neuron-request@HPLABS.HPL.HP.COM ("Neuron-Digest Moderator Peter Marvit") (02/10/90)
Neuron Digest Friday, 9 Feb 1990
Volume 6 : Issue 10
Today's Topics:
Administrivia
re: Emperor's New Mind...
Re: ridiculous price
Upcoming talk at BBN of interest
Reply from NETtalk's author
Neural Net inputs...
Neural Net Course
PSYCOLOQUY editorial
SAB90 Call for Papers
Research Positions at MITRE
EURASIP Workshop on NN - Emergency announcement
Send submissions, questions, address maintenance and requests for old issues to
"neuron-request@hplabs.hp.com" or "{any backbone,uunet}!hplabs!neuron-request"
Use "ftp" to get old issues from hplpm.hpl.hp.com (15.255.176.205).
------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Administrivia
From: "Neuron-Digest Moderator -- Peter Marvit" <neuron@hplabs.hp.com>
Date: Fri, 09 Feb 90 17:53:08 -0800
As regular readers know, I try to batch "announcements" and "discussion"
separately, so that any one Digest is just one flavour. However, I'm
trying a slightly new tack to cope with the considerable volume generated
by the USENET group (from which many postings come). I will be giving
priority to messages sent directly to <neuron-request@hplabs.hp.com> and
will fill Digests with these first. Often, timely announcements (as one
below), need to get out where they might have languished in an electronic
backwater in the past. Further, I want to encourage more "discusion"
amongst subscribers (hint, hint).
Another practical note: Please notify me if you move, or if your email
address will cease for any reason. If mail bounces with "no such user or
address," I unceremoniously delete that name from the mailing list. In
general, I try to trace other mail problems.
-Peter
: Peter Marvit, Neuron Digest Moderator
: Courtesy of Hewlett-Packard Labs in Palo Alto, CA 94304 (415) 857-6646
: neuron-request@hplabs.hp.com OR {any backbone}!hplabs!neuron-request
------------------------------
Subject: re: Emperor's New Mind...
From: dank@moc.Jpl.Nasa.Gov (Dan Kegel)
Date: Fri, 02 Feb 90 14:42:46 -0800
Roger Penrose writes:
> In my book I ... suggest that the outward manifestations of conscious
> mental activity cannot even be properly simulated by calculation.
A wag once said,
When great scientists say something is possible, they're often right,
but when they say something is impossible, they're usually wrong.
I don't trust philosophers who claim that brains have a magic that computers
can't copy; makes me think they've been spending too much time up in their
towers of ivory.
- Dan Kegel
[[ Editor's note: Hmmm, see also Searle's basic tenet that a simulation
is not the thing itself and that thinking/consciousness is the behaviour
of "brain"; a simulation of thinking cannot, no matter how detailed the
computation, have the same properties. Or do I misunderstand Searle (and
Penrose?). Nah, that's impossible. -PM ]]
------------------------------
Subject: Re: ridiculous price
From: william stevenson <wstevens@uceng.UC.EDU>
Date: Fri, 02 Feb 90 18:13:40 -0500
Sounds crazy to me. Can't you get it directly yourself?
IJCNN-90 cost about $40; is available from LEA Publishers, 365 Broadway,
Hillsdale, NJ 07642, USA. Phone (201) 666-4110.
William
------------------------------
Subject: Upcoming talk at BBN of interest
From: aboulang@WILMA.BBN.COM
Date: Sat, 03 Feb 90 19:45:32 -0500
BBN Systems and Technologies Corporation Science Development Program
APPLIED & COMPUTATIONAL MATHEMATICS SEMINAR
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
TIME DELAYS, NOISE,
AND
NEURAL DYNAMICS
John G. Milton (telaces@uchimvs1.bitnet)
Assistant Professor
Department of Neurology
University of Chicago
Chicago Illinois, 60637
Wednesday February 14th, 10:30AM
2nd Floor Large Conference Room (6/273)
BBN 10 Moulton St.
