Lorentz Centre Workshop: Formal Methods for the Informal World

I am pleased to announce that an application in which I am an organiser has been successful, lead by Virginia Dignum.

Details will be at: http://www.lorentzcenter.nl/lc/web/2013/531/info.php3?wsid=531&venue=Oort

Formal Methods for the Informal World
from 4 Mar 2013 through 8 Mar 2013

Venue: Lorentz Center@Oort

This workshop is in preparation

Scientific organizers:
Francien Dechesne (Delft, Netherlands)
Frank Dignum (Utrecht, Netherlands)
Virginia Dignum (Delft, Netherlands)
Bruce Edmonds (Manchester, United Kingdom)
Liz Sonenberg (Melbourne, Australia)

The Crime & Corruption Observatory Website

the Crime & Corruption Observatory.

CRIME&CO (www.crimeco.eu)  will monitor, study and predict the dynamics of criminal phenomena by ICT (data-mining and agent based simulation), theories (complexity, SNA, sociological-legal theories, ABM and social cognition), methods (analytical and empirical), data (natural and simulation-based).

Here you can download materials  from CrimEx KickOff Meeting (Rome, January 2012)

CRIME&CO is an activity of
FuturICT, www.futurict.eu
Info federico.cecconi@istc.cnr.it 

New CPM Paper: Learning, Social Intelligence and the Turing Test – why an “out-of-the-box” Turing Machine will not pass the Turing Test by Bruce Edmonds and Carlos Gershenson

Learning, Social Intelligence and the Turing Test
– why an “out-of-the-box” Turing Machine will not pass the Turing Test


CPM Report No.: 10-215
By: Bruce Edmonds and Carlos Gershenson
Date: 15th Feb 2012

An Invited talk at the Turing Centenary Conference, CiE Cambridge, June 2012.

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Abstract

The Turing Test (TT) checks for human intelligence, rather than any putative general intelligence. It involves repeated interaction requiring learning in the form of adaption to the human conversation partner. It is a macro-level post-hoc test in contrast to the definition of a Turing Machine (TM), which is a prior micro-level definition. This raises the question of whether learning is just another computational process, i.e. can be implemented as a TM. Here we argue that learning or adaption is fundamentally different from computation, though it does involve processes that can be seen as computations. To illustrate this difference we compare (a) designing a TM and (b) learning a TM, defining them for the purpose of the argument. We show that there is a well-defined sequence of problems which are not effectively designable but are learnable, in the form of the bounded halting problem. Some characteristics of human intelligence are reviewed including it’s: interactive nature, learning abilities, imitative tendencies, linguistic ability and context-dependency. A story that explains some of these is the Social Intelligence Hypothesis. If this is broadly correct, this points to the necessity of a considerable period of acculturation (social learning in context) if an artificial intelligence is to pass the TT. Whilst it is always possible to ‘compile’ the results of learning into a TM, this would not be a designed TM and would not be able to continually adapt (pass future TTs). We conclude three things, namely that: a purely “designed” TM will never pass the TT; that there is no such thing as a general intelligence since it necessary involves learning; and that learning/adaption and computation should be clearly distinguished.

Available from:  http://cfpm.org/cpmrep215.html

PhD Position at the Centre for Policy Modelling on: Data-mining, Visualisation and Agent-Based Modelling

PhD Position at the Centre for Policy Modelling on:

Data-mining, Visualisation and Agent-Based Modelling

Stipend: £13,290 per annum + applicable fees for 3 years 

Centre for Policy Modelling
Manchester Metropolitan University Business School

Applications are invited to apply for this fully-funded doctoral position at the Centre for Policy Modelling, to investigate some of the potential synergies between data-mining, visualisation techniques and agent-based modelling.  This studentship is within the umbrella of the SCID project (scid-project.org), funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council’s Cross-disciplinary Interfaces Programme, 'Complexity Science in the Real World'.  This project is in association with the University of Manchester's Institute for Social Change and its Department of Theoretical Physics.  This is a high-profile and ambitious project that aims to develop a new approach to using simulations to gain understanding of important social issues.  The project is from September 2010 to August 2015 so the funding will end August 2015.

The period of study will involve the development of techniques to apply data-mining, visualisation and agent-based simulation in innovative and complementary ways drawing on the evidence and data from the SCID project, which is centered around 3 areas: diversity, homophily and social trust, socio-political integration, and socio-economic inequality.  Thus the data and target of the techniques and approaches developed would be to do with one of these areas.

The data and evidence will be provided by experts at the Institute for Social Change. The central challenge of the PhD will be to find synergies between data-mining, visualisation techniques and agent-based modelling, for example: visualising the output from simulations, using data-mining techniques to inform the specification of agent-based models, or using data-mining to locate “phases” in the behaviour of simulations. Depending on the exact area identified for investigation this studentship will be jointly supervised with the department for computer science.

Applicants should preferably have a Masters-level degree in a relevant discipline, preferably with an element of computer science or computational social science. The candidate should thus have a reasonable level programming and/or simulation experience. The candidate has to be an EU national and not already have a PhD.

The CPM is a world-leading research centre in social simulation.  Since its inception in 1992 it has developed its unique blend of trans-disciplinary research, crossing the areas of: artificial intelligence, complexity science, philosophy and computational social science (to get an idea of its scope browse its discussion papers).  It has built up a reputation and track-record over that time being involved in a number of EU and UK projects (Ocopomo, EMIL, Nania, NeWater, GIACS, CAVES, CCDEW, FIRMA, IMIS).  The CPM is a happy, informal but creative lab.  For more information about the work of the Centre see its website at http://cfpm.org

For informal discussions about the post, contact Bruce Edmonds on +44 (0) 161 247 6479 or email bruce@edmonds.name.  

To apply, send a CV with a covering letter to Bruce Edmonds, Centre for Policy Modelling, MMUBS, Aytoun Building, Aytoun Street, M1 3GH, UK.  Closing date for applications: 16^h March 2011.

The University is committed to an Equal Opportunities Policy.

Complexity in the Real World workshop @ ECCS 21012

4th&5th September 2012, LUB, Brussels.

See http://crweccs.wordpress.com for details.