perm filename OUTGO.MSG[1,JMC]32 blob
sn#885334 filedate 1990-06-24 generic text, type C, neo UTF8
COMMENT ⊗ VALID 00020 PAGES
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C00001 00001
C00003 00002 ∂01-Apr-90 1132 JMC
C00004 00003 ∂01-Apr-90 1758 JMC
C00005 00004 ∂01-Apr-90 1759 JMC
C00006 00005 ∂01-Apr-90 1807 Mailer re: Japanese Space Effort
C00007 00006 ∂01-Apr-90 1820 JMC
C00008 00007 ∂01-Apr-90 1831 JMC Please surface mail
C00009 00008 ∂01-Apr-90 1833 JMC Any suggestion?
C00010 00009 ∂01-Apr-90 2147 JMC re: a family emergency
C00011 00010 ∂02-Apr-90 1305 JMC re: meeting
C00012 00011 ∂02-Apr-90 1311 Mailer death penalty
C00013 00012 ∂02-Apr-90 1348 JMC
C00014 00013 ∂02-Apr-90 1515 JMC work
C00015 00014 ∂02-Apr-90 1517 JMC more about work
C00016 00015 ∂02-Apr-90 2204 JMC re: Question
C00017 00016 ∂03-Apr-90 0007 JMC reply to message
C00018 00017 ∂03-Apr-90 1134 JMC
C00019 00018 ∂03-Apr-90 1654 JMC committee on computer readable phd theses
C00020 00019 ∂03-Apr-90 1750 Mailer death penalty
C00024 00020 ∂03-Apr-90 1853 JMC reply to message
C00025 ENDMK
C⊗;
∂01-Apr-90 1132 JMC
To: usenet@SHELBY.Stanford.EDU
NO/su NO
∂01-Apr-90 1758 JMC
To: pjd@RIACS.EDU
Sir:
John Searle's Chinese room in which a man interprets
∂01-Apr-90 1759 JMC
To: pjd@RIACS.EDU
%penros[f89,jmc] Review of Penrose book
\input memo.tex[let,jmc]
\noindent {\it The Emperor's New Mind}, by Roger Penrose.
Oxford University Press, Oxford, New York, Melbourne,
1989, xiii + 466 pp., \$24.95. ISBN 0-19-851973-7
Penrose doesn't believe that computers constructed
∂01-Apr-90 1807 Mailer re: Japanese Space Effort
To: vera@FANARAAKEN.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from vera@fanaraaken.Stanford.EDU sent 2 Apr 90 00:06:21 GMT.]
It succeeded.
∂01-Apr-90 1820 JMC
To: CLT
I'd like copy of your copy of Sol's "Reflections on Incompleteness"
∂01-Apr-90 1831 JMC Please surface mail
To: marsland%alberta.bitnet@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
me a copy of the final version of my paper.
Also I would like a bibiographical reference to
the volume in which it will appear. Also please
acknowledge this message, since I'm guessing
on the address.
∂01-Apr-90 1833 JMC Any suggestion?
To: ME
marsland%alberta.bitnet@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
550 Unknown Bitnet system: alberta.bitnet
∂01-Apr-90 2147 JMC re: a family emergency
To: HOFFMAN@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun 1 Apr 90 21:45:16-PDT.]
I'll be in most of the week. Please phone. I forget what's at issue.
∂02-Apr-90 1305 JMC re: meeting
To: shoham@HUDSON.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 2 Apr 1990 12:52:57 PDT.]
That will be fine. Vladimir will be here also.
∂02-Apr-90 1311 Mailer death penalty
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
Suppose Governor Deukmejian were to recognize sentiment
against the death penalty by offering to commute the
sentence to life imprisonment for anyone whom the death
penalty opponents were willing to support in prison for
the rest of his life. The prisoner could have whatever
standard of living the death penalty opponents were
willing to support. Of course, if they slacked off too
much, the prisoner would starve.
∂02-Apr-90 1348 JMC
To: lenat@MCC.COM
Did you do something with Rubik's cube?
∂02-Apr-90 1515 JMC work
To: lenat@MCC.COM
I would like to put in one to four days this week and next
trying to finish off emotions. After next week, I'll be doing
some travelling. Palo Alto is preferable to Austin, and I'd
prefer doing it at the Cyc West office as less subject to
distraction.
∂02-Apr-90 1517 JMC more about work
To: lenat@MCC.COM
Thursday of this week would be good and possibly also Friday.
I'm not teaching this quarter, but I seem to have committed
myself to a fair amount of travelling.
∂02-Apr-90 2204 JMC re: Question
To: RDZ@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 2 Apr 90 22:02 PDT.]
Yes, let's try that one.
∂03-Apr-90 0007 JMC reply to message
To: clemm@NEON.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 2 Apr 90 23:40:32 -0700.]
Unfortunately, I was insufficiently impressed with the paper. In
fact, only one of the papers caused me to give an A in the course.
It is not a matter of policy to give few A's; that's just how it
turned out this time.
∂03-Apr-90 1134 JMC
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
michie.1
∂03-Apr-90 1654 JMC committee on computer readable phd theses
To: chandler@SUNBURN.Stanford.EDU
Who is on it besides
McCarthy, Khatib, Pratt?
∂03-Apr-90 1750 Mailer death penalty
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
I was beginning to fear that su-etc had died, but the death penalty issue
stirred them up.
Let me point out that I wasn't suggesting any change in law, merely that
Governor Deukmejian accomodate the opponents of the death penalty by
using the power he already has to commute sentences if they would pay
the cost. He could make the offer for some criminals and not other.
Another possibility is that he could offer some of them to any countries
whose leaders protest, provided they guarantee they not return to
California.
Ah, well. I admit this is all fantasy. Here is a response to some
of the considerations raised.
Whether life imprisonment is more expensive than the death penalty
is questionable. Almost certainly it depends on the case. What issues
are appealable, and how many times, is gradually being resolved. In
the Harris case, the Supreme Court has agreed that the defense lawyers
have found a new gimmick that has to be looked at. Most likely, it
will be discovered that his trial was fair after all. Does anyone know
an actual study of the cost issue?
If the million opponents of the death penalty would all contribute their
dime for each inmate per year, that would do it. I think it would come
to about $25 per year per opponent, considering that California has
about 250 condemned. Maybe 99 percent of the nominal opponents would
refuse to contribute, leaving the one percent with $2500 per year apiece.
As for North, I don't believe the judge gave the expense of keeping him
in prison as the reason for suspending the sentence, so Jeff Mogul's offer
of $10 per year is irrelevant. Incidentally, if raising money for people
that someone else calls terrorists is a crime, maybe Mr. Mogul himself
is guilty if he has helped raise money to support the cause of the
El Salvador rebels.
