perm filename E86.OUT[LET,JMC] blob
sn#825533 filedate 1986-10-01 generic text, type C, neo UTF8
COMMENT ⊗ VALID 00020 PAGES
C REC PAGE DESCRIPTION
C00001 00001
C00003 00002 ∂02-Jul-86 2036 JMC re: Lifschitz for editorial board
C00004 00003 ∂03-Jul-86 0910 JMC
C00005 00004 ∂03-Jul-86 1007 JMC status
C00006 00005 ∂03-Jul-86 1306 JMC re: Pucci visit
C00007 00006 ∂03-Jul-86 1351 JMC Freiling will come
C00008 00007 ∂03-Jul-86 2225 JMC re: Freiling will come
C00009 00008 ∂04-Jul-86 1222 JMC re: glorious fourth
C00010 00009 ∂04-Jul-86 1516 JMC
C00011 00010 ∂07-Jul-86 1020 JMC workshop on AI foundations
C00012 00011 ∂07-Jul-86 1021 JMC workshop on AI foundations
C00013 00012 ∂07-Jul-86 1126 JMC
C00014 00013 ∂07-Jul-86 1128 JMC
C00015 00014 ∂07-Jul-86 1516 JMC re: workshop on AI foundations
C00016 00015 ∂07-Jul-86 1613 JMC re: [kirsh: AI Workshop]
C00017 00016 ∂07-Jul-86 1615 JMC Okner question
C00018 00017 ∂07-Jul-86 1956 JMC
C00019 00018 ∂08-Jul-86 1349 JMC re: message
C00020 00019 ∂08-Jul-86 1357 JMC re: Visit
C00021 00020 ∂08-Jul-86 1738 JMC use of Portia by Computers and Mathematics Conference
C00022 ENDMK
C⊗;
∂02-Jul-86 2036 JMC re: Lifschitz for editorial board
To: Bobrow.pa@XEROX.COM
[In reply to message sent 30 Jun 86 18:31 PDT.]
Computer Science Dept.
Stanford, CA 94305
415 723-3334
∂03-Jul-86 0910 JMC
To: TAL
I'll be in around 1pm.
∂03-Jul-86 1007 JMC status
To: RLG
I have looked at it briefly. It seems to me that you are well occupied.
I will be in this afternoon, and we can talk then. VAL won't be back
till Monday or Tuesday.
∂03-Jul-86 1306 JMC re: Pucci visit
To: LES
[In reply to message rcvd 03-Jul-86 12:52-PT.]
Actually I don't plan to go to the European AI meeting and will come
back Monday or Tuesday after the Logic Programming meeting. I agree
about LaBrea.
∂03-Jul-86 1351 JMC Freiling will come
To: sf@SU-CSLI.ARPA
CC: GLB@SU-AI.ARPA, VAL@SU-AI.ARPA
I've been out of town, but I finally co-ordinated with Freiling. He
will come for the logic lunch on Monday as proposed. I can still
call him off if it has become very inconvenient.
∂03-Jul-86 2225 JMC re: Freiling will come
To: SF@SU-CSLI.ARPA
[In reply to message sent Thu 3 Jul 86 22:17:46-PDT.]
No, I suppose we should use the title of his JSL paper. Is the lunch still
in the philosophy lounge?
∂04-Jul-86 1222 JMC re: glorious fourth
To: SJM
[In reply to message rcvd 04-Jul-86 11:46-PT.]
yes, after Carolyn comes home.
∂04-Jul-86 1516 JMC
To: SJM
I have made some progress tinkering with medici[s79,jmc].
∂07-Jul-86 1020 JMC workshop on AI foundations
To: nilsson@SU-SCORE.ARPA
There is to be one approximately next June. The format is a
speaker on each topic followed by a commentator. Would you be
willing to be the speaker on the logic approach to AI?
∂07-Jul-86 1021 JMC workshop on AI foundations
To: feigenbaum@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA
There is to be one approximately next June. The format is a
speaker on each topic followed by a commentator. I have been
advocating that there be a speaker about knowledge engineering
and expert systems, perhaps advocating the view that present
expert system technology is adequate for common sense if done
on a large enough scale. Do you think that someone from the
applied expert systems area would have something to say in
a foundations conference? Should it be you? If not, can you
think of a suitable person?
∂07-Jul-86 1126 JMC
To: boyer@MCC.ARPA
What are Stallman's co-ordinates?
∂07-Jul-86 1128 JMC
To: rms@AI.AI.MIT.EDU
How can I phone you?
∂07-Jul-86 1516 JMC re: workshop on AI foundations
To: FEIGENBAUM@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA
[In reply to message sent Mon 7 Jul 86 14:08:24-PDT.]
Yes, it will still be relevant.
∂07-Jul-86 1613 JMC re: [kirsh: AI Workshop]
To: KIRSH%OZ.AI.MIT.EDU@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU
[In reply to message sent 30 May 1986 15:34 EDT.]
I'll need till Thursday for a preliminary reading. Nilsson is out
of town till Wednesday, and Feigenbaum asked for a week to think it
over, but I'll phone him Thursday or Friday anyway. Saturday I go
to the UK till Tuesday July 22.
∂07-Jul-86 1615 JMC Okner question
To: CLT
Okner asked whether we had filed some form required for the Kehoe by the
end of July. I said I didn't know. Would you call him?
∂07-Jul-86 1956 JMC
To: treitel@SU-SUSHI.ARPA
jmc - Another example of prejudice.
∂08-Jul-86 1349 JMC re: message
To: CONTRERAS@SU-SCORE.ARPA
[In reply to message sent Mon 30 Jun 86 09:41:58-PDT.]
What kind of phone number is this?
I tried both 9 and 1 and neither worked.
∂08-Jul-86 1357 JMC re: Visit
To: CL.SHANKAR@R20.UTEXAS.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon 7 Jul 86 15:09:29-CDT.]
According Jussi's and my schedules, Wednesday July 30 is the best
time, say 10am. Is that possible with you?
∂08-Jul-86 1738 JMC use of Portia by Computers and Mathematics Conference
To: king@PORTIA
p.pierre@lots-a
use of Portia for demos at Computers and Mathematics Conference
I arranged with Ralph for the use of Portia during that conference for the
demonstration of three systems, MAPLE, REDUCE and CAYLEY, all of which
involve computer algebra. There will be (as I presently understand it)
three users. I'm not involved technically, and whoever is will get in
touch with you by July 20. For the present I'd only like to know whether
Portia is reachable from LOTS terminals in general.
∂08-Jul-86 1812 JMC use of Portia for demos at Computers and Mathematics Conference
To: p.pierre@LOTS-A
I arranged with Ralph for the use of Portia during that conference for the
demonstration of three systems, MAPLE, REDUCE and CAYLEY, all of which
involve computer algebra. There will be (as I presently understand it)
three users. I'm not involved technically, and whoever is will get in
touch with you by July 20. For the present I'd only like to know whether
Portia is reachable from LOTS terminals in general.
∂08-Jul-86 1846 JMC re: Visa photos
To: GOLUB@SU-SCORE.ARPA
[In reply to message sent Tue 8 Jul 86 13:00:42-PDT.]
The photo place in Town and Country across from the supermarket
does it while you wait at reasonable cost.
∂09-Jul-86 1356 JMC re: reminder Feigenbaum, Nilson
To: KIRSH%OZ.AI.MIT.EDU@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU
[In reply to message sent 9 Jul 1986 16:04 EDT.]
Here is Nilsson's reply, so it should be toward the end of June.
You'd better communicate directly with Nilsson@SU-SCORE.
"About the workshop on AI foundations: There will probably be some
things I need to do in June (like commencement, end-quarter wrap up,
etc.), so as soon as you know the dates pls let me know. I'm writing
a section for John Hopcroft's report called "the logic approach to
AI," so I ought to be reasonably prepared. -Nils"
I guess Feigenbaum is gone till next week when he promised to reply.
∂09-Jul-86 1449 JMC re: Calo call
To: LES
CC: CLT, GRP
[In reply to message from LES rcvd 09-Jul-86 14:22-PT.]
There is no problem about agreeing to present the results at Yorktown,
so push the proposal through Stanford. I assume a contract means
overhead and that you discussed with Calo what this would do to
the spendable money.
∂09-Jul-86 1501 JMC re: visit
To: alliant!jat@MIT-EDDIE.ARPA
[In reply to message sent Wed, 9 Jul 86 16:58:36 edt.]
I'll be in England next week.
∂09-Jul-86 1532 JMC re: inventions
To: NILSSON@SU-SCORE.ARPA
[In reply to message sent Wed 9 Jul 86 10:52:18-PDT.]
You might mention time-sharing, since some of this work was done at Stanford.
∂09-Jul-86 1540 JMC re: Executive Council Meeting -- Sunday, Aug 10
To: AAAI-OFFICE@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA
[In reply to message sent Wed 9 Jul 86 11:08:05-PDT.]
I believe I already said I'd come.
∂09-Jul-86 1544 JMC re: ~= Newark to Upenn: parts of NJ actually OK! (from SAIL's BBOARD)
To: SU-BBOARDS@SU-AI.ARPA
I enjoyed the 4 years I spent in Princeton, N.J., 2 as a graduate
student and 2 as faculty. New Jersey, apart from its industrial and
rundown areas, is as nice as any other Eastern state.
∂09-Jul-86 1546 JMC re: meeting tomorrow?
To: GRP
[In reply to message rcvd 09-Jul-86 15:32-PT.]
11 is planned, I think.
∂09-Jul-86 1749 JMC re: CSD/Faculty/WICS contract
To: TAJNAI@SU-SCORE.ARPA
[In reply to message sent Wed 9 Jul 86 16:36:09-PDT.]
Since this message came from you, I am hoping to get away with replying
that I choose to take my extra WICS income as consulting.
∂10-Jul-86 0757 JMC ebos meeting
To: GRP
See if the meeting can be postponed till tomorrow. Carolyn can't
make it today. Either of us can make it any time tomorrow.
∂10-Jul-86 1035 JMC
To: SJM
Sue Corneille phoned regarding the Logic Programming Conference. She
said it is very URGENT. 1-871-2016.
∂10-Jul-86 1043 JMC
To: SJM
Sue Corneille, Imperial College, 1 589-5111 x5011
∂10-Jul-86 1116 JMC Subject: re: TT #2 (from SAIL's BBOARD)
To: SU-BBOARDS@SU-AI.ARPA
This talk of 5 billion walkers is a typical enthusiast's exaggeration.
There are only 5 billion people altogether, and about 5 percent
of them are under a year and hence don't walk.
∂10-Jul-86 1335 JMC re: WICS
To: TAJNAI@SU-SCORE.ARPA
[In reply to message sent Thu 10 Jul 86 13:29:51-PDT.]
This is a conference not a class. I am the faculty sponsor but not
an important participant; I will be chairing just one session.
Alas, they'll be lucky if they get anywhere near 600.
∂10-Jul-86 1556 JMC
To: CLT
June 1986 Stanford directory has 3-3334 for you.
∂11-Jul-86 1125 JMC visit
To: rms@PREP.AI.MIT.EDU
Is there any chance you can come out July 25 and/or July 24 (Thurs and Fri)?
We can pay expenses plus a consulting fee.
∂11-Jul-86 1241 JMC Chudnovsky conference
To: aaai-office@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA
David said that you would take $5K from NSF for support of the conferenc
if I recommended it. I do.
∂11-Jul-86 1529 JMC VAX accounts for Japanese collaborators
To: john@SU-CSLI.ARPA
CC: sf@SU-CSLI.ARPA, CLT@SU-AI.ARPA
This summer Sol and I and Carolyn have three Japanese visitors
collaborating on Theory of Computation. One of them is Sato
who was housed at CSLI when he visited last year. We would
like VAX accounts for them until September 1. There isn't
money for it. I'll be away for a week starting tomorrow, so
if you need to discuss it, MAIL to CLT@@SAIL or phone 3-0936.
∂11-Jul-86 1635 JMC re: CSD-CF Change
To: NILSSON@SU-SCORE.ARPA, LES@SU-AI.ARPA
[In reply to message sent Fri 11 Jul 86 15:00:21-PDT.]
In case it make a difference, you may want to remind Len that he
committed himself to me when he took the job of CSD-CF director
to give four months notice if and when he left.
∂11-Jul-86 1638 JMC
To: CLT
There is no mention of Freiling in my entire jmc-lists file.
∂11-Jul-86 1641 JMC re: VAX accounts for Japanese collaborators
To: INGRID@SU-CSLI.ARPA
[In reply to message sent Fri 11 Jul 86 16:31:35-PDT.]
If you can agree to the request or get someone else to do so, I will
be grateful. I also will be away for a week starting tomorrow, so
if you want more information phone Carolyn Talcott 3-0936 alias CLT@SAIL.
∂11-Jul-86 1645 JMC re: VAX accounts for Japanese collaborators
To: CLT
∂11-Jul-86 1645 INGRID@SU-CSLI.ARPA re: VAX accounts for Japanese collaborators
Received: from SU-CSLI.ARPA by SU-AI.ARPA with TCP; 11 Jul 86 16:45:18 PDT
Date: Fri 11 Jul 86 16:44:01-PDT
From: Ingrid Deiwiks <INGRID@SU-CSLI.ARPA>
Subject: re: VAX accounts for Japanese collaborators
To: JMC@SU-AI.ARPA
In-Reply-To: Message from "John McCarthy <JMC@SU-AI.ARPA>" of Fri 11 Jul 86 16:41:00-PDT
okay, will do.
Ingrid
-------
∂11-Jul-86 1724 JMC new DARPA proposal
To: LES, VAL, CLT
Les says it would be appropriate to have a draft by August 1.
To understand the sort of thing that is involved, it would help
if copies of the last proposal could be found and distributed
among us. It seems to me that the proposal should, if DARPA
will agree to a title this basic, have the title "Basic Research
in Artificial Intelligence and Mathematical Theory of Computation".
The mathematical theory of computation will involve Carolyn and
me and Shankar (or a simulation) + students; we name Ian Mason
and Gian-Luigi Bellin even though they may be gone. The basic
research AI part should include Vladimir and me and possibly
Shoham + students. Check the budget of the last proposal, because
we aren't going to propose less people than they supported
before.
I don't think we'll quite make August 1, but I don't think the
writing will take long once we start. Les can do the budget
in parallel with the prose.
Items not mentioned above such as a share of Les and secretarial,
travel etc. should be in accordance with past practice.
∂12-Jul-86 1117 JMC (→20057 23-Jul-86)
To: "#___JMC.PLN[2,2]"
I will be in London for the Logic Programming Conference and then
in Edinburgh and Dublin returning July 22 in the evening.
∂12-Jul-86 1548 JMC Winograd and Flores
To: clancey@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA
I fear you have mistaken vagueness and incoherence for profundity.
∂12-Jul-86 1558 JMC jmc
To: CLT
Carolyn, do you know where John is? We have arrived at your house
to pick him up, but...
---Susie
∂23-Jul-86 0000 JMC Expired plan
To: JMC
Your plan has just expired. You might want to make a new one.
Here is the text of the old plan:
I will be in London for the Logic Programming Conference and then
in Edinburgh and Dublin returning July 22 in the evening.
∂23-Jul-86 2256 JMC re: An indirect approach to the common-sense reasoning problem
To: jbn@GLACIER.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun, 13 Jul 86 16:51:13 pdt.]
I have been away and so didn't answer your message. If you phone 723-4430,
we can talk, but I'm not sure I'll have time for a meeting until the
middle of August.
∂23-Jul-86 2257 JMC re: book?
To: MODICA@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue 15 Jul 86 10:35:07-PDT.]
Steele will be required.
∂24-Jul-86 1156 JMC WICS course
To: CLT
Do you have the hours of the WICS course?
Also a reception for the people taking the course is listed
for Wednesday, the day we are having dinner with Miro. There
is some obligation for the instructors to spend some time at
the reception. I suggest that I take Miro along to the reception
after we have finished talking here and that we hang about there
for (say) 45 minutes and then go to dinner.
∂24-Jul-86 1211 JMC re: Programming in Prolog
To: REGES@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU, ullman@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU,
genesereth@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from REGES@SU-SCORE.ARPA sent Thu 24 Jul 86 11:55:27-PDT.]
My own opinion is that LOTS should be used unless there is a clear case
for its inadequacy, and I don't see one in this case. When Shapiro
arrives in the Fall we can ask his advice in the matter of appropriate
software and hardware for teaching logic programming. Is he scheduled to
teach logic programming in the Fall? If so, a letter telling him what
hardware and software we have is appropriate. He is at the Weizmann
Institute.
∂24-Jul-86 1357 JMC
To: GRP
Stallman will be here tomorrow from 11am. Please arrange meeting.
∂24-Jul-86 1358 JMC
To: LES, CLT, VAL
Now I remember that RPG put together the last DARPA proposal.
∂24-Jul-86 1422 JMC learning workshop
To: aaai-office@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
I am sending you copies of a proposal from UC Irvine that we
should support. This is the first time I have got one in the
formal style used for Government agencies. Nevertheless it's
clear what they want. I leave you to deal with the bureaucrats,
which should be easy since we're giving them money rather than
vice versa.
∂24-Jul-86 1445 JMC
To: LES
Sato has a key problem.
∂24-Jul-86 1445 JMC key problem
To: LES
Sorry about previous message. There aren't keys to Sato's office
and the key lady tells him to wait another week. Perhaps one can
be borrowed from a provious occupant in the meantime. It's room 351.
∂25-Jul-86 1515 JMC re: Your vote on the new Ph.D. requirements
To: CHEADLE@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri 25 Jul 86 10:14:28-PDT.]
I'll vote yes.
∂25-Jul-86 1616 JMC re: Software Sillies (from SAIL's BBOARD)
To: SU-BBOARDS@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
The interesting question about software contributions to
unreliability is to try to estimate the fraction of disasters,
program delays and cost over-runs that are due to software. My
impression is that it's small, but I don't really know.
∂26-Jul-86 1313 JMC re: Fourth Discussion Topic
To: OTA-CIT@A.ISI.EDU, davis@HT.AI.MIT.EDU, tk@MC.LCS.MIT.EDU,
allen.newell@A.CS.CMU.EDU, feigenbaum@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA,
schank@YALE.ARPA, rhayes-roth@SRI-KL.ARPA,
ohlander@B.ISI.EDU, winograd@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU,
waltz@GODOT.THINK.COM, brown.pa@XEROX.COM, kay@MIT-MULTICS.ARPA,
raj.reddy@A.CS.CMU.EDU, nilsson@SU-SCORE.ARPA,
hector%utai.toronto.edu@CSNET-RELAY.ARPA,
lenat@MCC.COM, hollister%ti-csl@CSNET-RELAY.ARPA,
herb.simon@A.CS.CMU.EDU,
bundy%aiva.edinburgh.ac.uk@CS.UCL.AC.UK,
lehnert%umass@CSNET-RELAY.ARPA, forbus@P.CS.UIUC.EDU,
wilensky@DALI.Berkeley.EDU, jlk%gatech.csnet@CSNET-RELAY.ARPA,
feldman@ROCHESTER.ARPA, norman@NPRDC.ARPA,
collins@BBNA.ARPA, lederberg@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA,
lederberg@ROCKEFELLER.ARPA, weldon@NOSC-COD.ARPA,
ar@ALV.UMD.EDU, sebrecht%weslyn.bitnet@WISCVM.WISC.EDU,
hthompson%uk.ac.ed.eusip@CS.UCL.AC.UK,
aarons%cvaxa.sussex.ac.uk@CS.UCL.AC.UK, chapman@RUSSELL.STANFORD.EDU,
dts%cstvax.edinburgh.ac.uk@CS.UCL.AC.UK,
litp!jp.uucp@seismo.CSS.GOV
[In reply to message from OTA-CIT@A.ISI.EDU sent 26 Jul 1986 12:24:03 EDT.]
Q. What do you think should be the Federal role in anticipating the social
implications of AI? What social implications do you think are the most
critical to anticipate?
A. There should be little if any Federal role in anticipating the social
implications of AI. Above all there should be no attempt of establish
a Government position on these issues. The reason is that the discussion
of AI would become yet another ideological battleground between those who
want the power to control technological progress and those who oppose anyone
having this power.
In its present state, AI is just another technology with some potential
to increase productivity, make human life easier and make defense cheaper.
Human level AI will revolutionize society, but we don't have and can't
soon get a clear idea of what form it will take. Moreover, it is not
reasonable to ask political authorities to pay much attention to issues
that won't arise until there is a scientific breakthrough. Imagine that
some organization had asked candidates Reagan and Mondale for policy
statements on AI during the 1984 campaign. If their advisers were
smart enough they would have ignored the request. If slightly less smart,
they would have asked a speech writer to prepare a bland statement saying,
``AI is an important technology with great future potential. We must
think about it carefully''. If not smart at all, the third assistant
speech writer would have read two books and three magazine articles
and produced a policy statement. If the country were unfortunate enough
to have that candidate elected, all sorts of foolishness might have
ensued.
I consider avoiding such a wasteful and potentially harmful effort
important enough to mail these comments to the entire list.
∂27-Jul-86 1224 JMC re: Lisp Conference Speech
To: RPG
[In reply to message rcvd 27-Jul-86 12:11-PT.]
30 to 45 minutes will be fine. I would like the option of overheads,
although I may not use them.
∂27-Jul-86 1655 JMC re: is this ok?
To: IAM
[In reply to message rcvd 27-Jul-86 15:07-PT.]
Yes.
∂27-Jul-86 2021 JMC David Chudnovsky using my office.
To: RA
He will use my office on Monday and Tuesday in order to use the
terminal to communicate over the ARPAnet. I'll be teaching the
WICS course on those days in History 205. Please help him log in,
etc. He already has an account.
∂27-Jul-86 2145 JMC old journals
To: library@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
I am planning to get rid of some old computing and mathematics
journals. I would expect that the library would already have
all of them. Is there anything useful to do with them other
then put them in the wastebasket?
∂28-Jul-86 1720 JMC re: Gebauer
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 28-Jul-86 10:05-PT.]
Ralph Gorin or Peter King.
∂28-Jul-86 1725 JMC reply to message
To: RPG
[In reply to message rcvd 28-Jul-86 10:34-PT.]
OK, I'll do without slides.
∂29-Jul-86 1715 JMC re: computer usage
To: RWW
[In reply to message rcvd 29-Jul-86 14:36-PT.]
OK, but I'm reluctant to get involved in discussions of
charges or appropriate use.
∂29-Jul-86 1715 JMC re: computer usage
To: RWW
[In reply to message rcvd 29-Jul-86 14:36-PT.]
I'll be in Wednesday afternoon.
∂29-Jul-86 1716 JMC re: connection machine
To: STAN@SRI-STRIPE.ARPA
[In reply to message sent Tue 29 Jul 86 10:55:09-PDT.]
I have no short term interest.
∂29-Jul-86 1825 JMC vms
To: DAC@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU, cayley@PORTIA
There is a vax 750 called Naxos on the 4th floor of MJH belonging
to Prof. Gio Wiederhold that he agrees to let Canon use. The regular
expert in its use is away, but his secretary has the key. We're trying
to find another expert.
