mikes@tekecs.TEK.COM (Michael Sellers) (11/13/86)
[Someone recently asked why all this cognitive science stuff kept appearing
in net.cog-eng and net.ai . Where else *should* it go? Do we have enough
readership to justify a net.cogsci (it'd be nice)?]
I recently asked about cognitive science graduate programs; specifically,
why did you join the one you're in? I've gotten a number of responses
(thanks! keep that e-mail coming), and now I'd like to alter the question
a bit.
It seems that there are very few schools with anything like a bona fide
cognitive science (or cognitive anything) program at the grad level. There
are some schools that have some sort of mish-mash of AI & psych or linguistics
shoehorned into being a cogsci program (this is not meant to be an attack).
It may be that the field is still too young for there to be people to teach
it reliably, so a full-blown program is not yet possible.
My question, then, is in two related parts: first, what do you consider
appropriate and adequate preparation at the undergraduate level for a
graduate program in cognitive science (i.e., how much computer science, how
much math, how much bio or psych, etc); and second, what do you consider
would be a viable program at the graduate level to warrent an advanced degree
(MS or PhD) in cognitive science?
My main goal here is to start some discussion about how we should proceed
in this area in general; and more specifically so I can get some other ideas
about *my* possible program. In addition, it might be useful to approach the
question of "what is/should be cognitive science?" from this perspective.
Rather than arguing about whether neurology is more important than linguistics,
maybe we can settle on how much of each is a good blend.
E-mail to me is fine (I love the stuff), but I'd like to see a discussion
of this get going, so posting is probably good too.
--
Mike Sellers
UUCP: {...your spinal column here...}!tektronix!tekecs!mikes
"You learn lessons from no one so well as from yourself"spf@bonnie.ATT.COM (11/17/86)
>From clyde!rutgers!lll-crg!mordor!sri-spam!sri-unix!hplabs!decwrl!decvax!tektronix!orca!tekecs!mikes Mon Nov 17 10:05:58 EST 1986 > >and second, what do you consider >would be a viable program at the graduate level to warrent an advanced degree >(MS or PhD) in cognitive science? > Mike Sellers Well, I can tell you what I did (it must be right, no?). With a B.A. in Environmental Physics (no, I'm not sure what that is), I first took an M.S. in Computer Sciences, which gave me a solid foundation in algorithms, formal languages, and a little AI. At the time I was doing some industrial research with a cognitive psychologist (ex-EE), and came to appreciate the need for FORMAL training in experimental psychology. "Tech" types (myself included) tend to believe they can step into the psychology arena, derive a partial differential equation describing brain function, and solve it to know who people work. Of course, this is ridiculus; VERY little is known about how the brain (and it's owner) works. And experimenting with humans is not like doing physics experiments -- the sample rarely behaves the same way two days (or hours) in a row, and no two samples are alike. Besides that, the basic science of psychology is today where physics was in Newton's time (that's not a flame -- in fact, that's one reason why it interests me!). So, as a result of the above observations, I went back and got a second M.S. in Applied Psychology (experimental psychophysics, cognition, perception). Actually, I'm just finishing that M.S. now, and am considering grabbing a PhD (if my sheep farm doesn't intrigue me more). I think the duel M.S. has served me well; if I had taken HALF the courses in each of the two disciplines (CS and psych), as would have been the case with a single, combined masters, I don't think I'd have an adequate understanding of either. I don't know what the ideal PhD program for me would be, but I suspect it will consist of AI-type courses (pattern recognition, inference systems, etc), and advanced psych courses in cognition and perception, and possibly linguistics. Of course, this relates to my research interest in sensory data representation (auditory and visual) and other areas of "natural" intelligence enhancement. I'd enjoy seeing some discussion about "cognitive science" programs and curricula. Steve *** How can they know it's time for them to go? -- Sandy Denny
tjhorton@utai.UUCP (Timothy J. Horton) (12/11/87)
Do you have info about cognitive science programs?
ie. interdisciplinary programs based on several of
computersci / psychology / neurosci / linguistics / even philosophy / etc
Please drop me a few lines or pointers to info. I will summarize and post.
I have read of a Cognitive Science Society. Do they have a published list
of programs somewhere? If so, where?