∂03-Apr-90 1853 JMC reply to message
To: CN.MCS@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 3 Apr 90 18:20:11 PDT.]
I'll be there.
∂04-Apr-90 1038 JMC committee meeting
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
The committee on computer readable phd theses is
McCarthy, Khatib, Pratt, Genesereth.
Please arrange a meeting, preferably a lunch at the Faculty Club.
∂04-Apr-90 1040 JMC title and handout
To: ingrid@RUSSELL.Stanford.EDU
\title{Elephant 2000: A Programming Language Based on Speech Acts}
\noindent Abstract: Elephant 2000 is a vehicle for some ideas about
programming language features. We expect these features to be
valuable in writing and verifying programs that interact with
people (e.g. transaction processing) or interact with programs belonging
to other organizations (e.g. electronic data interchange)
\hfill\break 1. Communication inputs and outputs are in an I-O
language whose sentences are meaningful speech acts approximately
in the sense of philosophers and linguists. These include
questions, answers, offers, acceptances, declinations, requests,
permissions and promises.
\hfill\break 2. The correctness of programs is partially defined in
terms of proper performance of the speech acts. Answers should
be truthful, and promises should be kept. Sentences of logic expressing
these forms of correctness can be generated automatically
from the form of the program.
\hfill\break 3. Elephant source programs may not need data
structures, because they can refer directly to the past. Thus a
program can say that an airline passenger has a reservation if he
has made one and hasn't cancelled it.
\hfill\break 4. Elephant programs themselves will be represented as
sentences of logic. Their properties follow from this
representation without an intervening theory of programming or
anything like Hoare axioms.
\hfill\break 5. Elephant programs that interact non-trivially with
the outside world can have both {\it illocutionary} and {\it perlocutionary}
specifications, i.e. behavioral specifications relating inputs and outputs,
and specifications concerning what they accomplish in the world.
∂04-Apr-90 1053 JMC re: title and handout
To: ingrid@RUSSELL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 04 Apr 90 10:49:04 PDT.]
I don't want to give out copies of the current draft of the paper, because
it's just a draft. I will bring my own transparencies. For now, the
abstract is the only handout. Note the texisms in the title and
abstract. \title is a macro that includes my name and Stanford
affiliation.
∂04-Apr-90 1107 JMC re: title and handout
To: ingrid@RUSSELL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 04 Apr 90 11:01:30 PDT.]
I'll get them for you as soon as they are ready. When do you need
them. In the normal course of events, I'd do them Monday, but if
you need them sooner, I'll try.
∂04-Apr-90 1115 JMC re: title and handout
To: ingrid@RUSSELL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 04 Apr 90 11:12:42 PDT.]
I'll try for Friday, but if I do them over the weekend I can leave
them outside your office. Which is your office? I don't have a key
to Ventura, but I can surely find someone in Cordura who has one.
∂04-Apr-90 1119 JMC re: title and handout
To: ingrid@RUSSELL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 04 Apr 90 11:21:25 PDT.]
OK, there'll be a computer message also.
∂04-Apr-90 1128 Mailer Cobol question
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
For an illustration I need the most Englishy Cobol form of the
pseudo-Algol statements
bill := 123.45;
print("Please pay $",bill," by May 10, 1990.");
Is there anyone around who knows enough Cobol to do that?
I don't need the decorations required to make a complete
Cobol program out of that. I'd like it as soon as possible,
but don't bother after Monday. I'll fake it somehow.
I promise not to tell anyone you know Cobol.
∂04-Apr-90 1446 JMC re: AI Division Lunch
To: jutta@COYOTE.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent 4 Apr 1990 1330-PST.]
I'll be there.
∂04-Apr-90 1448 JMC re: Cobol question
To: gray@NEON.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 4 Apr 90 14:43:30 -0700.]
Many thanks. That fragment will suit my purpose admirably.
∂04-Apr-90 1535 JMC
To: SF
What's the bibliographic reference for your "Reflections on Incompleteness"?
∂04-Apr-90 1536 JMC
To: SF
Correction: Reflecting on Incompleteness
∂04-Apr-90 2019 JMC re: term paper (cs323)
To: sreerang@PORTIA.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 4 Apr 90 20:15:45 PDT.]
It seemed rather confused about a number of points, which was why
it didn't rate an A. I would be glad to go over it with you and
make suggestions for pursuing the problem further.
∂04-Apr-90 2029 JMC re: term paper (cs323)
To: sreerang@PORTIA.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 4 Apr 90 20:28:24 PDT.]
Come at 2pm and bring a copy with you.
∂05-Apr-90 0951 JMC re: Files
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message rcvd 05-Apr-90 09:32-PT.]
With Jan 88 in front and jan 89 in back. Only the file in
my desk should have the reverse order.
∂05-Apr-90 1014 JMC reply to message
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message rcvd 05-Apr-90 10:01-PT.]
Not yet. Keep trying.
∂05-Apr-90 1446 JMC Alex Bronstein
To: sreerang@PORTIA.Stanford.EDU
is the student who wrote a Stanford PhD thesis on design verification.
He now works for D.E.C. in Palo Alto. Carolyn Talcott, clt@sail,
knows about his thesis.
∂05-Apr-90 1541 JMC Telegram to Smirnov.
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
I plan to arrive in Moscow
may 16, lufthansa 1372, arriving 1740
and depart on May 26 on su231 at 0905 to Brussels.
I would be glad to give lectures. One or two could have the
title Elephant 2000: A Programming Language Based on Speech Acts.
Our fax number is 415 725-7411.
John McCarthy
∂05-Apr-90 1657 JMC
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
Please decorate
∂05-Apr-90 1658 JMC Please decorate
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
petrio.1[let,jmc], fill out the speaker's form, and include the
attached abstract. His letter, etc. are in my out box.
∂06-Apr-90 1539 JMC re: meeting
To: shoham@HUDSON.STANFORD.EDU, VAL@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message from shoham@Hudson.Stanford.EDU sent Fri, 6 Apr 1990 14:56:24 PDT.]
Tuesday isn't possible for either of us. Wednesday morning is
preferable, and possible for us both; because VAL and I have a
regular lunch on Friday.
∂06-Apr-90 1620 JMC re: meeting
To: shoham@HUDSON.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri, 6 Apr 1990 16:18:20 PDT.]
ok.
∂06-Apr-90 1723 JMC re: your IAP presentations
To: ingrid@RUSSELL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri, 06 Apr 90 17:22:23 PDT.]
Yes, I'll do it.
∂06-Apr-90 1745 Mailer re: death penalty
To: katz@RPAL.COM, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from katz@rpal.com sent 3 Apr 90 16:41:10 GMT.]
That's a good suggestion.
