duska Rosenberg, Brunel University
Abstract below
12:00 - Cognitive Science Lunch
Cordura Hall, Room 100
The Development of Children's Knowledge About Thinking
and Consciousness
John Flavell, Stanford Psychology
Abstract below
4:15 - SSP Forum
Building 60, Room 61-F
An Introduction to Systems Thinking
Maggie Johnson, Stanford Computer Science
Abstract below
FRIDAY, 19 JANUARY
12:00 - Logic Lunch
Building 380, Room 383-N
A Review of P. Clote's "Cutting Plane and Frege Proofs"
Grigori Mints, Stanford Philosophy
Abstract below
12:30 - HCI Seminar
Skilling Auditorium
Social Activity on Networked Systems
Mark Ackerman, UC Irvine Computer Science
Abstract below
3:30 - Linguistics Colloquium
Building 460, Room 146
Transparency Effects and Locality in Assimilation
Edward Flemming, Stanford Linguistics
Abstract below
MONDAY, 22 JANUARY
1:30 - Semantics Workshop
Cordura Hall, Room 104
Need We Say More About Polarized Auxiliaries?
Ton van der Wouden, Yale Linguistics/Vakgroep Nederlands
Groningen
Abstract below
TUESDAY, 23 JANUARY
7:00 - SSP Film Series
NEW LOCATION TO BE ANNOUNCED
The Thinking Machine (The Machine That Changed the
World, Part 4) (1992)
Abstract below
7:15 - Philosophy of Computation Seminar
Cordura Hall, Room 100
Readings in Computation: The Origin of Objects
Brian Cantwell Smith, Xerox PARC
WEDNESDAY, 24 JANUARY
4:15 - Seminar on Computational Learning and Adaptation
Ventura Hall, Room 17
Title and speaker to be announced
THURSDAY, 25 JANUARY
10:00 - STASS Seminar
Cordura Hall, Room 100
Barwise-Seligman Reading (cont'd)
Keith Devlin, CSLI & St.Mary's College
Abstract below
12:00 - CSLI CogLunch
Cordura Hall, Room 100
On the Nature of Phenomenal Consciousness
Guven Guzeldere, Stanford Philosophy & CSLI
Abstract below
4:15 - SSP Forum
Building 60, Room 61-F
Propositional Quantification in Modal Logics and
in Other Non-Classical Logics
Philip Kremer, Stanford Philosophy
Abstract below
FRIDAY, 26 JANUARY
12:30 - HCI Seminar
Skilling Auditorium
Multivalent Documents: Documents as Interfaces to
Information in Networked Digital Repositories
Thomas A. Phelps and Robert Wilensky, UC Berkeley
Abstract below
3:15 - Philosophy Colloquium
Encina Hall, Room 423
The Metaphysics of Nonfactualism
Michael Devitt, Maryland Philosophy
3:30 - Linguistics Colloquium
Building 460, Room 146
Title to be announced
Dani Byrd, Haskins Laboratories
____________
The CSLI Calendar appears on Wednesdays weekly throughout the academic year.
Announcements, abstracts, and other information to appear in the Calendar can
be submitted by e-mail to [incalendar@csli.stanford.edu].
Further information about CSLI and past issues of the CSLI Calendar
are available on the Internet at URL [http://www-csli.stanford.edu/csli/].
The Calendar is also posted each week to the [csli.bboard] newsgroup.
____________
STASS SEMINAR
on Thursday, 18 January
10:00 a.m., Cordura Hall, Room 100
Applying Situation Theory to Study Communication in the Workplace
Keith Devlin, CSLI & St.Mary's College
and Duska Rosenberg, Brunel University
[devlin@csli.stanford.edu, duska.rosenberg@brunel.ac.uk]
During the past five years we have been applying situation theory to analyze
the flow of information in the workplace. We are nearing completion of a
detailed study of a particular data corpus from a large computer company.
Interim reports on that work have appeared as a series of CSLI Reports, and a
comprehensive treatment will shortly appear as a CSLI Lecture Notes volume. We
are contemplating extending our work to various other areas of application,
including education and virtual enterprises. In our talk, we will survey the
work so far, and speculate on the future developments.
____________
CSLI COGLUNCH
on Thursday, 18 January
12:00 noon, Cordura Hall, Room 100
The Development of Children's Knowledge About
Thinking and Consciousness
John Flavell
Stanford Psychology
Most theory of mind research has dealt with children's knowledge about mental
states such as beliefs and desires. In contrast, our recent research focuses
on their knowledge about mental activities and experiences such as thinking
and consciousness.