∂29-Jul-86 1828 JMC Naxos help needed.
To: winslett@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
John Canon from Australia has a program he needs a VMS VAX to demonstrate
for this week's Computers and Mathematics Conference, and Gio has agreed
to his using Naxos. Rumor has it that you may know how.
∂29-Jul-86 1829 JMC
To: winslett@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
Canon is called CAYLEY@PORTIA.
∂29-Jul-86 2319 JMC Fredkin check
To: DAC
Fredkin phoned from Vancouver saying that he will mail the check he
promised tomorrow from Seattle. It will be made out to Stanford
and sent to me. If this turns out not to work, we'll send the
check back, and he'll make out another one. It seems to me that
it would have been better for him to make it out to AAAI, but
that didn't occur to me at the time.
∂30-Jul-86 1030 JMC teenager saved by handgun use
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
Statistics about the rate of murder in the U.S. are hard
to interpret, because high rates of murder are concentrated
in certain communities, especially, but far from exclusively,
black. It would be interesting to know how the rate in the
American academic community compares with others.
My newspaper reading indicates that underclass black communities
have such high rates of murder (presumably fighting rather than
sneaking up on one another) that murder is a major cause of death
for blacks as a whole. Professional criminals use murder as
a method of business competition, e.g. over drug markets and for
collecting debts. Violent criminals often commit additional
murders after serving short sentences for their first murders.
Anyone who truly wants to understand murder, even as it relates
to handguns, had better study the statistics for different
communities, assuming this information has been collected and hasn't
been suppressed to avoid offending the ``spokesmen'' for certain
groups.
∂30-Jul-86 1352 JMC re: check from Delfin
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 30-Jul-86 12:23-PT.]
No. At least I didn't see it in the mail I looked at.
∂30-Jul-86 1538 JMC re: NAXOS
To: WIEDERHOLD@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU, arun@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU,
winslett@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from WIEDERHOLD@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA sent Wed 30 Jul 86 12:50:47-PDT.]
It seems that Canon has managed to get VMS time on STAR, and therefore NAXOS
for him is moot. Many thanks for your willingness to help.
∂30-Jul-86 1715 JMC re: Paul Rovner
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 30-Jul-86 16:34-PT.]
I got the letter. Please make it (p. 151 of my message file) come out
in TEX.
∂30-Jul-86 1717 JMC
To: RA
p. 153 is another letter
∂31-Jul-86 1444 JMC re: Flight to Boston
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 31-Jul-86 14:41-PT.]
I don't love San Jose that much; I'll take the 8:15.
∂01-Aug-86 1544 JMC I may not come.
To: RPG
If my cold isn't better by Monday, I probably won't come.
∂01-Aug-86 1614 JMC re: Reservations for Philadelphia trip
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 01-Aug-86 16:11-PT.]
Did she say the Franklin Plaza Hotel was full? Anyway I would like a
reservation starting Saturday night, there if possible.
∂01-Aug-86 1639 JMC reservations
To: RA
I think I'll take the Plaza for the 9th and 10th. Ask Claudia if she
has any rooms blocked there - if you haven't already.
∂02-Aug-86 1139 JMC re: Feeling Better
To: RPG
[In reply to message rcvd 01-Aug-86 22:09-PT.]
Please MAIL a phone number just in case.
∂02-Aug-86 1322 JMC re: Aristotle, "Knowledge Processor"
To: Restivo@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sat 2 Aug 86 12:43:56-PDT.]
I hadn't previously heard of Voevodsky. What you say about him seems
plausible; there are many such people - too many to make search-and-destroy
operations worthwhile.
∂02-Aug-86 1930 JMC check for $2500
To: bscott@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
CC: RA@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU, DAC@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
I have a check for $2500 made out to Stanford from the Fredkin Foundation.
The purpose of the check is to pay the travel expenses of Tullio Regge,
a famous physicist, who spoke at the Computers and Mathematics Conference.
David Chudnovsky, the organizer of the conference actually paid for
Regge's ticket himself, but he will try to make a bill from Alitalia
appear. Fredkin made the check out to Stanford, but if using it for
the intended purpose is too complicated, we'll send it back to him,
and he'll make another payable to AAAI. Can we do it?
∂02-Aug-86 1934 JMC
To: bscott@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
CC: RA@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
The bill will be addressed to CSD, attention J. McCarthy.
∂03-Aug-86 0351 Mailer failed mail returned
To: JMC@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
In processing the following command:
MAIL
The following message was unsent because of a command error:
------- Begin undelivered message: -------
∂03-Aug-86 0351 JMC re: Outside use of CSD Computers
To: cheriton@PESCADERO.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from cheriton@pescadero.stanford.edu sent Sun, 3 Aug 86 00:36:20 pdt.]
My guess is that the shoe is on the other foot. Stanford can claim
ownership of anything it pleases, but that doesn't guarantee courts will
enforce the claim in absence of a contract agreeing to it.
------- End undelivered message -------
∂03-Aug-86 1659 JMC reply to message
To: sato@RUSSELL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun, 3 Aug 86 16:37:53 pdt.]
I don't think Nakashima and I have sufficient interests in common,
and it is very difficult to find space.
∂04-Aug-86 0733 JMC I didn't go to Boston
To: RA
because of sore throat. I'll be in later.
∂04-Aug-86 1143 JMC Possible Visit to Austin
To: CLT
∂04-Aug-86 0841 roseh@ratliff.CS.UTEXAS.EDU Possible Visit to Austin
Received: from IM4U.UTEXAS.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 4 Aug 86 08:40:17 PDT
Posted-Date: Mon, 4 Aug 86 10:21:44 CDT
Received: from ratliff.CS.UTEXAS.EDU by im4u.UTEXAS.EDU (4.22/4.22)
id AA01013; Mon, 4 Aug 86 10:30:12 cdt
Date: Mon, 4 Aug 86 10:21:44 CDT
From: roseh@ratliff.CS.UTEXAS.EDU (Rose M. Herring)
Message-Id: <8608041521.AA12446@ratliff.CS.UTEXAS.EDU>
Received: by ratliff.CS.UTEXAS.EDU (5.15/4.22)
id AA12446; Mon, 4 Aug 86 10:21:44 CDT
To: jmc@su-ai.arpa
Subject: Possible Visit to Austin
Cc: roseh@ratliff.CS.UTEXAS.EDU, skr@ratliff.CS.UTEXAS.EDU
I have heard from Woody Bledsoe and Bob Boyer that we might be able
to persuade you and Carolyn to spend a year at Austin as visiting faculty.
We would like very much to pursue this opportunity. The circumstances would
be that we would allocate to you for your year of visiting one of the endowed
Chairs which the Department now has. We have a similar arrangement for 1986-
87 with Tony Hoare. We would be delighted to have Carolyn as a visiting
faculty or research scientist (whether or not you come!).
If this seems an interesting possibility, please send me an electronic
mail message and I will follow up with you, or else let me know when you aare
coming to Austin and we will come out and have a visit on the subject.
Best regards,
J. C. Browne
Chairman (via R. M. Herring, Senior Secretary)
∂04-Aug-86 1358 JMC re: jmc
To: SJM
[In reply to message rcvd 04-Aug-86 12:39-PT.]
I didn't go to Boston and will be here this week and next, because I
have decided not to go to the AAAI meeting in Philadelphia either.
∂04-Aug-86 1505 JMC Shoham letter
To: RA
shoham.re1 is the letter requested by Nils. Please decorate it in
the same style as Nils own letter now in my out box. Deliver a copy
to Nils's office for his comments.
∂04-Aug-86 1507 JMC
To: richardson@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
Who is in charge of seminars for the Fall Quarter?
∂04-Aug-86 1551 JMC re: NSF Us-Japan grant extension
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 04-Aug-86 14:40-PT.]
OK, do it and tell Carolyn.
∂05-Aug-86 1421 JMC Fredkin check
To: AAAI-OFFICE@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
CC: DAC@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
David Chudnovsky persuaded Ed Fredkin to donate $2,500 to cover the travel
expenses from Italy of the famous Italian physicist Tullio Regge to the
Computers and Mathematics Conference. Fredkin sent me a check from the
Fredkin Foundation made out to Stanford. Betty Scott informs me that
Stanford can't handle it for bureaucratic reasons. I propose that we send
Fredkin back his check and that he issue a new one to AAAI which would
then pay the $2,500. The way Chudnovsky left it that there will be a bill
from Alitalia for $2,500 addressed to Stanford and sent to me. However,
actually Chudnovsky paid for the travel with his credit card, so it may
end up with a need to reimburse him personally.
Can AAAI do this as part of its support of the Conference? I don't
suppose anything will have to happen until the AAAI meeting is over.
∂05-Aug-86 1701 JMC re: planning
To: SJG
[In reply to message rcvd 05-Aug-86 16:35-PT.]
That's fine. Early afternoon would be best.
∂05-Aug-86 1718 JMC re: planning
To: SJG
[In reply to message rcvd 05-Aug-86 16:35-PT.]
Also top[e86,jmc] is a written version of what I told you.
∂05-Aug-86 1724 JMC
To: LES
By the way, we need to circulate the vita to the faculty.
∂05-Aug-86 1749 JMC re: Shankar
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 05-Aug-86 17:48-PT.]
ok
∂06-Aug-86 0028 JMC Shoham's chapter 3 draft
To: VAL
shoham[e86,jmc] contains some comments. If you haven't seen the
original, I'll make a copy for you. I'd like your reaction before
I pass the comments on to him.
∂06-Aug-86 1329 JMC
To: RA
phelps.1
∂06-Aug-86 1412 JMC puzzled
To: squires@A.ISI.EDU, LES@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
I am puzzled by the following. I will be able to see Pucci and provide him
with material for a presentation to his "new admirals", but I don't understand
the relation between this and the still not-quite-here Qlisp contract. Do we
still have to convince the new admirals? I thought that DARPA was putting
up the money and had made the decisions. What are our responsibilities
to Pucci in the Qlisp matter and in the renewal of our basic
contract? - John McCarthy
∂06-Aug-86 1402 BSCOTT@SU-SCORE.ARPA [PUCCI@A.ISI.EDU: Possible visit]
Received: from SCORE.STANFORD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 6 Aug 86 14:02:51 PDT
Date: Wed 6 Aug 86 14:00:59-PDT
From: Betty Scott <BSCOTT@SU-SCORE.ARPA>
Subject: [PUCCI@A.ISI.EDU: Possible visit]
To: JMC@SU-AI.ARPA, Binford@WHITNEY.STANFORD.EDU, DCL@SU-AI.ARPA,
Wiederhold@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA
Message-ID: <12228722866.12.BSCOTT@Score.Stanford.EDU>
Need all your input on this. Will you all please let me know, with copy
to others addressed here, when you will be able to see John Pucci. When
I hear from all of you, I'll get a date and times confirmed with him.
Thanks for your early response,
Betty
---------------
Return-Path: <PUCCI@A.ISI.EDU>
Received: from A.ISI.EDU by SU-SCORE.ARPA with TCP; Wed 6 Aug 86 11:49:53-PDT
Date: 6 Aug 1986 14:50:16 EDT
From: PUCCI@A.ISI.EDU
Subject: Possible visit
To: bscott@SU-SCORE.ARPA
cc: pucci@A.ISI.EDU
Betty,
I am planning to visit (at Stanford's convenience) either later
this month or early next month. In earlier attempts to schedule a
meeting I have found it difficult to coordinate my trip with
peoples' schedules. I would greatly appreciate it, if it is not too
much trouble, if you could try and set up an agenda for me. I need to
talk with you about current events with the contract. I also need to set
up meetings with the P.I.s about presentations I have to make to our
new admirals. In particular, I need enough information to put together
half-hour pitches on each line of research. Prof. Binford andProf.
McCarthy are the people I am supposed to present on first so it is
more important to schedule them than any others. If you or anyone
else want to talk about anything, just add it to the schedule.
Thank You,
John
-------
-------
∂06-Aug-86 1425 JMC Pucci visit
To: bscott@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
CC: LES@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
I will be available most of the time. Excluded dates are in my calendar
to which Rutie has access. Please copy Les in all such matters connected
with my contracts and grants and Rutie in matters concerning my schedule.
I have grumbled to Squires at DARPA about Pucci wanting a presentation
for his "new admirals". The money for our contract comes from DARPA,
and I now worry that the money may be delayed until the new admirals have
their say.
∂06-Aug-86 1539 JMC Please update
To: SJM
material in gic[1,sjm] concerning present average income and
poverty level. Probably a 1986 Statistical Abstract of the U.S.
which I am happy to buy has the info. I know it's available in
the gov't bookstore in SF, but probably it can be found locally.
∂06-Aug-86 1656 JMC bus.re1
To: RA
Please find out who should get copies of this complaint. It should
include the Stanford Police, whoever is in charge of Campus Parking,
and the v.p. for business affairs William Massey.
∂06-Aug-86 1734 JMC money here
To: squires@A.ISI.EDU
It seems that the Qlisp money has been here since July 22, but the
STanford Sponsored Projects Office didn't tell us in spite of several
inquiries. So cancel query about whether the "new admirals" are involved.
∂06-Aug-86 1738 JMC
To: CLT, RPG
CC: LES
Qlisp money has been here since July 22. SPO forgot to tell us.
∂06-Aug-86 1857 JMC a draft of letter to Massey
To: LES
Dear Bill:
This is a complaint about incompetence in the Sponsored Projects
Office that cost us two weeks in getting started on a project. It
seems that the authorization to spend money on our Qlisp project
funded by DARPA arrived in Sponsored Projects on July 22. On three
occasions between then and August 6, Lester Earnest inquired whether
the money had arrived and was informed that it hadn't. Finally, on
August 6 and additional inquiry was answered that the money had
been here since July 22.
I had alway supposed that the practice of having Congressmen
announce grants and contracts was merely a device for getting the
Congresmen publicity. Now it seems that this may be the best way
of finding out. We have been waiting out Government delays to start
this project for almost two years, and it is very unpleasant to have
additional delays from Stanford incompetence.
Please tell us how this delay occurred and what measures
have been taken to prevent it occurring again.
Sincerely,
cc: Nils Nilsson, Chairman, Computer Science Department
cc: C. Frederick Bentley II, Associate Director Sponsored Projects Office
Dean of Engineering
∂06-Aug-86 2207 JMC copyright
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
My opinion is that the concept of fair use needs to be expanded to
include posting short copyrighted pieces on electrnic bulletin
boards just as it has been expanded to include putting xeroxes
of such material on ordinary bulletin boards. My guess is that
those who are so confident of the law are over-confident. Putting
something on an electronic bulletin board could be regarded as
analogous to putting on an ordinary bulletin board or it could be
regarded as analogous to reprinting it. Which view courts would
take cannot be predicted. If the material were copied into a
database which users pay to look at, I believe copyright would
almost certainly be taken to apply. In the case of su-etc, I
think it would go the other way.
A major criterion in determining what is just is whether it tends to
reduce the sale of the original material. If the law is found (by
court decisions) not to correspond to this, then it should be
changed.
Just to warm up matters a bit, I'll copy the following item from
August American Spectator.
"At Yale University a heterosexual undergraduate was put on probation
for two years for satirizing the univerisity's Gay Lesbian Awareness
Days. How the fellwo ever got admitted to the university remains a
question but now the rogue has addressed a letter to Yale's president
Mr. A Bartlett Giamatti, concluding: `After being brought up on charges
and found guilty of harassing the gay and lesbian community, I realized
that criticism of the public acceptance of homosexuality as moral is
prohibited by Yale ... I ask that my sentence be overturned if the
free expression regulation is in force, or that my sentence be reduced
because of my ignorance of the special status of the debate on
homosexuality. If my sentence is not overturned, please advise me as to
other views that I am also not allowed to criticize, so that I won't
unknowingly violate my probation and the standards of Yale University.'
President Giamatti is leaving Yale to become commissioner of the
National Baseball League."
I wait with interest to see if I get a nasty letter from American Spectator's
legal counsel listed on the masthead as: Solitary, Poor, Nasty, Brutish &
Short.
∂06-Aug-86 2336 JMC Mosher case.
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
I presently intend, at about the beginning of Fall Quarter,
a time suggested to maximize publicity, to release a statement of which
the following is a draft.
Until that time, I would welcome additional considerations
in favor or against my proposed action or suggested improvements
in the statement. I especially welcome company.
Statement on Mosher case
After a long time, I have decided to join the Stephen Mosher
Defense Committee out of opinion that Stanford University has not
acted fairly in this case. I hope other Stanford faculty, students
and staff will join this effort for the reasons that follow.
While dubious about the action of the Anthropology Department
and the University in confirming it, I didn't see my way clearly
to taking a position because of the mystery charges. After President
Kennedy's statement confirming the action allegedly on the basis
of revealed facts, I was deterred by the length of the documentation.
This isn't a good excuse, perhaps, but better late than never.
First, as to the mystery charges. My present opinion is that
mystery charges have no more place in an academic proceeding than
they have in a judicial proceeding. When the Government is unable
to prosecute a spy without revealing secret information, they have
to give up the prosecution. It should be the same with a University.
Second, the Anthropology Department really did rely on the
mystery charges in its action. This is according to a statement
by its Chairman included in the documentation. Thus the new charges
have been brought in order support the previously taken action.
Already this looks suspiciously like a presumption of guilt.
Some of the new charges lack any merit, some have little merit,
and still others would warrant only lesser penalties than expulsion.
I don't know whether the word ``expulsion'' used by the Anthropology
Department has a definite meaning in University proceedings, but I
note that President Kennedy's statement is headlined ``termination'',
which has weaker connotations.
An example of a charge with no merit whatsoever is the one that
Mosher changed the subject of his dissertation without consultation. Lots
of students change the subjects of their dissertations, and the
consultation is usually entirely informal. At most it would require the
filing of a new form and a negotiation with his adviser to determine
whether the new subject is acceptable. The charge seems particularly
dubious, because one would expect that a graduate student in anthropology
with an unprecedented opportunity to spend a year in China would very
likely change the subject of his dissertation. What did they suppose
he was there for?
The charges concerning Mosher's bringing the van into China, his
giving the van to the commune and the approvals of his trip to Chungking
have little if any merit. He was in an unprecedented situation, in a
country with very informal procedures where the left hand often doesn't
even want to know what the right hand is doing. He had to act as he
thought best. In my opinion, pushing the system as far as he could make
it go was probably justified under the circumstances. He was tactful
enough so that they let him stay his year.
As to taking the trip that he thought was legal and post facto
turned out not to be, the same thing just happened to the New York Times
Bureau chief in Peking. I trust that President Kennedy will write a
letter to the New York Times proposing that John Burns be terminated
or maybe even expelled.
In fact the Anthropology Department could have got rid of Mosher
without fuss by his adviser withdrawing and his being unable to find
another or finding his dissertation topic unacceptable. Of course,
it is common practice to allow a student with a legitimate topic
but no adviser competent in the area to find an adviser in another
department or even in another university.
In answering Mosher's claim that the University did not follow
its judicial procedures, President Kennedy advanced the idea that
this isn't a disciplinary proceeding but merely an academic proceeding,
and no quasi-judicial procedures are required. Certainly many
students are terminated for lack of progress without it being
a judicial matter. However, when the basis of the termination
is misconduct and the word ``expulsion'' has been used, proper
quasi-judicial procedure is appropriate.
What about the charge that the proceedings are politically
motivated? There is unlikely to be a clear answer to that one.
My experience at Stanford, including two years as a member of the
Academic Senate, has convinced me that university professors are
very skillful at finding other reasons for doing what they want
to do in cases where a ``naive'' observer would conclude that they
were violating someone's academic freedom. Indeed the
Chairman of the Anthropology Department was one of the signers
of a statement proposing action against the Hoover Institution that
that looked like a violation of academic freedom to me. Others
didn't see it that way and found other criteria for justifying
restricting the Hoover Institution in ways that seemed unlike those
applied to other institutions connected to Stanford. To me, it
looked like an intellectual gerrymander. My opinion, which I see
no way of verifying or refuting, is that political criteria, including
obsequiousness to the Chinese communists, played a role.
In the informal discussion of the Mosher case at Stanford,
unsupported rumors that Mosher was ``a sleazy character''
played an important role in inhibiting people from supporting
him. I was told that graduate students in anthropology played
a big role in this rumor-mongering, and I think they should be
ashamed of it. However, I suppose that they are just as susceptible
as anyone else to mass hysteria.
What should be done? In my opinion, Mosher should be re-admitted
and given a reasonable time to produce a thesis. If he submits a thesis,
the University should find a way to evaluate it, using outsiders if
necessary --- as it probably would be. He can be reprimanded, but the
associated punishment cannot reasonably be a suspension for longer than he
has already been out. If the University wants to suspend registration
until he has either accounted for the camera to the University's
satisfaction or paid for it, this would be legitimate.
I must confess that reading Mosher's two excellent books,
admittedly more like journalism than anthropology, led me to believe
that Mosher is an acute observer and that American social science
has lost (probably to journalism) someone who is capable of substantial
contributions.
∂07-Aug-86 0146 JMC
To: VAL
See what you think of fred[e86,jmc].
∂07-Aug-86 1132 JMC re: copyright
To: PATASHNIK@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu 7 Aug 86 08:59:20-PDT.]
Thanks. I'll probably take you up on it, and I'll check the use of "dubious".
∂07-Aug-86 1140 JMC re: Mosher case.
To: ANDY@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu 7 Aug 86 10:52:45-PDT.]
It's clear I need to explain more about the mystery charges. I don't know
what they are. The Anthropology Department claimed they were central to
its case for expulsion. Kennedy's statement bases its affirmation of the
"termination" entirely on the charges in his statement, i.e. his position
is different from the Anthropology Department, although he comes to the
same conclusion. It is these openly revealed charges that seem to me to
be too weak to justify kicking Mosher out. However, the unrevealed charges
have certainly inhibited protest, and I have decided not to let them
inhibit my protest any longer.
∂07-Aug-86 1154 JMC re: Mosher case.
To: ANDY@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu 7 Aug 86 11:49:40-PDT.]
I will make that more clear. Barnett claimed it would compromise their
sources, and everyone speculates that the sources are people who could and
would be persecuted by the Chinese communists.
∂07-Aug-86 1157 JMC complaint letter
To: LES
I would like you to write the letter of complaint after all. My reason
is that I am writing a letter to Massey complaining about something
quite different, and I don't want him to merge the two complaints
in his mind.
∂07-Aug-86 1607 JMC re: Knowledge Conference 88
To: vardi@DIABLO.STANFORD.EDU, aaai-office@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu, 7 Aug 86 14:36:33 pdt.]
Unless AAAI changes the system next week for deciding what workshops to support,
the way to get support is to apply to me. I consider you to have applied,
and I agree to support your workshop on Theoretical Aspects of Reasoning
about Knowledge in Spring 88 somewhere in the Bay Area. We can support it
up to $10K of expenditure. Joe Halpern got additional money from other
sources for the 1986 version. Please arrange details with Claudia Mazzetti
at AAAI. If I have been fired, she'll tell you.
