The BG News October 18, 2018

The BGSU campus student newspaper. Volume 98-Issue 16. October 18, 2018.https://scholarworks.bgsu.edu/bg-news/10062/thumbnail.jp

The technological utopia: mimamori care and family separation in Japan

Japan is undergoing a significant demographic upheaval, and the Japanese government is formulating policies for stimulating technological advances based on the assumption that they will solve issues such as labour shortages and elder care. The government argues through policy initiatives that technology will decrease the care burden on Japan’s workers, families, and itself. Although the domestic media show awareness of changing family patterns in Japan, newspapers are following a similar pattern of technological utopianism. However, this article posits that the proposed policy reforms rely on a conservative ideal of the extended family that ignores changing patterns in Japanese households. Moreover, it argues that, rather than facilitating a return to the ideal of an extended family, technology is exacerbating separation among families that have been growing apart for some time.Asian Studie

Using an ontology for guiding natural language interaction with knowledge based systems

Des dels anys 80, els sistemes basats en el coneixement, programes que utilitzen una gran quantitat de informació per modelar situacions i resoldre problemes, han adquirit gran importància en el camp industrial, financer i científic. La complexitat d'aquests sistemes fa que el seu ús presenti més dificultats que altres aplicacions informàtiques. La comunicació entre els sistemes basats en el coneixement i l'usuari presenta, doncs, nous reptes. Tot i que el llenguate natural es especialment apropiat per comunicar-se amb aquests sistemes, són pocs els que incorporen interfícies en llenguatge natural. Els motius principals són els problemes d'eficiència que presenta el processament del llenguatge natural i l'elevat cost de desenvolupar les bases de coneixement (conceptual i lingüístic) necessàries per a cada aplicació. L'objectiu d'aquesta tesi és millorar la comunicació en llenguatge natural amb els sistemes basats en el coneixement. Aquesta recerca s'ha centrat en el disseny d'una representació reutilitzable dels diferents tipus de coneixement involucrats en aquesta comunicació, que permetir de generar de forma automàtica la interfície més adequada per a cada aplicació. S'ha desenvolupat un sistema, GISE (Generador de Interfaces a Sistemas Expertos), que genera interfícies en llenguatge natural per diferents tipus d'aplicacions. Aquest sistema adapta automàticament les bases de coneixement lingüístic generals als requeriments d'una aplicació concreta, obtenint la gramàtica més apropiada. El disseny del sistema està basat en una representació reutilitzable i modular dels diferents tipus de coneixement necessaris en la comunicació en llenguatge natural. Aquesta informació consisteix en els conceptes de l'aplicació, les tasques de comunicació, el coneixement lingüístic i les relacions generals entre el coneixement conceptual i la seva realització lingüística. Tres bases de coneixement s'han dissenyat per representar aquesta informació: la ontologia conceptual, la ontologia lingüística i un conjunt de relges de producció. El coneixement conceptual s'ha representat en la ontologia conceptual. Aquest coneixement inclou aspectes sobre el domini i la funcionalitat. Tota la informació necessària per modelar l'aplicació i tots els possibles actes de comunicació estan representats en la ontologia conceptual. La complexitat dels sistemes basats en el coneixement fa necessària una representació formal i explícita de la seva funcionalitat i domini.El coneixement lingüístic general necessari per expressar en llenguatge natural les possibles tasques del sistema es representen en la ontologia lingüística.La informació que permet relacionar el coneixement lingüístic general a una aplicació concreta per tal d'obtenir la gramàtica més adequada es representada mitjançant un conjunt de regles de producció.L'organització modular dels diferents tipus de coneixement que intervenen en la comunicació facilita l'adaptació del sistema a diferents tipus d'aplicacions i usuaris.Les gramàtiques generades pel sistema GISE utilitzen un llenguatge alhora ric i precís, adaptat a l'aplicació. La interfície del sistema incorpora un sistema de finestres que guia a l'usuari a introduir les opcions en llenguatge natural que el sistema reconeix.GISE s'ha aplicat a diferents sistemes: a SIREDOJ, un sistema expert en lleis i a un sistema que dóna informació sobre trens.Since the 1980's, knowledge based systems (KBSs), programs that use knowledge to model situations and solve problems, have spread throughout industry, finance and science. Human communication with these systems deals with complex concepts and relationships that are not present in other software applications. Allthough the natural language (NL) is especially appropriate for expressing these concepts, there are not many KBSs incorporating NL interfaces. The main reasons for this are problems of efficiency in NLI performance, lack of adequacy to the communication needs of the applications and the high cost of developing and maintaining them.The aim of this thesis is to study how the communication process and engineering features can be improved in NL interaction with KBSs. This study has been focused on the efficient and reusable representation of the knowledge involved in NL communication with KBSs. GISE (Generador de Interfaces a Sistemas Expertos), a system supporting NL communication with KBSs has been developed. This system adapts the general linguistic resources to application requirements in order to automatically obtain application-restricted grammars. The main issue of the system design is a separate and reusable representation of all types of knowledge involved in communication with KBSs. This knowledge consists of the application knowledge appearing in the communication, the tasks of communication, the linguistic knowledge supporting their expression and the general relationships between conceptual knowledge and its linguistic realization. Three general bases were designed to represent all this knowledge : the Conceptual Ontology (CO), the Linguistic Ontology (LO) and a set of control rules.Conceptual knowledge is represented in the CO. This conceptual knowledge includes domain and functionality issues. All knowledge required to model the applications as well as the description of all possible communication acts is provided in the CO. The CO is the skeleton for anchoring the domain and the functionality of the applications. The complexity of KBS performance makes a formal and explicit representation of their domain and functionality necessary. The general linguistic knowledge needed to cover the expression in NL of the tasks the system performs is represented by means of the LO and a set containing all possible realizations of the application terms. The LO is domain and application independent. The control information to relate the general linguistic knowledge to conceptual application knowledge in order to generate the application-restricted grammars is represented by a set of production rules. The modular organization of the relevant knowledge into separate data structures provides great flexibility for adapting the system to different types of applications and users.The grammars generated by GISE use expressive and precise language tuned to the application and adapted to the evolution of the communicative process. A menu-system to guide the user in introducing the NL is integrated into the GISE interface. GISE has been applied to a couple of applications: SIREDOJ, an ES in law and a railway communication system

