nl-kr-request@cs.rpi.edu (NL-KR Moderator Chris Welty) (10/05/90)
NL-KR Digest (Thu Oct 4 12:08:18 1990) Volume 7 No. 18 Today's Topics: Abstract for Syntax Workshop, 9 October, 7:30 p.m. Machine Translation CFP: JOURNAL OF IDEAS Submissions: nl-kr@cs.rpi.edu Requests, policy: nl-kr-request@cs.rpi.edu Back issues are available from host archive.cs.rpi.edu [128.213.5.17] in the files nl-kr/Vxx/Nyy (ie nl-kr/V01/N01 for V1#1), mail requests will not be promptly satisfied. If you can't reach `cs.rpi.edu' you may want to use `turing.cs.rpi.edu' instead. BITNET subscribers: we now have a LISTSERVer for nl-kr. You may send submissions to NL-KR@RPIECS and any listserv-style administrative requests to LISTSERV@RPIECS. ----------------------------------------------------------------- To: nl-kr@cs.rpi.edu Date: Thu, 4 Oct 90 08:47:37 PDT >From: ingrid@russell.Stanford.EDU (Ingrid Deiwiks) Subject: Abstract for Syntax Workshop, 9 October, 7:30 p.m. SYNTAX WORKSHOP Complex Predicates in LFG Miriam Butt, Michio Isoda, Peter Sells (mutt@csli.stanford.edu, isoda@csli.stanford.edu, sells@csli.stanford.edu) Tuesday, 9 October, 7:30 p.m. Cordura 100 This is a report on work conducted at CSLI over the summer by a group of people, including the authors. We will primarily talk about the relation in LFG between f-structure and a(rgument)-structure, which we have tried to formalize, by looking at certain complex predicates in Urdu. The standard account of complex predicates (e.g., Ishikawa (1985) for Japanese) is that they are monoclausal in c-structure but biclausal in f-structure and a-structure. Urdu presents some complex predicates of just this type. However, there are others that seem to require monoclausal c- and f-structures but biclausal a-structures; these are the ones we will focus on. ------------------------------ To: nl-kr@cs.rpi.edu >From: Tony McEnery <mcenery@comp.lancs.ac.uk> Newsgroups: comp.ai.nlang-know-rep Subject: Machine Translation Date: 4 Oct 90 15:33:50 GMT Reply-To: Tony McEnery <mcenery@comp.lancs.ac.uk> NEW JOURNAL ANNOUNCEMENT Applied Computer Translation Keep Up To Date With Machine Translation And Computer Aided Language Learning Applied Computer Translation (ACT) aims to encourage an inter-disciplinary perspective on this all important issue, by bringing together concepts from linguistics, computer science and related fields, in an easily understandable form. Topics covered include knowledge based and probabilistic machine translation, computer aided language learning and corpus based applications. News and reviews provide informed insight into developments in the field, as well as providing a useful channel for information. Applications from the mainframe to the micro are covered, ranging from research projects at an international level, to activities in the classroom. The journal gives high quality academic and industrial opinion in a digestible form - articles and features will work together to provide not only new information, but also background to areas already covered, to facilitate wider understanding. Within the journal, language professionals, linguists, computer scientists, industrialists and those with any interest in machines and language can find a forum for active, intelligent discussion on this important topic. CONTRIBUTIONS INCLUDE : Research Papers at the very forefront of technology. Application Reports - short papers covering a wide area, from personal comments to positional papers to previews of forthcoming work. Case Studies - reviews of major applications of computer translation in any environment. (All Above REFEREED) Reviews of books, software and new equipment. EDITORS : General Editor : Tony McEnery, UCREL, Department Of Computing, Engineering Building, Lancaster University, Bailrigg, Lancaster, LA1 4YR, ENGLAND. email mcenery@uk.ac.lancs.comp Far East Editor : Professor Jun-Ichi Tsujii, c/o Motojiro Tsujii, 78 Un'rin'in cho, Kita-Ku, Kyoto, Japan 603. (Visiting Professor at UMIST, PO Box 88, Manchester, M60 1QD, ENGLAND) email : tsujii@uk.ac.umist.ccl North American Editor : Dr. Ezra Black, Continuous Speech Recognition Group, Research Division, IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Centre, PO Box 704, Yorktown Heights, New York 10598, USA. email : BLACK@almaden.ibm.com General Board : Dr. D. Arnold (Linguistics, University Of Essex, UK) Dr. W. Black (Computational Linguistics, UMIST, UK) Prof. J Durand (Linguistics, Salford University, UK) John Higgins (School Of Education, Bristol University,UK) Ian Kelly (Chairman, British Computer Society Special Interest Group On Natural Language Translation) Prof. F. Knowles (Modern Languages, Aston University, UK) Tom Routen (Dept. Maths Stats & Computing, Leicester Polytechnic, UK) Prof. W. Skala (Department Of Informatics And Computing, Pilzen Institute Of Technology, Czechoslovakia) SUBSCRIPTION RATES : Volume 1 : Personal 22.50 pounds (45 dollars) Library/Corporate 45 