I think many advocates of the death penalty would be willing to pay
their shares of the additional cost, if any. Imagine it were done
as follows. The state fights the various appeals up to the cost
of life imprisonment, and then says it will fight them further to
the extent that the costs are donated. It would be even more effective
if the death penalty advocates were allowed to hire the lawyers that
would fight the appeals. Once some experience was gained, the costs
might be lower than under the present system.
∂06-Apr-90 1937 Mailer death penalty - the Katz plan
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
Addendum to previous message: The death penalty advocates
would use the families of the victims to help raise money
for fighting the appeals. The appeals would be fought
to an extent that depended on the public abhorrence of the
particular criminal. There'd be lots more publicity, but
that would be ok, since there would be no juries to be
influenced by publicity - only objective judges.
Would Mr. Katz like to withdraw his plan?
∂07-Apr-90 1528 JMC re: time
To: shoham@HUDSON.STANFORD.EDU, VAL@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message from shoham@Hudson.Stanford.EDU sent Sat, 7 Apr 1990 12:20:55 PDT.]
9 would be ok with me.
∂08-Apr-90 0343 Mailer death penalty
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
"without possibility of parole" eh? I assume Les
voted for George Bush?
∂08-Apr-90 1505 JMC re: ok
To: shoham@HUDSON.STANFORD.EDU, VAL@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message from shoham@Hudson.Stanford.EDU sent Sun, 8 Apr 1990 14:44:56 PDT.]
Right. We attack at dawn.
∂08-Apr-90 1653 Mailer death penalty
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
It seems to me that the idea that crime should be punished, and
not just the criminal rehaabilitated or incapacitated still plays
an important role in our legal system. My present inclination is
that it should continue to play such a role. Punishment is like
revenge. In fact one of the major features of having criminal
law is that people give up their rights to private revenge in
exchange for a criminal law. The reason why private revenge (and
also group revenge) has been suppressed is that it leads to blood
feuds that last for generations.
If the criminal law were to give up the idea of punishment
entirely, I could kill whomever I pleased provided I could
convince the court that the reasons that motivated me to kill
were sufficiently unlikely to arise again. The obvious example
is that if Harris had killed my child, and I killed or injured
him in return, but it was clear that the killing of one of my
children was an unlikely event. Under present law, I would be
punished, because private revenge is a crime.
Incidentally, the lawyers whose defense of Harris from the
death penalty is paid for by the State of California are
his lawyers unreservedly. If the best way to save him from
the death penalty were to make the point that some police
search was improper, and this contaminated the whole case
against him and this led to his release, they would do it
regardless of whether the improper search had found good
evidence and regardless of how probable it was that he
would kill again. If his sentence were commuted to life
imprisonment, they are still committed to try to get
him freed as long as they continue to represent him.
∂08-Apr-90 2238 JMC
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
My reservations for Seattle still aren't in cal.
∂08-Apr-90 2253 JMC
To: ingrid@RUSSELL.Stanford.EDU
I'll be in with my material Monday morning.
∂09-Apr-90 0939 JMC re: Harley, care to help out Prof. McCarthy on this?
To: GA.JRG@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 9 Apr 90 09:20:38 PDT.]
Thanks for the Cobol help.
∂09-Apr-90 1121 Mailer re: Death penalty
To: tran@PORTIA.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from tran@portia.Stanford.EDU sent 9 Apr 90 16:55:42 GMT.]
I think the death penalty advocates would settle for Hy Tran's solution
of freezing the condemned.
∂09-Apr-90 1412 JMC re: Books for Review
To: jfetzer@ub.d.umn.edu
[In reply to message sent Mon, 9 Apr 90 15:47:51 CDT.]
I have thought about my suggestion some more and want to change it
slightly. Better than Manna and Waldinger are two items by the
Boyer-Moore group. One is their Computational Logic Handbook and
the other is a special issue of the Journal of Automated Reasoning
devoted to hardware verification. If you like, the book reviewing
task can include the Manna-Waldinger volumes as well. The reason
for preferring the Boyer-Moore items is that they better represent
the current state of the art of verification. The Manna and
Waldinger is more an undergraduate text.
I further suggest that you plan to publish a second review of these
items. Unless someone else who favors computer verification comes
along, I'll volunteer to be that reviewer.
Boyer promised to send me the bibliographic information tonight, and
I'll get the info from Waldinger tomorrow, so I expect to send it
tomorrow.
∂09-Apr-90 1433 JMC re: handouts for tomorrow's meeting
To: ingrid@RUSSELL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 09 Apr 90 14:35:26 PDT.]
You will have them by 3:30.
∂09-Apr-90 1656 JMC re: mid term report
To: guha@SUMEX-AIM.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 9 Apr 1990 16:00:38 PDT.]
Yes, I have it.
∂09-Apr-90 1730 Mailer re: Death Penalty Alternative
To: siegman@sierra.UUCP, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from siegman@sierra.UUCP sent 9 Apr 90 23:38:39 GMT.]
If only Tony Siegman could persuade Judge Warren Justice of the
Federal District Court in Tyler, Texas of his point of view, the
State of Texas could re-establish the prison system it previously
enjoyed. Judge Justice has ruled that the previous system
constitutes cruel and unusual punishment and threatened to put
officials of the State in jail for contempt if they don't spend
money to bring prisons up to a standard approved by his court
appointed master.
Judge Justice's reforms had an interesting side-effect reported
by Time a few years ago. One of the things Justice found
unconstitutional was the practice of appointing prisoners as
trustees with authority over other prisoners. On the basis of
the trustee system, Texas prisons were constructed without the
catwalks that permitted guards to patrol the prison physically
separated from the prisoners. After the reform, guards became
afraid to mingle with the prisoners as they were now required to
do in order to do work previously done by trustees. Instead of
being controlled by the guards via the trustees, the prisoners
came under the control of inmate gangs. In the first few years,
enforcement of gang powers involved more than 50 murders, many
more than had occurred previously.
Judge Justice's clerks, of whom my son-in-law was one, avoided
expressing any definite opinion on whether this was in any sense
the fault of the Judge. The key point of Justice's successive
decrees was that the State could not plead poverty. If the money
for improving the prisons had to come from the budget for schools
that was just too bad.
It would take a constitutional amendment or a few more
appointments by Bush to the Supreme Court to change this
situation.
∂09-Apr-90 1842 JMC death penalty
To: siegman@SIERRA.Stanford.EDU
(this one didn't make it to you before because of the
siegman@sierra.uucp. Our mailer was offended by the .uucp.)
If only Tony Siegman could persuade Judge Warren Justice of the
Federal District Court in Tyler, Texas of his point of view, the
State of Texas could re-establish the prison system it previously
enjoyed. Judge Justice has ruled that the previous system
constitutes cruel and unusual punishment and threatened to put
officials of the State in jail for contempt if they don't spend
money to bring prisons up to a standard approved by his court
appointed master.