An intrinsic property of neural control mechanisms is the presence of time
delays which arise as a consequence of, for example, finite conduction
times along the axon and across the synapse. A neural control mechanism
which is amenable to manipulation and non-invasive monitoring is the pupil
light reflex (PLR). Specifically it is possible to "clamp" the PLR with
external electronic feedback and thus compare prediction to experimental
observation in a precisely controllable manner. The PLR is modeled with a
first-order delay-differential equation (DDE) and the dynamics compared
with those observed experimentally. Physiological considerations suggest
the importance of considering:
- DDEs with distributed and state-dependent delays,
- second order DDEs,
- the influence of noise (stochastic DDEs).
-------------------------------------------------------------------
| |
| I have an electronic mailing list for these |
| announcements. If you would like to be on the list send |
| mail to: ABOULANGER@BBN.COM. For more information on this |
| talk or the series contact Albert Boulanger (617 873-3891). |
| |
-------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------
Subject: Reply from NETtalk's author
From: Charles Rosenberg <crr%shum.huji.ac.il@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Date: Wed, 07 Feb 90 17:17:17 +0200
[[ Editor's Note: After the recent summary of NETtalk angst, I am pleased
that Dr. Rosenberg sent the following thoughtful response. -PM ]]
There has been much discussion about NETtalk's performance here lately,
so I figured I might as well add my 2 cents worth.
We never claimed that NETtalk's performance was better or even as good as
other techiques. Here is a quote from the Complex Systems paper (1987):
"The main goal of our model was to explore the basic principles of
distributed information coding in a real-world domain rather than achieve
perfect performance." The central point that Terry and I wished to make
was that connectionist networks may provide an alternative way to do
non-trivial, language-oriented tasks. We meant it to be the starting
point, to be suggestive for further research in this (we think)
interesting and (so far) productive area of cognitive modeling, rather
than something that was a complete and finished product in itself. I
think we have succeeded to the extent that we inspired others to think
about this and other problems in similar ways. I am sorry if if
continues to be a source of confusion.
Performance is important, but we don't believe that the value of the
network totally hinges on this one measure. There are other ways to
measure the success of the model. Some of these other measures have
already been mentioned here: the fact that it learns rather than being
programmed, that it is highly parallel and can be implemented on a
massively parallel computer (Blelloch and Rosenberg, 1987), the fact that
it continues to perform after sustaining damage, that it learns internal
representations of the orthographic to phonological structure (Rosenberg,
1987), that the memorial characteristics of the network bare certain
similarities to those of human memory (Rosenberg and Sejnowski, 1986;
Sejnowski and Rosenberg, 1987), that the structure on which it is based
is "inspired" by the known structure of the brain. And yes, as someone
mentioned, the errors are important too. And there are others. Some
audiences may regard certain of these aspects to be more important than
others. Performance is important, perhaps even primary, but these other
aspects are important as well.
Right now, if one is only interested in practical applications, NETtalk
is not the best choice. Other systems are better. But so far, even the
best systems are not as good as humans. So we still have a ways to go,
and it is not yet clear whether that future system that IS as good as (or
better than?) humans will be network-based or rule-based. But because
rule-based systems are better today, that does not necessarily mean that
they will be better tomorrow.
The actual performance of NETtalk:
As reported in (Sejnowski and Rosenberg, 1986), we trained a network with
80 hidden units and 7 input groups, where the output units represented
articulatory features. We first trained the network on a sample of
casual, informal children's speech. When trained on a 1024 word segment
from this corpus, the network attained a performance of 95% correct
phonemes after 50,000 words (about 50 epochs). Generalization
performance on a 439 word continuation from this same corpus was 78%. We
also trained NETtalk on 1,000 high-frequency words from the dictionary.