∂07-Aug-86 1843 JMC Mosher
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
Shih is quite right about many students spending a year in China. I
meant "a year studying a Chinese village", and I have revised the writeup
to say so. His pointing out this misstatement is helpful. If the
part about a year studying a village is wrong, I'd like to know about
it.
China still doesn't have law in the same sense as the U.S., i.e. a
published code with the property that if you don't violate it you
can't legally be punished. "Revolutionary law" means that the party
can declare something you did illegal after the fact. The Chinese
communists were quite explicity until recently in declaring a written
legal code a reactionary bourgeouis idea. Recently they have declared
an intention to have a legal code, but I believe they haven't finished
installing it. This arbitariness as Mosher in his book and many others
have pointed out extends to all rules including those that apply to
foreigners.
Shih seems to be saying that the same arbitrariness applies to Stanford -
that Mosher's expulsion can be justified by the state of opinion among
graduate students.
∂07-Aug-86 1853 JMC Mosher
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
Siegman means the Anthropology Department (rather than sociology) which
seems to have about 22 faculty. There are historical precedents for even
more than 22 people jointly committing an injustice. Let me remind
everyone that according to Kennedy the current justification for his
"termination" is supposed to be entirely on the record. However, Siegman
and others persist in basing their support of it on the basis of secret
evidence that they don't know.
∂07-Aug-86 1900 JMC re: Questions, question, questions
To: HOLSTEGE@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from HOLSTEGE@Sushi.Stanford.EDU sent Thu 7 Aug 86 16:27:21-PDT.]
A very recent Scientific American has an article by Jearl Walker describing
experiments with freezing ice cubes that explains fingers of one layer
projecting into another in terms of various instabilities, I believe
related to segregation of impurities such as entrained air. I don't remember
it mentioning stalagmites from the ice cube as a whole. He corresponds with
people with observations or questions related to his articles.
∂07-Aug-86 2303 JMC mosher
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
I agree with Roland van Gaalen that a conspiracy would be surprising;
pigheadedness is more common.
∂08-Aug-86 1528 JMC reporter
To: cerf@A.ISI.EDU
Broderick Perkins, a reporter from the San Jose Mercury would like to
talk to an expert on electronic mail; I fingered you. If willing could
you phone him at 408 920-5833.
∂08-Aug-86 1609 JMC
To: SJM
Please take a look at mosher[e86,jmc].
∂08-Aug-86 1620 JMC
To: RA
mahaba.1
∂08-Aug-86 1651 JMC
To: SJM
Thanks for suggestions on Mosher statement.
∂08-Aug-86 1742 JMC re: Mahabala
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 08-Aug-86 17:39-PT.]
OK, Monday will be fine.
∂09-Aug-86 1913 JMC re: Secret charges against Mosher
To: JOHNMARK@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
CC: su-etc@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from JOHNMARK@Sushi.Stanford.EDU sent Sat 9 Aug 86 17:32:53-PDT.]
Mosher is not very effective at defending himself. He tends to be distracted
by the temptation to score points off Stanford. There is a saying that
a lawyer who defends himself has a fool for a client. Mosher's defense
committee has a Fresno address, which is where Mosher lives, so in terms
of activity, I suspect he's it. However, it has been
established in the case of criminals and leftists that not being effective
in one's own defense is not to be taken as evidence of guilt.
The publicists who have defended him have each written a single column, and
the academics have each made a single statement. Alas, I have no time
to do more. He has said that he reserves revealing the secret charges
for the actual lawsuit, but I don't know whether he actually has a lawyer.
∂09-Aug-86 1930 JMC Mosher address
To: RA
See if you can find it in the material filed in chron. It will be the
same as the address of his defense committee. Otherwise, the president's
office or the Anthropology Department will have it.
∂09-Aug-86 1931 JMC
To: RA
Actually I want a telephone number.
∂09-Aug-86 1933 JMC re: signs of the times
To: TREITEL@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU,
su-etc@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
CC: treitel@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from TREITEL@Sushi.Stanford.EDU sent Sat 9 Aug 86 13:50:19-PDT.]
I kept telling them they should get brown chalk.
∂11-Aug-86 1006 Mailer failed mail returned
To: JMC
In processing the following command:
MAIL/su
The command was aborted because these Host Name(s) are Unknown:
decwrl.com
------- Begin undelivered message: -------
∂11-Aug-86 1006 JMC message from Pereira
I received it and will talk to Feigenbaum and Nilsson when the return
from AAAI next week. I don't remember an earlier message.
- John McCarthy
------- End undelivered message -------
∂11-Aug-86 1006 JMC message from Pereira
To: salvador%lisvax.dec@DECWRL.DEC.COM
I received it and will talk to Feigenbaum and Nilsson when the return
from AAAI next week. I don't remember an earlier message.
- John McCarthy
∂11-Aug-86 1231 JMC re: Mosher opinion piece
To: HERSHBERGER@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon 11 Aug 86 12:27:55-PDT.]
Thanks.
∂11-Aug-86 1400 JMC When you return this afternoon, I'd like to talk about Qlisp.
To: CLT
∂11-Aug-86 1550 JMC
To: RLG
Please come and see me.
∂11-Aug-86 1637 JMC job offer
To: shankar@R20.UTEXAS.EDU
We will make you a job offer of a Research Associate position.
We have to circulate your vita to the CSD faculty pro forma to see
if anyone objects, but no-one ever has. The amount of the offer isn't
determined yet. I believe the offer can be effective as early as
September 1 if you want, although we probably can't mail a letter
till Aug. 25. We will have a salary offer fairly soon. Lester
Earnest is generating that.
∂11-Aug-86 1653 JMC
To: RWF
Drexler, Eric 364-8609, 86 Renato Court, 10, Redwood City 94061
∂12-Aug-86 1220 JMC re: Visit of Prof. Wu Wen-Tsun (re: Theorem Proving)
To: Arnon.pa@XEROX.COM, PRATT@NAVAJO.STANFORD.EDU
CC: Arnon.pa@XEROX.COM, ATP.CHOU@R20.UTEXAS.EDU,
Boyer@MCC.COM, PATASHNIK@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from Arnon.pa@Xerox.COM sent Tue, 12 Aug 86 12:15:33 PDT.]
I will be happy to see Prof. Wu and am free any time on those days.
In order to be definite, let me propose 11am on Thursday the 21st followed
by lunch. I'll let someone else arrange the seminar.
∂12-Aug-86 1256 JMC re: Internat'l Radio Codewords
To: WIEGAND@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue 12 Aug 86 12:46:20-PDT.]
sierra,uniform,victor,whiskey
∂12-Aug-86 1359 JMC re: Theorem Proving)
To: Arnon.pa@XEROX.COM
[In reply to message sent Tue, 12 Aug 86 13:32:35 PDT.]
That's room 356 Margaret Jacks Hall which is bldg. 460. Facing the church
from the oval it's the first door on the right on the front of the Quad.
3rd floor, NE corner office.
∂12-Aug-86 1452 JMC re: job offer
To: CL.SHANKAR@R20.UTEXAS.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue 12 Aug 86 16:49:47-CDT.]
October 15 is fine too. Yes, we'll pay for the ticket and any other
expenses you had in connection with the trip.
∂12-Aug-86 1452 JMC
To: LES
Shankar proposes Oct. 15 as a realistic starting date.
∂12-Aug-86 1455 JMC paper
To: VAL
I have an IBM Research Report "Towards a Theory of Declarative Knowledge"
by Apt, Blair and Walker - in case you don't already have a copy. It
gives their ideas about stratified logic programs.
∂12-Aug-86 1546 JMC
To: SJM
When does the stuff in notes.ess[e86 fit?
∂13-Aug-86 1240 JMC telephone service
To: gc.tlx@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
What level (A,B or C) do you list 3-4430 as having?
- John McCarthy
∂13-Aug-86 1524 JMC Where are you physically now? A visitor is curious about computer individuals.
To: RWW
∂13-Aug-86 1525 JMC re: HAGIYA@RUSSELL,Nakahara@RUSSELL,
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 13-Aug-86 14:11-PT.]
That will be fine.
∂13-Aug-86 1526 JMC Do you know if RWW is around today?
To: RWW
∂14-Aug-86 1130 JMC re: michaelsons
To: SJM
[In reply to message rcvd 14-Aug-86 10:18-PT.]
Michaelson, Sidney 011 44 31 667-2200
10, Salisbury Road, Edinburgh
∂14-Aug-86 1153 JMC re: various
To: SJM
[In reply to message rcvd 14-Aug-86 09:53-PT.]
I have created a directory, sjm,jmc. Please move all files having
to do with the work you did to me to that directory and any other
files you would like me to keep for you. Put another file in
that directory listing all files with half a line describing each.
I read woods[1,sjm]. Are all the names fictitious including the
officials? You should say which names are fictitious and if the
officials aren't they should be identified further, e.g. of
Santa Clara County. The article is rather long, although this
may be ok - depending on where it is to be published. I think
shorter version with an introductory paragraph stating the
conclusions is desirable. The introductory paragraph is desirable
in any case. For example,
The recent concern about child abuse has given the police
and social service bureaucracies more power to take more action on
less evidence. Perhaps this increased power has saved some children
from abuse, but it has led to harm in some cases. Here are some of
cases. The parents and children mentioned have fictitious names,
but the authorities and officials are given their real names and
the quotes are real.
∂14-Aug-86 1153 JMC re: buick
To: SJM
[In reply to message rcvd 14-Aug-86 11:16-PT.]
I'll look for it. What are your intentions?
∂14-Aug-86 1154 JMC
To: SJM
Since no-one is in a position to do anything with it, I fear it must be junked.
∂14-Aug-86 1220 JMC
To: RLG
Let's talk.
∂14-Aug-86 1334 JMC
To: CLT
We have the private room at Maddalena's at 7:30 tomorrow. The time can be changed if wanted.
∂14-Aug-86 1412 JMC
To: RA
Aspects ... to Doug Lenat MCC, Brad Allen of Inference.
∂14-Aug-86 1524 JMC re: The Realities of a Socialist Workers' Paradise
To: R.ROLAND@LOTS-B, bboard@LOTS-B, su-etc@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from R.ROLAND@LOTS-B.STANFORD.EDU sent Thu 14 Aug 86 14:22:02-PDT.]
Roland writes sarcastically about the Berlin Wall and I entirely agree
with him. The occasion is that the East German Government and Party
are having a celebration of the 25th anniversary of the Wall with
parades, etc. The West Berlin protests are on a much smaller scale.
There isn't a party to get the people out.
Note, however, the respectful way the New York Times headlines its article
on the occasion.
"After 25 Years of Berlin Wall, The Views are Still Divided"
by James M. Markham
East Berlin Aug. 13 - The leaders of a divided Germany today marked the
25th anniversary of the wall that sunders Berlin, on this side proclaiming
the barrier a bold triumph and in the west declaring it a cause for shame
and mourning."
The article as a whole is ok, but I fear that plenty of people accept the
Wall as something about which different people just happen to have
different views. Honecker's arrogance pays off when he said,
"It was a historic ded that preserved the liberty of our poeple and laid
the foundation for the sustained prosperity of our socialist state".
and also
"Widespread monetary speculation was going on, immense material property
was smuggled out of the country, and highly skilled workders were being
lured away with the obvious aim of destabilizing the economy. We put
a stop to those schemes on Aug. 13, 1961."
This arrogance gets a certain plausibility as soon as one imagines
that a state has rights of self-preservation even in opposition to
the rights of the people who inhabit it.
Please note where the quotes begin and end.
∂14-Aug-86 1559 JMC Maddalena
To: CLT
Our reservation for the private room is for 7:30 tomorrow. The
time can be changed.
∂15-Aug-86 1116 JMC
To: CLT
try "jenks.yktvmx"@ibm.com
∂15-Aug-86 1632 JMC default problem
To: grosof@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
∂15-Aug-86 1629 perlis@mimsy.umd.edu default problem
Received: from MIMSY.UMD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 15 Aug 86 16:29:20 PDT
Received: by mimsy.umd.edu (5.9/4.7) id AA03296; Fri, 15 Aug 86 19:28:17 EDT
Date: Fri, 15 Aug 86 19:28:17 EDT
From: Don Perlis <perlis@mimsy.umd.edu>
Message-Id: <8608152328.AA03296@mimsy.umd.edu>
To: val@su-ai.arpa
Subject: default problem
Cc: ether%ubc.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa, grosoff@su-score.arpa, jmc@su-ai.arpa,
kautz@rochester.arpa, mcdermott@yale.arpa,
reiter%toronto@csnet-relay.arpa, shoham@yale.arpa
Vladimir,
I probably will see you in Washington next week, before you get a
chance to read this, but just in case not: I am having second thoughts
about what you said regarding my counterexample of default reasoning that we
first discussed in Kentucky last year. At first I thought you were right
that Skolem constants and names (instead of individuals) settles it, but now
I think not. To be precise, I'll start from the beginning, and instead of
birds I'll provide relief in the form of chocolate and grandchildren. Also,
since the efficacy of default logics was a big issue at the AAAI this year,
I am sending copies of this to several people, who I hope will feel free to
reply.
---------------------------------
The Queen has 100 grandchildren, whom she dearly loves and knows by
sight and by their names P1...P100. However, she cannot recall anything
else about them individually. But she does know that almost all of them
like chocolate and also that at least one of them does not. When P17 comes
to visit her one day, she offers him some chocolate.
---------------------------------
Represent and justify the Queen's reasoning in terms of some default
formalism, in which are included the facts that P1...P100 are her only
grandchildren, that liking chocolate is the typical (default) case for them,
and that at least one of them does not like chocolate. Caution: note that
if LikesChocolate(P17) is inferred, your methods will probably also infer
the same of P1...P100, which is an apparent contradiction. Note also that a
STRAIGHTFORWARD treatment using circumscription leads to FAILING to conclude
LikesChocolate(P17), and hence failing to model the Queen's reasoning, for
in one minimal model, P17 will not like chocolate.
For those who want a simple formal example, consider the following
watered down case: A = { (Ex)(GrdChld x & -LikesChocolate x) , GrdChld P17 }.
Then circumscribing -LikesChocolate in A does NOT lead to the expected
conclusion LikesCholcolate(P17). The mere existence of a case that doesn't
obey the default (which after all is half of what makes defaults DEFAULTS,
the other half being that such cases are rare), seems to block the default
conclusion. For we have no way to get P not to be that exceptional case, in
the present formulation of A. The challenge is to rewrite A so it will
work, but honestly, i.e., respecting the intuitions of the original problem.
Skolemizing is one direction to try, but my cautions in the previous paragraph
point to trouble if the full problem with all 100 grandchildren is faced,
for the Skolemized grandchild name must corefer with one of the 100.
My suggestion is that in addition to whatever mechanism specifies
defaults, another mechanism must specify the range to which it is to apply,
i.e., a focus of interest must be determined which, if too large, nullifies
the use of the default, but if small (e.g., just P17) sanctions it. As long
as we care about only a few cases, it is sensible to use defaults, but not
when we consider global questions. This points in an unfortunately messy
direction, but I see no way to avoid it.
--Don
∂15-Aug-86 1634 JMC re: default problem
To: perlis@MIMSY.UMD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri, 15 Aug 86 19:28:17 EDT.]
I have forwarded your message to grosof@score, since grosoff@score is
non-existent. I'll consider the substance of your message later.
∂15-Aug-86 1636 JMC re: Fred's unenlightened suicide
To: RLG
[In reply to message rcvd 15-Aug-86 16:29-PT.]
I don't mind frequent messages, so long as you don't mind not getting
quick feedback.
∂15-Aug-86 1639 JMC default problem
To: RLG
Here's something else that might interest you.
∂15-Aug-86 1629 perlis@mimsy.umd.edu default problem
Received: from MIMSY.UMD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 15 Aug 86 16:29:20 PDT
Received: by mimsy.umd.edu (5.9/4.7) id AA03296; Fri, 15 Aug 86 19:28:17 EDT
Date: Fri, 15 Aug 86 19:28:17 EDT
From: Don Perlis <perlis@mimsy.umd.edu>
Message-Id: <8608152328.AA03296@mimsy.umd.edu>
To: val@su-ai.arpa
Subject: default problem
Cc: ether%ubc.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa, grosoff@su-score.arpa, jmc@su-ai.arpa,
kautz@rochester.arpa, mcdermott@yale.arpa,
reiter%toronto@csnet-relay.arpa, shoham@yale.arpa
Vladimir,
I probably will see you in Washington next week, before you get a
chance to read this, but just in case not: I am having second thoughts
about what you said regarding my counterexample of default reasoning that we
first discussed in Kentucky last year. At first I thought you were right
that Skolem constants and names (instead of individuals) settles it, but now
I think not. To be precise, I'll start from the beginning, and instead of
birds I'll provide relief in the form of chocolate and grandchildren. Also,
since the efficacy of default logics was a big issue at the AAAI this year,
I am sending copies of this to several people, who I hope will feel free to
reply.
---------------------------------
The Queen has 100 grandchildren, whom she dearly loves and knows by
sight and by their names P1...P100. However, she cannot recall anything
else about them individually. But she does know that almost all of them
like chocolate and also that at least one of them does not. When P17 comes
to visit her one day, she offers him some chocolate.
---------------------------------
Represent and justify the Queen's reasoning in terms of some default
formalism, in which are included the facts that P1...P100 are her only
grandchildren, that liking chocolate is the typical (default) case for them,
and that at least one of them does not like chocolate. Caution: note that
if LikesChocolate(P17) is inferred, your methods will probably also infer
the same of P1...P100, which is an apparent contradiction. Note also that a
STRAIGHTFORWARD treatment using circumscription leads to FAILING to conclude
LikesChocolate(P17), and hence failing to model the Queen's reasoning, for
in one minimal model, P17 will not like chocolate.
For those who want a simple formal example, consider the following
watered down case: A = { (Ex)(GrdChld x & -LikesChocolate x) , GrdChld P17 }.
Then circumscribing -LikesChocolate in A does NOT lead to the expected
conclusion LikesCholcolate(P17). The mere existence of a case that doesn't
obey the default (which after all is half of what makes defaults DEFAULTS,
the other half being that such cases are rare), seems to block the default
conclusion. For we have no way to get P not to be that exceptional case, in
the present formulation of A. The challenge is to rewrite A so it will
work, but honestly, i.e., respecting the intuitions of the original problem.
Skolemizing is one direction to try, but my cautions in the previous paragraph
point to trouble if the full problem with all 100 grandchildren is faced,
for the Skolemized grandchild name must corefer with one of the 100.
My suggestion is that in addition to whatever mechanism specifies
defaults, another mechanism must specify the range to which it is to apply,
i.e., a focus of interest must be determined which, if too large, nullifies
the use of the default, but if small (e.g., just P17) sanctions it. As long
as we care about only a few cases, it is sensible to use defaults, but not
when we consider global questions. This points in an unfortunately messy
direction, but I see no way to avoid it.
--Don
∂16-Aug-86 1240 JMC re: Lisp Conference
To: RPG
[In reply to message rcvd 16-Aug-86 11:56-PT.]
I'm ok now. In the mean time the money for Qlisp came, so we need to
get together and discuss schedule.
∂16-Aug-86 1550 JMC re: TEX course
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 16-Aug-86 15:46-PT.]
ok.
∂16-Aug-86 1614 JMC
To: LES, RPG, CLT
How about Monday or Tues. at 11 here, preferably Monday?
∂16-Aug-86 1712 JMC re: default problem
To: perlis@MIMSY.UMD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sat, 16 Aug 86 19:38:31 -0500.]
I would welcome an account of those sessions - apart from what I'll get
from the Proceedings. I just had a sore throat, and I'm better now.
∂17-Aug-86 1242 JMC Lisp standardization
To: RPG
I have read all the messages, but I haven't formed a coherent view of
what is going on, but it occurs to me that there is one issue on which
I might play a role. I don't think there ought to be a single standard
called "Lisp", because this precludes improvements. "Common Lisp",
"Eulisp" or "Galactic Lisp" are all ok. I interpreted one of the messages
as saying that the Europeans wanted to call their proposal "Lisp", and it
seems to me that I could probably shoot that idea down by opposing it,
giving the above reason. I don't want to get involved in controversy
unless it is important, however.
∂17-Aug-86 1745 JMC
To: shoham@YALE.ARPA
Here are the comments written two weeks ago. I delayed sending them
hoping for a more decisive solution to the tragedy of Fred. I'm
still hoping.
Dave Smith put your ch3. in my box, and I suppose you are soliciting my comments.
Anyway I hope they are useful.
shoham[e86,jmc] Comments on Shoham's 1986 July 30 draft of ch. 3 of his thesis
1. I agree with what I take to be your view that the foundation
of non-monotonic reasoning, as with monotonic, should be semantic. I
also agree that the ability to express preference orderings among models
looks like a good approach. I have followed it myself in developing
circumscription and looking for variants. So has Vladimir Lifschitz.
Indeed he resuscitated it when I had let it languish and gone to
depending on the circumscription formula itself.
It would be good if there were more examples of useful preference
orderings - described either semantically or syntactically.
2. In considering purely semantic formalisms, you should read
the Artificial Intelligence paper of Bossu and Siegel. You will find
some of the ideas familiar.
3. The reason for wanting a syntax corresponding to the semantics
as well as possible is that syntactic reasoning from premisses is readily
verified, even in its non-monotonic forms, while reasoning with the set of
models of a formula is prima facie undecidable when there are an infinity
of models and intractable when there are only a finite set. With
additional assumptions, it is sometimes feasible to reason about the set
of models, but when this is formalized, it amounts to syntactic reasoning
in a metalanguage.
4. Circumscription has indeed proved difficult for many people
to understand. It took me a long time to understand Lifschitz's
pointwise circumscription. Now that I understand it, I have come
to believe that it is a very powerful formalism, and either it is
suitable for formalizing common sense or it is on the right track.
There are several papers about how to compute the old circumscription,
and a summer student, Bob Givan, has found some important cases in
which the computation of pointwise circumscription is doable with
very similar algorithms.
It also looks like Vladimir's latest formulation will be
rather easy to use for writing common sense axioms. I have already
done both specialization priority (getting rid of cancellation
of inheritance) and temporal priority (Fred's doom).
5. In criticizing circumscription (and perhaps the other
formalisms) you are shooting at a moving target, and it's likely
to make that part of your thesis soon obsolete. My opinion is
that one can't make one's own formalism popular by shooting at
its competitors. It is better to spend the effort doing more
examples with one's own formalism and writing it up better.
Unless it is congenial to you to put quite a bit of time in
trying out circumscription and the other formalisms, you should say less
about them.
Similarly Drew's "Critique of Pure Reason" would be more useful if
it emphasized the specific challenges to logical formalism rather than
general arguments against it, i.e. it needs more "How do you propose to do
X?". When you make general arguments against something, you tend to get
general arguments back, and the discussion rapidly gets too high level to
be useful.
6. Here are some points of English. "Lifschitz's" not "Lifschitz'".
On p. 10, you mean "ingenious" not "ingenuous". In that same sentence,
the parenthesized phrase would better read ( both McCarthy's original
ones and Lifschitz's more recent ones), although it would be still
better to start the whole sentence with "Both McCarthy's original
circumscription axioms and ...".