Judge Justice's reforms had an interesting side-effect reported
by Time a few years ago. One of the things Justice found
unconstitutional was the practice of appointing prisoners as
trustees with authority over other prisoners. On the basis of
the trustee system, Texas prisons were constructed without the
catwalks that permitted guards to patrol the prison physically
separated from the prisoners. After the reform, guards became
afraid to mingle with the prisoners as they were now required to
do in order to do work previously done by trustees. Instead of
being controlled by the guards via the trustees, the prisoners
came under the control of inmate gangs. In the first few years,
enforcement of gang powers involved more than 50 murders, many
more than had occurred previously.
Judge Justice's clerks, of whom my son-in-law was one, avoided
expressing any definite opinion on whether this was in any sense
the fault of the Judge. The key point of Justice's successive
decrees was that the State could not plead poverty. If the money
for improving the prisons had to come from the budget for schools
that was just too bad.
It would take a constitutional amendment or a few more
appointments by Bush to the Supreme Court to change this
situation.
------- End undelivered message -------
∂09-Apr-90 1843 JMC re: References
To: boyer@CLI.COM
[In reply to message sent Mon, 9 Apr 90 17:59:59 CDT.]
Thanks for the references. I'm hoping to visit the next
time I come to MCC.
∂09-Apr-90 2155 Mailer re: Time Off for Good Behavior?
To: siegman@SIERRA.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from siegman@sierra.Stanford.EDU sent Mon, 9 Apr 90 19:44:17 PDT.]
Certainly the system can vary from state to state. In the cases
I have read about, the prison system authorities decide - the
Adult Authority in California. There is some committee that
meets regularly. Each prisoner who might be eligible on the
basis of time served is considered in the light of reports from
the prison he inhabits and his file. In California, there will
be thousands of such cases every year, so clearly the process
has to be even more bureaucratic than the process we use to
determine which graduate students are making satisfactory
progress. The alternative is to have the judges do it.
∂10-Apr-90 0906 JMC Fellowship supplement
To: CLT
∂10-Apr-90 0857 littell@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU Fellowship supplement
Received: from Sunburn.Stanford.EDU by SAIL.Stanford.EDU with TCP; 10 Apr 90 08:57:00 PDT
Received: by Sunburn.Stanford.EDU (5.61+IDA/25-eef) id AA29466; Tue, 10 Apr 90 08:57:46 -0700
Date: Tue, 10 Apr 90 08:57:46 -0700
From: Angelina M. Littell <littell@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU>
Message-Id: <9004101557.AA29466@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU>
To: mccarthy@cs.Stanford.EDU, clt@cs.Stanford.EDU
Cc: littell@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU
Subject: Fellowship supplement
John,
I am working on fellowship supplements for Spring quarter. I have Ramin Zabih
as working for you for spring quarter. Will you be supporting his supplement
for this quarter? If so, what account should I charge it to? His supplement
amount is $287.33. Please inform.
THanks.
--Angie
Replying-To: littell@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU
Reply-Subject: re: Fellowship supplement
Reply-Text:
[In reply to message sent Tue, 10 Apr 90 08:57:46 -0700.]
Yes, we'll pay it.
∂10-Apr-90 0906 JMC re: Fellowship supplement
To: littell@SUNBURN.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 10 Apr 90 08:57:46 -0700.]
Yes, we'll pay it.
∂10-Apr-90 0921 JMC re: Fellowship supplement
To: littell@SUNBURN.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 10 Apr 90 09:08:09 -0700.]
Ask Carolyn Talcott next week.
∂10-Apr-90 1105 JMC
To: RJW@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
I need a precise bibliographical reference to your book, not the book's biblio.
∂10-Apr-90 1145 JMC
To: guha@MCC.COM, lenat@MCC.COM
Did you want me to look more at the Interim Report?
∂10-Apr-90 1755 JMC reply to message
To: WALDINGER@WARBUCKS.AI.SRI.COM
[In reply to message sent Tue 10 Apr 90 11:48:08-PST.]
Thanks.
∂10-Apr-90 1759 JMC re: [maja@ai.mit.edu: seminar this Thursday 4p.m.]
To: rdz@GANG-OF-FOUR.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 10 Apr 90 14:18:28 -0700.]
Methinks Mr. Chaney doesn't have John Sununu, former Professor
of Civil Engineering, or even Daniel Patrick Moynihan in mind.
∂11-Apr-90 1129 Mailer re: Death Penalty Alternative
To: karish@FOREL.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from karish@forel.stanford.edu sent 11 Apr 90 06:51:01 GMT.]
Chuck Karish writes:
The fault I find with vengeful approaches like JMC's is
that they're self-defeating. The brutality of our
prison systems, directed as it is largely against those
too poor to hire adequate lawyers, is helping to create
an underclass so alienated that the prison population
is certain to continue to increase without any limit
except our willingness to pay for new prisons.
1. I didn't take a definite position on punishment before, but I
think I'll get off the fence. I think crime should be punished, i.e.
that the sole considerations shouldn't be rehabilitation and protection
of the public against further crime. I don't regard this as vengeful,
but I suppose others might.
2. Karish's last sentence expresses, in my view, an extreme of liberal
sentimentality about crime and criminals. It implies the most prisoners
are in prison because they don't have adequate lawyers. It's not clear
to me whether the position is cynical (You can get away with anything
if you have an adequate lawyer.) or whether Karish believes that most
prisoners haven't done anything to deserve prison, and if we only gave
them adequate lawyers they would be found innocent. The last phrase
suggests that a major cause of crime is putting criminals in prison
and thus alienating them. We law-and-order advocates take the opposite
position that it is failure to punish crime that encourages it.
3. In so far as we conservatives can convince the public that Karish's
position is characteristic of liberalism, conservative candidates will
succeed in using ``liberal'' as an epithet. I'll even bet Karish would
lose in the black community of East Palo Alto or Washington, D.C. if
he ran for office with the above statement.
∂11-Apr-90 1303 JMC Evaluating readiness
To: CLT
Sue said that the
Children's Health Council can evaluate Timothy's Kindergarten
readiness. 326-5530
I called and they referred me to Doris K.... there. On
April 11 I called her. She said their procedure is to have
one of their counselors interview us, then observe Timothy at school,
and then meet with us again. The procedure doesn't involve examining
Timothy. This seems unlikely to come up with much result, but she
will send us their brochure, and I said we would call her if we wanted
to proceed further with them. If you want to proceed with them you
can make an appointment, but I'd like to come too.
∂11-Apr-90 1638 JMC re: undergraduate colloquium
To: jones@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 11 Apr 1990 13:58:48 PDT.]
Looks good.