The network reached 82% (phonemes) without hidden units and 98%
(phonemes) with 120 hidden units. Generalization to the full 20,000 word
corpus (with hidden units) was 77% before training. After one epoch of
learning the full corpus, performance was 85%, and 90% (phonemes) after 5
epochs. (An epoch is one complete sweep or pass through the corpus.) We
also varied the number of input groups (see the original paper).
In my dissertation (available as a TR from the Cognitive Science
Laboratory, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, June, 1988), I used a
network with local output encodings (rather than features as before). In
this model, there were 55 output units encoding each of the 55 phonemes
possible. With 9 input groups and 50 hidden units, and training on a
11,000 word portion of the same dictionary, performance reached 90%
correct phonemes and 46% completely correct words (roughly 0.90^(average
word length)). Generalization to novel words was 86.1% (phonemes).
However, this is not a perfect test of generalization, since what the
network actually "sees" are not words but WINDOWS. Generalization to
novel WINDOWS was 84.3% phonemes.
Research continues:
Seidenberg and McClelland (1989) have recently analyzed a model of
text-to-speech which is similar to NETtalk, and have showed that it
corresponds quite closely to a large number of psychological results in
word recognition and naming, as well as development and dyslexia.
Bibliography:
Rosenberg, C.R. and Blelloch, G.E., An Implementation of Network
Learning. In: Connectionist Models and Their Implications: Readings from
Cognitive Science, D. Waltz and J.A. Feldman, Eds. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.,
1987.
Rosenberg, C.R. Revealing the Structure of NETtalk's Internal
Representations. Proceedings of the Ninth Annual Conference of the
Cognitive Science Society, Seattle, Wash., 1987.
Sejnowski, T.J. and Rosenberg, C.R., Connectionist Models of Learning,
In: Perspectives in Memory Research and Training, M.S. Gazzaniga, Ed.,
Cambridge, MIT Press, 1988.
Sejnowski, T.J. and Rosenberg C.R., Parallel Networks that Learn to
Pronounce English Text, Complex Systems, Vol. 1, 145-168, 1986.
Seidenberg, Mark S. and McClelland, James L., A Distributed Developmental
Model of Word Recognition and Naming, Psychological Review, Vol. 96, No.
4, pp. 523-568, 1989.
------------------------------
Subject: Neural Net inputs...
From: "EOLAB::MCCAULEY" <mccauley%eolab.decnet@scfd.nwc.navy.mil>
Date: 08 Feb 90 07:42:00 -0700
Hi netland,
There were several requests for information in the last NN listing I
thought I could contribute to.
1. NN and expert systems... I went to the WNN-AIND 90 conf. in
Auburn Al. Two of the talks concerned NN and ES. You may want
to pick up a copy of the proceeding by writing Mary Lou Padgett,
200 Broun Hall, Electrical Engineering Dept. Auburn University,
AL, 36849-5201. The first paper was entitled "The Transmission
of Knowledge between expert systems and Neural networks by David
C. Kuncicky of Florida State University and the second paper was
entitled Hybrid Intelligent Perception System: Intelligent
perception through Combining Artificial Neural Networks and an
Expert System. This last paper was written by C.W. Glover and
P.F. Spelt of Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
2. Analog VLSI... Christof Koch at Cal Tech, computation and
Neural Systems Program may be able to answer some questions
regarding.
3. Finally, the workshop for graduate students in India looking for
public domain software on Neural Nets for IBM pcs. I don't know
of any public domain software, but if you purchase the book
Explorations in Parallel Distributed Processing, A handbook of
models, programs, and exercises; the book comes with some IBM pc
disks that implement several different NN models. The
implementations may be too basic for grad students, but for
people just getting into NN, this is a good start.