From what I understand, perhaps not accurately (please clarify):
MIT:
department of Brain and Cognitive Science
Brown:
department of Linguistics and Cognitive Science
Stanford:
Graduate Program in Cognitive Science
Psychology (organizing dept), Linguistics, Computer Science, Philosophy
UCSD:
interdisciplinary PhD in Cognitive Science exists
undergraduate program in Cog Sci currently offered by psychology
strengths in psychology, connectionism (though fading?), neurosci, linguistics
a real dept of Cognitive Science is in the works, perhaps for 88/89
UC Berkley:
Cognitive Science Program
focus on linguistics
Michigan:
defunct Program in Communications Sciences
Toronto:
Undergraduate Major in Cognitive Science and Artificial Intelligence
Princeton:
program of some sort?
Edinburgh:
department of Cognitive Science (formerly School of Epistemics)
focus on linguistics
Sussex:
School of Cognitive Science
--
Timothy J Horton (416) 979-3109 tjhorton@ai.toronto.edu (CSnet,UUCP,Bitnet)
Dept of Computer Science tjhorton@ai.toronto (other Bitnet)
University of Toronto, tjhorton@ai.toronto.cdn (EAN X.400)
Toronto, Canada M5S 1A4 {seismo,watmath}!ai.toronto.edu!tjhortonrapaport@sunybcs.uucp (William J. Rapaport) (12/11/87)
In article <4186@utai.UUCP> tjhorton@ai.toronto.edu (Timothy J. Horton) writes: >Do you have info about cognitive science programs? State University of New York at Buffalo has several active cognitive science programs. What follows is a slightly outdated on-line information sheet on two of them. The newest is the SUNY Buffalo Graduate Studies and Research Initiative in Cognitive and Linguistic Sciences, whose Steering Committee is currently planning the establishment of a Cog and Ling Sci Center and running a colloquium series. For more information, please contact me. In addition, let me know if you wish to be on my on-line mailing list for colloquium announcements. William J. Rapaport Assistant Professor of Computer Science Co-Director, Graduate Group in Cognitive Science Interim Director, GSRI in Cognitive and Linguistic Sciences Dept. of Computer Science||internet: rapaport@cs.buffalo.edu SUNY Buffalo ||bitnet: rapaport@sunybcs.bitnet Buffalo, NY 14260 ||uucp: {ames,boulder,decvax,rutgers}!sunybcs!rapaport (716) 636-3193, 3180 || ======================================================================== GRADUATE GROUP IN COGNITIVE SCIENCE STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK AT BUFFALO Buffalo, NY 14260 Gail A. Bruder William J. Rapaport Department of Psychology Department of Computer Science Co-Directors, 1986-1987 Cognitive Science is an interdisciplinary effort intended to investigate the nature of the human mind. This effort requires the theoretical approaches offered by computer science, linguistics, mathematics, philo- sophy, psychology, and a host of other fields related by a mutual interest in intelligent behavior. The Graduate Group in Cognitive Science was formed to facilitate cognitive science research at SUNY Buffalo. Its activities have focused upon language-related issues and knowledge representation. These two areas are important to the development of cognitive science and are well represented at SUNY Buffalo by the research interests of faculty and graduate students in the group. Since its formal recognition in April 1981, the Graduate Group has grown quickly. Currently, its membership of over 150 faculty and gradu- ate students is drawn from the Departments of Computer Science; Psychol- ogy; Linguistics; Communicative Disorders and Sciences; Philosophy; Instruction; Communication; Counseling and Educational Psychology; Edu- cational Organization, Administration, and Policy Studies; the Intensive English Language Institute; Geography; and Industrial Engineering; as well as other area colleges and universities. The Group sponsors lec- tures and informal discussions with visiting scholars; discussion groups focused on Group members' current research; an interdisciplinary, team- taught, graduate course, "Introduction to Cognitive Science"; a graduate seminar on current topics and issues in language understanding; and a Cognitive Science Library. 1985 COLLOQUIA Our colloquium speakers during 1985 included Andrew Ortony (Psychology, Illinois), David Waltz (Computer Science, Brandeis), Alice ter Meulen (Linguistics, Washington), Joan Bybee (Linguistics, SUNY Buffalo), Livia Polanyi (AI, BBN), Joan Bresnan (Linguistics, Stanford), Leonard Talmy (Linguistics, Berkeley), Judith Johnston (Communicative Disorders, Indi- ana), Richard Weist (Psychology, SUNY Fredonia), and Benjamin Kuipers (AI, Texas). RESEARCH PROJECT A research subgroup of the Graduate Group in Cognitive Science is actively engaged in an interdisciplinary research project investigating narrative comprehension, specifically the role of a "deictic center". Grant proposals, conference papers, publications, and several disserta- tion proposals have come from this collaborative effort. A