∂12-Apr-90 0855 JMC re: 'Foreword'
To: ito@ITO.ECEI.TOHOKU.AC.JP
[In reply to message sent Thu, 12 Apr 90 19:32:56 JST.]
I received the material and will do the foreword.
∂12-Apr-90 1039 JMC
To: CLT
Joe has resigned as of May 31.
∂12-Apr-90 1110 Mailer re: Death Penalty Alternative
To: karish@FOREL.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from karish@forel.stanford.edu sent 11 Apr 90 06:51:01 GMT.]
Stimulated by Chuck Karish I have been mulling over the question
of what sort of constitutional amendment I would favor that would
cancel Judge Justice's taking over the way Texas handles its
prisons. Karish writes
What sort of constitutional amendment? Maybe
one to institute Les's proposal for graduated
mutilation? One to suspend all civil rights for anyone
accused or convicted of a crime?
Neither of those is what I had in mind. Anyway Karish seems to have
forgotten that he was discussing prison conditions not criteria for
conviction. Judge Justice used the clause in the Constitution forbidding
cruel and unusual punishment to require more expensive prisons. Texas
prisons were probably far more comfortable than prisons at the time
the Constitution was established. Therefore, his decision represents
one of these creations of Constitutional rights by metaphor from the
Constitution. That's what I want to hamper. I also want to re-establish
a substantial amount of ``states' rights'' in order to get an increased
amount of experimentation.
Karish and I disagree about whether crime is to be reduced by strengthening
or weakening ``law and order''. The way things are going, the argument
will be just as intense 20 years from now as it is today. If we
had more states' rights, we could imagine that one state would go
very far towards victims' rights and law-and-order and another would
go very far in the liberal direction. It would be good if both states
were subsidized in their experiments by the country as a whole. Twenty
years later, we might actually know something about which policy
works better.
Karish thinks that Texas should have an income tax. I suspect that he
would think it ok if the Federal Courts were to find some way of ruling
that Texas must have an income tax. We conservatives would find that
abominable.
Les accuses me of not being a proper conservative in supporting the
death penalty. His argument is mere terminology-mongering, since
almost all people called conservatives by themselves and others
support the death penalty. This is not one of the issues on which
I feel most strongly, because I don't think that either abolishing
or maintaining the death penalty will enormously help or damage the
country. I favor it for now, but if a large decrease in violent
crime were somehow achieved, I would feel much easier about abolishing
it.
I have to suspect the supporters of Judicial power of some
insincerity. Judge Justice just celebrated his 70th birthday (My
daughter and son-in-law journeyed to Texas for the occasion). If he
retires soon his successor will be appointed by Bush, and very likely
will be a man of considerably different view. Eisenhower and even
Nixon didn't understand how far the general population of middle-aged
lawyers was going from the constitutional philosophy they supported,
and appointed many people they should have known better than to
appoint, e.g. Brennan.
I predict that in a few years the liberals will again be babbling about
``nine old men'' and the tyranny of the courts.
∂12-Apr-90 1423 Mailer re: Death Penalty Alternative
To: MRC@CAC.WASHINGTON.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from MRC@CAC.Washington.EDU sent Thu, 12 Apr 1990 14:09:35 PDT.]
Alas, MRC has missed the point I and other conservatives are
making. It isn't that Texas should or should not have an income
tax, although many of us have an opinion on that. What I worry
about is that the Federal judiciary should be able to force Texas
to have an income tax, whether it be directly or by imposing
costs that make it necessary, e.g. on grounds that otherwise
Texas is inflicting cruel and unusual punishments.
∂12-Apr-90 1432 Mailer re: housing policy for unmarried cohabitants
To: vera@FANARAAKEN.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from vera@fanaraaken.Stanford.EDU sent 12 Apr 90 21:03:37 GMT.]
Many of the benefits offered to married couples by common law, by
statute law at various levels and by Stanford University policy are
motivated by the idea that married couples often produce children
and that it is a public benefit to help this - at least not to
increase its costs. In so far as benefits are to be offered to
couples that are presumed not to produce children, they need to
be disentangled from what is supposed to benefit genuine
families. I use the word ``genuine'' intentionally.
What thought have the advocates of recognizing homosexual
combinations given to that? Or are they merely out to grab
everything in sight that isn't nailed down?
∂12-Apr-90 1715 Mailer re: housing policy for unmarried cohabitants
To: vera@FANARAAKEN.STANFORD.EDU
CC: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from vera@fanaraaken.STANFORD.EDU sent Thu, 12 Apr 90 14:57:52 -0700.]
There are great institutional costs to micromanagement, so the
laws whose proposers explicitly wished to encourage families have
no provisions for checking whether a couple intends to have
children. However, many laws and other institutional arrangements
provide additional benefits for families with children.
While homosexuals might adopt children, they hardly ever do, and
society is ambivalent about whether they should even be allowed to.
∂12-Apr-90 1718 JMC
To: CLT
We need to optimize Joe to producing a qlisp project report.
∂12-Apr-90 1803 Mailer re: housing policy for unmarried cohabitants
To: bthomas@NEON.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from bthomas@Neon.Stanford.EDU sent 12 Apr 90 22:04:45 GMT.]
My own opinion is that the decline in numbers of people scoring in
a high level in the SAT from 35,000 to 14,000 between the years 1965
to 1985 is due in a substantial measure to smart people not having
enough children. I also think there is an absolute shortage of
very smart people, e.g. the offspring of Stanford graduate students
(with some probability). I also think the overall population problem
won't be substantial in the U.S. for several hundred years, maybe
longer if fertility continues as at present.
Also when I get old, there will still be the baby-boomers around to
take care of me. When Becky Thomas gets old, there may not be.
∂12-Apr-90 2232 Mailer re: housing policy for unmarried cohabitants
To: MRC@CAC.WASHINGTON.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message sent Thu, 12 Apr 1990 22:04:07 PDT.]
I haven't noticed concern among many of my fellow conservatives
about smart people not having enough children.
∂13-Apr-90 1218 JMC re: housing policy for unmarried cohabitants
To: bthomas@NEON.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri, 13 Apr 90 11:40:37 -0700.]
The first thing to do is to determine objectivel whether there is
a problem and how big it is. Around the turn of the century, the
eugenics movement worried about the problem, but they assumed (or
perhaps concluded on limited evidence) that genetic intelligence was
very strongly correlated with social class. It turned out that
there was enough intelligence latent in the lower classes to
prevent any short term drop in the number of people available for
jobs requiring high intelligence. However, there has been substantial
equality of opportunity for a long time now. I came from a working
class family, and I believe that very few children of my ability
in my generation in the schools I went to failed to get a good
education. Now we see that the highest scores in the Science Talent
Search are being made by oriental immigrants. All this is indicative
but far from conclusive. There needs to be an objective study.
