Reflections on the relationship between artificial intelligence and operations research

Historically, part of Artificial Intelligence's (AI's) roots lie in Operations Research (OR). How AI has extended the problem solving paradigm developed in OR is explored. In particular, by examining how scheduling problems are solved using OR and AI, it is demonstrated that AI extends OR's model of problem solving through the opportunistic use of knowledge, problem reformulation and learning

Working Notes from the 1992 AAAI Spring Symposium on Practical Approaches to Scheduling and Planning

The symposium presented issues involved in the development of scheduling systems that can deal with resource and time limitations. To qualify, a system must be implemented and tested to some degree on non-trivial problems (ideally, on real-world problems). However, a system need not be fully deployed to qualify. Systems that schedule actions in terms of metric time constraints typically represent and reason about an external numeric clock or calendar and can be contrasted with those systems that represent time purely symbolically. The following topics are discussed: integrating planning and scheduling; integrating symbolic goals and numerical utilities; managing uncertainty; incremental rescheduling; managing limited computation time; anytime scheduling and planning algorithms, systems; dependency analysis and schedule reuse; management of schedule and plan execution; and incorporation of discrete event techniques

Focus of attention in an activity-based scheduler

Earlier research in job shop scheduling has demonstrated the advantages of opportunistically combining order-based and resource-based scheduling techniques. An even more flexible approach is investigated where each activity is considered a decision point by itself. Heuristics to opportunistically select the next decision point on which to focus attention (i.e., variable ordering heuristics) and the next decision to be tried at this point (i.e., value ordering heuristics) are described that probabilistically account for both activity precedence and resource requirement interactions. Preliminary experimental results indicate that the variable ordering heuristic greatly increases search efficiency. While least constraining value ordering heuristics have been advocated in the literature, the experimental results suggest that other value ordering heuristics combined with our variable-ordering heuristic can produce much better schedules without significantly increasing search

Sharing the light: an analysis of RERC archival accounts describing shared experiences of unusual light

Whilst conducting research in the RERC archive looking into the possibility of a common core to religious experience, a number of shared accounts of encounters with unusual light were found. The importance of these was immediately apparent, not least because of the interest shown by researchers in recent years in a variety of accounts of shared religious experiences and because of the possibilities such experiences offer for surmounting the so-called ‘problem of verification’ of religious experience. This paper seeks to present in detail the accounts of shared experiences of light found in the archive, to evaluate them, and to draw conclusions from them concerning their evidential value and resemblance to other comparable non-archival accounts

Searching for the truth around the next twist: why do we like The X-Files?

The current popularity of the paranormal cannot be denied. An eclectic smorgasbord of unusual and anomalous phenomena, it encompasses everything from Near-death Experiences to UFO sightings, alien abductions, a fascination with all things occult and an often uncritical acceptance of New Age-related claims. The evidence of this popularity is clear for all to see. From the amount of shelf-space given to New Age, Mind-Body-Spirit and paranormal-related book titles in High Street bookshops, through to new and nearly-new television programmes which deal with the subject in serious and not-so-serious ways, the message is clear: parapsychology and the New Age have come of age. And of the many programmes – factual and fictional – which cater for the ever-growing band of enthusiasts, one of the most popular among the viewing public is the much acclaimed series The X-Files, created by Chris Carter

The PATRIOT Act: Liberty Afire

The USA PATRIOT Act was written and passed into law in the United States within weeks of the devastating 9/11 terrorist attack. Its purpose was to strengthen and realign U.S. policy to allow greater judicial power to better protect the U.S. from further acts of terrorism. However, as the legal tenets of the Act became more transparent, public concern mounted over the wide latitude given to the governmental agencies that seemed to threaten academic and intellectual freedom and overall civil liberties. The problems inherent in the USA PATRIOT Act are described, and potential amendments and improvements have been suggested

Motivations for Self-Employment: The Case of Maori in New Zealand

This article adds to the knowledge of ethnic entrepreneurship by examining differences between Maori and non-Maori in New Zealand