LAWS@SRI-AI.ARPA (03/01/85)
From: AIList Moderator Kenneth Laws <AIList-REQUEST@SRI-AI.ARPA> AIList Digest Friday, 1 Mar 1985 Volume 3 : Issue 27 Today's Topics: AI Tools - XLISP & Unification & Rete Networks & DUCK, Applications - CAI & Commonsense Reasoning & Paradox, Representation - Analytic Solid Modeling, Bindings - General Research Corp., Correction - Webster service, Linguistics - Wally & Y'alls, Business - R&D Opportunity & Medicomp AI/DB System, Seminars - Direct Manipulation Interfaces (CMU) & Counterfactuals (SU) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 25 Feb 85 15:56:24 EST From: David_Michael_Fobare%Wayne-MTS%UMich-MTS.Mailnet@MIT-MULTICS.ARPA Subject: XLISP Questions I am working on a version of LISP called XLISP and am wondering if anyone else has worked with it. In particular I am having trouble with the 'Object', 'Class', and 'Keymap' primitives. What are instance variables? Class variables? Thanks. David Fobare ------------------------------ Date: Tue 26 Feb 85 10:20:30-MST From: Pete Tinker <tinker@UTAH-20.ARPA> Subject: Production Systems/Unification Are there any production systems (backward- or forward-chaining) which use unification rather than simple pattern matches to bind variables? -Pete Tinker (TINKER@UTAH-20) ------------------------------ Date: 27 Feb 85 12:49:42 PST (Wed) From: Don Rose <drose@uci-icse> Subject: rete networks Hello everyone - I am currently familiarizing myself with the subject of rete networks (esp. with regards to a possible synthesis with current data-dependency frameworks for truth maintenance); if anyone can point the way to relevant/interesting articles along these lines (or just on rete networks alone), I would appreciate your help. Thanks --Donald Rose drose@uci-icse ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 27 Feb 85 17:57:23 PST From: Koenraad Lecot <koen@UCLA-LOCUS.ARPA> Subject: DUCK Can anybody provide me with references to the DUCK language? I know Smart Systems Technologies is selling DUCK but I imagine they'll charge for manuals (smart). Thanks in advance, -- Koenraad Lecot ARPA: koen@ucla-cs.arpa UUCP: ...!{cepu,ihnp4,randvax,sdcrdcf,trwspp,ucbvax}!ucla-cs!koen ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 27 Feb 85 15:09:44 est From: Deepak Kumar <kumard%buffalo.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa> Subject: Info wanted - Expert Systems for CAI I'm taking a course on AI in Medicine where in I have decided to present a seminar on Intelligent Computer Assisted Instruction for Medical Diagnosis. I want to emphasize use of already- existing Expert Systems for CAI applications. After all, when the knowledge is there, it can be utilized for purposes other than advising and decision making. If there are any references or materials on the above domain I'd like to have it. It need not be specifically to the area of Medicine. So, if anyone has made any attempts on using Expert Systems in Education, I'd like to get some experiences that I can share with my audience. Thanx. Deepak Kumar (Dept. of CS, SUNY at Buffalo) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 27 Feb 85 17:16:42 est From: arora@buffalo (Kulbir S. Arora) Subject: Request for bibliography Is there a bibliography available on Common-sense reasoning systems (qualitative reasoning, mental models) ? Kulbir Arora ------------------------------ Date: 27 Feb 1985 1559-PST (Wednesday) From: Eugene Miya <eugene@AMES-NAS.ARPA> Subject: info requested -- paradox Newsgroups: net.ai Distribution: net This is for someone else. Send replies to me. Does anybody have pointers to structures and techniques for dealing with paradox or apparent contradiction [e.g., light is a wave, light is a particle]? one suggestion made was to use analogy, but we have a copy of the "analogy considered harmful" paper by some people at parc. thanks in advance. --eugene miya NASA Ames Research Center {hplabs,ihnp4,dual,hao,vortex}!ames!aurora!eugene emiya@ames-vmsb.ARPA p.s. usenet responses turned up one ref to work at mit on contradiction. ------------------------------ Date: 26 February 1985 23:16-EST From: John G. Aspinall <JGA @ MIT-MC> Subject: Recent Article - representation of solids In a recent AI digest, I noticed this summary of a paper from IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications, February 1985: From: Ken Laws <Laws@SRI-AI.ARPA> An Overview of Analytic Solid Modeling, by M. Casale and E. Stanton of PDA Engineering, pp. 45-56: Describes a way of modeling complex shapes as ... I'm very interested by these sorts of systems, and have been working with splines for some time now, so I was quite interested in the paper. If any reader has deeper knowledge of the system described I would appreciate some enlightenment about a query of mine. I have read the paper thoroughly, and I don't think it