7. I agree with you about the complexity of the formulation
involving Eq(p,q,r); I didn't understand it either. However, the
current version with the V predicates is much easier to understand
and use.
8. In my view, giving earlier situations priority should be
derived, when it applies, from a more general principle of giving priority
to the entities one knows about and lower priority to facts about entities
whose properties are derived from them. Formalizing this presumably
requires more reification than has been used in papers on non-monotonic
reasoning, perhaps along the line of my "First order theories of
individual concepts and propositions". I think the non-monotonic part can
be done with pointwise circumscription.
9. On p.3 you say "The trick is to identify the preference
criterion that is appropriate for a given purpose." Vladimir and
I don't agree with the most obvious interpretation of this. If
the preference criterion is in the metamathematics, i.e. in the
program rather than in the axioms, then we haven't achieved our
goal of expressing common sense knowledge in logical formulas.
For that reason I introduced the notion of simple abnormality
theory with the idea that having decided to minimize ab, everything
specific to the purpose was included in the axioms. Even when
I introduced it, I knew it would be inadequate in general. Vladimir
pursued the goal of getting everything about the "given purpose" in
the axioms with his pointwise circumscription, and so far as I can
presently tell, he has succeeded.
I look forward to comparing the various formalisms on
challenging examples when you come to Stanford.
∂17-Aug-86 2348 JMC
To: LES
Do you have phone number for Bill Pitts?
∂18-Aug-86 1545 JMC re: AAAI gossip
To: perlis@MIMSY.UMD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 18 Aug 86 18:38:30 EDT.]
Thanks for the summary. I conclude that people's positions didn't change
much and further that they won't without more technical results.
∂19-Aug-86 1232 JMC Re: default problem
To: RLG
∂19-Aug-86 1155 perlis@mimsy.umd.edu Re: default problem
Received: from MIMSY.UMD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 19 Aug 86 11:52:57 PDT
Received: by mimsy.umd.edu (5.9/4.7) id AA04214; Tue, 19 Aug 86 14:49:02 EDT
Message-Id: <8608191849.AA04214@mimsy.umd.edu>
To: shoham@yale.arpa
Cc: perlis@mimsy.umd.edu
Cc: val@su-ai.arpa, ether.allegra%btl.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa,
grosof@su-score.arpa, jmc@su-ai.arpa, kautz@rochester.arpa,
reiter%toronto@csnet-relay.arpa, kyburg@rochester.arpa,
minker@mimsy.umd.edu, mm@tove.umd.edu, drapkin@tove.umd.edu
Subject: Re: default problem
In-Reply-To: Your message of 18 Aug 86 20:18:19 EDT (Mon).
<8608190018.AA04585@Yale-Bulldog.YALE.ARPA>
Date: Tue, 19 Aug 86 14:49:00 -0500
From: Don Perlis <perlis@mimsy.umd.edu>
From: shoham@yale
1. In the usual Tweety example we don't usually say "Oh, and by the
way, at least one bird can't fly." But suppose we did, then 2.
indeed we are no longer justified in concluding that Tweety can fly
(since there is a minimal model in which she can't. As Drew points
out this is one model among an overwhelming number of others, but as
we all agree there is no way to capture this unlikelihood in the
logic as it stands). The question is so what. All we lose is the
ability to answer the question `can Tweety fly'. But any other
inference that depends on Tweety being able to fly can go through:
as I said previously, we simply condition the inference on <>canfly
instead of on []canfly.
This I do not agree with. SOME inferences, yes, but hardly all. For instance,
the inference that if <>canfly then []can-escape-cat. For it may be of
interest whether Tweety is safe, and flying is a way to be safe; merely
saying "oh, well, maybe she can and maybe she can't" won't do: we want a
reasonably solid conviction without demanding absolute certainty. That after
all is what typicalities are for: they give us the expected case.
Also, note that what you call the "usual" form of the problem (without the
negative existential axiom) then comes into question as to its significance.
Why are we studying such problems? What are we learning from such a
rarified case that it cannot even tolerate the simple assertion that there
are counterexamples to the rule? We might as well simply assert Bird x ->
Flies x and be done with it, if we intend only to deal with cases like that.
As for probabilities, note that the chocolate example can be given without
the number of children being known except by way of an upper bound, e.g.,
less than 10**100 children, and then the calculation of probabilities is
irrelevant.
Don
P.S. I think several of the potential discussants here are at a meeting,
and so perhaps we should wait til next week to continue this, if there
is interest.
∂19-Aug-86 1232 JMC Re: default problem
To: RLG
∂18-Aug-86 1745 shoham@YALE.ARPA Re: default problem
Received: from YALE-BULLDOG.ARPA by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 18 Aug 86 17:44:55 PDT
Received: by Yale-Bulldog.YALE.ARPA; 18 Aug 86 20:18:19 EDT (Mon)
Date: 18 Aug 86 20:18:19 EDT (Mon)
From: Yoav Shoham <shoham@YALE.ARPA>
Message-Id: <8608190018.AA04585@Yale-Bulldog.YALE.ARPA>
Subject: Re: default problem
To: perlis@mimsy.umd.edu
Cc: val@su-ai.arpa, ether.allegra%btl.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa,
grosof@su-score.arpa, jmc@su-ai.arpa, kautz@rochester.arpa,
reiter%toronto@csnet-relay.arpa, kyburg@rochester.arpa,
minker@mimsy.umd.edu, mm@tove.umd.edu, drapkin@tove.umd.edu
! But this is probably not what we mean intuitively - when the queen
! gives one kid chocolate she still has a nagging doubt about his
! really liking it (a 1% doubt, in fact).
!
! Well then, you can say the same about birds judged to fly in the absence of
! evidence to the contrary. If it's one or two or three birds, ok, but if it's
! thousands, we begin to expect some non-fliers there, not because of ostriches
! but because of odd birds that 'ought' to fly but don't due to broken wings
! or birth defects or whatever.
I must disagree with you here. There are two issues here. The first is whether
we can infer that an individual bird can fly, and the second is whether we
care to. Let me explain what I mean.
1. In the usual Tweety example we don't usually say "Oh, and by the way, at
least one bird can't fly." But suppose we did, then
2. indeed we are no longer justified in concluding that Tweety can fly (since there
is a minimal model in which she can't. As Drew points out this is one model among
an overwhelming number of others, but as we all agree there is no way to capture
this unlikelihood in the logic as it stands). The question is so what. All we lose
is the ability to answer the question `can Tweety fly'. But any other inference
that depends on Tweety being able to fly can go through: as I said previously,
we simply condition the inference on <>canfly instead of on []canfly.
Note that this introduces no contradiction: )[]exists x -canfly x) and
(forall x <>canfly x) are not contradictory.
This is also why in the chocolate example you needed to say that queen *gave*
chocolate to P17, which depended on P17 *possibly* liking chocolate. The fact
that she gave chocolate is known for sure, but the fact that he likes it isn't.
For some reason you seem to want to have also the fact that P17 is known to like chocolate.
I don't know why you do; that inference doesn't seem to be justified, neither
formally nor intuitively.
Again, we need to distinguish between the *meaning* of our formulas, which is
minimal knowledge (I claim), and the justification for adopting that meaning
on the other (most birds can fly, most kids like chocolate). The latter is
totally extra-logical.
-------
∂19-Aug-86 1233 JMC AAAI gossip
To: RLG
∂18-Aug-86 1538 perlis@mimsy.umd.edu AAAI gossip
Received: from MIMSY.UMD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 18 Aug 86 15:38:02 PDT
Received: by mimsy.umd.edu (5.9/4.7) id AA10086; Mon, 18 Aug 86 18:38:30 EDT
Date: Mon, 18 Aug 86 18:38:30 EDT
From: Don Perlis <perlis@mimsy.umd.edu>
Message-Id: <8608182238.AA10086@mimsy.umd.edu>
To: jmc@su-ai.arpa
Subject: AAAI gossip
John,
I'll summarize what I recall of the discussions, without attempting
to resist the urge to editorialize along the way.
There was considerable disagreement on the role of logic in
commonsense reaoning, in particular at the panel on autonomous agents,
starring McDermott, Nilsson, Rosenschein, and Rosenbloom. McDermott was the
maverick, stating his new view that logic is not the way to go after all.
He gave a very entertaining talk, tho I was not convinced by his arguments.
That is, he made a number of points that I think are sound, but drew (Drew?)
from them the wrong conclusion. As I recall, he argued that almost no
general statements in the real world are true, even at the level of
commonsense (I agree), and that logic deals with certainties (I disagree),
therefore the unsuitablility of the latter. He in particular criticized
efforts to formalize default reasoning, saying that it was leading to more
and more complex notations designed to force the logic into ill-fitting
clothes and from which no general principles were emerging: rather, we were
merely cramming our (already poor) intuitions into the logic for each
special case.
Someone also claimed (it may have been McDermott again) that since
logic simply tells us what is already implicit in our axioms, then it has no
bearing on insight, learning, guessing, etc. I think this is a mistake, in
that logic can serve to tell us what our tentative THEORIES entail. Indeed,
I see no need for axioms to be true. We can use Bird x -> Flies x even tho
it is false. In fact, I think we can devise logics that do not face
disaster in the presence of inconsistency. What I think we do need is a
realtime logic, i.e., one that blends in with a control structure and is
robust enough to withstand minor radical alterations (i.e., if given just
ONE new and unusual axiom, it will soon come to ignore it). But it will
still be logic in that it will show us (some) valid conclusions, and
therefore let us see more clearly what assumptions we are entertaining. It
can also codify for us past experience in the form of (more or less) good
rules for future guesses. It can I think also be put to the task of telling
us when to use probabilities, when to use defautls, and so on, as in the
chocolate grandchildren puzzle I sent around.
In hallway discussions at AAAI it was said that in a paper of
Drew's, there is the following example: Drew notices a coffee cup upside
down on the table, and infers his wife placed it so. The claim is that this
is not a logical inference. I haven't seen the paper, and so don't know
details, but it seems to me that this is precisely the kind of
theory-building that we (and logic) are good at. We notice something and
try to build a theory to fit it. John Anderson gives a similar example of
human illogicality (so he says): if I am dying the doctor will be frowning;
the doctor is frowning so I must be dying. I see this as simply an attempt
to explain the facts. In so doing we cast about for "inner models" (much
like circumscription) that account for things without too much baggage
(circumscription may be overkill in this, tho). That is, on the issue of
newness, if a new input arrives, say x, then all of a sudden there is a
whole RAFT of NEW things that become true (entailed) and which are NOT
already known until they are deduced as part of this new state (theory) that
the old plus new input form. That is, logic plays the role of telling us
what our changing theories really are like (what they entail) and also can
give us info on how to use/improve theories with axioms such as above with
DO or CONSIDER. That is, control can be axiomatized, as long as there is a
top level controller that obeys the proven control commands (suggestions?).
I might claim that without logic we are sunk, for then nothing means
anything to us at all. We can't even see when we are in fact contradicting
ourselves.
Also, axioms can be prescriptions, such as "if this then DO (or consider)
that" so that truth isn't even an issue, but rather efficacy. Of course, I
am making unproven claims, but I think this is at least a direction worth
trying. Perhaps some would say it is not logic if it does these things.
But at least it will be syntactic in form, have a vestige of semantics, have
important subcases that are valid, and so on.
I guess I have beaten enough drums here, so I'll sign off!
Regards,
Don
∂19-Aug-86 1233 JMC Re: default problem
To: RLG
∂18-Aug-86 1532 perlis@mimsy.umd.edu Re: default problem
Received: from MIMSY.UMD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 18 Aug 86 15:30:51 PDT
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Message-Id: <8608182228.AA09822@mimsy.umd.edu>
To: shoham@yale.arpa, mcdermott@yale.arpa
Cc: perlis@mimsy.umd.edu
Cc: val@su-ai.arpa, ether.allegra%btl.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa,
grosof@su-score.arpa, jmc@su-ai.arpa, kautz@rochester.arpa,
reiter%toronto@csnet-relay.arpa, kyburg@rochester.arpa,
minker@mimsy.umd.edu, mm@tove.umd.edu, drapkin@tove.umd.edu
Subject: Re: default problem
In-Reply-To: Your message of 18 Aug 86 10:16:48 EDT (Mon).
<8608181416.AA00932@Yale-Bulldog.YALE.ARPA>
Date: Mon, 18 Aug 86 18:28:20 -0500
From: Don Perlis <perlis@mimsy.umd.edu>
From: Yoav Shoham <shoham@yale.arpa>
From: perlis@maryland
The queen assumes that a child LIKES chocolate unless known
otherwise.
If all 100 kids visit the queen then she must infer that all of them
like chocolate (the reasoning about p17 can be duplicated for all
kids). Therefore the queen is inconsistent...
Yes, that's the point, or at least that's the danger. It is not out of the
question that some mechanism could select the child of interest, as I hinted
at, a kind of focus device. E.g., if x is of interest and if nothing else is,
then use default rules for x...
But this is probably not what we mean intuitively - when the queen
gives one kid chocolate she still has a nagging doubt about his
really liking it (a 1% doubt, in fact).
Well then, you can say the same about birds judged to fly in the absence of
evidence to the contrary. If it's one or two or three birds, ok, but if it's
thousands, we begin to expect some non-fliers there, not because of ostriches
but because of odd birds that 'ought' to fly but don't due to broken wings
or birth defects or whatever.
you must incorporate the notions of probability and utility in the
language itself, I believe. In summary, I think we should require
the logic to support decision making in the presence of incomplete
knowledge, and not the augmentation of that partial knowledge.
That was precisely what I was hinting at toward the end of my initial
message. But then it seems to infect all default reasoning, not just this
one example. If this is so, then we are barking up the wrong tree, it seems
to me, in looking for a logically complete and sound inference structure.
----------------
From: mcdermott@yale
Congratulations! You have rediscovered the Lottery Paradox.
So others have told me as well. And I have accordingly put Henry Kyburg on
the Cc list.
I discuss this problem in Nonmonotonic Logic II, which appeared in
JACM a few years ago.
Someone did refer me to your paper; but I had thought on reading it that you
regarded the paradox as boding ill for monotonic logic but not for its
opposite number. Sorry about that.
Our conclusion must be, once again, that while there are lots of
interesting theories of nonmonotonic *inference,* there are few
interesting nonmonotonic *logics.*
I guess I don't know what distinction you have in mind. I think that there
are very important and technically complex formal mechanisms to be
discovered, and that they will *contain* classical logic as subsets, with
however the qualification that they will not be undone by contradictions:
they will be sufficiently introspective to note (damaging) contradictions
before they get out of hand. That is, with Kyburg, conjunctions of beliefs
need not be beliefs, but here I think that a subtle "doublethink" may be
appropriate: we see the contradiction arising as we start to do the
conjunction, and then we realize it for what it is and purposely avoid it
while also telling ourselves that the individual conclusions for each bird
(or child) are after all only extremely likely and so in ISOLATION are ok.
I think that a key to this is a DO predicate, that has no foreordained
logical semantics, any more than any other predicate; it allows much of
control to be placed in the inferences. That is, a reasoner can instruct
itself to avoid certain conclusions, etc., by means of such a predicate.
I am handwaving here in the extreeme, but this is a direction that I think
deserves pursuing.
Perhaps your point is that such things should not be considered logic?
∂19-Aug-86 1233 JMC Re: default problem
To: RLG
∂18-Aug-86 0859 shoham@YALE.ARPA Re: default problem
Received: from YALE-BULLDOG.ARPA by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 18 Aug 86 08:58:04 PDT
Received: by Yale-Bulldog.YALE.ARPA; 18 Aug 86 10:16:48 EDT (Mon)
Date: 18 Aug 86 10:16:48 EDT (Mon)
From: Yoav Shoham <shoham@YALE.ARPA>
Message-Id: <8608181416.AA00932@Yale-Bulldog.YALE.ARPA>
Subject: Re: default problem
To: Don Perlis <perlis@mimsy.umd.edu>
Cc: val@su-ai.arpa, ether.allegra%btl.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa,
grosof@su-score.arpa, jmc@su-ai.arpa, kautz@rochester.arpa,
mcdermott@YALE.ARPA, reiter%toronto@csnet-relay.arpa
In-Reply-To: Don Perlis <perlis@mimsy.umd.edu>, Sun, 17 Aug 86 17:56:25 -0500
!
! Well, I see I should have stuck with birds! I have not expressed my
! intentions well enough. I meant that the queen by default assumes that
! a child LIKES chocolate unless known otherwise, not simply that she
! GIVES chocolate unless known that it likes chocolate. This is in analogy with
! assuming a bird FLIES (not just closing its cage door). So you see, there
! lurks here a potential conflict with concluding P17 actually LIKES chocolate
! (and perhpas so do all the others, but they can't...).
!
! Don
----------------
Don, I'm not sure I understand your motivation. By your criterion, if all 100
kids visit the queen then she must infer that all of them like chocolate (the
reasoning about p17 can be duplicated for all kids). Therefore the queen is
inconsistent, and so should our formulation (replace givechoc in my formulation
by likechoc).
But this is probably not what we mean intuitively - when the queen gives one kid
chocolate she still has a nagging doubt about his really liking it (a 1% doubt,
in fact). If 2 kids visit her, do you require that she still believe that both
like chocolate? If not, why the arbitrary distinction between 1 and 2? If yes,
then how about 3 kids? etcetera. Clearly what's going on here is that the more
chocolates she hands out the bigger the doubt - for n kids its
n%. For some n this is just too big, according to some utility criterion.
To capture that you must incorporate the notions of probability and utility in the
language itself, I believe. In summary, I think we should require the logic to support
decision making in the presence of incomplete knowledge, and not the
augmentation of that partial knowledge.
Yoav.
-------
∂19-Aug-86 1233 JMC Re: default problem
To: RLG
∂17-Aug-86 1457 perlis@mimsy.umd.edu Re: default problem
Received: from MIMSY.UMD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 17 Aug 86 14:57:19 PDT
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Message-Id: <8608172156.AA06475@mimsy.umd.edu>
To: shoham@yale.arpa
Cc: perlis@mimsy.umd.edu
Cc: val@su-ai.arpa, ether.allegra%btl.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa,
grosof@su-score.arpa, jmc@su-ai.arpa, kautz@rochester.arpa,
mcdermott@yale.arpa, reiter%toronto@csnet-relay.arpa
Subject: Re: default problem
In-Reply-To: Your message of 16 Aug 86 12:28:14 EDT (Sat).
<8608161628.AA13613@Yale-Bulldog.YALE.ARPA>
Date: Sun, 17 Aug 86 17:56:25 -0500
From: Don Perlis <perlis@mimsy.umd.edu>
From: Yoav Shoham <shoham@yale.arpa>
I will use nonmon epistemic logic, which I hope will also serve to
illustrate that nonmon modal logic is really a good way to go.
I will use:
<>phi: possibly phi (i.e., -phi is not known)
[]phi: necessarily phi (i.e., phi is known)
grch(x): x is a grandchild.
likechoc(x): x likes chocolate
givechoc(x): the queen decides to give x chocolate
First we fix the grandchildren:
(0) forall x. []grch(x) <-> []p1(x) V ... V []p100(x)
The translation of the default rule into this logic yields:
(1) forall x. []grch(x) & <>likechoc(x) -> []givechoc(x)
In other words, the queen descides to give chocolate to all kids
which she does not know for certain not to like chocolate.
It is not hard to see that in all preferred models the queen does
not know -likechoc(P17), and therefore by (1) she must give P17
chocolate.
-----
Well, I see I should have stuck with birds! I have not expressed my
intentions well enough. I meant that the queen by default assumes that
a child LIKES chocolate unless known otherwise, not simply that she
GIVES chocolate unless known that it likes chocolate. This is in analogy with
assuming a bird FLIES (not just closing its cage door). So you see, there
lurks here a potential conflict with concluding P17 actually LIKES chocolate
(and perhpas so do all the others, but they can't...).
Don
P.S. Note that I had grosof's address wrong in the first message; it is
correct now. (one f, not two). I also had Etherington's old address; it
too now is correct.
P.P.S. Please try again!
∂19-Aug-86 1234 JMC Re: default problem
To: RLG
∂17-Aug-86 1109 shoham@YALE.ARPA Re: default problem
Received: from YALE-BULLDOG.ARPA by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 17 Aug 86 11:09:02 PDT
Received: by Yale-Bulldog.YALE.ARPA; 16 Aug 86 12:28:14 EDT (Sat)
Date: 16 Aug 86 12:28:14 EDT (Sat)
From: Yoav Shoham <shoham@YALE.ARPA>
Message-Id: <8608161628.AA13613@Yale-Bulldog.YALE.ARPA>
Subject: Re: default problem
To: Don Perlis <perlis@mimsy.umd.edu>
Cc: val@su-ai.arpa, ether%ubc.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa, grosoff@su-score.arpa,
jmc@su-ai.arpa, kautz@rochester.arpa, mcdermott@YALE.ARPA,
reiter%toronto@csnet-relay.arpa, shoham@YALE.ARPA
In-Reply-To: Don Perlis <perlis@mimsy.umd.edu>, Fri, 15 Aug 86 19:28:17 EDT
Don,
It's the first time I see this good example, but I think I understand what's going on
here. Let me suggest an account of it.
Let me first say that it isn't obvious what conclusions one would *like* the queen to arrive at,
regardless of the mechanism for arriving at them. Suppose all 100 kids visit
her: should she give all of them chocolate? all but one, chosen at random? none?
That will determine her behavior in the case where P17 visits her (why does everyone
use P17 to represent randomness? I use HOUSE17 in my paper). According to the three
choices above, she will either give P17 his fix automatically (which you
apparently prefer), or else she will
give it to him iff he happens to not be identical to the child chosen at random
ahead of time, or else she will not give it to him no matter what.
I agree that the second possibility seems a bit silly, but the third one isn't. For
example, replace `x likes chocolate' by `x likes chocolate and is not strongly
alergic to it', and correspondingly replace `x does not like chocolate' by `either x
doesn't like chocolate or else he is strongly alergic to it'; if I were the queen I'd
hold back on all the kids.
Since you require an account of the first option, I will treat it explicitly. Let
me just say parenthetically that the third option is as easily implementable, and
that I think the second one isn't implementable without a notion of random choice
in the logic itself.
I will use nonmon epistemic logic, which I hope will also serve to illustrate that
nonmon modal logic is really a good way to go.
I will use:
<>phi: possibly phi (i.e., -phi is not known)
[]phi: necessarily phi (i.e., phi is known)
grch(x): x is a grandchild.
likechoc(x): x likes chocolate
givechoc(x): the queen decides to give x chocolate
First we fix the grandchildren:
(0) forall x. []grch(x) <-> []p1(x) V ... V []p100(x)
The translation of the default rule into this logic yields:
(1) forall x. []grch(x) & <>likechoc(x) -> []givechoc(x)
In other words, the queen descides to give chocolate to all kids which she does not
know for certain not to like chocolate (in the allergic child version, the cautious
queen would replace <>likechoc(x) by []likechoc(x) ).
The other condition is:
(2) [] exists x. grch(x) & -likechoc(x)
Note that this is quite distinct from `exists x. [] (grch(x) & -likechoc(x))' -
you can't move quantifiers across modal operators.