Unfortunately, ideology and politics have prevented objectivity.
When one sees newspaper reports about the decline in the number
of very high SAT scores, every hypothesis except the genetic one
is mentioned. America tends to be equalitarian anyway, and the
political left has been able to intimidate people into regarding
any attempt at objective study of genetic determination of human
intelligence as racist. They all fear that William Shockley was
right and don't want to touch the subject. An assistant professor
of genetics would have to be really fanatic to risk his chances
of tenure on such a question.
Suppose there is a substantial genetic component. In my opinion,
the best chance is for a private foundation to subsidize children
by intelligent people. However, to pay the full costs of additional
children would be very expensive - maybe several hundred thousand
dollars over the minority of the child. Therefore, it might be
more cost-effective to pay a small subsidy immediately, e.g. to pay
the costs of infant child care while the mother worked, say $20,000
per child above one or two. I say private foundation, because I
despair of getting politicians to admit the problem exists until
it gets enormously worse.
Maybe some jawboning will help. Please have two children instead
of just one. It is possible, of course, to counter the anti-child
propaganda of Paul Ehrlich, etc., because that's a matter of citing
facts. There's a book on the subject by Ben Wattenberg of which
I have read reviews. Wattenberg is an optimist about America generally,
and about the resource availability to support a larger population.
He also thinks immigration to the U.S. is good for the U.S.
There is a sense in which the U.S. is becoming less crowded all the
time. Namely, many less desirable areas of the U.S are losing
population. People complain about the crowded Bay Area but other
people continue to move in, and the complainers don't move out.
The far North East county in California, Modoc County, had a population
change from 8,000 to 7,000 between 1960 and 1970. (Reagan visited
it just before he left office as Governor and claimed he was the
only Governor to visit Modoc County while in office.)
∂13-Apr-90 1427 JMC phone call on my line
To: VAL
Howard Blair of Syracuse University 315 443-3565 would like you to call.
∂13-Apr-90 2318 JMC re: a mathematical problem for your amusement
To: beeson@UCSCD.UCSC.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri, 13 Apr 90 23:09:31 -0700.]
Each of the four triangles into which the square is divided
must then have rational area.
∂14-Apr-90 0126 JMC Spider contest
To: LES
It seems to me that in the week before SAIL is turned off,
there should be a Spider contest, i.e. everyone works on
the same 10 random initial positions.
∂14-Apr-90 0816 JMC re: Spider contest
To: LES
[In reply to message rcvd 14-Apr-90 01:41-PT.]
I suppose so, unless some other scheme seems more interesting.
∂15-Apr-90 1414 JMC Am I truthful?
To: RPG@SAIL.Stanford.EDU, JJW@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
Ito asked me to write a Foreword for the proceedings of the
Sendai workshop. Here's a draft. It contains some remarks
about history of parallelism about which I haven't had time
to verify by the necessary library work. Is there anything
that contradicts what you know?
Since computers were first invented, it has been known
that serial computation has limits that can be far exceeded by
using parallel computation. Even very early computers used
parallelism in carrying out arithmetic operations, and improved
hardware has expanded this kind of parallelism.
The first project to build a parallel computer was
probably Illiac 4 proposed by the early 1960s. It was
over-elaborate, the cellular automaton influenced design made it
almost immune to programming, and by the time it was working, it
had been over-run by the Cray I, and ordinary serial computer
with added vector facilities.
Parallel computing poses a harsh dilemma for the system
designer. The largest number of arithmetic operations per second
is obtained by designs that offer very limited communication
among the processors. If the problem fits such a design, it can
run very fast, but for many kinds problems, effective parallelism
cannnot be obtained without good communication. Designs offering
the best communication, e.g. fully shared full-speed memory,
cannot compute as fast other designs and don't scale easily to
very large numbers of processors. Ingenuity sometimes provides
unexpected solutions, but sometimes it seems that no amount of
ingenuity will substitute for shared memory.
The largest numerical computations are those involving
partial differential equations. When these are replaced by
difference equations in the most obvious ways, they seem to lend
themselves to regular arrays of processors. However, as soon as
shock waves require concentrating the computation on dynamically
selected parts of space, and radiation propagates influences at
the speed of light, the most obvious grids waste computation.
The idea of queue-based multi-processing arose in the
early 1960s, but support was not offered for actually
implementing it. The ideas is that processes that generate
subprocesses that can be done in parallel dynamically put the
subtasks in a queue structure and that processors take tasks from
this structure when they become free. On the one hand, queue
based multi-processing seems to require a shared memory, which is
expensive. On the other hand, it offers straightforward ways of
programming almost any kind of problem using techniques that
aren't far from those used in programming for serial computers.
Moreover, the programs produced don't depend on the number of
processors, which can even change dynamically. The languages
needed are just the usual serial languages augmented by a few
constructions for declaring parallelism.
Queue-based multi-processing is particularly well suited
for symbolic computation, where the same recursive process may
involve data structures of similar structure and of enormously
varied size, and where the data structures are dynamically
determined. Lisp can be made into a parallel language in a
variety of ways without distorting its character. Moreover, many
Lisp programs written for serial machines can be made to take
advantage of parallelism of this kind. Putting Lisp programs on
parallel machines based on the idea of a cellular automaton is
problematical, and if a solution is found for a particular
program, it is likely to be strongly configuration dependent.
Projects to build parallel Lisp systems in the form of
compilers and interpreters for existing or announced shared
memory multi- processors began in the middle 1980s and have
proceeded uneventfully. It seems to be a straightforward task
whenever the necessary resources can be assembled and maintained.
The initial proposals for parallel constructs were similar to
each other, and my original idea in proposing the workshop
reported in these papers was that it would be a standardization
conference, and on the basis of some experience with the parallel
constructs, a proposal could be made for the incorporation of
parallelism into Common Lisp. Unfortunately, it seems that the
field of parallel Lisp is not quite ready for standardization. I
hope the idea will be pursued in a future meeting.
The present workshop is about the first in which
extensive experience in actually implementing and using the
parallel constructs is extensively reported. The approaches
taken are adequately introduced in the Preface.
∂15-Apr-90 2102 Mailer married student housing
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
I believe that Stanford didn't have any kind of married
student housing till after World War II. Previously
marriage was considered incompatible with undergraduate
education and having children, even more so. Many
universities considered marriage grounds for expulsion.
I believe the service academies are the only present
relic of such a policy.
After World War II, Stanford was flooded with veterans,
some of whom had spent 5 years in the service and were
already married and wouldn't wait. Stanford and
other universities correctly considered it important
that married veterans should still be able to get
a university education and therefore made provision
for married housing. They also correctly considered
that it was a mistake to pressure these veterans to
postpone their families.