Howard McCauley, Naval Weapons Center, China Lake CA.
mccauley@nwc.navy.mil
------------------------------
Subject: Neural Net Course
From: Michael Cohen <mike@bucasb.bu.edu>
Date: Fri, 12 Jan 90 02:07:49 -0500
NEURAL NETWORKS:
FROM FOUNDATIONS TO APPLICATIONS
May 6--11, 1990
Sponsored by the Center for Adaptive Systems,
the Graduate Program in Cognitive and Neural Systems,
and the Wang Institute of Boston University
with partial support from
The Air Force Office of Scientific Research
This in-depth, systematic, 5-day course is based upon the world's leading
graduate curriculum in the technology, computation, mathematics, and
biology of neural networks. Developed at the Center for Adaptive Systems
(CAS) and the Graduate Program in Cognitive and Neural Systems (CNS) of
Boston University, twenty-eight hours of the course will be taught by six
CAS/CNS faculty. Three distinguished guest lecturers will present eight
hours of the course.
COURSE OUTLINE
MAY 7, 1990
-----------
---Morning Session (Professor Stephen Grossberg)
Historical Overview, Content Addressable Memory, Competitive Decision Making,
Associative Learning
---Afternoon Session (Professors Michael Jordan (MIT) and Ennio Mingolla)
Combinational Optimization, Perceptrons, Introduction to Back Propagation,
Recent Developments of Back Propagation
MAY 8, 1990
-----------
---Morning Session (Professors Gail Carpenter and Stephen Grossberg)
Adaptive Pattern Recognition, Introduction to Adaptive Resonance Theory,
Analysis of ART 1
---Afternoon Session (Professor Gail Carpenter)
Analysis of ART 2, Analysis of ART 3, Self-Organization of Invariant Pattern
Recognition Codes, Neocognitron
MAY 9, 1990
-----------
---Morning Session (Professors Stephen Grossberg and Ennio Mingolla)
Vision and Image Processing
---Afternoon Session (Professors Daniel Bullock, Michael Cohen, and
Stephen Grossberg)
Adaptive Sensory-Motor Control and Robotics, Speech Perception and Production
MAY 10, 1990
------------
---Morning Session (Professors Michael Cohen, Stephen Grossberg, and
John Merrill)
Speech Perception and Production, Reinforcement Learning and Prediction
---Afternoon Session (Professors Stephen Grossberg and John Merrill and
Dr. Robert Hecht-Nielsen, HNC)
Reinforcement Learning and Prediction, Recent Developments in the
Neurocomputer Industry
MAY 11, 1990
------------
---Morning Session (Dr. Federico Faggin, Synaptics Inc.)
VLSI Implementation of Neural Networks
TO REGISTER: By phone, call (508) 649-9731; by mail, write for further
information to: Neural Networks, Wang Institute of Boston University,
72 Tyng Road, Tyngsboro, MA 01879. For further information about registration
and STUDENT FELLOWSHIPS, see below.
REGISTRATION FEE: Regular attendee--$950; full-time student--$250.
Registration fee includes five days of tutorials, course notebooks, one
reception, five continental breakfasts, five lunches, four dinners, daily
morning and afternoon coffee service, evening discussion sessions.
STUDENT FELLOWSHIPS supporting travel, registration, and lodging for the
Course are available to full-time graduate students in a PhD program.
Applications must be postmarked by March 1, 1990. Send curriculum vitae,
a one-page essay describing your interest in neural networks, and a letter
from a faculty advisor to: Student Fellowships, Neural Networks Course,
Wang Institute of Boston University, 72 Tyng Road, Tyngsboro, MA 01879.
------------------------------
Subject: PSYCOLOQUY editorial
From: harnad@Princeton.EDU (Stevan Harnad)
Date: Wed, 31 Jan 90 17:52:43 -0500
[Apologies if you see this more than once; I've posted it to several
somewhat overlapping lists. -- SH.]
The following editorial is reposted from PSYCOLOQUY, an international
email forum of which I have just become the co-editor. Please read what
it is about, and if you are interested, please subscribe (it's free)
according to the instructions below. The editorial has been slightly
revised for this reposting.