We adopt nonmon semantics as explained in the chapter I sent you (and to
most of the cc'ed). Briefly, we prefer models which satisfy
[]-likechoc(x) for as few x's as possible, and among those models we prefer
to know as little as possible (again, in the usual sense of set-inclusion).
It is not hard to see that in all preferred models the queen does not know
-likechoc(P17), and therefore by (1) she must give P17 chocolate. Note that Axiom (2)
plays no role here.
Yoav.
-------
∂19-Aug-86 1234 JMC default problem
To: RLG
∂15-Aug-86 1629 perlis@mimsy.umd.edu default problem
Received: from MIMSY.UMD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 15 Aug 86 16:29:20 PDT
Received: by mimsy.umd.edu (5.9/4.7) id AA03296; Fri, 15 Aug 86 19:28:17 EDT
Date: Fri, 15 Aug 86 19:28:17 EDT
From: Don Perlis <perlis@mimsy.umd.edu>
Message-Id: <8608152328.AA03296@mimsy.umd.edu>
To: val@su-ai.arpa
Subject: default problem
Cc: ether%ubc.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa, grosoff@su-score.arpa, jmc@su-ai.arpa,
kautz@rochester.arpa, mcdermott@yale.arpa,
reiter%toronto@csnet-relay.arpa, shoham@yale.arpa
Vladimir,
I probably will see you in Washington next week, before you get a
chance to read this, but just in case not: I am having second thoughts
about what you said regarding my counterexample of default reasoning that we
first discussed in Kentucky last year. At first I thought you were right
that Skolem constants and names (instead of individuals) settles it, but now
I think not. To be precise, I'll start from the beginning, and instead of
birds I'll provide relief in the form of chocolate and grandchildren. Also,
since the efficacy of default logics was a big issue at the AAAI this year,
I am sending copies of this to several people, who I hope will feel free to
reply.
---------------------------------
The Queen has 100 grandchildren, whom she dearly loves and knows by
sight and by their names P1...P100. However, she cannot recall anything
else about them individually. But she does know that almost all of them
like chocolate and also that at least one of them does not. When P17 comes
to visit her one day, she offers him some chocolate.
---------------------------------
Represent and justify the Queen's reasoning in terms of some default
formalism, in which are included the facts that P1...P100 are her only
grandchildren, that liking chocolate is the typical (default) case for them,
and that at least one of them does not like chocolate. Caution: note that
if LikesChocolate(P17) is inferred, your methods will probably also infer
the same of P1...P100, which is an apparent contradiction. Note also that a
STRAIGHTFORWARD treatment using circumscription leads to FAILING to conclude
LikesChocolate(P17), and hence failing to model the Queen's reasoning, for
in one minimal model, P17 will not like chocolate.
For those who want a simple formal example, consider the following
watered down case: A = { (Ex)(GrdChld x & -LikesChocolate x) , GrdChld P17 }.
Then circumscribing -LikesChocolate in A does NOT lead to the expected
conclusion LikesCholcolate(P17). The mere existence of a case that doesn't
obey the default (which after all is half of what makes defaults DEFAULTS,
the other half being that such cases are rare), seems to block the default
conclusion. For we have no way to get P not to be that exceptional case, in
the present formulation of A. The challenge is to rewrite A so it will
work, but honestly, i.e., respecting the intuitions of the original problem.
Skolemizing is one direction to try, but my cautions in the previous paragraph
point to trouble if the full problem with all 100 grandchildren is faced,
for the Skolemized grandchild name must corefer with one of the 100.
My suggestion is that in addition to whatever mechanism specifies
defaults, another mechanism must specify the range to which it is to apply,
i.e., a focus of interest must be determined which, if too large, nullifies
the use of the default, but if small (e.g., just P17) sanctions it. As long
as we care about only a few cases, it is sensible to use defaults, but not
when we consider global questions. This points in an unfortunately messy
direction, but I see no way to avoid it.
--Don
∂19-Aug-86 1305 JMC qlisp implementation
To: squires@A.ISI.EDU
CC: RPG@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU, CLT@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU,
LES@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
We met today with the Lucid people to discuss their subcontract.
Dick Gabriel tells me that you discussed with him at AAAI interpolating
a task in between implementing Common Lisp on the Alliant and implementing
Qlisp - namely implementing message passing between Lisps. Some of the
Lucid people think this has the potential of slowing the schedule. If
you want us to consider revising the goals of the project in view of the
time that has elapsed between the original proposal and the present,
we should have a meeting on the subject, e.g. you, me, Carolyn Talcott
and RPG.
∂19-Aug-86 1436 JMC
To: CLT
The Mazda is also done, and VW Specialty is open till 5:30.
∂19-Aug-86 1442 JMC cars
To: CLT
The Cadillac place is open till 5:30 also. How about a grand plan that
involves picking Timothy, collecting both cars and turning in
the Budget car, all starting from here at 4:30.
∂20-Aug-86 1028 JMC reply to message
To: rms@PREP.AI.MIT.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 20 Aug 86 08:00:11 EDT.]
John McCarthy
Computer Science Dept.
Stanford, CA 94305
∂20-Aug-86 1806 JMC re: CS306
To: MODICA@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed 20 Aug 86 11:18:40-PDT.]
Tell Judith Lemmon that it will be the same as last year, the year before
that and the year before that. Students will use LOTS and can have
dial-up access to it under whatever conditions LOTS provides.
∂20-Aug-86 1906 JMC re: kcl
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 20-Aug-86 18:38-PT.]
tuesday noon is ok
∂21-Aug-86 1355 JMC Afghan Journalists
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
Here we have a prize example of professorial arrogance, stupidity,
contentiousness, anti-anticommunism and intellectual gerrymandering.
I'll put the justifications of these characterizations after the
article itself. Stanford faculty would be capable of the same,
but the Stanford Administration hasn't the courage or principles
of John Silber.
a207 1154 21 Aug 86
AM-Afghan Journalists, Bjt,0823
Boston University To Train Afghan Refugees near Conflict
By CAROLYN LUMSDEN
Associated Press Writer
BOSTON (AP) - Boston University's agreement to train Afghan refugees
as journalists so they can spread the word of the Soviet invasion
that drove them from their country has sparked a fierce debate that
already has cost the school two deans.
To Sen. Gordon J. Humphrey, R-N.H., who sponsored the bill
allocating the money for the program, it's a simple plan: ''If we
train freedom fighters in the use of cameras to bring out footage,
that might help raise international public outrage. It's propaganda
in the best sense of the word.''
But 10 faculty members at the 1,800-student College of Communication
say academic standards would be compromised from the start because
the refugees will be trained in Pakistan, near the border of the
conflict, rather than at the school.
''The gravest risk,'' they said in a November letter to Provost Jon
Westling, ''is that the program would be seen by the outside world
and by the American academic community as not an educational
enterprise at all but as a venture in propaganda and
counterintelligence.''
The university hopes to train up to 30 refugees in Peshawar with a
$180,364 grant from the U.S. Information Agency. King Features
Syndicate will distribute the refugees' work with a $309,696 grant.
In two six-week sessions starting as early as September, the
refugees will be taught to use television cameras and other tools to
report the war in the closed country occupied by 115,000 Soviet
troops. Since the troops entered in 1979 to support the Marxist
government against Moslem insurgents, 3 million refugees have crossed
into Pakistan.
Afghanistan's charge d'affaires, Rohullah Erfaqui, said the program
will interfere in his country's internal affairs and violate
international law.
H. Joachim Maitre, an East German defector who spearheaded the
project, said the refugees will bring back news that only the most
intrepid of Western journalists cover.
Maitre, a MiG pilot trainee before his defection in 1953, will
select students from among candidates chosen by Islamic Unity, a
coalition of anti-communist Afghan tribes in exile.
Faculty members said in their letter that proper training
''certainly cannot be nurtured in the turmoil of a refugee center
awash with secret agents, rival political factions and intense
emotions.''
The college submitted a proposal to train the refugees in Boston,
but USIA spokeswoman Lesley Vossem said the agency preferred the
university plan because ''the cultural adjustment might interfere
with the refugees' training.''
The communications college dean, Bernard S. Redmont, quit in July
after refusing to give the university plan his backing and after
demoting an associate dean for working on the program without
Redmont's approval.
Redmont was named dean emeritus and assigned to spend the fall in
London supervising a college internship program. He declined comment.
Maitre was named interim dean by President John Silber on Aug. 12,
after his return from a two-week fact-finding trip in Peshawar.
One faculty member said few dared risk their jobs by speaking openly
against the program.
Faculty members who spoke on condition they not be identified said
Maitre has written articles for the defense magazine Strategic Review
and that its publisher, Arthur Metcalf, is a university trustee who
shares the conservative political views of Maitre and Silber.
''In the past, Dr. Metcalf has never interfered in my work,'' Maitre
said. ''I'm a working journalist and want to stay a working
journalist.''
Professors said the project has divided the college's 45 faculty
members over the proper role of reporters and schools that train
them.
''I think of journalism as the practice of inquiring about and
describing the world, but there are people who bring more of a sense
of mission to journalism,'' said Bernice Buresh, an associate
professor and former Boston bureau chief for Newsweek. ''They talk
about it as a tool for defending the American way of life.''
Other professors pointed out at faculty meetings that such
journalists as the late Edward R. Murrow have worked for the USIA and
that the college also trains students in publicity and advertising.
''This government has a stake in developing a free press in foreign
countries,'' said Robert Lewis, president of the Society for
Professional Journalists, Sigma Delta Chi. ''I can't see anything
inherently wrong about such grants with two provisions: that the
university has control of the contents of the educational program and
provided that it's all done aboveboard.''
George A. Krimsky, executive director of the year-old Center for
Foreign Journalists in Reston, Va., said his organization declined to
apply for the USIA grant because of inexperience in training
reporters abroad.
But Krimsky added, ''I guess it's fair to say we were queasy about
the partisanship implied in a program designed to train Afghan rebels
engaged in a military conflict in journalistic practices.''
AP-NY-08-21-86 1453EDT
***************
1. arrogance - because they want to prevent someone else from doing
something.
2. stupidity - because they don't recognize the difference between
the situation in Afghanistan and the U.S. They don't recognize
the almost complete lack of any kind of reporting from the fighting
front in Afghanistan.
3. contentiousness - because the current flap is almost certainly
regarded by its participants as a continuation of guerrilla warfare
among the faculty with the President, John Silber.
4. anti-anti-communism - because without bothering to justify the Soviet
actions in Afghanistan, it somehow turns out that the most important part
of the left opposes every particular counteraction.
5. intellectual gerrymandering - because the issue isn't whether the
U.S. should train Afghans to report their war, but turns into a narrow
issue of how academic programs should be run.
∂21-Aug-86 1945 JMC gate
To: CLT
He climbed up to the landing without any special encouragement. Then
after a while started up further. He did fine as long as he kept going
but when he sat down, he showed an alarming tendency to topple over
backwards. I moved him from about the third step to where he could see
over the top and he finished the journey, complaining all the while.
If you like I'll take him to Lullaby Lane now and get gates for top
and bottom.
∂21-Aug-86 2058 JMC re: Good riddance, kitties. . .
To: Z.ZENON@LOTS-A
[In reply to message sent Thu 21 Aug 86 19:08:24-PDT.]
By mailing to su-etc at both LOTS and SCORE you have caused two copies
of your message to appear.
∂22-Aug-86 0423 JMC Afghan Journalists
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
Answers to MRC's points
1. I didn't take the protesters' claim of fear of reprisal seriously.
It's just part of the bombast.
2. I didn't say they didn't have a right to protest; I said their
protest was wrong in the ways I mentioned.
3. I am not pleased that the Soviets are mired in Afghanistan; it
kills too many people.
4. The people fighting for the freedom of their country in Afghanistan
happen to be Moslems. They were not guilty of the kind of
massacres characteristic of Khomeini, so I don't think it is
a choice of evils. Love for the U.S. is not a requirement in
my mind, but if we supply them with the wherewithal to shoot
down Soviet helicopters, a certain mild degree of affection
may be generated.
5. Joe Pallas doesn't understand what I meant by intellectual gerrymandering
- a term I confess having coined. The concept is nicely illustrated
by the discussion so far.
The USIA, John Silber, J. H. Maitre and Abdul Kathlan and I imagine that
there is a problem of the Soviets killing people in Afghanistan and no-one
reporting it to the outside world. A part of the problem is to be
attacked by equipping some Afghans with VCRs and teaching them how to use
them, since not many American reporters care to risk their lives in
Afghanistan.
The ten faculty protesters, MRC, J. Pallas, and Bill Poser see no such
problem; presumably a university should rise above any concern with how
many Afghans the Soviets kill. The issue is simply whether the Afghan
journalist wouldn't be better educated in the spirit of American
journalism in Boston rather than in Peshawar where they might actually be
influenced by the plight of their fellows.
I called this redefining the problem to an issue of where academic
journalistic purity is best maintained "intellectual gerrymandering".
6. Now I'll spell out my accusation of arrogance. Prof. J. H. Maitre,
perhaps foolishly remembering his experience in East Germany, proposes
to teach the Afghans some journalism in Peshawar. The protesters
say he shouldn't be allowed to do that. An analogy would be my
saying that the Knowledge Systems Laboratory shouldn't be allowed
to apply for Government grants, because they don't recognize that
mathematical logic is the proper tool for AI.
7. As for anti-anti-communism, I have to resort to ad hominem remarks.
The same people here object to this anti-communist activity as
have objected to other anti-communist measures - giving, of course,
different reasons in each case. I presume, conceivably incorrectly,
the Boston University protesters are similarly motivated to past
Boston University protesters. Alas, I'm now making an
anti-anti-anti-communist remark.
This isn't an adequate answer to Bill Poser's asking for specific
examples of previous leftist opposition to measures to aid the
Afghan resistance. Certainly, there has been less leftist opposition
to aiding the Afghans than to aiding the Angolans. However, I'll
look for more specifics.
8. I have nothing to add about contentiousness.
9. Finally, let's return to the problem perceived by the USIA, Silber,
Prof. Maitre, Abdul and myself - the under-reporting of the Soviet
war against the Afghans. Do MRC, Pallas and Poser see this as a
problem at all. If not, why not? If yes, do they have a better way
of dealing with it than letting Prof. Maitre teach some Afghans
how to do it?
∂22-Aug-86 1519 JMC re: Time for another New Paltz conference?
To: SJG
[In reply to message rcvd 22-Aug-86 13:45-PT.]
I'm in favor of another Mohonk conference. It may be that the number
of submissions will be quite a bit larger. AAAI is good for $10K. I
won't be on the Program Committee. I suggest Yoav Shoham for the
Committee.
∂22-Aug-86 1618 JMC Next Monday's PLANLUNCH -- Marianne Winslett
To: RLG
∂20-Aug-86 1629 LANSKY@SRI-WARBUCKS.ARPA Next Monday's PLANLUNCH -- Marianne Winslett
Received: from SRI-WARBUCKS.ARPA by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 20 Aug 86 16:29:30 PDT
Date: Wed 20 Aug 86 16:02:46-PDT
From: Amy Lansky <LANSKY@SRI-WARBUCKS.ARPA>
Subject: Next Monday's PLANLUNCH -- Marianne Winslett
To: planlunch.dis:
Message-ID: <VAX-MM(194)+TOPSLIB(120)+PONY(0) 20-Aug-86 16:02:46.SRI-WARBUCKS.ARPA>
VISITORS: Please arrive 5 minutes early so that you can be escorted up
from the E-building receptionist's desk. Thanks!
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
IS BELIEF REVISION HARDER THAN YOU THOUGHT?
Marianne Winslett (WINSLETT@SCORE)
Stanford University, Computer Science Department
11:00 AM, MONDAY, Aug. 25
SRI International, Building E, Room EJ228
Suppose one wishes to construct, use, and maintain a database of
knowledge about the real world, even though the facts about that world
are only partially known. In the AI domain, this problem arises when
an agent has a base set of extensional beliefs that reflect partial
knowledge about the world, and then tries to incorporate new, possibly
contradictory extensional knowledge into the old set of beliefs. We
choose to represent such an extensional knowledge base as a logical
theory, and view the models of the theory as possible states of the
world that are consistent with the agent's extensional beliefs.
How can new information be incorporated into the extensional knowledge
base? For example, given the new information that "b or c is true,"
how can we get rid of all outdated information about b and c, add the
new information, and yet in the process not disturb any other
extensional information in the extensional knowledge base? The burden
may be placed on the user or other omniscient authority to determine
exactly which changes in the theory will bring about the desired set
of models. But what's really needed is a way to specify the update
intensionally, by stating some well-formed formula that the state of
the world is now known to satisfy and letting internal knowledge base
mechanisms automatically figure out how to accomplish that update. In
this talk we present semantics and algorithms for an operation to add
new information to extensional knowledge bases, and demonstrate that
this action of extensional belief revision is separate from, and
in practice must occur prior to, the traditional belief revision
processes associated with truth maintenance systems.
-------
∂22-Aug-86 1847 JMC
To: RA
frolov.1
∂23-Aug-86 1427 JMC
To: CLT
∂23-Aug-86 1354 RA dinner at Fiesta
How many people participated in the dinner at the Fiesta?
Thanks
Rutie
------
∂23-Aug-86 1910 JMC tax bill
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
I think that Treitel is right. It amazes me that officials of the
academic world and the students can act like every other special interest
without even the slightest attempt to argue that they should actually
be an exception to the general closing of loopholes. Ask for aid
for education in the expenditure side of the budget.
I think that the tax avoidance industry is one of the worst drags on
American productivity, both in the direct costs of the tax avoidance
experts and the ways in which they distort investment.
∂24-Aug-86 2134 JMC
To: VAL
Here is the announcement of the Moscow conference. I wouldn't have
discussed it with Bukovsky before discussing with you, but I wanted
to be sure to catch him before he left for England. He told me that
you were in favor of giving a paper. It could either be separate
or joint with me. I also called Suppes and asked him whether a
paper by us on non-monotonic reasoning would be scientifically
appropriate for the conference - before mentioning possible
complications - and he said it would. I think this will be the
reaction of other logicians and philosophers. Did you meet Fenstad
at Stanford, and have you met Frolov? Let's talk about it tomorrow.
moscow[e86,jmc] Moscow conference
From JSL, June 1986, p. 512
The Eighth International Congress of Logic, Methodology and
Philosophy of Science will be held in Moscow, August 17-22, 1987.
The chairman of the Program Committee is Professor J. E. Fenstad,
of Norway; the chairman of the Soviet Organizing Committee is
Professor I. T. Frolov, Volkhonka 14, Moscow 119842, USSR. The
deadline for submission of abstracts is November 1, 1986; for
details on the required format of abstracts, and for any other
information on the Congress, please write to Professor Frolov
at the above address.
Prof. Jens Erik Fenstad
Mathematics Institute
University of Oslo
PB. 1053-Blindern
Oslo 3
Norway
∂24-Aug-86 2217 JMC Freiling
To: RA
Did Chris Freiling who gave a seminar here get paid his travel
expenses and a $200 honorarium? There also needs to be a letter
from me thanking him for the seminar. Here's a letter in case
I didn't send him one already.
Dear Dr. Freiling:
Many thanks for giving the seminar here on your set theory
axioms. In my inexpert opinion, they are what Goedel predicted would
exist --- axioms disproving the continuum hypothesis.
Sincerely,
∂24-Aug-86 2258 JMC
To: genesereth@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
Whose AAAI Proceedings do I have?
∂25-Aug-86 0907 JMC reply to message
To: rms@PREP.AI.MIT.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 25 Aug 86 05:02:27 EDT.]
No generals have seen it, but I have a question. Where does it say how
to program macros in the Lisp? I plan a trip to Washington in the next
month or so.
∂25-Aug-86 1218 JMC paper for VAL
To: RA
I think I gave a paper by Tarnlund about logic and logic programming
to be filed. Please make a copy for Vladimir.
∂25-Aug-86 1240 Mailer failed mail returned
To: JMC@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
In processing the following command:
MAIL
The following message was unsent because of a command error:
------- Begin undelivered message: -------
∂25-Aug-86 1240 JMC reply to message
To: JOHNMARK@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
CC: Reuling@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from JOHNMARK@Sushi.Stanford.EDU sent Mon 25 Aug 86 12:28:02-PDT.]
I regard the phrase "too much potential for abuse" as a sign of an
bureaucratic mind or future bureaucratic mind applicable far beyond
the question of who can post on bboards. In such matters it is sufficient
to impose restrictions only after abuse has occurred to an annoying degree.
------- End undelivered message -------
∂25-Aug-86 1254 JMC shanka.1
To: RA
Les will MAIL you an addition about travel expenses.
∂25-Aug-86 1325 JMC reply to message
To: JOHNMARK@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU, JJW@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
CC: Reuling@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU, ME@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from JOHNMARK@Sushi.Stanford.EDU sent Mon 25 Aug 86 12:28:02-PDT.]
I regard the phrase "too much potential for abuse" as a sign of an
bureaucratic mind or future bureaucratic mind applicable far beyond
the question of who can post on bboards. In such matters it is sufficient
to impose restrictions only after abuse has occurred to an annoying degree.
∂25-Aug-86 1658 JMC re: Your trip to NY 8/27-28
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 25-Aug-86 15:36-PT.]
Tell him to leave the reservations as they are.
∂25-Aug-86 1659 JMC re: CS 520
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 25-Aug-86 16:48-PT.]
The answer to Judith Lemmon is no.
∂25-Aug-86 1704 JMC Re: Towers, 1 For loop.
To: JMC
∂25-Aug-86 1443 PEHOUSHEK@SU-SCORE.ARPA Re: Towers, 1 For loop.
Received: from SCORE.STANFORD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 25 Aug 86 14:43:05 PDT
Date: Mon 25 Aug 86 14:38:04-PDT
From: Daniel Pehoushek <PEHOUSHEK@SU-SCORE.ARPA>
Subject: Re: Towers, 1 For loop.
To: su-etc@SU-SCORE.ARPA
Message-ID: <12233710354.38.PEHOUSHEK@Score.Stanford.EDU>
I said something about using 3 FOR loops in a simple manner, for the Towers
program. Even though the code below solves it with one loop, I see no easy
way to solve the problem with three loops (unless you stick in two useless
loops).
(defun towers (n from to middle)
;; move n discs from FROM to TO using middle.
(cond ((oddp n) (setf c middle b to a from))
(T (setf c to b middle a from)))
(for i from 1 to 2**N - 1 do
(case (mod i 3)
(0 (move.between.towers a c))
(1 (move.between.towers a b))
(2 (move.between.towers b c)))))
(defun move.between.towers (x y)
(print "Move a disk from " x " to " y
" or from " y " to " x ", whichever is legal."))
It could be improved to give more explicit movement commands, but you
get the idea. My claim about three FOR loops stands. -dan
-------
∂25-Aug-86 2101 JMC re: meeting with Ginsberg
To: VAL
[In reply to message rcvd 25-Aug-86 14:55-PT.]
Wednesday or Friday at 11 would be good.