pounds (90 dollars) Volume Two Onwards : Personal 30 pounds (60 dollars) Library/Corporate 60 pounds (120 dollars) Prices Include Postage/Airmail Send Cheques/PO's/Money Orders OR MASTERCARD/EUROCARD/VISA/ACCESS (number, expiry date & signature) To : Sigma Press, 1 South Oak Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 6AR, UK. SUBMISSIONS : You are invited to submit contributions to the editors. The normal length of an article is 7,00 words, though longer articles may be accepted. You should write concisely but not at the expense of clarity, bearing in mind that the referees report will be based on a contributions length relative to its content. An acknowledgement of receipt will normally be sent within seven days. A publication decision should be made within six weeks of the receipt of a contribution. Our policy is to ensure rapid publication of accepted contributions so that their currency is maintained. It is imperative that all articles are either sent in ascii format by electronic mail, or on a 5.25/3.5 inch disk in a PC format. Several word processor formats are acceptable though straight ascii is simplest. Under extenuating circumstances manually typed articles will be accepted. Each article must be accompanied by an abstract. Please note that electronic submissions save the waste of paper. More detailed notes on guidance for contributors and a style sheet are available from the publishers on request. ------------------------------ To: nl-kr@cs.rpi.edu Date: 22 Sep 90 01:00:31 EDT >From: Elan Moritz <71620.3203@CompuServe.COM> Subject: CFP: JOURNAL OF IDEAS ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ ANNOUNCEMENT and CALL for PAPERS +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ for VOLUME 2 of the JOURNAL of IDEAS The first issue of the Journal of Ideas was recently published. Below is the introduction to the Journal. The abstracts of papers in the first issue will appear in a subsequent digest. The Journal of Ideas is aiming at publishing papers in its relevant areas within 3-6 months of receipt of papers. Regular papers and proposals for invited papers are welcome and should be addressed to: Dr. Elan Moritz, Editor Journal of Ideas, The Institute for Memetic Research, Inc. P. O. Box 16327 Panama City, Florida 32406- 1327 or moritz@well.bitnet moritz@well.sf.ca.us.bitnet or via internet moritz@well.sf.ca.us or 71620.3203@compuserve.com +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ personal subscriptions (in the U.S) are available at $46 year (includes Volume 1 #1 described below and 4 issues of Volume 2 to appear in 1991). limited copies of the first issue described below are available for $20. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Journal of Ideas The Journal of Ideas is an archival forum for discussion of existing and original ideas and concepts. Its purpose is to circulate and nurture inquiry that focuses attention on the evolution and spread of ideas, on the process of discovery as well as the creative process, and on biological and electronic implementations of idea/knowledge generation and processing. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Elan Moritz Editor Patricia S. Smith Managing Editor * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Editorial Advisory Board ++++++++++++++++++++++++ R. Wilburn Clouse Department of Educational Leadership, Vanderbilt University Peter A. Kiss Sentar, Inc., Hunstville, Alabama Matthew Witten Center for High Performance Computing, University of Texas at Austin Manuscripts should be sent in duplicate to the Managing Editor, Journal of Ideas, IMR, Box 16327, Panama City, Florida, 32406-1327. Manuscripts and correspondence can also be sent via e-mail to BITNET: moritz@well, and to INTERNET: 71620.3203@compuserve.com, or, moritz@well.sf.ca.us Subscriptions to the Journal of Ideas may be obtained from the Institute for Memetic Research. Annual personal subscription prices are US$ 46 for U.S. and Canadian subscribers, and US$ 72 for overseas subscribers. Annual corporate and institutional subscription rates are US$ 138 for U.S. and Canadian subscriptions and US$ 164 for overseas subscriptions. Subscription orders should be forwarded with correct payment by check or money order (drawn on a U.S. bank). Single issues are available for US$ 20. Inquiries concerning back-issues should be addressed to the Institute for Memetic Research. Orders may also be placed through EBSCO Subscription Services in Dumont, New Jersey, tel. (201) 387-2660, fax (201) 387-0671. The Journal of Ideas and the Institute for Memetic Research, Inc. will assume no responsibility for opinions and statements advanced by authors publishing in the Institute of Memetic Research's publication. Permission to quote from this journal is permitted with acknowledgement of source. Reprinting lengthy excerpts require the Institute's permission as do republication and storage in any form (written, translated, electronic, optical, etc.). The Journal of Ideas, ISSN 1049-6335, is published quarterly by the Institute for Memetic Research, Inc. P. O. Box 16327, Panama City Florida 32406-1327. Copyright [(c)] 1990 by the Institute for Memetic Research, Inc. ******************************* ******************************* Welcome to the Journal of Ideas ******************************* ******************************* In 1608 Hans Lippershey (aka Lippersheim) placed one spectacle lens in front of another and pointed this configuration at a distant building. To his amazement he noticed that the building top appeared much closer and larger than he could see before; furthermore, he could see the details of the building top quite clearly. On October 2, 1608 he offered this device (which he called 'looker') to the Estates of Holland for 900 florins. Lippershey's looker is known nowadays as a telescope. Through Jacques Bovedere of Paris, the telescope was made known to Galileo Galilei. Galileo, in turn, constructed his own telescope and pointed it towards the moon, Jupiter, and other celestial objects. Galileo's discoveries of the irregular surface of the moon, sunspots on the sun, moons of Jupiter, and a host of other unexpected astronomical phenomena, challenged the Ptolmeic astronomical theories and the official views of man's position in the universe. Galileo's observations ultimately led to what we now recognize as modern science while Galileo himself was subjected to continuing house arrest. On reviewing the fascinating sequence of events leading to Galileo's discoveries, one immediately recognizes the simple two lens experiment, conducted by Lippershey, as the singular most important event for modern astronomy, and perhaps for modern science. This is so because it is the one event that provided a simple tool which generated uncontestable direct evidence about nature and the universe. It was the telescope that provided data supporting or refuting systems of beliefs held for many centuries. A number of natural questions arise. Why did Lippershey place the one lens in front of the other at the time that he did? Where did that idea come from? If we reflect upon these questions and bring into the foreground the fact that spectacle lenses were known for over three centuries (before Lippershey) and that the magnifying effects of glass and water-filled glass spheres were known for over 1300 years, another question comes to mind. Why did it take as long as it did to think of and do Lippershey's experiment? Events such as Lippershey's invention of the telescope, and Galileo's use of the telescope to discover craters on the moon, point to a class of underlying phenomena that we all participate in continuously, namely the awareness, development, use and propagation of ideas. Until very recently, attempts to understand the mechanics and dynamics of 'ideas' (as entities by themselves) have been limited to philosophical, sociological and perhaps psychological speculations. Almost all discussions of 'ideas' revolve about truth values (i.e. true/false) of particular ideas, their meaning and their impact (i.e., how many people subscribe to an idea or a collection of ideas and what did they do as result of believing that particular idea). To date, little discussion has taken place on objective, quantitative aspects of 'ideas' and 'idea-dynamics'. This journal, The Journal of Ideas, is being launched to stimulate thinking about the very nature of 'ideas' as rigorously quantifiable objects. The Journal aims to provide a forum for disciplined presentation of formal results in an archival scholarly format. Basically, it is our view that ideas are discrete objects that can combine, mutate, spread, and die, much like the many living biological entities we are familiar with. In this issue we have assembled a collection of invited papers by distinguished investigators. J. T. Bonner (Princeton University, author of "The Evolution of Culture in Animals") presents an analysis of cultural evolution from a biological point of view. Bonner discusses cultural evolution in terms of selection of units of behavioral information, individual memory, and collective memory of the species. He argues that cultural changes (in short time spans) rival genetically derived changes that take hundreds of millions of years. D. Brooks (University of Toronto, co-author of "Evolution as Entropy") and D. McLennan extend the unified theory of biology which is based on entropy analysis of biological systems as informational systems. Their unified theory of biological evolution argues for production of historically constrained, spontaneously stable, complex structures and hierachies. S. Salthe (Brooklyn College, author of "Evolving Hierarchical Systems" and "Complexity and Change in Biology") presents a related biological-entropy based approach to infodynamics - the study of uncertainties. Salthe's framework allows discussion of