Stevan Harnad
---
To the readership of PSYCOLOQUY: An International Electronic Forum for
Scholarly Communication (formerly BITNET PSYCHOLOGY NEWSLETTER)
[Currently 1300 readers and redistribution sites]
This is just to let you know that this list has just come come under new
editorship. We all owe many thanks to Bob Morecock for having founded the
Bitnet Psychology Newsletter, originally "Psychnet," now PSYCOLOQUY. He
has performed a valuable service to the field of psychology in getting
the list started and sustaining it through its first few years in an era
in which this medium will become inceasingly important in scholarly
communication.
I will edit the scientific contributions to PSYCOLOQUY. The co-editor for
clinical and professional matters will be Perry London, Dean of the
Graduate School of Applied and Professional Psychology at Rutgers
University; he will be assisted by Professor Cary Cherniss, likewise of
GSAPP. We will also be looking for subeditors in the many specialized
areas of psychology, including: perception, cognition, development,
personality/social, physiological, comparative, operant/Pavlovian, etc.
There are some rather ambitious plans under consideration for this forum.
Academic email networks can be much more than bulletin boards for
meetings, abstracts and notices, as most of them are. They are a
potentially revolutionary medium for disseminating and discussing new
findings and ideas -- "Scholarly Skywriting." The global scope and
lightning pace of intellectual exchanges in this medium are uncannily
well suited to the thought processes of the creative mind -- or so I
believe, at any rate, and this hypothesis will soon be put to the test.
Along with the conference and preprint notices in psychology and
related fields that will continue to appear, and that you are
encouraged to continue to submit, there will be demonstrations of
"skywriting" in many areas of psychology and related disciplines. At
first they will be circulated to the list as a whole. Then they will
only be archived; to continue receiving them you will either have to
request the volumes from listserv@uhupvm1.bitnet or to sign up for
special sublists on tcsvm.bitnet devoted to the topic under
discussion. Occasional summaries or samples will be sent to the list as
a whole from topics whose discussions endure.
Anyone can contribute to the scholarly discussion, but the submissions
will be moderated by Perry and me, and we will have to exercise
selectivity where necessary, for reasons of length, relevance or tone
(skywriting discussions must be polite and dispassionate).
In addition, the American Psychological Association Science Directorate
will be sponsoring PSYCOLOQUY on a trial basis for 8 months; this will
pay the student assistants at Princeton and Rutgers who will update the
lists, which are maintained at Tulane University (tcsvm.bitnet)and
University of Houston (uhupvm1.bitnet) in the US as well as in Finland
(finhutc.bitnet).
Meanwhile, the list should grow to include the 25,000 members of the
American academic and research psychological community and the at least
as many academic and research psychologists and representatives of
related disciplines worldwide. Please make known the existence of
PSYCOLOQUY to all email-using psychologists and scholars in related
disciplines (and urge those who are not yet using email to try it!).
There will be notices in the APA publications and in BBS about
PSYCOLOQUY, inviting psychologists to sign on and contribute.
There will also be an article about the project.
The list's subscibership is currently about 1300, which is not small
for an email list but microscopic in relation to the size of the world
psychological community. I encourage all interested individuals on this
list to subscribe, and all subscribers to recruit new subscribers to
the list (feel free to capture and circulate this text to others by
email). The procedure for adding one's name automatically to the list
is to send email from the login at which you wish to receive PSYCOLOQUY
to listserv@tcsvm.bitnet (or listserv@finhutc.bitnet) with
SUB PSYCH Firstname Lastname
as the only line of text.
To unsubscribe:
UNSUB PSYCH (name not required)
I have also initiated the procedure for making PSYCOLOQUY available as
a moderated scientific discussion forum (sci.psycoloquy.moderated) on
Usenet, which is an efficient way to complement bitnet's email
distribution. Usenet goes directly to most major institutions in the
US and all users at each site have access. There is also wide Usenet
redistribution abroad.