∂25-Aug-86 2141 JMC re: CS326 for credit
To: YOUNG@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon 25 Aug 86 21:32:02-PDT.]
Which powers? How soon do you need it? Would writing next winters'
term paper suit you?
∂25-Aug-86 2300 JMC re: CS326 for credit
To: YOUNG@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon 25 Aug 86 21:42:01-PDT.]
I have sometimes required a term paper and almost certainly will this
winter. I don't remember what was asked for the time you took the
course. Unfortunately, you can't get started early, because I haven't
decided what I will ask for. See me at the beginning of Winter Quarter.
∂26-Aug-86 1429 JMC An idea for gun registration
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from Crew@Sushi.Stanford.EDU sent Tue 26 Aug 86 13:47:19-PDT.]
Comparing rifling may work only when there are a small number of guns
to compare with. Getting a record making feasible a search
in a file of a million guns is more difficult. It would be easier if
the rifling pattern was systematically varied as the gun was rifled.
Another idea is to register bullets by putting a pattern of small
amounts of activatable isotopes that differs from box to box of bullets
and require registration of bullet purchases just as purchase of poisons
is registered. Criminals might try to defeat this by making their own
bullets, but an illegal bullet manufacturing industry would be a target
for law enforcement and would make crime more expensive. Besides most
criminals aren't that well organized.
I believe that some system of tagging may already be in use with explosives.
Adoption of some such system depends on a compromise with the gun
owners' organizations such as the National Rifle Association. The
NRA people rightly believe that much of the political force behind
proposals to register guns comes from people who view it as a first
step to banning them altogether. Therefore, they resist all such
proposals. Suppose universal registration and tagging were combined in a
constitutional amendment with a prohibition of state and local regulations
restricting ownership by respectable people.
It would be interesting to know the attitude that would be taken by
people for and against present gun control proposals. Different
compromises are possible, but what about the idea of compromise
in general? Or is it "Victory or death"?
Flaming encouraged.
∂26-Aug-86 1528 JMC dinner
To: CLT
Sarah and Mary and unknown others are proposing dinner at 6:30 and I
agreed to go with them. I had rather supposed that you wouldn't want to
go, but it now occurs to me that you might change your mind, or rather
decide differently than I had predicted, because the dinner will be at
Sophie's Choice - the Sophie being the one of A La Carte. If you would
like to come and a different time would be more convenient, I'll try to
change it. Of course, the restaurant won't go away. Marie-Jose won't
be there, because, according to Sarah who got it from Mary, she
has married rich.
∂26-Aug-86 1535 JMC An idea for gun registration
To: local-etc-only@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
Comparing rifling may work only when there are a small number of guns
to compare with. Getting a record making feasible a search
in a file of a million guns is more difficult. It would be easier if
the rifling pattern was systematically varied as the gun was rifled.
Another idea is to register bullets by putting a pattern of small
amounts of activatable isotopes that differs from box to box of bullets
and require registration of bullet purchases just as purchase of poisons
is registered. Criminals might try to defeat this by making their own
bullets, but an illegal bullet manufacturing industry would be a target
for law enforcement and would make crime more expensive. Besides most
criminals aren't that well organized.
I believe that some system of tagging may already be in use with explosives.
Adoption of some such system depends on a compromise with the gun
owners' organizations such as the National Rifle Association. The
NRA people rightly believe that much of the political force behind
proposals to register guns comes from people who view it as a first
step to banning them altogether. Therefore, they resist all such
proposals. Suppose universal registration and tagging were combined in a
constitutional amendment with a prohibition of state and local regulations
restricting ownership by respectable people.
It would be interesting to know the attitude that would be taken by
people for and against present gun control proposals. Different
compromises are possible, but what about the idea of compromise
in general? Or is it "Victory or death"?
Flaming encouraged.
-------
∂26-Aug-86 2048 JMC re: An idea for gun registration
To: G.MDP@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue 26 Aug 86 19:46:12-PDT.]
Hand loading, as it is called, is indeed a common hobby among
certain gun enthusiasts. It requires, however, equipment
time and skill not often available to the average
thug who wants to hold up a 7-11.
∂26-Aug-86 2100 JMC Message of 26-Aug-86 20:45:52
To: billw@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
This is the second time MAIL SU-ETC got the following reply from SCORE.
∂26-Aug-86 2051 Mailer@SU-SCORE.ARPA Message of 26-Aug-86 20:45:52
Received: from SCORE.STANFORD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 26 Aug 86 20:51:47 PDT
Date: Tue 26 Aug 86 20:45:58-PDT
From: The Mailer Daemon <Mailer@SU-SCORE.ARPA>
To: JMC@SU-AI.ARPA
Subject: Message of 26-Aug-86 20:45:52
Message failed for the following:
local-etc-only@SU-SCORE.ARPA.#Internet: No such directory name
------------
Received: from SAIL.STANFORD.EDU by SU-SCORE.ARPA with TCP; Tue 26 Aug 86 20:45:54-PDT
Date: 26 Aug 86 2048 PDT
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU>
Subject: re: An idea for gun registration
To: G.MDP@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue 26 Aug 86 19:46:12-PDT.]
Hand loading, as it is called, is indeed a common hobby among
certain gun enthusiasts. It requires, however, equipment
time and skill not often available to the average
thug who wants to hold up a 7-11.
-------
∂26-Aug-86 2101 JMC And idea for gun registration
To: local-etc-only@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
Hand loading, as it is called, is indeed a common hobby among
certain gun enthusiasts. It requires, however, equipment
time and skill not often available to the average
thug who wants to hold up a 7-11.
∂26-Aug-86 2253 JMC multiple messages
To: cramer@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
The SAIL etc file ended up with 3 copies of your latest and an
additional copy of my message forwarded by you. I suppose other
bulletin boards have been similarly enriched.
∂27-Aug-86 1034 JMC re: Alliant users meeting
To: JJW, CLT
[In reply to message from JJW rcvd 27-Aug-86 10:26-PT.]
Sure.
∂27-Aug-86 1035 JMC
To: VAL
Yuri Gurevich has applied to go to the Moscow meeting.
∂27-Aug-86 1215 JMC
To: VAL
Gurevich, Yuri (o:313 763 4526)(h:971-2652)(n:"yg%eecs.umich.csnet"@CSNET-RELAY)
Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Dept.
University of Michigan
Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109 1109
∂29-Aug-86 2341 JMC re: McDermott status
To: hector%utai.toronto.edu@RELAY.CS.NET
[In reply to message sent 28 Aug 86 09:17:41 EDT.]
I think I can submit something on time, because it's mostly written when
I read the original draft. It will also comment on the Hanks and
McDermott prize paper which seriously misunderstands circumscription.
However, I doubt that controversy per se will constitute progress, but
we'll see when you distribute the submissions.
∂29-Aug-86 2344 JMC re: your comments
To: shoham@YALE.ARPA
[In reply to message sent 28 Aug 86 20:23:32 EDT.]
Please send the new version.
∂29-Aug-86 2347 JMC
To: RA
Please send him the requested memo.
Now the reason for writing to you is to obtain from you a copy of an internal
memo 'Map colouring and the Kowalski doctrine' which I believe you had
circulated. Also, I would be glad to hear any comments from you. I will be
visiting Ehud Shapiro early October at Stanford, and perhaps we can get a
chance to talk about this, and the broad programme of research I am working on,
then. I would be glad to send you some of my papers on the definition and
semantics of the language CP[!,|,&] (which contains these control constructs).
Thanks,
Vijay Saraswat
Department of Computer Science
Carnegie-Mellon University
Pittsburgh Pa 15216.
-------
∂30-Aug-86 1703 JMC re: AI DISC: Update and Searle's Reply
To: vijay@ERNIE.Berkeley.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sat, 30 Aug 86 15:55:55 PDT.]
It was received promptly.
∂30-Aug-86 1731 JMC re: AI DISC: Update and Searle's Reply
To: vijay@ERNIE.Berkeley.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sat, 30 Aug 86 15:55:55 PDT.]
Do you want anything further concerning Searle? It would
be very short.
∂31-Aug-86 1136 JMC re: AI DISC: Update and Searle's Reply
To: vijay@ERNIE.Berkeley.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun, 31 Aug 86 10:53:22 PDT.]
OK, there will be some more --- including perhaps some new topics.
∂01-Sep-86 1103 JMC
To: RA
scarle.6
∂01-Sep-86 1229 JMC
To: RWW
The following expression is the one that was given. Fed to Maclisp,
it indeed returns itself - converted to caps.
((lambda (X) (list X (list (quote quote) X)))
(quote (lambda (X) (list X (list (quote quote) X)))))
∂01-Sep-86 1439 JMC hook.2
To: RA
Find out from his office in Hoover whether it is better to mail
this to him in Vermont or at Stanford. We can do both, of course.
∂01-Sep-86 1511 JMC re: 2nd Knowledge Acquisition Workshop
To: AAAI-OFFICE@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu 28 Aug 86 10:24:04-PDT.]
I have decided to support Kowalik's second workshop. I see you
have a copy of the proposal. That will be $5K. Please inform him.
∂01-Sep-86 1538 JMC re: Fifth Topic -- Special Request
To: OTA-CIT@A.ISI.EDU
[In reply to message sent 27 Aug 1986 05:39:56 EDT.]
I have no problem with DARPA support of basic research in AI. Indeed I'm
about to request a renewal of my contract. However, it is important to
remember that DARPA support is based on the view that basic research in AI
will help defense. Should they stop taking that view, the support will
stop. Therefore, DARPA support, however large, (like NIH support) should
be considered supplemental to the support of AI research based on AI as a
basic scientific topic. This must be from NSF.
As to the two proposed projects. Both are applied research except to
the extent they can be considered example projects. Over 20 years I
think actual basic research will have a higher payoff. This differs
from the view that basic and applied research are best advanced by
building more and bigger expert systems.
1. The forecaster's associate resembles the DARPA pilot's associate except
that the time scale is different. Whichever agency thinks it's a good
idea should fund it provided they get convincing proposals.
2. The "intelligent library" strikes me as similar to old information
retrieval projects. My applied view is that something much duller
will be vastly more useful and is long overdue. Namely, since about
1970 it has been technically and economically feasible to make the
texts of the books and magazines in the Library of Congress electronically
available throughout the country and the world. Read them with OCR,
store them on disk, and keep the catalog on disk also. Once this
is done, intelligent libraries will become a sensible project, but
until the documents themselves are more conveniently available, the
intelligent library will have to be designed with one hand behind its
back. Even making the existing disk-based catalogs universally
available would be an important thing to do. I make considerable
use of Stanford's disk-based catalog even though it only goes back
to 1973.
∂01-Sep-86 1614 JMC reserve for cs306
To: library@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
3) Henderson, Peter, FUNCTIONAL PROGRAMMING (Englewood Cliffs, N.J. : c1980.)
LOCATION: QA76.6.H46: Math & Comp Sci
∂02-Sep-86 1138 JMC Weening registration
To: cheadle@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
CC: RPG@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU, ullman@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU,
JJW@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
I approve lifting the hold on his registration.
∂02-Sep-86 1213 JMC two articles
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
A Moral Guide to Guerrilla War by Charles Krauthammer in the September 8
New Republic discusses issues concerning when it is legitimate for the
U.S. to help guerrilla movements.
A Case of Academic Freedom by Joseph Epstein in the September Commentary
discusses an assistant professor at Northwestern University being
denied tenure for disrupting a meeting where Arthur Calero of the Contras
was to speak. The author of the article seems inclined to support the
denial of tenure.
Both magazines are in the CS lounge.
∂02-Sep-86 1301 JMC Swedish referendum
To: RA
The letter to NYT refers to a Swedish referendum on nuclear power. Please
find out in what year that referendum occurred. The reference librarians
will help.
∂02-Sep-86 1311 JMC re: International Logic Meeting
To: minker@MIMSY.UMD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 2 Sep 86 16:03:54 EDT.]
Carey said he would look into the matter.
It is not simply a matter of what the Soviets will do without pressure.
Surely Lifschitz and Gurevich will not get in if the organizers of the
meeting don't take a strong stand. I want to use this preliminary
information to persuade the organizers to commit themselves to move the
meeting from the Soviet Union if Lifschitz and Gurevich can't attend.
Your characterization of what the State Department is leery about can't
be accurate. Thousands of Americans visit their former homelands. Both
Lifschitz and Gurevich left the Soviet Union legally. If they get visas
their going to the Soviet Union will be publicized in advance. How
many international meetings will there be in the Soviet Union if
they kidnap an attendee.
∂02-Sep-86 1349 JMC
To: RA
I have the info about the Swedish referendum.
∂02-Sep-86 1403 JMC proposal
To: amarel@A.ISI.EDU, simpson@A.ISI.EDU
CC: VAL@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU, CLT@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU,
LES@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
We will soon submit a renewal proposal for our work on basic research in
formal reasoning including non-monotonic reasoning, formalization of
common sense knowledge and logical properties of computer programs.
Shall we just send it or would you like some of us to visit?
∂02-Sep-86 1528 JMC Luis Pereira and Stanford in Portugal
To: feigenbaum@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU, nilsson@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
Ed and Nils:
I had planned to talk to you both but didn't catch you when I
was thinking about it. At the London logic programming conference
at the beginning of August, Prof. Luis Pereira of the University
of Lisbon asked if I would recommend him in connection with some
proposals concerning Stanford in Portugal. He seemed to think
the two of you were somehow concerned. He advertises that his
group is strong in logic programming and suggests it as an area
for concentration. Indeed his group is strong in logic programming,
and in fact it's the only computer science group in Portugal that
can be described as strong in anything. I visited them once and
had one of his people, Antonio Porto, as a visitor for a quarter.
Obligation completed. - John
∂02-Sep-86 1530 JMC tinlap3
To: pereira@SRI-STRIPE.ARPA
I have a request from Yorick for AAAI support of TINLAP3. Do you
have an opinion?
∂02-Sep-86 1753 JMC tinlap3
To: aaai-office@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
I have decided to support this workshop. I'll send you a copy of the
letter, and you can inform Wilks.
∂02-Sep-86 1755 JMC copy of letter to Claudia
To: RA
I gave you a letter to file from Yorick Wilks asking for AAAI support
for a workshop. Please send a copy to Claudia Mazzetti.
∂03-Sep-86 1423 JMC
To: RA
Fenstad and Tbilisi.
∂03-Sep-86 1428 JMC re: cs-306 (cont.)
To: LIBRARY@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed 3 Sep 86 08:19:31-PDT.]
The Henderson book is the only item so far. I believe the 3 is left over
from my copying the book description from Socrates.
∂03-Sep-86 1430 JMC re: meeting with Matt
To: VAL
[In reply to message rcvd 03-Sep-86 10:16-PT.]
Friday at 11 will be fine for Ginsberg.
∂03-Sep-86 1431 JMC re: Attending conferences in the USSR
To: VAL
[In reply to message rcvd 03-Sep-86 13:01-PT.]
Please find out any details about Kheifets's trip. In particular did
the SLAC people have to make any special representations.
∂03-Sep-86 1804 JMC nijmegen
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
I'll guess Belgium, and then I'll look it up.
∂03-Sep-86 1805 JMC nijmegen
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
Now I have looked it up in Webster's Collegiate, and it
is the Netherlands.
∂03-Sep-86 2036 JMC video recorders
To: MRC@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
I am thinking of buying a camcorder. I vaguely recall from old bboards
that you might know about the merits of what's for sale. Is it so?
∂04-Sep-86 0001 JMC re: video recorders
To: MRC%PANDA@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed 3 Sep 86 23:10:49-PDT.]
Thanks. I had seen one Sony in Emporium and had about decided to get
the Canon 8mm, but it must have been the M8, because it did require
a separate playback unit. Do you have an opinion of the Canon? Are
there stores with really good selections an knowledgable salesmen?
You presume correctly.
∂04-Sep-86 0933 JMC
To: RA
∂04-Sep-86 0608 rms@PREP.AI.MIT.EDU
Received: from PREP.AI.MIT.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 4 Sep 86 06:08:10 PDT
Received: by PREP.AI.MIT.EDU; Thu, 4 Sep 86 09:10:27 EDT
Date: Thu, 4 Sep 86 09:10:27 EDT
From: rms@PREP.AI.MIT.EDU (Richard M. Stallman)
Message-Id: <8609041310.AA18589@prep.ai.mit.edu>
To: jmc@su-ai.arpa
Did my airline ticket receipts arrive and get processed ok?
Is Greep making any progress on implementation?
∂04-Sep-86 0934 JMC re: video recorders
To: MRC%PANDA@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu 4 Sep 86 00:29:51-PDT.]
Thanks for the information.
∂04-Sep-86 0957 JMC re: question
To: SJG
[In reply to message rcvd 04-Sep-86 09:54-PT.]
Right.
∂04-Sep-86 1036 JMC re: [Reply to message sent: Thu, 4 Sep 86 09:10:27 EDT]
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 04-Sep-86 10:21-PT.]
yes, consulting, but I think he'll need to submit an invoice for that.
∂04-Sep-86 1359 JMC Models of the world for common-sense reasoning purposes
To: RA
CC: VAL
Please tell him Monday at 3pm.
∂04-Sep-86 1346 jbn@glacier.stanford.edu Models of the world for common-sense reasoning purposes
Received: from GLACIER.STANFORD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 4 Sep 86 13:45:47 PDT
Received: by glacier.stanford.edu with Sendmail; Thu, 4 Sep 86 13:46:24 pdt
Date: Thu, 4 Sep 86 13:46:24 pdt
From: John B. Nagle <jbn@glacier.stanford.edu>
Subject: Models of the world for common-sense reasoning purposes
To: JMC@SAIL
When would it be convenient for me to meet with you and your
research assistant to talk about the ideas I discussed with you
previously? At the moment, next week is completely open for me
with the exception of Tuesday, September 9. Please leave a
message at 415-856-0767 in reply.
John Nagle
∂04-Sep-86 1652 JMC re: INFO on INION
To: MYERS@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu 4 Sep 86 08:26:47-PDT.]
"jointly set up by the Soviet Union and Austria" suggests the IIASA, the
International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, located near Vienna.
It was set up during detente, and one of its activities involves databases.
The U.S. Government withdrew from IIASA, but some U.S. participation still
exists organized by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
headquartered in Cambridge or Somerville, MA 617 492-8800. A phone call
to them might be a suitable move of desperation.
∂08-Sep-86 1311 JMC Japanese LISP machines
To: CLT
∂08-Sep-86 1103 FEIGENBAUM@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA Japanese LISP machines
Received: from SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 8 Sep 86 11:03:55 PDT
Date: Mon 8 Sep 86 11:03:30-PDT
From: Edward Feigenbaum <FEIGENBAUM@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA>
Subject: Japanese LISP machines
To: jmc@SU-AI.ARPA
Message-ID: <12237341310.51.FEIGENBAUM@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA>
John,
(please forward this message to Carolyn)
(the message is for both of you but I dont know her e-mail address)
NTT has loaned my lab two TAO/ELIS lisp machines. They are installed
and running well in the sumex machine room. They are accessed by telephone
line (or perhaps ethernet, I dont remember) and are operated via the
usual dumb terminals (i.e. they are not yet "display oriented" in the
way that symbolics or xerox lisp machines are).
John had a demo of this machine in Japan, I think. It's a very
interesting machine since it has lisp,smalltalk, and prolog all
microcoded, and the tradeoffs have been done very well. It is
quite fast relative to other lisp machines (on an interpreter-vs-
interpreter comparison).
Hiroshe Okuno gave the KSL people a demo of the machine doing various
tasks last week. Would you like him to give a demo to people in your
project(s)? We should also see if there is any interest in your
project(s) in using the machine(s). [there are two machines].
Let me know what the interest is.
Ed
-------
∂08-Sep-86 1311 JMC re: Japanese LISP machines
To: FEIGENBAUM@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon 8 Sep 86 11:03:30-PDT.]
Carolyn is CLT@SAIL, but I did forward your message.
∂08-Sep-86 1353 JMC Another AAAI Workshop
To: aaai-office@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
I have decided to support this one. A copy of the letter is on its
way, and Brown will phone you.
Sept. 8
letter from Frank Brown, U. of Kansas
w. on Logical Solutions to the Frame Problem
U. of Kansas, 2 days in March 1986, agreed Sept. 8
∂08-Sep-86 1402 JMC re: Quals for Marianne Baudinet
To: RA, CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 05-Sep-86 12:41-PT.]
Please tell whomever that Carolyn Talcott (clt@sail) has agreed to
replace me on this exam. September 30 is ok with her. I forgot
to ask her about 2pm.
∂08-Sep-86 1443 JMC re: Comp reading list
To: WINOGRAD@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon 8 Sep 86 14:32:29-PDT.]
As I understand it AI isn't a subject of the Comp any more, and I have
no objections to that. However, if there is any reading on AI, I object
if there is more than one book, e.g. if there is more than the Elaine
Rich book. There is a tendency for reading lists to expand indefinitely,
and I want to resist it. If there isn't such a problem, please don't
forward the message. Otherwise, send it on to Don.
∂08-Sep-86 1512 JMC section for report
To: jeh@GVAX.CS.CORNELL.EDU
CC: nilsson@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
Here it is finally.
Artificial Intelligence as a branch of computer science
Artificial intelligence is concerned with making machines,
especially computers, behave intelligently. As a branch of computer
science, it suffers from the fact that what constitutes intelligent
behavior is still not fully defined.
Indeed the name ``artificial intelligence'' arose in 1955 in
connection with a proposal for a summer study that was held
at Dartmouth College in the summer of 1956. The reason for choosing
such an ambitious name was that a previous effort, a call for
papers which it was hoped would elicit papers in the area had
been called more modestly {\it Automata Studies} had elicited
papers defining automata theory --- a branch of mathematics.
Even today, people who start with the idea of doing artificial
intelligence find the lack of definition frustrating and tend
to veer off either into some related topic admitting a more
mathematical treatment at the present state of science or
into purely empirical experimental programming.
However, if computer programs with human level intelligence
are to be achieved, it is necessary to study what intelligence is
even though the problems are ill-defined.
The problems have been attacked on several levels.
1. The human and animal physiological level. Starting with
studies of the neuron, people have asked what the assemblies of
neurons in the nervous system do. In parallel, others ask what
assemblies of mathematically defined ``neurons'' can be constructed
to do. Pattern recognition has been the goal of most of this study.
Hardware has been built or simulated by computer programs.
2. Others have taken a psychological approach. The behavior
of humans and animals in problem-solving situations is studied.
Hypothesized mechanisms are simulated in computers and whether
they exhibit the behavior and solve the problems is studied. From
the beginning, the simulation programs have required large amounts
of internal state, and this is a major cause of the demise of
behaviorism which demanded theories that directly related stimulus
and response.
3. Direct study of the relation between problems and their
solution methods. This has been the most popular and successful
AI methodology.
The idea is that intelligent goal-achieving behavior can be studied
apart from the specifics of the way animals or humans do it. From
this point of view AI is a branch of engineering or applied mathematics
akin to operations research or ``mathematical programming''. It differs
fundamentally from those disciplines in that is concerned with the
treatment of problems before a delimited mathematical model has been
found for them. AI programs may either establish a model and use
it or may treat the problem without ever establishing a delimited
model, i.e. without ever establishing what phenomena are to be
taken into account. Post facto, i.e. after the system has decided
what to do, it can be asked what facts it did take into account.