My opinion is that there is no matter of right
involved. Stanford has a legal right to any housing
policy that will further its educational goals.
My opinion is that married students with children
or expecting them should get the highest priority.
I don't see any need for Stanford to make special
provisions for any other kind of couple.
To summarize, I don't buy a parity argument for
subsidizing others. Is there any other kind of
argument?
∂15-Apr-90 2335 JMC appointments
To: cross@VAX.DARPA.MIL, scherlis@VAX.DARPA.MIL
I will be in Washington for the National Academy of Sciences meeting
from Monday April 23 to Wednesday. I would like to visit DARPA
at this time to discuss formal reasoning, Elephant and perhaps
Qlisp. If possible I would like an appointment with Barry
Boehm. Wednesday afternoon is the best time for me.
I'll try to get you by phone.
∂16-Apr-90 1240 Mailer re: Death Penalty Alternative
To: andy@Neon.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from andy@Neon.Stanford.EDU sent 16 Apr 90 19:05:01 GMT.]
Chuck Karish writes that people who steal car stereos are more likely
to go to jail than money launderers and people who swindle savings and
loans. He adds
``Contrasts like this don't do much for the
credibility of the US legal system.''
Andy Freeman challenges this on statistical grounds, and I would like
Karish to clarify his remarks with regard to the following points.
1. Does he think improvement lies in the direction of imprisoning fewer
stereo thieves or more errant bankers?
2. If more errant bankers can't be caught, should the number of stereo
thieves imprisoned be reduced in order to increase ``fairness''.
3. To what extent are questions of incapacitation and rehabilitation
relevant in comparing the two cases? I don't know about rehabilitation,
since I can't look into bankers' hearts, but for someone to be caught
twice in banking swindles is extremely rare. (I believe Billie Sol
Estes has manage something similar twice, but at a twenty year interval).
The typical stereo thief acquires quite a long record.
∂16-Apr-90 1428 JMC re: 'Foreword'
To: ito@ITO.ECEI.TOHOKU.AC.JP
[In reply to message sent Thu, 12 Apr 90 19:32:56 JST.]
Here is the Foreword. I'll be back from a trip April 26 in case
you want modifications.
Since computers were first invented, it has been known
that serial computation has limits that can be far exceeded by
using parallel computation. Even very early computers used
parallelism in carrying out arithmetic operations, and improved
hardware has expanded this kind of parallelism.
The first project to build a parallel computer was probably
Illiac 4 proposed by the early 1960s. It was over-elaborate, the
cellular automaton influenced design made it almost immune to
programming, and by the time it was working, it had been over-run by
the Cray I, and other ordinary serial computers with added vector
facilities and pipelining.
Parallel computing poses a harsh dilemma for the system
designer. The largest number of arithmetic operations per second is
obtained by designs that offer very limited communication among the
processors. If the problem fits such a design, it can run very fast,
but for many kinds of problem, effective parallelism cannnot be obtained
without good communication. Designs offering the best communication,
e.g. fully shared full-speed memory, cannot compute as fast as other
designs and don't scale easily to very large numbers of processors.
Ingenuity sometimes provides unexpected solutions, but sometimes it
seems that no amount of ingenuity will substitute for shared memory.
The largest numerical computations are those involving partial
differential equations. When these are replaced by difference
equations in the most obvious ways, they seem to lend themselves to
regular arrays of processors. However, as soon as shock waves require
concentrating the computation on dynamically selected parts of space,
and radiation propagates influences at the speed of light, the most
obvious grids waste computation.
The idea of queue-based multiprocessing arose in the early
1960s, but support was not offered for actually implementing it. The
idea is that processes can dynamically generate subprocesses that can
be done in parallel, and these subtasks are put in a queue structure
from which processors take tasks when they become free. On the one
hand, queue based multiprocessing seems to require a shared memory,
which is expensive. On the other hand, it offers straightforward ways
of programming almost any kind of problem using techniques that aren't
far from those used in programming for serial computers. Moreover,
the programs produced don't depend on the number of processors, which
can even change dynamically. The languages needed are just the usual
serial languages augmented by a few constructions for declaring
parallelism.
Queue-based multiprocessing is particularly well suited
for symbolic computation, where the same recursive process may
involve data structures of similar structure but of enormously
varied size, and where the data structures are dynamically
determined. Lisp can be made into a parallel language in a
variety of ways without distorting its character. Moreover, many
Lisp programs written for serial machines can be made to take
advantage of parallelism of this kind. Putting Lisp programs on
parallel machines based on the idea of a cellular automaton is
problematical, and if a solution is found for a particular
program, it is likely to be strongly configuration dependent.
Projects to build parallel Lisp systems in the form of
compilers and interpreters for existing or announced shared
memory multiprocessors began in the middle 1980s and have
proceeded uneventfully. It seems to be a straightforward task
whenever the necessary resources can be assembled and maintained.
The initial proposals for parallel constructs were similar to
each other. In fact my original idea in proposing the workshop
reported in these papers was that it would be a standardization
conference, and on the basis of some experience with the parallel
constructs, a proposal could be made for the incorporation of
parallelism into Common Lisp. Unfortunately, it seems that the
field of parallel Lisp is not quite ready for standardization. I
hope standardization will be pursued in a future meeting.
The present workshop is about the first in which extensive
experience in actually implementing and using the parallel constructs
is extensively reported. The approaches taken are adequately
introduced in the Preface.
It seems to me that both queue-based multi-processing and
systems with weaker communication are destined to survive and
will be suitable for different kinds of application. Queue-based
multi-procesing will provide general and straightforward
facilities of all kinds of work, but some kinds of program will
compute faster on more specialized systems.
∂16-Apr-90 1524 JMC Elephant slides
To: nilsson@TENAYA.STANFORD.EDU
They are in elepha.sli[e89,jmc] on SAIL. Some will suit you
and some won't. Pat will print a copy for you.
∂16-Apr-90 2017 JMC T
To: CLT
1. On my desk is a collection of little books entitled "Beginning
Reading at Home (for Children 3-6). It includes a test of
reading readiness. His score was 22 out of 24. According to the
criteria of the book he's ready to start reading. He is also
just beginning to sound words.
2. I took the Arnolds and T to Louie's. We reserved for six
but because of the Chinatown strike in favor of rebuilding
the Embarcadero Freeway, Louie was late in bringing back
the crab and the Peking duck, so we didn't eat till 7. T
behaved beautifully while we waited, and when the food
finally came ate quantities of crab, duck, rice and some
asparagus. He demanded we bring some home - which we did.
This was the first time taking Timothy to a restaurant was
a clear win.
∂16-Apr-90 2043 JMC re: automobile hydrogen fuel
To: rick@HANAUMA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 16 Apr 90 17:49:32 PDT.]