You are encouraged to send three kinds of postings to PSYCOLOQUY
starting right now: (i) announcements of meetings, preprints,
employment, journal contents, etc., i.e., the usual scientific
bulletin board information; (ii) discussions pertaining to clinical
and professional matters in the field of psychology, and (iii) brief
reports of recent ideas or findings on which you would like to initiate
multiple scholarly discussion ("skywriting"). Send your messages for
posting to:
psych@tcsvm.bitnet
(NOT to listserv@tcsvm.bitnet, which is just for subscribing).
Let's use these 8 months to swell the ranks of the PSYCOLOQUY
subscribership and to demonstrate the net's revolutionary potential as
a medium for scholarly interaction!
Your reactions and suggestions are welcome. Looking forward to
a rewarding collaboration,
Stevan Harnad
------------------------------
Subject: SAB90 Call for Papers
From: Stewart Wilson <wilson@Think.COM>
Date: Thu, 01 Feb 90 11:00:41 -0500
Dear colleagues,
Dr. Meyer and I would be very grateful if you would again distribute
the following call for papers on your email list. It was distributed
a month ago--this is for readers who may have missed it then.
Thank you.
Sincerely,
Stewart Wilson
==============================================================================
==============================================================================
Call for Papers
SIMULATION OF ADAPTIVE BEHAVIOR: FROM ANIMALS TO ANIMATS
An International Conference to be held in Paris
September 24-28, 1990
The object of the conference is to bring together researchers in
ethology, ecology, cybernetics, artificial intelligence,
robotics, and related fields so as to further our understanding
of the behaviors and underlying mechanisms that allow animals
and, potentially, robots to adapt and survive in uncertain
environments.
The conference will focus particularly on simulation models in
order to help characterize and compare various organizational
principles or architectures capable of inducing adaptive behavior
in real or artificial animals.
Contact among scientists from diverse disciplines should
contribute to better appreciation of each other's approaches and
vocabularies, to cross-fertilization of fundamental and applied
research, and to defining objectives, constraints, and challenges
for future work.
Contributions treating any of the following topics from the
perspective of adaptive behavior will receive special emphasis.
Individual and collective behaviors Autonomous robots
Action selection and behavioral Hierarchical and parallel
sequences organization
Self organization of behavioral
Conditioning, learning and induction modules
Neural correlates of behavior Problem solving and planning
Perception and motor control Goal directed behavior
Motivation and emotion Neural networks and classifier
Behavioral ontogeny systems
Cognitive maps and internal Emergent structures and behaviors
world models
Authors are requested to send two copies (hard copy only) of a
full paper to each of the Conference chairmen:
Jean-Arcady MEYER Stewart WILSON
Groupe de Bioinformatique The Rowland Institute for Science
URA686.Ecole Normale Superieure 100 Cambridge Parkway
46 rue d'Ulm Cambridge, MA 02142
75230 Paris Cedex 05 USA
France
e-mail: meyer%FRULM63.bitnet@ e-mail: wilson@think.com
cunyvm.cuny.edu
A brief preliminary letter to one chairman indicating the
intention to participate--with the tentative title of the intended
paper and a list of the topics addressed--would be appreciated for
planning purposes. For conference information, please also
contact one of the chairmen.
Conference committee:
Conference Chair J.A. Meyer, S. Wilson
Organizing Committee Groupe de BioInformatique.ENS.France.
and local arrangements A. Guillot, J.A. Meyer, P. Tarroux,
P. Vincens
Program Committee L. Booker, USA R. Brooks, USA
P. Colgan, Canada P. Greussay, France
D. McFarland, UK L. Steels, Belgium
R. Sutton, USA F. Toates, UK
D. Waltz, USA
Official Language: English
Important Dates
31 May 90 Submissions must be received by the chairmen
30 June 90 Notification of acceptance or rejection
31 August 90 Camera ready revised versions due
24-28 September 90 Conference dates
------------------------------
Subject: Research Positions at MITRE
From: Russell Leighton <russ@dash.mitre.org>
Date: Fri, 02 Feb 90 09:10:08 -0500
The MITRE corporation Signal Processing Center is interviewing qualified
candidates for positions in Neural Network research and pattern
recognition.