Dynamic Collectivity: Artistic Direct Action, Economic Sustainability, and the Punchlock Printing Collective

Through a case study of the Toronto-based Punchclock Printing Collective, this paper considers how experiments with prefigurative politics and collective cultural production pose alternatives to hegemonic power structures, and just as importantly, what kinds of contradictions and challenges these endeavours face. I begin with a personal story about my relationship to art and politics, a brief introduction to Punchclock, some theory I’ve found useful, and an overview of my research process. These sections set the groundwork for a detailed case study based on interviews I conducted with members of Punchclock. The first part of the case study explores how Punchclock formed and evolved over time as a social entity born from artistic, political, and economic desires. My research suggests that from 2003-2013 there were three discernible acts: a founding by two activist artists who brought a range of other people on board; a second wind of political and cultural activity under new leadership, which was interrupted by economic pressures, a stark turnover, and internal tensions; and a deradicalized third form in which Punchclock continued to function as a collective space for art production without direct engagement with political movements. The second part of the case study analyzes Punchclock’s activities in more depth: Who are the members of Punchclock? What are their relations of collective production? What is the meaning of their political graphics? What kinds of contestations of power are taking place? This approach is otherwise summarized as: WHO, HOW, WHAT, and SO WHAT. The reflections of Punchclock members offer complex and nuanced insights into these questions, which I hope will be useful for socially-engaged artists and anyone with an interest in cultural production and social movements. I found that when a group of outsider artists with activist backgrounds coalesced around Punchclock, new collective relationships allowed them to transcend their singular capacities and make important artistic, political and economic contributions to social struggles. These contributions were shaped by the hybrid and ever-shifting nature of their collective organizing, which brought activist artists together with musicians and other cultural producers. However, Punchclock’s eventual reversal in core membership from self-taught activists to art school graduates is indicative of the challenges with sustaining prefigurative collectives. Internal tensions are often exacerbated by the difficulties of surviving within a hostile political climate. Along with external factors, including aggressive gentrification and the onerous task of ethical sourcing with little money, internal tensions abounded: the effects of a wave of personal transitions and health crises were compounded by the lack of an access mandate, loose operating principles, and a devaluing of this work by movements themselves