answers this. One thing I did not understand was the following: They made a big deal out of the necessity to represent circles (surfaces of rotation, holes, cylinders, etc.) which I agree with -- a round object is easily produced in many ways in the real world (lathes, drills, etc.). But there is no way to exactly represent a circle as a polynomial of a parametric variable. That is if x = P(u) and y = Q(u), where P and Q are polynomials, there is no way to let x^2 + y^2 = r^2 (a constant, independent of u) except the trivial point solution x = constant, y = constant. So how do they represent circles? Possibility 1: they represent them approximately with splines. Problem: suppose you want to model another cylinder rotating in that hole. It's quite conceivable that the clearances involved might be 10^-3 or less of the diameter. That implies an awful lot of spline-knots. Possibility 2: Circles (and by extension, cylinders etc.) exist as exact entities in their system. Problem: how do you join that to a spline solid, for instance when you put a hole in something? If you have any ideas about this, I'd be very interested in hearing them. Many thanks for any light you might shed. Oh yes, please reply to me directly. John Aspinall. ------------------------------ Date: Wed 27 Feb 85 14:36:52-CST From: CMP.BARC@UTEXAS-20.ARPA Subject: General Research Corp. Query General Research has two locations: P.O. Box 6770 7655 Old Springhouse Road Santa Barbara, CA 93160-6770 McLean, VA 22102 (805) 964-7724 (703) 893-5915 TWX-TELEX 910-334-1193 Dallas Webster ------------------------------ Date: Thu 28 Feb 85 15:22:16-PST From: David Roode <ROODE@SRI-NIC.ARPA> Subject: Webster service In Volume 3 issues 17 and 23 of this digest, mention was made of an experimental service being developed here at SRI-NIC. The articles gave the false impression that this was a generally available, production service. This is in fact not the case. We have to iron out several issues before the service can be made public, and an announcement will be made when and if the online dictionary is available. [My apologies for picking up the Rutgers bboard announcement and help file for the WEBSTER program without checking into the program's availability. It seems there may be copyright or related issues in addition to software-related ones. -- KIL] ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 27 Feb 85 13:16:03 EST From: Pete Bradford (CSD UK) <bradford@AMSAA.ARPA> Subject: Re: Wally As a `Brit', now resident in the US for some 3 years, and an avid fan of the `Grauniad' newspaper, let me try to answer Gordon Joly's question. To the best of my knowledge the word `wally' does NOT exist in the United States. It app- ears in Websters Dictionary as a Scottish word meaning `fine, splendid, or sturdy', a long way from its modern day British use! There is also a word `wallydraigle', or `wallydrag'(!), also Scottish, which means `a feeble, undergrown or slovenly creature', perhaps a lot closer to the `wally' we all know -- at least, ONE of the meanings we know! The nearest equivalents to `wally' over here, in the sense of a stupid or foolish person, are `jerk',or `nerd'. As for the other meanings, well, the one meaning that which you would buy in a Fish and Chip shop is a `dill pickle', or just plain `pickle'. The other meaning, ie an organ which I, along with approximately half the human race, possess, is covered by as many terms in the US as it is in the UK - but NOT wally. Hope this helps! PJB ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 26 Feb 85 13:43:58 est From: "Thomas E. Schutz" <tes%bostonu.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa> Subject: Y'alls Some people in Richmond, Virginia have evolved their own forms for the singular and plural "you" : Singular - "y'all" Plural - "y'alls" I discovered this while visiting Richmond over summer vacation. A native of the town addressed me as "y'all"; perplexed, I turned around but did not see anyone else standing there. Later on I overheard the word "y'alls," and then everything fell into place. - Tom Schutz ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 26 Feb 85 16:04 EST From: White@RADC-MULTICS.ARPA Subject: R&D Opportunity An announcement will soon appear (estimated 7 - 14 March 85) in the Commerce Business Daily (CBD) advertizing a research and development (R&D) program to be undertaken by the Rome Air Development Center (RADC). This advertisement will be in the form of a Program Research and Development Announcement (PRDA) which is a notice which provides information about RADC's interest in R&D in a specific area where the method for achieving the goal is not evident. This particular PRDA will contain many different areas of interest. Some will be of interest to the AI community such as the application of AI technology in software development environments. The notice you are now reading is not a solicitation and is merely a "heads up" to encourage participation. Responses and/or communications are not to be directed to the address appearing on this notice and should be made in accordance with directions contained in the CBD announcement. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Feb 85 05:50:10 cst From: Laurence Leff <leff%smu.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa> Subject: Medicomp AI/DB System Electronics Week February 18, 1985 Page 59 Medicomp of Virginia Inc. is now selling a combination medical records /artificial intelligence system. The system runs on an IBM Series/1 minicomputer with a dabase covering 3000 diseases, 1000 symptoms and 1000 medical tests. The system had its first sale to Cleveland Clinic. They purchased it when it solved a baffling case of infectious endocarditis. It costs $55,000. They have been maintaining a free telephone hookup to the system for demonstration purposes. ------------------------------ Date: 25 February 1985 1351-EST From: Jeff Shrager@CMU-CS-A Subject: Seminar - Direct Manipulation Interfaces (CMU) [Forwarded from the CMU bboard by Laws@SRI-AI.] Artificial Intelligence Lecture Series COGNITIVE ENGINEERING of DIRECT MANIPULATION INTERFACES Don Norman Institute for Cognitive Science University of California, San Diego La Jolla CA 92093 2:00 PM, Friday, March 1 Westinghouse R & D Center Auditorium - Bldg 401 Abstract To program by Direct Manipulation is to program by connecting together data streams, drawing the interconnections on the screen and letting the resulting diagram be the program. Direct Manipulation is made possible by the combination of object-oriented programming languages (as available on Lisp machines), high-resolution bit-mapped graphics, and pointing devices. It promises superior performance for that class of problems that can be characterized in this manner. It allows concentration upon the semantics of the task rather than the structure of the programming language. At least, so goes the rhetoric. Examination of the nature of Direct Manipulation leads naturally to an examination of the major issues in interface design. It turns out that one of the major virtues of Direct Manipulation is the feeling of control that it produces, the feeling of directly manipulating the computational objects one cares about. This feeling depends as much upon the skill of the user as the nature of the interface. We meet the Gulfs of Execution and of Evaluation, gulfs that Direct Manipulation interfaces promise to bridge more readily than conventional interfaces. Will Direct manipulation Interfaces live up to their promise? Yes and no. Directions Head east on the parkway, I-376, to the Churchill exit (13). As you come off, keep bearing right for a few hundred yards to the first traffic light. Proceed straight through it, across Beulah Road, and up the R&D entrance road where the guard will point out visitors parking and reception. You don't need to call in advance; there will be a few technicians to escort visitors to the auditorium. In addition to the Westinghouse talk, Don Norman will be speaking in the Psychology Colloquium Series this Thursday, Feb 28, at 4:00 in the Adamson Wing (BH). The talk is entitled: "From slips and mistakes to a theory of action". ------------------------------ Date: Tue 26 Feb 85 09:39:50-PST From: Paula Edmisten <Edmisten@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA> Subject: Seminar - Counterfactuals (SU) [Forwarded from the Stanford SIGLUNCH distribution by Laws@SRI-AI.] DATE: Friday, March 1, 1985 LOCATION: Chemistry Gazebo, between Physical and Organic Chemistry TIME: 12:05 SPEAKER: Matthew Ginsberg, Computer Science Department and Heuristic Programming Project, Stanford University ABSTRACT: COUNTERFACTUALS Counterfactuals are a form of commonsense non-montonic inference that has been of long-term interest to philosophers. In this paper, we begin by describing some of the impact counterfactuals can be expected to have in artificial intelligence, and by reviewing briefly some of the philosophical conclusions which have been drawn about them. Philosophers have noted that the content of any particular counterfactual is in part context-dependent; we present a formal description of counterfactuals that allows us to encode this context-dependent information clearly in the choice of a sublanguage of the logical language in which we are working. Having made this choice, we show that our description of counterfactuals is formally identical to the accepted "possible worlds" interpretation due to David Lewis. Finally, we examine the application of our ideas in the domain of automated diagnosis of hardware faults. Paula ------------------------------ End of AIList Digest ********************