107,647 research outputs found
Collecting Diverse Natural Language Inference Problems for Sentence Representation Evaluation
We present a large-scale collection of diverse natural language inference
(NLI) datasets that help provide insight into how well a sentence
representation captures distinct types of reasoning. The collection results
from recasting 13 existing datasets from 7 semantic phenomena into a common NLI
structure, resulting in over half a million labeled context-hypothesis pairs in
total. We refer to our collection as the DNC: Diverse Natural Language
Inference Collection. The DNC is available online at https://www.decomp.net,
and will grow over time as additional resources are recast and added from novel
sources.Comment: To be presented at EMNLP 2018. 15 page
Leading the evaluation of institutional online learning environments for quality enhancement in times of change
This paper reports on findings from a nationally funded project which aims to design and implement a quality management framework for online learning environments (OLEs). Evaluation is a key component of any quality management system and it is this aspect of the framework that is the focus of this paper. In developing the framework initial focus groups were conducted at the five participating institutions. These revealed that, although regarded as important, there did not appear to be a shared understanding of the nature and purpose of evaluation. A second series of focus groups revealed there were multiple perspectives arising from those with a vested interest in online learning. These perspectives will be outlined. Overall, how evaluation was undertaken was highly variable within and across the five institutions reflecting where they were at in relation to the development of their OLE
The social cognition of medical knowledge, with special reference to childhood epilepsy
This paper arose out of an engagement in medical communication courses at a Gulf university. It deploys a theoretical framework derived from a (critical) sociocognitive approach to discourse analysis in order to investigate three aspects of medical discourse relating to childhood epilepsy: the cognitive processes that are entailed in relating different types of medical knowledge to their communicative context; the types of medical knowledge that are constituted in the three different text types analysed; and the relationship between these different types of medical knowledge and the discursive features of each text type. The paper argues that there is a cognitive dimension to the human experience of understanding and talking about one specialized from of medical knowledge. It recommends that texts be studied in medical communication courses not just in terms of their discrete formal features but also critically, in terms of the knowledge which they produce, transmit and reproduce
Science as systems learning. Some reflections on the cognitive and communicational aspects of science
This paper undertakes a theoretical investigation of the 'learning' aspect of science as opposed to the 'knowledge' aspect. The practical background of the paper is in agricultural systems research – an area of science that can be characterised as 'systemic' because it is involved in the development of its own subject area, agriculture. And the practical purpose of the theoretical investigation is to contribute to a more adequate understanding of science in such areas, which can form a basis for developing and evaluating systemic research methods, and for determining appropriate criteria of scientific quality. Two main perspectives on science as a learning process are explored: research as the learning process of a cognitive system, and science as a social, communicational system. A simple model of a cognitive system is suggested, which integrates both semiotic and cybernetic aspects, as well as a model of selfreflective learning in research, which entails moving from an inside 'actor' stance to an outside 'observer' stance, and back. This leads to a view of scientific knowledge as inherently contextual and to the suggestion of reflexive objectivity and relevance as two related key criteria of good science
Hypothesis Only Baselines in Natural Language Inference
We propose a hypothesis only baseline for diagnosing Natural Language
Inference (NLI). Especially when an NLI dataset assumes inference is occurring
based purely on the relationship between a context and a hypothesis, it follows
that assessing entailment relations while ignoring the provided context is a
degenerate solution. Yet, through experiments on ten distinct NLI datasets, we
find that this approach, which we refer to as a hypothesis-only model, is able
to significantly outperform a majority class baseline across a number of NLI
datasets. Our analysis suggests that statistical irregularities may allow a
model to perform NLI in some datasets beyond what should be achievable without
access to the context.Comment: Accepted at *SEM 2018 as long paper. 12 page
Restructuring and rescaling water governance in mining contexts: the co-production of waterscapes in Peru
The governance of water resources is prominent in both water policy agendas and academic scholarship. Political ecologists have made important advances in reconceptualising the relationship between water and society. Yet, while they have stressed both the scalar dimensions, and the politicised nature, of water governance, analyses of its scalar politics are relatively nascent. In this paper, we consider how the increased demand for water resources by the growing mining industry in Peru reconfigures and rescales water governance. In Peru, the mining industry’s thirst for water draws in, and reshapes, social relations, technologies, institutions and discourses that operate over varying spatial and temporal scales. We develop the concept of waterscape to examine these multiple ways in water is co-produced through mining, and become embedded in changing modes and structures of water governance, often beyond the watershed scale. We argue that an examination of waterscapes avoids the limitations of thinking about water in purely material terms, structuring analysis of water issues according to traditional spatial scales and institutional hierarchies, and taking these scales and structures for granted
Emergent processes as generation of discontinuities
In this article we analyse the problem of emergence in its diachronic
dimension. In other words, we intend to deal with the generation of
novelties in natural processes. Our approach aims at integrating some
insights coming from Whitehead’s Philosophy of the Process with the
epistemological framework developed by the “autopoietic” tradition.
Our thesis is that the emergence of new entities and rules of interaction
(new “fields of relatedness”) requires the development of discontinuous
models of change. From this standpoint natural evolution can be
conceived as a succession of emergences — each one realizing a novel
“extended” present, described by distinct models — rather than as a
single and continuous dynamics. This theoretical and epistemological
framework is particularly suitable to the investigation of the origin of
life, an emblematic example of this kind of processes
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