In this talk, I will first summarize what our research suggests that
preschoolers know about such activities and experiences, and then summarize
what they appear not to know.
COGLUNCH WINTER SCHEDULE
Theme: Consciousness
1/18: JOHN FLAVELL (Psychology, Stanford U.) "The Development of Children's
Knowledge About Thinking and Consciousness"
1/25: GUVEN GUZELDERE (Philosophy & CSLI, Stanford U.) "The Nature of
Phenomenal Consciousness"
2/01: DAVID SPIEGEL (Psychiatry, Stanford U.) "Disintegrated Experience:
Dissociation, Hypnosis and Trauma"
2/08: PAT SUPPES (Philosophy, Stanford U.) "The Scientific Study of
Consciousness: Problems and Prospects"
2/15: BRIAN WANDELL (Psychology, Stanford U.) "Imaging Human Brain Activity"
2/22: WALTER FREEMAN (Neurobiology, UC Berkeley) "A Biological View of
Consciousness and Intentionality"
2/29: DAVID CHALMERS (Philosophy, UC Santa Cruz) "On the Search for a Neural
Correlate of Consciousness"
3/07: ALAN WALLACE (Religious Studies, Stanford U.) "Attentional Training,
Introspection, and the Investigation of Consciousness in Tibetan
Buddhism"
____________
SYMBOLIC SYSTEMS FORUM
on Thursday, 18 January
4:15 p.m., Building 60, Room 61-F
An Introduction to Systems Thinking
Maggie Johnson
Stanford Computer Science
[johnson@cs.stanford.edu]
[http://www-cs-staff.stanford.edu/~johnson/]
It is no longer possible to ignore the complexity of the systems that we are a
part of, nor can we deny the need to improve our ability to function in them.
Understanding complex, dynamic systems requires different skills than most
people have. The primary skill one needs is systems thinking. This is a
conceptual framework, a body of knowledge and a set of tools that have been
developed over the past 50 years, to make high-level, wide-perspective
patterns clearer, and to help us see how to change them effectively.
In this seminar, we will cover the basics of systems thinking including an
introduction to continuous modeling and computer simulation. We will also
show why systems thinking is becoming one of the most important skills a
student (or anyone) can develop.
MAGGIE JOHNSON is a lecturer in the Computer Science and Symbolic Systems
departments here at Stanford. She teaches the CS109 sequence (Introduction to
Computer Science), CS143 (Compilers) and CS105a (Introduction to Computing).
Her research interests are system dynamics and computer modeling, computer
music, and software engineering.
____________
LOGIC LUNCH
on Friday, 19 January
12:00 noon, Building 380, Room 383-N
A Review of P. Clote's "Cutting Plane and Frege Proofs"
(1995, Information and Computation 121(1):103-122)
Grigori Mints
Stanford Philosophy
[mints@csli.stanford.edu]
Cutting plane (CP) system is a refutation system for propositional logic
deriving unsolvability of systems of integer linear inequalities by a
resolution-like rule. Propositional variables are translated by integer
variables, ~x goes to 1-x, clause VCi is represented by the inequality
SUM(ci)>=1, and a conjunction of clauses by the system of corresponding
inequalities. Inference rules (of the system CP) for deriving new
inequalities are transitivity, simplification, addition, multiplication by a
constant $c\in \bn$ and division with rounding. For example, 2x+2y >= 3
implies x+y >= 2.
A CP-refutation of a propositional formula is a derivation of 0>=1 from a
corresponding system of inequalities. A proof of A is a refutation of ~A. CP
obviously simulates binary resolution, hence it is complete. Arbitrary
propositional formulas are reduced to CP-form by a familiar device of
introducing new variables for subformulas. The paper was stimulated by a
problem (not solved here) whether this device for CP (applied only to
subformulas of the goal formula) is polynomially equivalent to constant depth
Frege proofs. In a preliminary version of the present paper (7th Annual
Symposium on Logic in Computer Science, 1992, 296-307) the author proved this
for an extension CP+ of CP admitting rounded division operation for arbitrary
inequality together with corresponding simplification and monotonicity rules.
Present paper (containing detailed proofs) shows that this extension is
stronger than expected: CP+ is polynomially equivalent to Frege systems (like
standard propositional calculus with modus ponens). One of the reasons for
this additional strength may be the absence of restrictions on the size of the
denominator in the division operation.