The MITRE corporation Signal Processing Center has been invloved with
neural network research for over three years. In addition, the Signal
Processing Center has groups doing active research in the areas of
A.S.W., speech processing and high speed computing.
We are seeking candidates with some of the following characteristics:
1. Experience in neural network research.
2. Familiarity with tradional pattern recognition,
detection and estimation theory.
3. Strong programming abilities.
- Unix
- C, Fortran, Postscript
- User interface (X11, NeWS)
4. Hardware experience, particulary parallel
scientific computing.
A U.S. citizenship is REQUIRED.
Interested candidates please send resumes to:
Russell Leighton
MITRE Signal Processing Lab
7525 Colshire Dr.
McLean, Va. 22102
USA
------------------------------
Subject: EURASIP Workshop on NN - Emergency announcement
From: Luis Borges de Almeida <inesc!lba%alf@relay.EU.net>
Date: Thu, 08 Feb 90 14:03:13 -0500
[I apologize to the many readers of this list who are not involved in the
EURASIP workshop, but this was the means to get to many people fast, on
emergency. I hope you will understand
Thanks
Luis B. Almeida]
VERY URGENT
Dear workshop participant,
We are very sorry to inform that, from what we have just learned,
the Portuguese air traffic controllers have announced a strike from
February 14 through February 18. This means there will be a big trouble
with transportation to/from Portugal. From our judgment of the situation,
we would guess that the strike will not be called off. However, it is
said that the Government might make a civilian requisition of the
controllers. Below are some indications of the possible measures that you
could take to ensure your arrival on time, and your departure, in case
the strike is maintained. Two points, however, are very important: 1) ACT
QUICKLY - alternate transportation around those days will probably get
full very fast. 2) LET US KNOW OF YOUR TRAVEL ARRANGEMENTS, AS SOON AS
POSSIBLE - we will try to help minimize the consequences of this strike
to our participants (the best ways to contact us are given at the end of
this message).
Measures that you can take:
1 - Contact your travel agent, and have him make "protective
reservations" for arrival on the 13th, and departure on the 19th.
Don't forget to do that for all flights along your route. It is best to
also keep your old reservations, in case the strike is called off. For
extra lodging, if Hotel do Mar is full and can't help you, we can suggest
Holiday Inn in Lisbon (phone +351-1-735093, 735123, 735222, 736018; fax
+351-1-736572, 736672; telex 60330 HOLINN P). Mention that you are coming
to a meeting organized by Inesc, they'll probalbly give you a special
price.
2 - Make "protective reservations" for arrival on the 14th and/or
departure on the 18th, in Madrid, instead of Lisbon. You can then use the
train to/from Lisbon, but we will also try to arrange a bus if there are
enough people in this situation. You can also choose to drive between
Madrid and Sesimbra (about 600 km).
You can contact anyone in the local organizing committee: Luis B.
Almeida, Ilda Goncalves, Joaquim S. Rodrigues, Fernando M. Silva, Joao
Neto
Phone numbers: +351-1-544607,545150
Fax: +351-1-525843 (may get quite busy, the next few days)
Telex: 15696 INESC P
E-mail: lba@inesc.inesc.pt (from Europe)
lba%inesc.inesc.pt@uunet.uu.net (from outside Europe)
lba@inesc.uucp (if you have access to uucp)
{any backbone, uunet}!mcvax!inesc!lba (older, but should still work)
We (still) look forward to meeting you in Sesimbra.
Sincerely,
Luis B. Almeida
------------------------------
End of Neuron Digest [Volume 6 Issue 10]
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