The direct treatments of problems may be regarded as
distributed along an axis. One pole of the axis involves formulating
the facts as formulas in languages of mathematical logic and deciding
what to do by reasoning with these formulas. Recently it has been
discovered that logical deduction is not the only reasoning method
required; that it must be supplemented by some form of non-monotonic
reasoning. Various approaches to formalizing non-monotonic reasoning
are being explored.
Towards the other end of the axis lies the current expert
system technology. The extreme is just programming various solution
methods in so-called AI languages, e.g. Lisp or Prolog or the
proprietary systems like ART, KEE and OPS-5 using a variety of
techniques that have been found useful for expressing the specialized
knowledge of a domain expert and reasoning methods used by him.
It is common to use logical formulas in expressing the knowledge
but to use more-or-less ad hoc programs for manipulating it. This
often achieves speed in specialized domains at the cost of generality.
Apart from the schemas outlined above, AI researchers have
pioneered machine implementation of sophisticated sensory and motor
activities, specifically in robotics, speech recognition and computer
vision. Each of these involves intellectual mechanisms that go
beyond the particular topic. For example, computer vision involves
pattern matching problems that also occur elswhere in AI.
Discussing the varied programs of AI research would be
too long for this report, so two subtopics have been chosen for
more detailed treatment --- AI formalisms using mathematical
logic and and computer vision.
∂08-Sep-86 1716 JMC re: ai & law
To: KOHEN@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon 8 Sep 86 16:09:11-PDT.]
Terry Winograd's (tw@sail) student, Anne Gardner, fits that description.
∂08-Sep-86 1751 JMC
To: TW@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
In phdcom, please replace jmc@sail by jmc-lists@sail.
∂08-Sep-86 1755 JMC Re: proposal
To: VAL, LES, CLT
∂04-Sep-86 0734 SIMPSON@A.ISI.EDU Re: proposal
Received: from A.ISI.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 4 Sep 86 07:34:42 PDT
Date: 4 Sep 1986 10:33-EDT
Sender: SIMPSON@A.ISI.EDU
Subject: Re: proposal
From: SIMPSON@A.ISI.EDU
To: JMC@SU-AI.ARPA
Message-ID: <[A.ISI.EDU] 4-Sep-86 10:33:52.SIMPSON>
In-Reply-To: The message of 02 Sep 86 1403 PDT from John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU>
John: I believe the best course of action is for you to send a
draft of the proposal for our "unofficial" review. That way if
there are changes necessary they can be included in the
"official" proposal. The offical proposal will not be a renewal,
but will need to be submitted in response to one of DARPA's broad
agency announcements which solicited computer science research.
See for example the 17 December 1985 issue of the Commerce
Business Daily (page 63) or the 2 May 1986 CBD (page 48). Both
of these solicitations expire 30 Sept, but there will be new ones
issued for FY87. -- Bob
∂08-Sep-86 1757 JMC cbd
To: LES
Please obtain the cbd pages mentioned by Simpson or get Rutie to do it.
∂09-Sep-86 0024 JMC letter to Shankar
To: LES
Does this look ok?
Dear Shankar:
I am please to offer you two year appointment as a Research
Associate in the Formal Reasoning Group of the Computer Science
Department of Stanford University. The appointment begins when
you are ready but before January 1, 1987 unless we agree on something
else. It ends August 31, 1988. It can be extended if this seems
worthwhile to both of us.
The salary for the first year is at an annual rate of
$46,000.
Sincerely,
∂09-Sep-86 0025 JMC
To: RA
shanka.1
∂09-Sep-86 0908 JMC re: Workshop proposal
To: Bonnie@CIS.UPENN.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 9 Sep 86 07:16 EDT.]
Subject: Enough to allow determining whether it is included in AAAI
subject matter and extent of overlap with other workshops.
When and where:
Program Committee:
How many people and how to be selected.
Budget: We don't pay overhead or honoraria for speakers.
Announcement: For AI Magazine if time and attendee selection method permit.
∂09-Sep-86 1005 JMC Your paper
To: RA
∂09-Sep-86 0945 mc%zen.DEC@decwrl.DEC.COM Your paper
Received: from DECWRL.DEC.COM by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 9 Sep 86 09:45:08 PDT
Received: by decwrl.dec.com (5.54.2/4.7.34)
id AA22404; Tue, 9 Sep 86 09:44:36 PDT
Message-Id: <8609091644.AA22404@decwrl.dec.com>
Date: Tuesday, 9 Sep 1986 09:42:04-PDT
From: mc%zen.DEC@decwrl.DEC.COM (Miguel Calejo)
To: jmc@sail.stanford.edu, "jmc@sail.stanford.edu"%ARPA.DEC@decwrl.DEC.COM
Subject: Your paper
Dear John
Could you please send me your paper
"Applications of Circumscription to Formalizing Common Sense Knowledge" ?
Thanks.
Best regards,
Luis Moniz Pereira
Universidade Nova de Lisboa
Departamento de Informatica
2825 Monte da Caparica
Portugal
∂09-Sep-86 1007 JMC re: SE2
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 09-Sep-86 09:38-PT.]
It should be a letter "Attention: Mimi Scrandis". They supplied a
ticket back, because my trip was changed so that I went to Boston
and back from there.
∂09-Sep-86 1513 JMC
To: GRP
09-10 Wed. 11am, Greep here
∂09-Sep-86 1518 JMC next visit
To: boyer@MCC.COM
CC: VAL@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
How about two days next week? Thursday and Friday would suit me best,
but any days are possible.
∂09-Sep-86 1655 JMC re: medical question?
To: SJG@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent 09 Sep 86 1256 PDT.]
Boiling both down (in separate pots), skimming off the fat and weighing it
would provide an indisputable answer, if only because of the removal of
possible disputants.
∂09-Sep-86 1702 JMC
To: SJG
Bob Simpson at DARPA, Office of Computing Activities nsf
∂09-Sep-86 1721 JMC
To: RA
I need a No. 2 pencil.
∂09-Sep-86 2209 JMC
To: RA
fensta.1
∂10-Sep-86 0934 JMC
To: RA
fensta.1
∂10-Sep-86 0936 JMC re: next visit
To: AI.BOYER@MCC.COM
[In reply to message sent Wed, 10 Sep 1986 11:20 CDT.]
Thursday and Friday it is then. Yes, have Ellie make reservations.
∂10-Sep-86 1040 JMC re: rivin visit
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 10-Sep-86 10:38-PT.]
yes
∂10-Sep-86 1328 JMC re: Chernobyl
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 10-Sep-86 13:04-PT.]
I believe her first name is Ella, and she lives on the campus. You
should be able to find out from Robert Conquest at Hoover or his
secretary. Haley's address
Frank Haley, Press Secretary
State House
Concord, N.H.
but I haven't given you the pictures yet.
∂10-Sep-86 1427 JMC re: meeting
To: AIR
[In reply to message rcvd 10-Sep-86 14:25-PT.]
Let's make it 3:30 if that's convenient.
∂10-Sep-86 1433 JMC re: machine learning workshop
To: langley@CIP.UCI.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 10 Sep 86 14:21:55 -0800.]
Is this the one proposed by Derek Sleeman and Bruce Buchanan or
has your proposal fallen into a crack. If the former, I'm waiting
for an actual proposal. If the latter remind me.
∂10-Sep-86 1654 JMC
To: RA
scienc.4
∂10-Sep-86 1756 JMC
To: RA
fensta.1 again
∂11-Sep-86 0910 JMC re: your american express card
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 11-Sep-86 09:04-PT.]
4-87
∂11-Sep-86 1152 JMC
To: RA
Again fensta.1.
∂11-Sep-86 2309 JMC re: meeting
To: JK
[In reply to message rcvd 11-Sep-86 20:37-PT.]
See you then.
∂12-Sep-86 0918 JMC
To: RA
Fredkin's zip is 02146.
∂12-Sep-86 0919 JMC re: fredkin check
To: AAAI-OFFICE@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri 12 Sep 86 08:56:04-PDT.]
It was Tullio Regge. I have just sent back the check made out
to Stanford. Also I just talked to Fredkin. He will send
another check to AAAI.
∂12-Sep-86 1503 JMC tex
To: RA
Please copy page 5 of moscow[e86,jmc] into a file kheife[e86,jmc] and TEX
it after suitable TEX decorations.
∂12-Sep-86 1531 JMC
To: RA
∂12-Sep-86 1514 rms@PREP.AI.MIT.EDU
Received: from PREP.AI.MIT.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 12 Sep 86 15:14:02 PDT
Received: by PREP.AI.MIT.EDU; Fri, 12 Sep 86 18:02:50 EDT
Date: Fri, 12 Sep 86 18:02:50 EDT
From: rms@PREP.AI.MIT.EDU (Richard M. Stallman)
Message-Id: <8609122202.AA13172@prep.ai.mit.edu>
To: jmc@su-ai.arpa
What is the status of reimbursing me?
I recall that a week or more ago Rutie sent me a message
that she was mailing me an invoice to sign and mail back.
I have not received it. Is this still the situation?
Perhaps it has been lost in the mail.
Replying-To: rms@PREP.AI.MIT.EDU
Reply-Subject: reply to message
Reply-Text:
[In reply to message sent Fri, 12 Sep 86 18:02:50 EDT.]
Give it a little longer, but I'll check that she has mailed it. She
is RA@SAIL.
∂12-Sep-86 1531 JMC reply to message
To: rms@PREP.AI.MIT.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri, 12 Sep 86 18:02:50 EDT.]
Give it a little longer, but I'll check that she has mailed it. She
is RA@SAIL.
∂12-Sep-86 1611 JMC
To: RA
chisum.1
∂12-Sep-86 1651 JMC DARPA proposal
To: VAL, CLT, LES
DARPA[E86,JMC] contains some notes and beginning material. Page 4 contains
a draft beginning and some material on formalization of common sense knowledge
organized around the goal of creating a common sense database. This will
be revised and extend. CLT should write a section on mathematical theory
of computation, and VAL should write about computing with non-monotonic
reasoning, whatever else he wants to include. We'll have to figure out
how to get in something about interactive theorem proving in order to
include the support of Shankar in the proposal.
∂12-Sep-86 1656 JMC re: [Reply to message recvd: 12 Sep 86 16:11 Pacific Time]
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 12-Sep-86 16:51-PT.]
Stanford is better for this, although it actually doesn't matter.
∂12-Sep-86 1829 JMC re: nsf proposal
To: SJG, VAL
[In reply to message from SJG rcvd 10-Sep-86 13:24-PT.]
I'm not sure I didn't answer this already. Yes, you can submit another
proposal, but you should ask them what its prospects are. Who would
be PI? I think I made it clear that I don't want to be PI of any
proposals except the ones I initiate. Please don't include any of
my time or VAL's.
∂14-Sep-86 2345 JMC paper
To: RPG
QLISP[e86,jmc] contains a draft of a suggested section. Also I have
some comments on what you have written. Please phone me at home or
at the office to discuss them.
∂15-Sep-86 1047 JMC Emigre
To: VAL
∂15-Sep-86 1006 minker@jacksun.cs.umd.edu Emigre
Received: from MIMSY.UMD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 15 Sep 86 10:05:43 PDT
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Date: Mon, 15 Sep 86 11:51:22 edt
From: minker@jacksun.cs.umd.edu (Jack Minker)
Return-Path: <minker>
Message-Id: <8609151551.AA08118@jacksun.cs.umd.edu>
To: JMC@su-ai.arpa, VAL@su-ai.arpa
Subject: Emigre
Dorothy Hirsch phoned to tell me of an emigree who went
back to the Soviet Union for a meeting. He is:
Shimon Suckever
Plasma Physics Laboratory
Princeton, New Jersey
(619) 683-3000.
Jack
∂15-Sep-86 1058 JMC
To: RA
bibel.re2
∂15-Sep-86 1107 JMC
To: VAL
See top[e86,jmc].
∂15-Sep-86 1558 JMC re: logical solutions to the frame problem workshop
To: AAAI-OFFICE@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon 15 Sep 86 15:09:42-PDT.]
Unless you think I should do otherwise.
∂16-Sep-86 1245 JMC re: DARPA proposal
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 16-Sep-86 11:35-PT.]
That was when I expected him to be here by now. I assume you will
write a section covering theory of computation.
∂16-Sep-86 1306 JMC free speech at universities
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
There is a conflict between some people being offended by insults and
other people's freedom of speech. For example, some people are
offended by blasphemy, others by insults to the flag, the Soviets
by "slandering the state", still others by pornography. Remarks
deemed racist offend others, some are offended by criticism of
homosexuality. Some say that their remarks objecting to affirmative
action or some measures taken in the name of affirmative action are
taken as racist. Some people claim the right to disrupt speeches
by officials of the U.S. Government on campus on the grounds that
U.S. Government policies are killing people in Central America, etc.
The success of some groups in preventing various forms of self-expression
depends, first of all on whether they try. Secondly, it depends on
their power in various institutions. The National Review, a magazine
that wouldn't object to being called right wing, cites in its current
issue that I have put in the lounge, instances of suppression of
speech and other forms of self-expression in Yale, Harvard,
Northwestern, Dartmouth and other universities. The forms of self-expression
range from breaking shanties to putting posters on one's own dormitory
door. The rightists claim that protesters of the 1960s have become
the oppressive deans of the 1980s.
Have such things happened at Stanford?
Should they?
$5 for the most ingenious intellectual gerrymander making a clever
distinction that shows that what "we" do is legitimate protest protected
by the first amendment whereas what "they" do is merely an incitement
to murder. The gerrymander can be from either a leftist or rightist
point of view. However, some points will be given for similarity to
things that have already occurred, especially recently.
∂16-Sep-86 1357 JMC computer science according to the New York Times
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
"Prospects for major advances in software appear to be negligible"
p.15, 1986 Sept. 16, box in article by Philip M. Boffey
∂16-Sep-86 1720 JMC
To: VAL, RLG
I hope you both can join me in meeting Genesereth at 10 Monday.
∂16-Sep-86 1829 JMC End heroin prohibition
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
I knew a doctor in London whose specialty was drug addiction. It was
her opinion also that allowing addicts to obtain heroin legally had
worked out badly. Exactly how I didn't understand.
∂16-Sep-86 1931 JMC end heroin prohibition
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
Now I think I remember what my doctor friend said about her experience.
Addicts commit crime to get money to buy heroin. Therefore, one would
expect that if they could get the heroin legally and free they would
commit less crime. Alas, the experience was that they didn't commit
less crime, perhaps more. I don't know the revised theory that accounts
for the unexpected result of the experiment.
∂16-Sep-86 2109 JMC re: Contact
To: ELLIOTT%SLACVM.BITNET@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 16 Sep 86 17:02:17 PDT.]
Tomorrow, Wednesday the 17th or Friday the 26th are feasible for me.
You can phone me in the morning 857-0672 or 723-4430.
∂17-Sep-86 0133 JMC an excerpt from a news story
To: MRC@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
a220 1249 16 Sep 86
AM-Infant Mortality,0483
1. Finland 6.0
8. Taiwan 8.9
17. United States 11.5
Although the Population Reference Bureau did not include them in
Tuesday's report, previous studies showed that the Soviet Union had
an infant mortality rate of 31 per 1,000 live births and China a rate
of 50.
∂17-Sep-86 1045 JMC re: infant mortality rate in China
To: MRC%PANDA@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed 17 Sep 86 10:26:51-PDT.]
I was drawing attention to the very low rate in Taiwan.
∂17-Sep-86 1320 JMC re: Winter books
To: MODICA@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed 17 Sep 86 11:01:49-PDT.]
Yes, I'll be teaching it with the help of Vladimir Lifschitz. In the past
I have only use course notes. If we decide to do otherwise, we'll let you
know.
∂17-Sep-86 1323 JMC (→20152 20-Sep-86)
To: "#___JMC.PLN[2,2]"
back saturday
∂19-Sep-86 1144 JMC
To: RA
Shankar hasn't gotten his letter yet.
∂20-Sep-86 0001 JMC Expired plan
To: JMC
Your plan has just expired. You might want to make a new one.
Here is the text of the old plan:
back saturday
∂20-Sep-86 1814 JMC re: formalities
To: LES
[In reply to message sent Fri 19 Sep 86 13:44:45-CDT.]
Explain it to Shankar.
∂21-Sep-86 1514 JMC mcc invoice
To: RA
2 days consulting
air ticket
car rental in Austin $109.28
$30 parking San Jose - not $40 as on receipt
round trip Stanford-sjo
meals $20
∂22-Sep-86 1642 JMC Workshop in Foundations of AI approved
To: aaai-office@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
I have approved this workshop being organized by David Kirsh for $10K.
He will be in touch with you.
∂22-Sep-86 1707 JMC re: Workshop proposal
To: Bonnie@CIS.UPENN.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 9 Sep 86 07:16 EDT.]
I hope this announcement answers your questions. - John
Workshops in AI sponsored by AAAI.
AAAI will sponsor workshops in particular areas of AI. So far more
than 10 have been sponsored. The format is not prescribed except that
this program does not sponsor large conferences.
Here are some policies.
1. Up to $10K can be approved per workshop.
2. No honoraria for speakers or overhead to institutions will be paid.
3. Proposals should be sent to
John McCarthy.
4. Electronic mail to JMC@SU-AI.STANFORD.EDU is preferred, but U.S.
mail to
Professor John McCarthy
Computer Science Department
Stanford, CA 94305
will also work. If you get impatient you can phone (415)723-4430.
5. Proposals should contain approximations to the following:
a. budget.
b. subject, detailed enough to evaluate relevance to AI
and possible overlap with other workshop proposals.
c. conditions of participation including how papers
and attendees are to be selected.
d. when and where if this is known.
6. Correspondence should be copied to AAAI-OFFICE@SUMEX.STANFORD.EDU
or to
Ms. Claudia Mazzetti, Executive Director
AAAI
445 Burgess St.
Menlo Park, CA 94025
You can phone her at (415)328-3123.
7. After McCarthy has approved the proposal further arrangements should
be made with Mazzetti at the AAAI office. This includes transfer of
money and possible help with publicity and workshop preprints and
publication.
8. After the workshop is finished there should be a report suitable
for publication in AI Magazine.
∂22-Sep-86 1713 JMC re: machine learning workshop
To: langley@CIP.UCI.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 10 Sep 86 14:21:55 -0800.]
It seems I have mislaid your proposal. Please send another.
∂22-Sep-86 1758 JMC peace week
To: minsky@AI.AI.MIT.EDU
First I need to know the sign. Will peace week make nuclear war more or
less likely, and why?
∂22-Sep-86 2106 JMC Laser printer info for Chudnovskys
To: LES
They want to know costs of reasonable configurations of laser printers
for home use to put in a proposal. For example, my configuration or
somewhat smaller. Imagen, and if easy to get, Apple. It should be
sent electronically c/o SPAD at IBM Yorktown or U.S. mail to their
home address which Rutie has.
∂22-Sep-86 2114 JMC re: machine learning workshop
To: langley@CIP.UCI.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 22 Sep 86 17:48:30 -0800.]
The expert is Richard Weyhrauch who is RWW@SU-AI.STANFORD.EDU. He is
also representing the KCL group in the U.S.
∂22-Sep-86 2116 JMC
To: roach@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
Please call me concerning your TAing CS306.
∂23-Sep-86 1317 JMC re: Emigres
To: minker@JACKSUN.CS.UMD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 23 Sep 86 09:59:59 edt.]
Thanks, we know about Kheifets.
∂23-Sep-86 1456 JMC re: [Jim Dray <OTA-CIT@A.ISI.EDU>: [Gary Chapman <chapman@russell.stanford.edu>: Contribution to panel discussion]]
To: OTA-CIT@A.ISI.EDU
[In reply to message sent 23 Sep 1986 12:36:34 EDT.]
I regret that I don't have time to respond at length to all the
points raised by Gary Chapman. It's asking quite a bit for a computer
scientist to respond in detail to a political blast by a political
scientist for whom such blasts are a full time activity. Here are a few
comments.
1. The first part about how DARPA has been an excellent supporter
of AI research is correct. The very large American lead over the rest of
the world in AI is something for which DARPA deserves much of the credit.
In the early 60s, none of the researchers in computer science in general
and AI in particular were old enough to have substantial positions in the
scientific establishment. This establishment was and substantially still
is dominated by people who consider computing entirely as an activity
auxiliary to other fields. But for DARPA it would have been a long time
before computer science would have received substantial support. Britain
provides an example of this. The British developed their first computers
at the same time as the U.S. in the late 1940s, but as late the 1970s
computer science funding was dominated by physicists. Only with the Alvey
program's reaction to the Japanese has this been substantially overcome.
DARPA support came about as a consequence of J.C.R. Licklider's
1962 argument that since defense was increasingly dependent on "command
and control", the Defense Department should support the basic research
behing that technology. Licklider's argument was accepted and turned out
to be correct.
2. Chapman says that many computer scientists supported by DARPA believe
that their work has no actual military implications. It suits his political
strategy not to mention that many more are entirely aware that the work
has military application and are content with that, believing that the
U.S. really does have a problem of defense and wanting to help.
3. Chapman suggests a vague scenario of autonomous weapons being more
inhumane than present weapons. Autonomous weapons have existed for
a long time, e.g. land and sea mines. Because of their primitive
character they don't care whom they blow up, and they don't even stop
being dangerous when the war is over. My own opinion is that computerized
weapons are more likely to obey whatever restrictions are programmed into
them, e.g. to limit killing civilians and enemy soldiers surrendering, than
human soldiers have been.
If this is so, then the question raised by Chapman of who can be punished
when they go wrong, as they sometimes will, is a red herring.
4. Chapman also raises the customary red herring of confusing research
development with putting the weapon systems into the field. The time to
consider precisely what restrictions shall be programmed into the weapon
systems is when deployment is being considered. Before that research
should aim at making it possible to build in restrictions. Deployment
decisions must take into account what restrictions are desired and the
extent to which they can be reliably implemented by the technology being
used.
5. Such little experience as exists shows that "smart weapons" in fact
reduce civilian casualties. The Israeli raid on the Tunisia PLO headquarters
and the U.S. attack on Libya produced far fewer civilian casualties than
earlier technology bombardment.
6. The idea that developing autonomous weapons constitutes a war crime
in itself is just a variant of the pacifist argument that all preparation
for war is a crime. Pacifism has some arguments in its favor, but there's
nothing new about this one.
7. It is indeed true that the current DARPA emphasis on specific
applications may limit DARPA support of basic research in AI, and this
would be unfortunate. It is wishful thinking to suppose that the four
DARPA projects or any other specific applications, defense or otherwise,
will in themselves elicit the basic research advances needed for long term
applications. It is very important that DARPA and other agencies with
applied missions do their share of supporting frankly basic research
relevant to the technologies used in their missions. Even the stated
goals of the DARPA projects most likely require advances that won't come
about through direct work on the applied goals. Increasing the NSF budget
is also important, but maintaining a variety of sources of support has
served the U.S. well in the past in mitigating errors of the
establishment.