____________
SEMINAR ON HUMAN-COMPUTER INTERACTION
on Friday, 19 January
12:30 p.m., Skilling Auditorium
Social Activity in CSCW Systems
Mark Ackerman
UC Irvine Computer Science
[ackerman@ics.uci.edu]
If Computer-Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) systems are to be successful, it
will be necessary to promote ongoing, continuing activity. Even once a CSCW
system gets past the critical mass problem, users must continue to find it
useful and usable. Only some CSCW systems will provide the social and
technical affordances necessary to promote the social maintenance required for
continued use.
In this talk, I will present two inter-related streams of research. The first
is social, examining an existing CSCW system (the MIT Zephyr help instance)
for its social and technical mechanisms that facilitate continuing use over
time. The second is technical, considering how to provide interface
mechanisms for indicating social activity. I will also provide an overview of
how this research fits into the design of a collaborative help and
organizational memory system, Answer Garden 2.
MARK S. ACKERMAN is an Assistant Professor in the Computing, Organizations,
Policy and Society (CORPS) group within Information and Computer Science at
the University of California, Irvine. He received his Ph.D. in Information
Technology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1993, working
with Tom Malone. Prior to attending MIT, he was an R&D software engineer and
manager, working on projects as diverse as the X Window System Toolkit (Xt)
and the Atari Ms. Pac-Man game.
____________
LINGUISTICS COLLOQUIUM
on Friday, 19 January
3:30 p.m., Building 460, Room 146
Transparency and Locality in Assimilation
Edward Flemming
Stanford Linguistics
[flemming@csli.stanford.edu]
Restrictions on consonant harmony are usually accounted for in terms of
transparency of intervening vowels to the consonant feature being spread: If
the vowel is specified for the feature, spreading is blocked; if it is not
specified, spreading is possible. This approach has been employed in attempts
to explain the typological generalization that almost all cases of consonant
harmony involve distinctions among coronals, as in Navaho, Chumash, and
Sanskrit. E.g., Shaw 1991 argues that consonant harmony in labial and dorsal
features is impossible because vowels are generally specified for these
features.
This analysis predicts a number of unattested harmony patterns: (1) Since
vowels are not specified for [coronal], this articulator shoul be able to
spread across vowels onto a following consonant yielding unattested
assimilations such as /tap/ -> [tat]. (2) Given the standard assumption that
unrounded vowels are not specified with a labial articulator, [labial] should
be able to spread from consonant to consonant across unrounded vowels
resulting in unattested assimilations such as /pak/ -> [pap].
A more satisfactory account of restrictions on consonant harmony can be
derived from the hypothesis that assimilation is strictly local, so
intervening vowels are not transparent to consonant harmony, they undergo it.
The possibility of consonant harmony in a given feature then depends on
compatibility of the feature with intervening vowels, not on transparency. The
only consonantal gestures which can be extended through a vowel without
significantly affecting its quality are the differences in tongue-tip posture
(apical vs. laminal) that can distinguish coronals. Other features such as
nasality and pharyngealization are compatible with a vocalic degree of
constriction, but have clearly perceptible effects on vowels. So nasal harmony
(as in Tucanoan (Piggott 1992)) and pharyngeal harmony (as in Arabic) have
been characterised as applying to consonants and vowels. Extending a labial,
dorsal or coronal constriction gesture would mask intervening vowels, so
consonant harmonies of these types are not possible (cf. Ni Chiosain and
Padgett 1994).
Strict locality in assimilation implies that there is no transparency to
assimilation, but there are a number of prima facie cases of consonant harmony
for which this claim seems implausible, e.g., Ponapean labialization harmony
and identity between glottalized consonants in K'ekchi and Hausa. It will be
argued that these are not in fact cases of assimilation but result from a
dispreference for similar but non-identical consonants within the morpheme or
word. Finally I will outline an approach to the analysis of transparency in
vowel harmony which does not employ non-local feature spreading.
____________
SEMANTICS WORKSHOP
on Monday, 22 January
1:30 p.m., Cordura Hall, Room 104
Need We Say More About Polarized Auxiliaries?
Ton van der Wouden
Yale Linguistics / Vakgroep Nederlands Groningen
[vdwouden@minerva.cis.yale.edu]
Research on polarity items is usually devoted to indefinites such as _any_ and
its counterparts in other languages, or to end of scale expressions like _the
least bit_ and _budge an inch_. In the early eighties Jerry Edmondson has
written about so-called "polarized auxiliaries" in various languages, but
these elements have since hardly received any attention. In my talk, I will
return to the problem of the distribution of lexical items such as English _em
dare_ and (uninflected) _need_ and of some comparable verbs in closely related
languages, such as German _brauchen_ and Dutch _hoeven_. The data will be
confronted with recent results in polarity research, in order to shed some new
light both on modal auxiliaries and on the general mechanisms underlying
polarity licensing.
