Mathematical practice, crowdsourcing, and social machines

The highest level of mathematics has traditionally been seen as a solitary endeavour, to produce a proof for review and acceptance by research peers. Mathematics is now at a remarkable inflexion point, with new technology radically extending the power and limits of individuals. Crowdsourcing pulls together diverse experts to solve problems; symbolic computation tackles huge routine calculations; and computers check proofs too long and complicated for humans to comprehend. Mathematical practice is an emerging interdisciplinary field which draws on philosophy and social science to understand how mathematics is produced. Online mathematical activity provides a novel and rich source of data for empirical investigation of mathematical practice - for example the community question answering system {\it mathoverflow} contains around 40,000 mathematical conversations, and {\it polymath} collaborations provide transcripts of the process of discovering proofs. Our preliminary investigations have demonstrated the importance of "soft" aspects such as analogy and creativity, alongside deduction and proof, in the production of mathematics, and have given us new ways to think about the roles of people and machines in creating new mathematical knowledge. We discuss further investigation of these resources and what it might reveal. Crowdsourced mathematical activity is an example of a "social machine", a new paradigm, identified by Berners-Lee, for viewing a combination of people and computers as a single problem-solving entity, and the subject of major international research endeavours. We outline a future research agenda for mathematics social machines, a combination of people, computers, and mathematical archives to create and apply mathematics, with the potential to change the way people do mathematics, and to transform the reach, pace, and impact of mathematics research.Comment: To appear, Springer LNCS, Proceedings of Conferences on Intelligent Computer Mathematics, CICM 2013, July 2013 Bath, U

Searching for a Common Ancestry: Linguistic and Biological Analogies in Comic Art

Sometimes comic book readers randomly encounter images in a comic that closely resemble images in other comics. This artwork could appear to the reader to have been copied, even directly 'lifted' from older or better-known comics. Sometimes, however, it does seem like any similarities have been generated independently, by chance or serendipity. In this note we draw on the work of Umberto Eco, William Lethaby, Walter Benjamin and Carl Jung to describe a multidisciplinary conceptual framework to analyse similar images using a heuristic approach involving two analogy concepts drawn from two different disciplines: linguistics and biology. When the origin of similarity between images is well documented, we propose the linguistic analogy approach can explain the phenomenon of recurrent images. When the similarity between two images appears to be unexplainable, or the result of mere chance, we propose that the concept of biological analogy can be helpful to explain the superficial resemblance of elements that have different origins

Snapshot Volunteer Monitoring: A Community Science Success Story

In the spring of 2017, community interest in reviving a “snapshot” model of volunteer monitoring in the Conodoguinet Creek watershed in south-central Pennsylvania initiated an exciting new opportunity for collaboration among diverse partners. The Alliance for Aquatic Resource Monitoring (ALLARM) and the Cumberland County Conservation District partnered with local watershed groups to create the Conodoguinet Watershed Snapshot, a program that collects data on stream health once per season over a year. The Conodoguinet Creek is a 520 mi2 watershed, which drains into the Susquehanna River. There have been several volunteer monitoring initiatives from 1996 to 2006 but no water quality data had been collected for eleven years when community members developed an interest in the current health of the watershed. Within this snapshot model, volunteers test several water quality indicators both in the field and in ALLARM’s laboratory at Dickinson College. Connecting college resources to community science amplified the effectiveness of the program. More than forty community members of all ages were actively engaged in snapshot monitoring in 2017-2018, which included up to 29 sites throughout the watershed. Community follow-up included a series of data interpretation meetings with local watershed groups and the publication of a final report. Positive volunteer feedback from the snapshot fueled a second year and led to the creation of a monthly monitoring program with the Conodoguinet Creek Watershed Association. This presentation will focus on key ingredients of the collaboration and community engagement that make the Conodoguinet Watershed Snapshot successful. Attendees will be able to take home lessons learned about this model of volunteer monitoring to apply in their own work

Percalços na história da ciência: B. F. Skinner e a aceitação inicial da Análise Experimental do comportamento entre as décadas de 1930 e 1940

A elaboração inicial do conceito de condicionamento operante e do delineamento experimental de sujeito único define as bases do sistema explicativo skinneriano em meados de 1930. Todavia, essas formulações não foram imediatamente aceitas. Com o objetivo de compreender os motivos envolvidos nesse episódio da história inicial da Análise do Comportamento, discutimos três eventos históricos, quais sejam: a) as dificuldades enfrentadas por Skinner após o seu pós-doutorado; b) a recepção ao seu primeiro livro, The Behavior of Organisms; c) a disputa com outros modelos explicativos do comportamento. Uma história constituída por determinantes de natureza motivacional, institucional, emocional, econômica e pelas dificuldades de ir na contramão de tendências dominantes na Psicologia Experimental norte-americana é o que se conclui na presente investigação