On the Combination of Game-Theoretic Learning and Multi Model Adaptive Filters

This paper casts coordination of a team of robots within the framework of game theoretic learning algorithms. In particular a novel variant of fictitious play is proposed, by considering multi-model adaptive filters as a method to estimate other players’ strategies. The proposed algorithm can be used as a coordination mechanism between players when they should take decisions under uncertainty. Each player chooses an action after taking into account the actions of the other players and also the uncertainty. Uncertainty can occur either in terms of noisy observations or various types of other players. In addition, in contrast to other game-theoretic and heuristic algorithms for distributed optimisation, it is not necessary to find the optimal parameters a priori. Various parameter values can be used initially as inputs to different models. Therefore, the resulting decisions will be aggregate results of all the parameter values. Simulations are used to test the performance of the proposed methodology against other game-theoretic learning algorithms.</p

"Shouldn't I use a polarquestion?" Proper Question Forms Disentangling Inconsistencies in Dialogue Systems

This work reports on the description of a specific class of clarification requests, adopted for the negotiation of pieces of information part of the common ground for argumentation strategies in human-machine interaction. Two studies are carried out to prove the adequateness of a specific form of polar question in a specific pragmatic situation, where a presupposition is contradicted by a new evidence. Whereas the first one proves the appropriateness of the negative form, the second one also demonstrate how the use of such a form, in the aforementioned pragmatic situation, can affect the principle of robustness, in terms of observability and recoverability, important in human–machine interaction applications. Given the results obtained in the two studies, dialogue systems with such capabilities are, therefore, a desirable goal, as they are expected to lead to improved usability and naturalness in conversation. For this reason, I present here a system capable of detecting conflicts and of using argumentation strategies to signal them consistently with previous observations

Evaluating the impact of variation in automatically generated embodied object descriptions

Institute for Communicating and Collaborative SystemsThe primary task for any system that aims to automatically generate human-readable output is choice: the input to the system is usually well-specified, but there can be a wide range of options for creating a presentation based on that input. When designing such a system, an important decision is to select which aspects of the output are hard-wired and which allow for dynamic variation. Supporting dynamic choice requires additional representation and processing effort in the system, so it is important to ensure that incorporating variation has a positive effect on the generated output. In this thesis, we concentrate on two types of output generated by a multimodal dialogue system: linguistic descriptions of objects drawn from a database, and conversational facial displays of an embodied talking head. In a series of experiments, we add different types of variation to one of these types of output. The impact of each implementation is then assessed through a user evaluation in which human judges compare outputs generated by the basic version of the system to those generated by the modified version; in some cases, we also use automated metrics to compare the versions of the generated output. This series of implementations and evaluations allows us to address three related issues. First, we explore the circumstances under which users perceive and appreciate variation in generated output. Second, we compare two methods of including variation into the output of a corpus-based generation system. Third, we compare human judgements of output quality to the predictions of a range of automated metrics. The results of the thesis are as follows. The judges generally preferred output that incorporated variation, except for a small number of cases where other aspects of the output obscured it or the variation was not marked. In general, the output of systems that chose the majority option was judged worse than that of systems that chose from a wider range of outputs. However, the results for non-verbal displays were mixed: users mildly preferred agent outputs where the facial displays were generated using stochastic techniques to those where a simple rule was used, but the stochastic facial displays decreased users’ ability to identify contextual tailoring in speech while the rule-based displays did not. Finally, automated metrics based on simple corpus similarity favour generation strategies that do not diverge far from the average corpus examples, which are exactly the strategies that human judges tend to dislike. Automated metrics that measure other properties of the generated output correspond more closely to users’ preferences

An analytical study of Edward Taylor's Preparatory Meditations

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Boston UniversityThe purpose of this dissertation is to substantiate Edward Taylor's Puritanism. Its methodology is a close analysis of four aspects of his Preparatory Meditations: his poetic theory as it is revealed in the attitude he expresses within the poems toward the poems; his meticulous revisions of the manuscript; his images; and the comparison of fourteen of his Meditations with their corresponding sermons [TRUNCATED

Formulaic sequences in Early Modern English: A corpus-assisted historical pragmatic study

This doctoral project identifies formulaic sequences (hereinafter FS and the plural form FSs) in Early Modern English (hereinafter EModE) and intends to investigate the functions they serve in communication and different text types, namely EModE dialogues and letters. Main contributions of the study include, firstly, the study provides solid arguments and further evidence that FSs are constructions in the Construction Grammar instead of exceptions in the traditional grammar-dictionary model. Within this theoreticall framework, I proposed a new working definition of FSs that is inclusive, descriptive, and methodologically neutral. The study also argues that there are fundamental differences between FSs and lexical bundles (LBs), although the latter often treated as an alternative term of FSs or sub-groups of FSs. Nevertheless, after a thorogh review of the characteristics of the two mult-word units, the study argues that despite of the differences, LBs can be upgrated to FSs as long as they fulfill certail sematic, syntactic, and pragmatic criteria. THis forms the fundation of the methodology design of the study. Secondly, the study enhanced the corpus-assisted approach to the identification of FSs, esp. in EModE texts. The approach consists of three steps: preparation, identification, and generalisation. The identification step was further conducted within two phases: automatic generation of LBs for a corpus and manual identification of FSs from LBs. Specifically, in the preparation step, the dissertation critically discussed how spelling variation in EModE texts shall be dealt with in investigations on FSs. I designed a series of criteria for the two-phase identification of FSs. For one thing, I disagree with previous research that two-word LBs shall be excluded from examination by arguing that many of them are formulaic and cannot be captured from longer LBs and the workload of processing the massive number of two-word LBs is actually manageable. For another, the study contributes an easy-to-follow flow chart demonstrating the procedure of the manual identification of FSs from LBs and listing the criteria that guide the decision-making process. Thirdly, the study provides systematic and comprehensive accounts of FSs in EModE dialogues and letters, esp. how their forms are conventionally mapped to their functions. Data analysis were conducted from aspects such as degree of fixedness, grammatical structures, distribution across function categories, multi-functional FSs, genre-specific FSs, etc. General findings suggest that EModE dialogues and letters actually have many similarities regarding the form and function of FSs and general trends of distribution across function categories. However, outstanding differences between the two text types can be observed too. From the perspective of form, the distinction lies in word choice in realisations of certain FSs. From the perspective of meaning/function, the distinction lies in the kinds of functions that need FSs the most or the least and common function combinations. More importantly, the study observed two types of relationships among FSs themselves and the discourse, including horizonal networks and vertical networks, which reflects the complexity of FSs and their identity as constructions. Specifically, three types of horizontal networks of FSs are embedding, attaching, and joining. A pair of new concepts is proposed to describe the vertical networks: superordinate FSs and subordinate FSs. As a result of the vertical networks, three types of functional diviation are observed: function extension, shifting, and specification