We will have the first Semantics Workshop in Winter on Monday, and then decide
on the regular meeting day for the future.
____________
SSP FILM SERIES
on Tuesday, 23 January
7:00 p.m., NEW LOCATION TO BE ANNOUNCED
The Thinking Machine (The Machine That Changed
the World, Part 4) (1992)
This 58 minute video is the fourth of five installments of "The Machine That
Changed the World," a WGBH-BBC series about the past, present, and future of
computing. Local researchers and Silicon Valley pioneers are featured
prominently. "The Thinking Machine" is devoted to artificial intelligence,
and what computer scientists, psychologists, and philosophers have learned
about human intelligence in the process of trying to teach computers to
"think." Part 5 of this series will be shown next week.
The Symbolic Systems Film Series showcases films and tapes of general
cognitive science interest. Attendance at film series events can substitute
for attendance at the Symbolic Systems Forum for students enrolled in SSP 10
for one unit. All are welcome at these events. The showing of the videos is
followed by a discussion, and researchers who are knowledgeable about the
program's topic are urged to join us in evaluating it.
____________
PHILOSOPHY OF COMPUTATION SEMINAR
on Tuesday, 23 January
7:15 p.m., Cordura Hall, Room 100
Readings in Computation: The Origin of Objects
Brian Cantwell Smith
Xerox PARC and Stanford Philosophy
[bcsmith@parc.xerox.com]
____________
STASS SEMINAR
on Thursday, 25 January
10:00 a.m., Cordura Hall, Room 100
Barwise-Seligman Reading (cont'd)
Keith Devlin
CSLI & St.Mary's College
[devlin@csli.stanford.edu]
The STASS group will continue its reading of the Barwise-Seligman manuscript.
New attenders welcome. Contact Eric Hammer [ehammer@csli.stanford.edu] for a
copy of the manuscript, and read through the first three chapters. We will
pick up in Chapter 2 and try to make our way to Chapter 3.
____________
CSLI COGLUNCH
on Thursday, 25 January
12:00 noon, Cordura Hall, Room 100
On the Nature of Phenomenal Consciousness
Guven Guzeldere
Stanford Philosophy & CSLI
[guven@csli.stanford.edu]
What is the nature of the qualitative character of experiences -- e.g., what
it's like to see red or taste something sour, or the hurtfulness of pains?
Such qualities are generally taken to be intrinsic, atomic, and
non-relational. I will argue for an alternative construal, and try to
substantiate the thesis that the phenomenal character of experiences lie in
their causal and representational relations to other experiences and
propositional attitudes, as well as to states of the body (in which they
occur). In this light, I will also reexamine the plausibility of old puzzles
like Absent Qualia.
____________
SYMBOLIC SYSTEMS FORUM
on Thursday, 25 January
4:15 p.m., Building 60, Room 61-F
Propositional Quantification in Modal Logics and
in Other Non-Classical Logics
Philip Kremer
Stanford Philosophy
[kremer@csli.stanford.edu]
This talk will have two purposes: first, to introduce students to the basics
of modal logic; and second, to indicate how, beginning with these basics, we
can develop a research programme. In particular, Kripke's semantics for modal
logic motivates a notion of a "proposition". This leads to a natural
treatment of propositional quantifiers "for all p" and "for some p". This, in
turn, leads to natural systems of propositionally quantified modal logic --
systems that will be discussed in the talk.
PHILIP KREMER earned a BSc in Math from the University of Toronto, a PhD in
Philosophy from the University of Pittsburgh, and has been teaching at
Stanford for one and a half years. At Pittsburgh he wrote a dissertation in
Relevance Logic under Nuel Belnap. He has also done work on propositional
quantification in non-classical logics, with three papers on this topic either
published or forthcoming in the Journal of Symbolic Logic: "Quantifying over
propositions in relevance logic"; "Defining relevant implication in a
propositionally quantified S4"; and "On the complexity of propositional
quantification in intuitionistic logic". He is also interested in other areas
of Philosophical Logic as well as in the Philosophy of Language.
