Linguistics and some aspects of its underlying dynamics

In recent years, central components of a new approach to linguistics, the Minimalist Program (MP) have come closer to physics. Features of the Minimalist Program, such as the unconstrained nature of recursive Merge, the operation of the Labeling Algorithm that only operates at the interface of Narrow Syntax with the Conceptual-Intentional and the Sensory-Motor interfaces, the difference between pronounced and un-pronounced copies of elements in a sentence and the build-up of the Fibonacci sequence in the syntactic derivation of sentence structures, are directly accessible to representation in terms of algebraic formalism. Although in our scheme linguistic structures are classical ones, we find that an interesting and productive isomorphism can be established between the MP structure, algebraic structures and many-body field theory opening new avenues of inquiry on the dynamics underlying some central aspects of linguistics.Comment: 17 page

'No news today': talk of witnessing with families of missing people

The paper contributes new ways of thinking about and responding to interview talk in the context of recent scholarship on interviewing, orality and witnessing. We proceed by paying attention to specific examples of interview talk on the experience of absence via the collecting of narratives from families of missing people. We highlight how ambiguous emotions are bound up with broader ways of recognizing such talk, largely exercised here as reflections on what is involved in witnessing those who are missing in communications with police. Tensions that may be produced by official ways of regarding and responding to family character witness of the missing are discussed in the context of two case studies. In response to these tensions, we offer suggestions for finding different spaces through which to value such ‘witness talk’ by families, particularly via ideas from grief scholarship. The paper concludes by briefly reflecting on how interviewing encounters might produce versions of praxis in which the content of talk is not just, and simply, ‘apprehended’ as academic evidence

Artificial Intelligence in the Context of Human Consciousness

Artificial intelligence (AI) can be defined as the ability of a machine to learn and make decisions based on acquired information. AI’s development has incited rampant public speculation regarding the singularity theory: a futuristic phase in which intelligent machines are capable of creating increasingly intelligent systems. Its implications, combined with the close relationship between humanity and their machines, make achieving understanding both natural and artificial intelligence imperative. Researchers are continuing to discover natural processes responsible for essential human skills like decision-making, understanding language, and performing multiple processes simultaneously. Artificial intelligence attempts to simulate these functions through techniques like artificial neural networks, Markov Decision Processes, Human Language Technology, and Multi-Agent Systems, which rely upon a combination of mathematical models and hardware

RRL: A Rich Representation Language for the Description of Agent Behaviour in NECA

In this paper, we describe the Rich Representation Language (RRL) which is used in the NECA system. The NECA system generates interactions between two or more animated characters. The RRL is a formal framework for representing the information that is exchanged at the interfaces between the various NECA system modules

Wonderful design: Applying Appraisal Theory to Procedural Level Generation

Procedural level generation for games is an active field of research with successful applications. However, how to generate content that embodies design intent is still an open research question. Level designers lack abstractions and tools for authoring generated artifacts for affecting emotion. We propose a novel pattern language for generative level design inspired by Appraisal Theory. Its patterns enable designers to add meaning, depth, and cohesiveness to the resulting content, and modify artifacts to make the content more engaging. We illustrate how these patterns can be implemented in a generative grammar for level generation for an adventure game. Formative evaluation of generated level content demonstrates the feasibility of the approach and suggests points for further improvements. Future work could focus on other elements which seem important for affecting emotions, including pacing, perception, and expectation

The Use of Context-free Grammars in Isolated Word Recognition

A method using nonrecursive context-free grammars is presented for the recognition of isolated words. Some form of \u27training\u27 is required to combat problems of variations in speech. In the training mode, one grammar for each word in the vocabulary is constructed directly from a set of sample strings of \u27features\u27 represented by symbols. In the recognition mode, an incoming string is analyzed to determine which grammar, if any, could have generated it. The word corresponding to such grammar is then said to have been recognized

Towards a Theory of Practice: Critical Transdisciplinary Multiliteracies

About the book: Education institutions and organizations throughout the world are currently being held accountable for achieving and maintaining historically unmatched standards of academic quality and performance. Accreditation bodies; policy makers; boards of trustees; and teacher, parent, and student groups all place educational institutions and organizations under unprecedented accountability pressures. The aim of this volume is to explore and better understand how these pressures are impacting a broad range of social and cultural issues and, subsequently, how these issues impact student motivation and learnin