technical report describing this project--Bruder et al., "Deictic Centers in Nar- rative: An Interdisciplinary Cognitive-Science Project," SUNY Buffalo Department of Computer Science Technical Report No. 86-20--is available from William J. Rapaport, at the above address. Specifically, we are developing a model of a cognitive agent's comprehension of narrative text. Our model will be tested on a computer system that will represent the agent's beliefs about the objects, rela- tions, and events in narrative as a function of the form and content of the successive sentences encountered. In particular, we are concentrat- ing on the role of spatial, temporal, and focal-character information for the cognitive agent's comprehension. We propose to test the hypothesis that the construction and modifi- cation of a deictic center is of crucial importance for much comprehen- sion of narrative. We see the deictic center as the locus in conceptual space-time of the objects and events depicted or described by the sen- tences currently being perceived. At any point in the narrative, the cognitive agent's attention is focused on particular characters (and other objects) standing in particular spatial and temporal relations to each other. Moreover, the agent "looks" at the narrative from the per- spective of a particular character, spatial location, or temporal loca- tion. Thus, the deictic center consists of a WHERE-point, a WHEN-point, and a WHO-point. In addition, reference to characters' beliefs, per- sonalities, etc., are also constrained by the deictic center. We plan to develop a computer system that will "read" a narrative and answer questions about the deictic information in the text. To achieve this goal, we intend to carry out a group of projects that will allow us to discover the linguistic devices in narrative texts, test their psychological reality for normal and abnormal comprehenders, and analyze psychological mechanisms that underlie them. Once we have the results of the individual projects, we will integrate them and work to build a unified theory and representational system that incorporates the significant findings. Finally, we will test the system for coherence and accuracy in modeling a human reader, and modify it as necessary. COURSEWORK The Graduate Group in Cognitive Science provides students with the opportunity for training and research in Cognitive Science at the Ph.D. level. Students must be residents in a host department (Communicative Disorders and Sciences, Computer Science, Linguistics, Philosophy, Psychology), whose requirements must be fulfilled (but which can include coursework in the other Cognitive Science disciplines), and must meet certain additional requirements: enrollment in the graduate course, Introduction to Cognitive Science; and the completion of a "Focus" in one other participating department. Further details are available from the Co-Directors of the Group. The Graduate Group faculty also encourages outstanding undergradu- ates to develop an interest in Cognitive Science. Qualified undergradu- ates may request admission to the graduate course (Introduction to Cog- nitive Science) and can design a major in Cognitive Science under the Special Majors program at SUNY Buffalo. ======================================================================== GRADUATE GROUP IN VISION STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK AT BUFFALO Buffalo, NY 14260 Malcolm Slaughter Department of Biophysics Director, 1986-1987 It is becoming increasingly important for vision researchers in diverse fields to interact, and the SUNY Buffalo Graduate Group in Vision has been formed to facilitate that interaction. Current membership includes 25 faculty and 25 students from 10 departments (Computer Science, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Industrial Engineering, Geography, Psychology, Biophysics, Physiology, Biochemistry, Philosophy, and Media Studies). The Group organizes a colloquium series and provides central- ized information about activities both on campus and in the local area that are of interest to vision researchers. The Vision Group received formal recognition and funding in April 1986. The 1986-87 activities include: biweekly meetings to discuss the current research being performed in one of the 20 vision laboratories represented in the group; an upper division undergraduate/lower-level- graduate course, which serves as an introduction to interdisciplinary research in vision; and a colloquium series. This year's speakers include Jerry Feldman (Computer Science, Rochester), Peter Shiller (Psychology, MIT), Bela Julesz (Psychology, Bell Labs/Murray Hill), Tomaso Poggio (AI, MIT; tentative), and Ed Pugh (Biophysics, Pennsyl- vania; tentative).
acohen@cs.toronto.edu (Andrew Cohen) (10/16/90)
I'm looking for an recent list of Universities which have Cognitive Science programs. As this information has appeared before, use E-mail please.