____________
SEMINAR ON HUMAN-COMPUTER INTERACTION
on Friday, 26 January
12:30 p.m., Skilling Auditorium
Multivalent Documents: Documents as Interfaces to Information
in Networked Digital Repositories
Thomas A. Phelps and Robert Wilensky
UC Berkeley Computer Science
[wilensky@cs.berkeley.edu]
Digital documents thus far have have largely mirrored their pre-digital
ancestors. As such, they provide little enhancement of non-digital
counterparts other than searching and hyperlinks.
We believe that far greater functionality is desirable and possible. To
achieve such functionality, we have been developing a new model of documents,
called "multivalent documents". A multivalent document comprises any number of
distinct, but intimately related, layers of content, along with small,
dynamically loaded programs, called behaviors. In effect, each document
becomes an interface to its particular set of contents. Multivalent documents
are especially well-suited to the highly networked work, as the various layers
of a document can reside on different machines, or even be created
dynamically.
A prototype version of MVDs has been implemented in Java. This prototype
allows access to our digital library collection of scanned page images, but
with added functionality. In particular, users can search for terms in a page
image, and have the resulting matches outline on the screen; they can select
regions of the image and paste ASCII text created from the image by optical
character recognition; some tables in the images have active properties, such
as sorting themselves in response to mouse clicks. Other functionality under
development includes distributed annotations and geographic information
systems capabilities.
____________
PHILOSOPHY COLLOQUIUM
on Friday, 26 January
3:15 p.m., Encina Hall, Room 423
The Metaphysics of Nonfactualism
Michael Devitt
Maryland Philosophy
____________
LINGUISTICS COLLOQUIUM
on Friday, 26 January
3:30 p.m., Encina Hall, Room 423
Title to be announced
Dani Byrd
Haskins Laboratories
____________
NEW CSLI VISITORS
JIM BLEVINS (Centre for Linguistics, University of Western Australia
[jblevins@csli.stanford.edu] Cordura Hall, Room 110) works primarily on
constraint-based approaches to the description of natural language syntax and
morphosyntax. His recent work deals with the structure of unbounded
dependency constructions, the interplay between paradigmatic relations and the
organization of feature structures, and the use of defeasible control
strategies to model categorial mismatches and construction overlap. Other
interests include computational linguistics and formal semantics.
NILS DAHLABACK (Cognitive Science Program, Linkoping University, Sweden
[nilsd@csli.stanford.edu] Cordura Hall, Room 110) has a background in
psychology and communication, and is currently working at the department of
Computer and Information Science, Linkoping University, Sweden. Nils
Dahlback's research has mainly been concerned with dialogue and discourse
models for natural language interfaces. The aim of the work has been to
develop empirically based and computationally tractable minimal models for
these kinds of dialogues. The empirical base has primarily been Wizard of
Oz-simulated human-computer dialogues. Together with colleagues in Linkoping
he has developed a prototype NLI based on these results. He has also worked on
psychological models of anaphora and discourse coherence within the framework
of Johnson-Laird's theory of Mental Models, and more recently on spatial
cognition and its relationship to the ability to navigate in hypertexts, and
on intelligent help systems in large application domains. His other interests
include group communication (he has some training in family therapy),
communication disorders (he is also a speech therapist), and philosophy of
mind (but he never took any philosophy).
CHRISTOPHER GAUKER (Department of Philosophy, University of Cincinnati
[gauker@csli.stanford.edu] Cordura Hall, Room 202) holds that it is a mistake
to think that the function of language is to convey thoughts from speaker to
hearer. In a recent book he criticized this conception from a variety of
angles and developed some of the elements of an alternative. One of the
strong points of this conception of language is that it seems to offer a
framework in which to theorize about pragmatic phenomena such as
presupposition and context-relativity. Accordingly, Gauker is developing an
alternative framework for pragmatics. This involves an "objective" conception
of linguistic context, not defined in terms of interlocutors' mental states,
and it results in a definition of logical validity in terms of "assertibility
in a context" rather than in terms of truth on an interpretation. He has come
to CSLI to talk with people and learn new things; so please don't hesitate to
introduce yourself.
HARTLEY SLATER (Department of Philosophy, University of Western Australia
[slater@csli.stanford.edu] Cordura Hall, Room 213) has been working on
philosophical applications of the epsilon calculus, particularly in
intensional contexts. The epsilon calculus provides the formal basis for an
"anti-realist" view of meaning, and an "externalist" view of the mind. His
work has many contacts with cognitive science research at CSLI, and he is keen
to learn more about the development of this research.
____________