external (historical) influences on dissipative structures and prediction of the effects of stored information. H. K. Henson (first president of the L-5 society and an activist in national space policy) and A. Lucas present a discussion of evolution and creationism in the context of memes (a particular category of ideas). Their paper explores the question of why humans have beliefs at all and raises the intriguing hypothesis that there may exist physical meme receptor sites with subtantial stability. R. Wiley (author of the book "BioBalance: The Acid/Alkaline Solution To The Food-Mood-Health Puzzle") presents a rigorous theory for the metabolic roots of consciousness that tracks metabolic inputs leading to correlations with metabolic and cognitive functions and dysfunctions. An interesting, and potentially highly significant aspect of R. Wiley's theory is the use of the relative acidity/alkalinity of venous plasma pH as the synoptic indicator of metabolic health and consequently mental/functional health. General metabolite reaction-diffusion equations, specializing to hermitian interactions are presented. E. Moritz introduces a rigorous foundation for memetic science. Moritz's paper provides a review of the major historical theories of ideas with attention to contemporary work of quantitative culture theorists of the past two decades. In addition to a wealth of key references, Moritz establishes a firm basis for a calculational science of ideas based on intrinsic and extrinsic properties of memes. The papers collected in this issue, while initially appearing as a diverse ensemble, in fact touch on various aspects that we hope to bring together in the Journal. Ideas and language appear to be present in a developed form only in humans. They are phenotypic artifacts of the state of cognitive abilities achieved by humans as a result of a biologically and culturally adaptive evolution. We hope these papers serve as a basis for and stimulate principled discussion for a comprehensive science that includes these diverse aspects. Since the topic of a science of ideas (as differentiated from philosophy) is new and uncharted, we expect that a variety of points of view and approaches will be taken. We anticipate that some topics and papers will generate heated discussions, as well as provide substantive advances in areas such as cognitive sciences, psychology, biology, sociology, artificial intelligence, artificial life, economics, computational linguistics, knowledge engineering, and a host of existing and new interdisciplinary fields. We stress that the Journal and its publisher will maintain the principle of scientific objectivity regarding publications. Accordingly, all views expressed in the Journal are solely those of the author(s) of individual papers. Correspondence pertaining to individual author's positions should be addressed to the relevant author. We encourage individuals who have interests in the topic of the science of ideas to submit papers for publication in this journal; while no standards can be set on a new science, it is expected that papers published in JoI will be of high professional quality. Papers submitted will be reviewed for content, technical accuracy, and novelty. We encourage readers to let their acquaintances know about the Journal as both a source of new information and a forum for discussion. Judging from correspondence received, and the great interest expressed, we are confident that many new and useful ideas will be presented here, and that JoI will act as a catalyst for discovering how ideas interact with other ideas and how the process of creativity can be made more fruitful and accessible. In particular, we see an emerging impact of this area on disciplines that require understanding of knowledge representation and dynamics, and on electronic based memes (such as electronic viruses, bacteria and worms), artificial intelligence, and genetic algorithms. We also see the distinct potential for memetic science (the science of ideas) to shed light on neural structures and to call attention to manditory architectures in the human brain (which would be required to support idea-processing and dynamics). It is distinctly possible that results obtained here will shed light on mental functions and dysfunctions such as schizophrenia. Ultimately, we look forward to being able to explain in detail why it took 300 years to go from a single spectacle lens to the two lens telescope, and to use the science of ideas, memetic science, the same way molecular biologists are able to piece together DNA and RNA molecules to create new structures. We hope that in the process, we will learn how to look at ideas that already exist and to piece them together effectively, so that what would otherwise take centuries, will be accomplished in years. Elan Moritz, Editor Patricia S. Smith, Managing Editor ------------------------------ End of NL-KR Digest *******************