∂23-Sep-86 1517 JMC re: [Jim Dray <OTA-CIT@A.ISI.EDU>: [Gary Chapman <chapman@russell.stanford.edu>: Contribution to panel discussion]]
To: OTA-CIT@A.ISI.EDU, ar@ALV.UMD.EDU, ohlander@B.ISI.EDU,
ar@ALV.UMD.EDU, JMC@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
CC: chapman@RUSSELL.STANFORD.EDU, BrianSmith.pa@XEROX.COM,
WINOGRAD@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from OTA-CIT@A.ISI.EDU sent 23 Sep 1986 12:36:34 EDT.]
I regret that I don't have time to respond at length to all the
points raised by Gary Chapman. It's asking quite a bit for a computer
scientist to respond in detail to a political blast by a political
scientist for whom such blasts are a full time activity. Here are a few
comments.
1. The first part about how DARPA has been an excellent supporter
of AI research is correct. The very large American lead over the rest of
the world in AI is something for which DARPA deserves much of the credit.
In the early 60s, none of the researchers in computer science in general
and AI in particular were old enough to have substantial positions in the
scientific establishment. This establishment was and substantially still
is dominated by people who consider computing entirely as an activity
auxiliary to other fields. But for DARPA it would have been a long time
before computer science would have received substantial support. Britain
provides an example of this. The British developed their first computers
at the same time as the U.S. in the late 1940s, but as late the 1970s
computer science funding was dominated by physicists. Only with the Alvey
program's reaction to the Japanese has this been substantially overcome.
DARPA support came about as a consequence of J.C.R. Licklider's
1962 argument that since defense was increasingly dependent on "command
and control", the Defense Department should support the basic research
behing that technology. Licklider's argument was accepted and turned out
to be correct.
2. Chapman says that many computer scientists supported by DARPA believe
that their work has no actual military implications. It suits his political
strategy not to mention that many more are entirely aware that the work
has military application and are content with that, believing that the
U.S. really does have a problem of defense and wanting to help.
3. Chapman suggests a vague scenario of autonomous weapons being more
inhumane than present weapons. Autonomous weapons have existed for
a long time, e.g. land and sea mines. Because of their primitive
character they don't care whom they blow up, and they don't even stop
being dangerous when the war is over. My own opinion is that computerized
weapons are more likely to obey whatever restrictions are programmed into
them, e.g. to limit killing civilians and enemy soldiers surrendering, than
human soldiers have been.
If this is so, then the question raised by Chapman of who can be punished
when they go wrong, as they sometimes will, is a red herring.
4. Chapman also raises the customary red herring of confusing research
development with putting the weapon systems into the field. The time to
consider precisely what restrictions shall be programmed into the weapon
systems is when deployment is being considered. Before that research
should aim at making it possible to build in restrictions. Deployment
decisions must take into account what restrictions are desired and the
extent to which they can be reliably implemented by the technology being
used.
Chapman collects a variety of suggestions by random military people
including West Point cadets and even TV science fiction. The time
to make suggestions for restrictions on automatic systems is when
deployment is proposed.
5. Such little experience as exists shows that "smart weapons" in fact
reduce civilian casualties. The Israeli raid on the Tunisia PLO headquarters
and the U.S. attack on Libya produced far fewer civilian casualties than
earlier technology bombardment.
While computer programs are often somewhat unreliable, other aspects of
technology are even more unreliable. Computer glitches in the Shuttle
program are cited, but they aren't responsible for the important delays,
cost overruns or the Challenger disaster. Finally, technological failures
are an order of magnitude smaller than failures of human organizations
under wartime conditions.
6. The idea that developing autonomous weapons constitutes a war crime
in itself is just a variant of the pacifist argument that all preparation
for war is a crime. Pacifism has some arguments in its favor, but there's
nothing new about this one.
7. It is indeed true that the current DARPA emphasis on specific
applications may limit DARPA support of basic research in AI, and this
would be unfortunate. It is wishful thinking to suppose that the four
DARPA projects or any other specific applications, defense or otherwise,
will in themselves elicit the basic research advances needed for long term
applications. It is very important that DARPA and other agencies with
applied missions do their share of supporting frankly basic research
relevant to the technologies used in their missions. Increasing the NSF
budget is also important, but maintaining a variety of sources of support
has served the U.S. well in the past in mitigating errors of the
establishment.
8. Chapman is right that the Federal Government should support more
research on "how we can use computers to make life better for people
in all walks of life". So far as I can tell, however, my suggestions
that Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility use their
political energy to advocate specific proposals, e.g. making
the Library of Congress available to home computer terminals fell
on deaf ears. Therefore, I feel justified in concluding that this
remark of Chapman's is a bluff and CPSR's activities have entirely
negative objectives.
∂23-Sep-86 1520 JMC previous messages
To: OTA-CIT@A.ISI.EDU
The second message is the final version. After I sent the previous one,
I realized that I had forgotten to send it to all recipients of your
message. Before I did, I "improved" it some more.
∂23-Sep-86 1914 JMC
To: RA
Please find phone numbers of Stanford Alumna Mary Mainland.
∂24-Sep-86 0048 JMC
To: RA
∂24-Sep-86 0042 rms@PREP.AI.MIT.EDU
Received: from PREP.AI.MIT.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 24 Sep 86 00:42:46 PDT
Received: by PREP.AI.MIT.EDU; Wed, 24 Sep 86 03:45:44 EDT
Date: Wed, 24 Sep 86 03:45:44 EDT
From: rms@PREP.AI.MIT.EDU (Richard M. Stallman)
Message-Id: <8609240745.AA07139@prep.ai.mit.edu>
To: jmc@su-ai.arpa
Did my invoice arrive ok? I have a copy and can send another
if it did not arrive.
I am leaving for a month a week from Friday
and my bank account is running low. It would
help me if I could have the check and deposit it before
I leave. If it is going to be mailed in time,
it would be good to send it special delivery
(not very expensive) to make sure it is not delayed
in the mail as the invoice was.
∂24-Sep-86 0914 JMC re: [Reply to message sent: Wed, 24 Sep 86 03:45:44 EDT]
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 24-Sep-86 08:35-PT.]
That's ok. Send Stallman a message that the check is being processed.
∂24-Sep-86 1027 JMC
To: RA
What's the extended part of our zip code?
∂25-Sep-86 1107 JMC California Supreme Court
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
In the September "American Spectator" Thomas Sowell gives strong
arguments for voting against all the incumbent California Supreme
Court incumbents except Lucas and Panelli. The article is entitled
"Rose Bird on Trial - Will the rest of her gang get away?". I have
left the magazine in the CSD lounge.
∂25-Sep-86 1224 JMC reply to message
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 25-Sep-86 11:52-PT.]
OK, I'll be home by 7:15.
∂25-Sep-86 1259 JMC notes for CS306
To: RA
Please reprint the same class notes as last year in the same quantity.
∂25-Sep-86 1515 JMC workshop
To: langley@CIP.UCI.EDU
I have your proposal. I'll decide in a day or two about the secretary
part, but AAAI is good for the $5K anyway.
∂25-Sep-86 1518 JMC workshop
To: langley@CIP.UCI.EDU
I have your proposal. I'll decide in a day or two about the secretary
part, but AAAI is good for the $5K anyway.
∂25-Sep-86 1625 JMC re: Thelma Inference
To: RA
[In reply to message rcvd 25-Sep-86 16:09-PT.]
I called Thelma.
∂25-Sep-86 1757 JMC Vladimir
To: bobrow@XEROX.COM
You misspelled his first name in your letter. I wouldn't bother except
that it occurred to me that it might subsequently appear misspelled in
the editorial board list in the Journal.
∂25-Sep-86 2248 JMC re: California Supreme Court
To: KOHEN@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
CC: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from KOHEN@Sushi.Stanford.EDU sent Thu 25 Sep 86 22:18:56-PDT.]
I might as well make it easy for myself. What, Mr. Kohen, do you have
against Scalia, for whom the Senate voted 98-0? By the way did you read
the Sowell article?
∂25-Sep-86 2358 JMC re: California Supreme Court
To: KOHEN@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
CC: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU, KOHEN@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from KOHEN@Sushi.Stanford.EDU sent Thu 25 Sep 86 23:43:13-PDT.]
So far as I am aware, Rehnquist, Manion and Scalia have not been
attacked except that Mr. Kohen said he didn't like them. I can probably
be provoked into defending Rehnquist's work on the court, because I know a
little about it, but it would be in response to actual criticism. Maybe I
would defend Manion if I had read more about the controversy concerning
his appointment, but since I don't intend to read about him, I beg to be
excused.
Well, actually I should respond to Mr. Kohen's arguments on the
level in which they are made. He says that Rose Bird is an angel compared
to them. I say, contrariwise, they are angels compared to her.
Incidentally, he should explain why his previous intention to
vote against Rose Bird was changed by his acquiring a dislike for
Rehnquist, Scalia and Manion.
∂26-Sep-86 1430 JMC
To: reges@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
∂26-Sep-86 1252 ROACH@SU-SCORE.ARPA
Received: from SCORE.STANFORD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 26 Sep 86 12:52:00 PDT
Date: Fri 26 Sep 86 11:54:19-PDT
From: Kelly Roach <ROACH@SU-SCORE.ARPA>
To: JMC@SU-AI.ARPA
In-Reply-To: Message from "John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU>" of Mon 22 Sep 86 21:16:00-PDT
Message-ID: <12242069152.44.ROACH@Score.Stanford.EDU>
Hi,
I was told last month that the Department wasn't going to let me TA
this term. I was really eager to do it because of interest in the subject
matter and some thoughts about putting my own theorem prover on exhibition,
but the Department wants me to study for the Comprehensive exam instead.
The people who know most about this are Terry Winograd and Victoria Cheadle.
Kelly
-------
∂26-Sep-86 1435 JMC re: Lunch next week
To: ELLIOTT%SLACVM.BITNET@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri, 26 Sep 86 14:17:34 PDT.]
You are sending me duplicate messages. su-ai and sail are synonyms.
JMC@SAIL arrives 3 minutes sooner. Next Friday is ok.
∂26-Sep-86 1453 JMC
To: CLT
10-01 wed 9am, MAD, th. at 9 if needed
Sten-Ake, 5pm and dinner
∂26-Sep-86 1531 JMC re: TEST
To: ELLIOTT%SLACVM.BITNET@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri, 26 Sep 86 15:25:35 PDT.]
Yes and yes.
∂26-Sep-86 1609 JMC workshop
To: langley@CIP.UCI.EDU
CC: aaai-office@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
I consulted two people who have run workshops and they agree that
1/5 of a secretary is reasonable. Therefore, I have decided to
fund your full request for the 1987 Machine Learning Workshop of $9950.
Please make all further arrangements with Claudia Mazzetti at the
AAAI office. She is AAAI-OFFICE@SUMEX in addition to being reachable
by phone and U.S. Mail.
∂26-Sep-86 1911 JMC
To: RPG
What happened in Washington?
∂26-Sep-86 2259 JMC California Supreme Court
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
from: John McCarthy
Abraham Kohen finds Thomas Sowell's article "childish and immature".
If so there doesn't seem to be very much chance that Sowell will grow
up given his age (56). Kohen could look for further evidence of childishness
in the following bibiliography or could compare the earlier and later
items to see if Sowell is growing up. More seriously, Kohen probably
didn't formulate his irritated reaction precisely and should try again.
Otherwise, he could look for reviews of Sowell's books, some of which
are by liberals and which would contain more plausible negative
characterizations of Sowell's ideas.
I think Ross Casley will look hard to find arguments in favor
of the California Supreme Court's decisions. Rose Bird's supporters
decided early in their campaign that it wouldn't be a good strategy
to defend the decisions or even Bird herself, but it would be better
to rely on a general argument that the people shouldn't exercise their
right to throw out judges except under conditions in which the legislature
would impeach them anyway. I regard this as an ad hoc argument since
I never heard it before the Bird matter came up. The appointment of
judges is a political matter, and I have no objection to their
removal after rather long terms being also political.
Sowell brings up many issues besides the death penalty. However,
the fundamental problem I find with activist judges is that they make
law themselves. The fact that liberal activists have been able to
get away with it for the last thirty years is somewhat of an accident.
Before that there were conservative activist judges, although they
were never as arrogant as Brennan, Bird et. al. in making what they
want of the Constitution.
2) Author: Sowell, Thomas, 1930-
2.1) DISCRIMINATION, AFFIRMATIVE ACTION, AND EQUAL OPPORTUNITY (Vancouver,
B.C., Canada : 1982, c1981.)
LOCATION: HD4903.D57 1982: Hoover
2.2) Sowell, Thomas, EDUCATION, ASSUMPTIONS VERSUS HISTORY (Stanford, Calif. :
c1986.)
LOCATION: LC2801.S734 1986: Hoover (-- ---Copy 2. -- ---Another copy
D509.H788 v.311)
2.3) Sowell, Thomas, EDUCATION (Stanford, Calif. : c1986.)
LOCATION: LC2801.S64 1986: Green Stacks; Education
2.4) Sowell, Thomas, MARKETS AND MINORITIES (New York : 1981.)
LOCATION: E184.A1S689 1981: Hoover
2.5) Sowell, Thomas, THE ECONOMICS AND POLITICS OF RACE : 1st ed. (New York :
1983.)
LOCATION: HT1531.S68 1983: Jackson Business
2.6) Sowell, Thomas, MARXISM : 1st ed. (New York : c1985.)
LOCATION: B809.8.S5745 1985: Green Stacks; Meyer
2.9) Sowell, Thomas, CIVIL RIGHTS : 1st ed. (New York : 1984.)
LOCATION: KF4749.A7S68 1984: Green Stacks; Meyer
2.17) Sowell, Thomas, ETHNIC AMERICA (New York : c1981.)
LOCATION: E184.A1S688: Hoover
2.18) Sowell, Thomas, PINK AND BROWN PEOPLE (Stanford, CA : c1981.)
LOCATION: E839.4.S69: Hoover (-----Copy 2. -----Another copy D509.H788
v.253)
2.19) Sowell, Thomas, 1930- MINIMUM WAGE ESCALATION (Stanford, Ca. : Hoover
Institution Press, 1977.)
LOCATION: HD4918.S6: Hoover
2.20) ESSAYS AND DATA ON AMERICAN ETHNIC GROUPS ([Washington : c1978.)
LOCATION: E184.A1E774: Hoover
2.21) Sowell, Thomas, 1930- SAY'S LAW; ([Princeton, N.J.] Princeton University
Press [1972])
LOCATION: HB105.S25S68: Hoover
2.22) Sowell, Thomas, 1930- CLASSICAL ECONOMICS RECONSIDERED. (Princeton,
Princeton University Press [1974])
LOCATION: HB75.S693: Hoover
2.23) Sowell, Thomas, KNOWLEDGE AND DECISIONS (New York : c1980.)
LOCATION: HM73.S78: Hoover
2.24) Sowell, Thomas, 1930- RACE AND ECONOMICS, (D. McKay, 1976, c1975.)
LOCATION: E184.A1.S69: Meyer
2.27) Sowell, Thomas, BLACK EDUCATION: MYTHS AND TRAGEDIES. (New York, [1972])
LOCATION: LC2781.S68: Meyer
2.32) AMERICAN ETHNIC GROUPS ([Washington : c1978.)
LOCATION: E184.A1A497: Green Stacks
2.35) Sowell, Thomas, 1930- AFFIRMATIVE ACTION RECONSIDERED; (Washington,
American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research [1975])
LOCATION: LC214.2.S68: Green Stacks; Education
∂27-Sep-86 1347 JMC re: (Neo)-Con activity in the Palo Alto area
To: cramer@SUN.COM
[In reply to message sent Sat, 27 Sep 86 13:41:36 PDT.]
None that I know of, but I would enjoy being invited to your meetings.
There was a Conservative Forum at Stanford, but it was mainly in
response to extreme radicalism and didn't have significant internal
discussion. It was run by Professor Alphonse Juilland, but he
ran out of energy.
∂27-Sep-86 1410 JMC re: (Neo)-Con activity in the Palo Alto area
To: cramer@SUN.COM
[In reply to message sent Sat, 27 Sep 86 14:06:37 PDT.]
Sure, although unless you're low on speakers, I'd prefer to attend
a meeting before speaking.
∂27-Sep-86 1419 JMC re: "Suppression of Priors"?
To: SIEGMAN@SIERRA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sat 27 Sep 86 10:47:26-PDT.]
Are you sure this isn't merely the fact that the jury isn't supposed to
know about prior convictions?
∂27-Sep-86 1637 JMC re: move to konstanz
To: HST
[In reply to message rcvd 20-Sep-86 09:17-PT.]
I forget where Konstanz is, but I hope you like it there. Please
MAIL me your addresses and phone numbers there when you have them.
∂27-Sep-86 1652 JMC re: Skydiving
To: vardi@NAVAJO.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sat, 27 Sep 86 15:50:58 PDT.]
I think they're all rather far, because it's usual to have
the landing point with walking distance of the
airport, and I doubt that the FAA would approve of jumpers
falling through the controlled airspace around here.
I used to go to Antioch Airport, and I've heard about jumping from
there recently. I've also seen publicity about Hollister Airport.
Los Banos and maybe Calistoga are also places from which jumping is
done. The Los Banos people had a reputation for recklessness.
∂27-Sep-86 1929 JMC re: Where's the New Student Brunch?
To: ZAUDERER@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sat 27 Sep 86 18:14:17-PDT.]
Golub's house:
I would be very pleased if you came to the Sunday Brunch for our new
students. It'll be at 11 am at my house which is at 576 Constanzo on
the Campus. It's near Santa Ynez and Mayfield, down the hill from the
President's house.
∂28-Sep-86 1525 JMC notice on door
To: RA
Please put a notice on my door that I won't be in Monday and that I
will be available for advising on Tuesday between 1pm and 2:30.
∂28-Sep-86 2203 JMC re: [John McCarthy <JMC@SU-AI.ARPA>: re: Collection Program / Archives ]
To: PHYSICSLIB@SIERRA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun 28 Sep 86 20:35:59-PDT.]
I'd be glad to talk with you. How about Friday afternoon? You name the time.
2pm or later.
∂29-Sep-86 2036 JMC Common Business Communication Language
To: RA
∂29-Sep-86 0814 nttlab!NTT-20!GOTO@shasta.stanford.edu Common Business Communication Language
Received: from SHASTA.STANFORD.EDU by SAIL.STANFORD.EDU with TCP; 29 Sep 86 08:14:51 PDT
Received: by shasta.stanford.edu; Mon, 29 Sep 86 08:13:58 PDT
Received: from NTT-20.NTT.JUNET (ntt-20) by nttlab.ntt.junet (4.12/5.0M) with TCP; Mon, 29 Sep 86 23:10:28 jst
Date: Mon 29 Sep 86 23:09:30
From: Shigeki Goto <nttlab!NTT-20!Goto@shasta.stanford.edu>
Subject: Common Business Communication Language
To: Shasta!JMC%Sail.Stanford.EDU@nttlab.ntt
Cc: Shasta!RA%Sail.Stanford.EDU@nttlab.ntt, goto@ntt-20.ntt
Message-Id: <12242792811.10.GOTO@NTT-20.NTT.JUNET>
John,
One of my friends at NTT, Nobuo Kawashima, wants me to forward his message
to you. He would be happy if you could send him a copy of your paper on
Common Business Communication Language.
Thanks in advance.
** Shigeki **
P.S. Thanks to ME, sg@sail forwards mails to "nttlab!goto"@Shasta.Stanford.EDU
---------------------
Dear Prof. McCarthy:
Thank you very much for sending me a copy of your paper:
"Application of Circumscription to Formalizing Common Sense Knowledge."
I have read it and got much interested in your Common Business Communication
Language.
I would like to read your paper, "Common Business Communication Language",
in Textverarbeitung und Burosysteme, Albert Endres and Jurgen Reetz eds.
R. Oldenboug Verlag, Munich and Vienna 1982.
Since I could not find it in our library, I would appreciate it if you
could send me a copy of your paper.
Regards,
N. Kawashima
Communication Processing Programs Section
NTT Communications and Information Processing Laboratories
1-2356, Take
Yokosuka, Kanagawa
Japan 238-03
------------------
-------
∂29-Sep-86 2039 JMC re: [John McCarthy <JMC@SU-AI.ARPA>: re: Collection Program / Archives ]
To: PHYSICSLIB@SIERRA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon 29 Sep 86 10:25:42-PDT.]
The 10th at 2pm will be fine.
∂29-Sep-86 2040 JMC re: Moscow deadline approaching
To: VAL
[In reply to message rcvd 29-Sep-86 13:02-PT.]
I think you're right. See if Suppes or Scott knows anything.
∂30-Sep-86 1603 JMC re: 306 TA
To: AMEHTA@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
CC: RA@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue 30 Sep 86 15:45:16-PDT.]
Since the first class is Thursday, I would like to tentatively schedule
a meeting with you and the other TA for tomorrow (Wed) at 4:30. There
is a possibility that I won't be able to make it which you can determine
by phoning my secretary, Rutie Adler 723-2800 tomorrow afternoon.
If she hasn't heard from me to the contrary, I'll be in my office at
4:30.
∂30-Sep-86 2209 JMC California Supreme Court
To: su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
Roland van Gaalen's "skimming" Sowell's article has led to the most
substantive comment so far. Here are some answers.
1. It isn't necessary to determine the framers' precise intentions.
There can be differences of opinions about their precise intentions,
but the doctrine conservatives object to involves ignoring them almost
completely. In fact the various degrees of loose or strict interpretation
of the Constitution have been well spelled out in books on
Constitutional law. For example, Lawrence Tribe, who prefers a loose
interpretation, has spelled out six or seven levels of strictness.
The conservative reviews I read of his book don't quarrel much with
his classification; the just disagree with his preference.
2. The doctrine that an act not otherwise legal becomes legal if it
is intended as a political expression is indeed one that conservatives
object to.
3. I agree that Turing should not have been punished for homosexuality.
I read the book, but I don't see that it claims he was a hero.
4. I would like to see a formulation of the liberal objection to
Reagan appointing young conservative judges formulated as an example
of a general principle applicable to both liberals and conservatives.
Otherwise, it's just special pleading. It seems to me that in
appointing Rose Bird, Jerry Brown knew and wanted what he was getting - an
extremist.
5. Carter was unlucky in not getting to appoint any Supreme Court
justices, but Eisenhower was unlucky in appointing Brennan. He
thought he was appointing a conservative. Apparently his staff
was merely careless, because Brennan's record as New Jersey justice
was not at all conservative.
6. As for Abraham Kohen, flattery will get him nowhere. There is
no Einstein of AI; AI has hardly reached the scientific level of Galileo.
I'd still like to see his considered reaction to Sowell's article.
∂01-Oct-86 0035 JMC re: California Supreme Court
To: ANDY@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue 30 Sep 86 23:29:23-PDT.]
AI is perhaps the most difficulty CS specialty, but I wouldn't say that
any part of CS has had an Einstein. That's really asking a lot.