Date: Thu 2 Jun 1988 22:43-EDT From: AIList Moderator Nick Papadakis Reply-To: AIList@AI.AI.MIT.EDU Us-Mail: MIT Mail Stop 38-390, Cambridge MA 02139 Phone: (617) 253-2737 Subject: AIList Digest V7 #16 To: AIList@AI.AI.MIT.EDU Status: RO AIList Digest Friday, 3 Jun 1988 Volume 7 : Issue 16 Today's Topics: Queries: inductive expert system tools Response to: current connectionist literature, etcetera Expert Systems Shells Info Philosophy: Artificial Intelligence Languages Self Simulation Free Will & Self Awareness ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 31 May 88 12:54:06 GMT From: mcvax!dnlunx!marlies@uunet.uu.net (Steenbergen M.E.van) Subject: Wanted, information on inductive expert system tools. Hello, I am new to USENET. I am engaged in artificial intelligence research. At the moment I am investigating the possibilities of inductive expert systems. In the literature I have encountered the names of a number of (supposedly) inductive expert system building tools: Logian, RuleMaster, KDS, TIMM, Expert-Ease, Expert-Edge, VP-Expert. I would like to have more information about these tools (articles about them or the names of dealers in Holland). I would be very grateful to everyone sending me any information about these or other inductive tools. Remarks of people who have worked with inductive expert systems are also very welcome. Thanks! Marlies ..!mcvax!dnlunx!marlies ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 2 Jun 88 03:34:49 CDT From: lugowski@resbld.csc.ti.com Subject: current connectionist literature, etcetera Responding to John Nagle's CURRENT connectionist literature inquiry: In my opinion, there is no good comprehensive book on current connectionist thinking. For one thing, folks are too busy going to conferences. For another, everyone has their own little garden to tend. Recent book content of interest includes "Neural Darwinism" (to judge from preprints) as well as the commentaries by Jim Anderson in "Neuroscience", a recent compendium of not-so-recent papers. You don't want to miss a not-yet-out MIT/Bradford Books book, Pentti Kanerva's 1984 thesis (CSLI 84-7), if you haven't read it yet. Other than that, I'd repeat the obligatory advice: monitor technical reports, the journals "Nature" and "Neural Networks" and the two connectionist mailing lists. To apply for subscription to those lists, send to: connectionists-request@q.cs.cmu.edu (sparsely firing connectionists) neuron-digest-request@csc.ti.com (everyone, sparse and otherwise) As for categorizing work, anything small-grained, bottom up and parallel probably can pass for connectionist. It's not the formalism, it's the claim, really: One must make massively parallel claims pertaining to massive parallelism. (Smirk, lest I get crucified.) Simulated annealing is "very connectionism". Some of the nicest connectionist work of late (Durbin & Willsaw, Cambridge, also stuff out of Los Alamos) has at least references to simulated annealing as benchmark. The trick one would like to see done is casting simulated annelaing as a localized computation *without* the closed-form cost function or globally computed energy -- everything strictly "grassroots". As for tensor calculus, the very idea appears contra connectionism, I hold with those who would like to see discrete, adpative and local formalisms take over the domains historically ceded to 19th century's closed-form mathematical analysis and its applications. Tensor calculus? Sure, but check them determinants at the bar, pardner... [Above opinions are strictly mine.] -- Marek Lugowski lugowski@resbld.csc.ti.com lugowski@ngstl1.ti.com marek@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu ------------------------------ Date: 2 Jun 88 13:14:16 GMT From: uh2@psuvm.bitnet (Lee Sailer) Subject: Expert Systems Shells Info wanted Here's you chance to help out some poor folk at a small college...8-) I have two students who want to learn about expert systems. One wants to build a system that answers micro-economics questions---"The banana crop fails, what happens to the price of apples?"---and the other will probably do something in manufacturing. I'm the "advisor". I have lots of book knowledge about ES, but we don't have any software here at this point. I need pointers to useful systems and advice. We have msdos machines and Macintoshes, plus an odd Unix box or two, and of course the ever popular IBM mainframe. What we don't have is much money. Advice gratefully accepted. ------------------------------ Date: 31 May 88 16:22:26 GMT From: elk@cblpn.att.com (Edwin King) Reply-to: elk@cblpn.att.com (55214-Edwin King) Subject: Re: Artificial Intelligence Languages >Can anyone suggest a list of features which a programming >language must have which would qualify it as an "artificial intelligence >language" ? I realize this may not exactly jive with the current list of "AI languages" but, in my opinion there are only a couple of features a language must have to be of any real use for AI. They are 1) True linked list capability. Sure, there are ways to fake this, but the headaches are enormous. But, do be aware that as long as you can use pointers and such to create this effect, I will include it on the list. Structure references are helpful as well (such as struct in C, or record in PASCAL). I don't think the actual manipulations of these lists have to be built-in since building a library for that purpose is easy enough that most folks have probably already done it. 2) For some (not all) AI fields easy access to the hardware itself it nice (like robotic and the like). 3) Easy to use string functions, or a library to do such. So, by this criteria, all the commonly held "AI languages" would fit (like PROLOG, LISP, POP, et cetera ad nauseum). But, I really think a few others (C, Pascal, ADA, Bliss--though that may be stretching a bit, and definitely ASSEMBLY) can also be used effectively given just a little overhead to library building. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~ Ed King | Have we been here before or are we yet to come? ~ ~ elk@cblpn.ATT.COM | -- Sarah Jane Smith ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ------------------------------ Date: 2 Jun 88 16:55:10 GMT From: sdcrdcf!csun!sdsu!caasi@hplabs.hp.com (Richard Caasi) Subject: Re: Self Simulation In article <33245@linus.UUCP> writes: >I was captured by the notion of self-simulation, and started day-dreaming, >imagining myself as an actor inside a simulation. I found that, as the >director of the day-dream, I had to delegate free will to my simulated >self. The movie free-runs, sans script. It was just like being asleep. > >So, perhaps a robot who engages in self-simulation is merely dreaming >about itself. That's not so hard. I do it all the time. > >--Barry Kort Wasn't it Chuang-Tzu who wrote: Once I dreamt I was a butterfly. After I awoke, I didn't know if I was a man dreaming about being a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming about being a man. ------------------------------ Date: 31 May 88 16:32:12 GMT From: umix!umich!eecs.umich.edu!itivax!dhw@uunet.UU.NET (David H. West) Subject: Re: AIList Digest V7 #4 [bwk@mitre-bedford.arpa: Re: Free Will & Self Awareness] In article <8805250055.AA01059@BLOOM-BEACON.MIT.EDU>, bwk@mitre-bedford.arpa (Barry W. Kort) writes: > [...] I can use my imagination to conceive a course > of action which increases both of our utility functions. Free will > empowers me to choose a Win-Win alternative. Without free will, I am > predestined to engage in acts that hurt others. Since I disvalue hurting > others, I thank God that I am endowed with free will. > > Is there a flaw in the above line of reasoning? If so, I would be > grateful to someone for pointing it out to me. Whether there is a flaw depends on what one supposes the conclusion(s) to be ;-) Robert Axelrod (in _The Evolution of Cooperation_) has shown by simulation that an evolutionary system containing only rather simple automata can learn to play Prisoners' Dilemma with a win-win (actually TFT, which is win-win against another TFT) strategy. In this particular instance it is the system that learns, rather than individuals, which are too transient. Do you wish to ascribe free will to such a (deterministic but stochastically driven) system? David West dhw%iti@umix.cc.umich.edu ------------------------------ End of AIList Digest ********************