Figuring the Modern: The Objectified Present in Stéphane Mallarmé and T. S. Eliot

Contextualizing modern/modernist poetry as an artful objectification, this monograph aims to elucidate the significance of resourceful texts by Stéphane Mallarmé and T. S. Eliot in a symbolist productivity. The engaging texts represent the sublime in verbal extremity: Mallarmé's posthumous manuscript entitled Igitur in an endless circularity for the completion by an incompletion, his article "Ballets" as a printed synthesis of poetry and the performing art, ballet, and Eliot's poetic works in their entirety for a manifold development of the imagery of water that embodies a cosmic inclusion. Particularly, as a swan song for the poet Mallarmé facing a mental crisis, Igitur directs the reader to reconsider the testamentary letters written by the conscripted Japanese students in the Second World War. Representing literature as a holistic combination of the logical and the artistic, the two poets' creation leads the reader to fully recognize the importance of living this moment

The role of phonology in visual word recognition: evidence from Chinese

Posters - Letter/Word Processing V: abstract no. 5024The hypothesis of bidirectional coupling of orthography and phonology predicts that phonology plays a role in visual word recognition, as observed in the effects of feedforward and feedback spelling to sound consistency on lexical decision. However, because orthography and phonology are closely related in alphabetic languages (homophones in alphabetic languages are usually orthographically similar), it is difficult to exclude an influence of orthography on phonological effects in visual word recognition. Chinese languages contain many written homophones that are orthographically dissimilar, allowing a test of the claim that phonological effects can be independent of orthographic similarity. We report a study of visual word recognition in Chinese based on a mega-analysis of lexical decision performance with 500 characters. The results from multiple regression analyses, after controlling for orthographic frequency, stroke number, and radical frequency, showed main effects of feedforward and feedback consistency, as well as interactions between these variables and phonological frequency and number of homophones. Implications of these results for resonance models of visual word recognition are discussed.postprin

Interactive effects of orthography and semantics in Chinese picture naming

Posters - Language Production/Writing: abstract no. 4035Picture-naming performance in English and Dutch is enhanced by presentation of a word that is similar in form to the picture name. However, it is unclear whether facilitation has an orthographic or a phonological locus. We investigated the loci of the facilitation effect in Cantonese Chinese speakers by manipulating—at three SOAs (2100, 0, and 1100 msec)—semantic, orthographic, and phonological similarity. We identified an effect of orthographic facilitation that was independent of and larger than phonological facilitation across all SOAs. Semantic interference was also found at SOAs of 2100 and 0 msec. Critically, an interaction of semantics and orthography was observed at an SOA of 1100 msec. This interaction suggests that independent effects of orthographic facilitation on picture naming are located either at the level of semantic processing or at the lemma level and are not due to the activation of picture name segments at the level of phonological retrieval.postprin

Attention Restraint, Working Memory Capacity, and Mind Wandering: Do Emotional Valence or Intentionality Matter?

Attention restraint appears to mediate the relationship between working memory capacity (WMC) and mind wandering (Kane et al., 2016). Prior work has identifed two dimensions of mind wandering—emotional valence and intentionality. However, less is known about how WMC and attention restraint correlate with these dimensions. Te current study examined the relationship between WMC, attention restraint, and mind wandering by emotional valence and intentionality. A confrmatory factor analysis demonstrated that WMC and attention restraint were strongly correlated, but only attention restraint was related to overall mind wandering, consistent with prior fndings. However, when examining the emotional valence of mind wandering, attention restraint and WMC were related to negatively and positively valenced, but not neutral, mind wandering. Attention restraint was also related to intentional but not unintentional mind wandering. Tese results suggest that WMC and attention restraint predict some, but not all, types of mind wandering

2017 GREAT Day Program

SUNY Geneseo’s Eleventh Annual GREAT Day.https://knightscholar.geneseo.edu/program-2007/1011/thumbnail.jp