Are you sure it's more dense than liquid hydrogen?
When I read about it, it was advertised as more dense than
compressed hydrogen gas. Hydrogen has three times the energy
density per kg of gasoline (when combined with atmospheric
oxygen). However, liquid hydrogen has a density of .07 compared
to .75 for gasoline, so a liquid hydrogen tank needs 3.5 times
the interior volume, which still seems feasible. The problem in
handling liquid hydrogen is that it can freeze any air it
contacts giving a danger of plugging pipes, causing pressure
build-up and possible explosions. I think that was the cause of
an accident at SLAC some years ago. When hydrogen is adsorbed in
metals, one has to worry about the weight and cost of the metal.
∂16-Apr-90 2348 JMC
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
I transmitted the Foreword to Ito.
∂17-Apr-90 0144 JMC (→22614 26-Apr-90)
To: "#___JMC.PLN[2,2]"
I'll be away until April 26. I may have the
opportunity to read electronic mail. You can
email mps@sail.stanford.edu or phone Pat Simmons
at 415 723-4430.
∂17-Apr-90 0201 JMC tax
To: CLT
The returns are mailed. I took $26K from Prudential-Bache
and deposited $30.5K including checks from MCC, MAD
and Stanford.
∂20-Apr-90 0854 JMC May
To: korf@CS.UCLA.EDU
It doesn't look like any of the proposed times for a lecture will
work. How about getting together Tuesday evening? I'll
communicate further when I get back to Stanford next Wednesday evening.
∂20-Apr-90 0858 JMC
To: shoham@HUDSON.Stanford.EDU
CC: VAL@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
9am is ok for me also.
∂25-Apr-90 2111 JMC re: URGENT AI Division business
To: jutta@COYOTE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent 20 Apr 1990 1010-PST.]
Both May 30 and May 2 are ok for me.
∂25-Apr-90 2117 JMC re: PDP
To: skitodie@MED.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun, 22 Apr 90 20:11:42 -0700.]
I have no definite opinion about its feasibility, but it would be
necessary to multiply the number of inputs by the maximum number
of rooms the house might have and add inputs for each pair of
rooms to say whether they would be connected. It would be interesting
to see whether their system could handle a 10 room house.
Even if it did work, it is then quite implausible as a model
of human reasoning, because it suggests that one explore the
whole house and then classify all the rooms at once.
I've been on a trip so I just saw your message.
∂25-Apr-90 2125 JMC re: Origins of Lisp
To: casley@NEON.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 23 Apr 90 16:47:16 -0700.]
I published a paper in the Proceedings of a conference on Programming
Languages edited by Wexelblatt. You can get a copy from Pat Simmons.
It's called History of LISP.
It says just the opposite of your conjecture. The original idea
was just to combine the list structure of IPL with the assignment
statements of Fortran. However, before I got started with LISP
I had invented conditional expressions in connection with a chess
program in Fortran I was working on. Of course, they could not
be properly implemented in Fortran. Then in writing a differentiation
program, I discovered that the program could be written in the
form that is called pure LISP. I was somewhat doubtful about
whether it would be convenient to base a language on it. Although
it was quite obvious that it was computionally universal, it was
apparent that it would not take advantage of the full capabilities of the
computer. For this reason I always planned to allow assignment
statements in the full language. However, some other people
thought they could get by without them.
∂25-Apr-90 2126 JMC re: meeting
To: guha@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 23 Apr 1990 16:49:29 PDT.]
The only possibility is the third. How about 2pm?
∂25-Apr-90 2129 JMC re: a question
To: james@CS.ROCHESTER.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 23 Apr 90 18:27:31 -0400.]
Hmm. I know of no version that doesn't have Hayes's name on
it. I'd better see if there is something else wrong with the
version you have. If it's the version for my collected papers
on AI, which is newly printed, it should still have his name on
it.
∂25-Apr-90 2130 JMC McCarthy and Hayes
To: VAL
Could you check whether the version being printed in my collected
papers also has Hayes's name on it. It should, of course.
∂25-Apr-90 2133 JMC re: Oops
To: korf@CS.UCLA.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 24 Apr 90 11:32:36 pdt.]
Later would be better. Say whether you would like a late dinner (You'd
have to find a place) or whether I should eat with my fellow Board
members of Information International. That meeting usually
continues the recriminations of the afternoon meeting, so I
wouldn't mind missing it.
∂25-Apr-90 2136 JMC re: Reading committee
To: lin@CS.Stanford.EDU, VAL@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message from lin@cs.stanford.edu sent Wed, 25 Apr 1990 14:26:12 PDT.]
Yes for me.
∂25-Apr-90 2138 JMC re: RISKS contribution
To: cdp!kpeters@LABREA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 25 Apr 90 15:20:12 PST.]
Yes, you may reproduce my contribution. However, I'd like to
check what you propose to reproduce to check whether it might
assume the reader already knows about the issue. At least
some of my contributions assumed that.
∂25-Apr-90 2141 JMC re: new draft; reference request
To: rathmann@ECLIPSE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 25 Apr 90 19:01:45 PDT.]
I have no objection to meeting on Saturday May 5. Assuming
you have the full day available, I'd like to choose the
time later. Will you be back in time to phone me the
previous evening at home 857-0672?
∂25-Apr-90 2146 JMC re: new draft; reference request
To: rathmann@ECLIPSE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 25 Apr 90 21:45:21 PDT.]
My flight leaves on Sunday at 2:45pm. I'm usually desperate before
a trip, but if worst comes to worst you could drive me to the
airport.
∂25-Apr-90 2148 JMC re: renewal of courtesy and consulting faculty
To: nilsson@TENAYA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sat, 21 Apr 90 15:56:29 PDT.]
Have any of the courtesy professors been promoted to higher
rank by their home departments?
∂25-Apr-90 2154 JMC re: express mail
To: aileen@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 24 Apr 1990 8:57:01 PDT.]
Electronic mail intended to be read promptly should go to
JMC@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU. Mail sent to MCCARTHY@CS.STANFORD.EDU
goes into my junk mail file and is read along with seminar
announcements and other notices.
∂25-Apr-90 2154 JMC re: new draft; reference request
To: rathmann@ECLIPSE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 25 Apr 90 21:49:48 PDT.]
Yes.
∂26-Apr-90 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:
I'll be away until April 26. I may have the
opportunity to read electronic mail. You can
email mps@sail.stanford.edu or phone Pat Simmons
at 415 723-4430.
∂26-Apr-90 0717 JMC request for a paper
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
∂19-Apr-90 0812 shekhar@cs.umn.edu request for a paper
Received: from cs.umn.edu by SAIL.Stanford.EDU with TCP; 19 Apr 90 08:12:03 PDT
Received: by cs.umn.edu (5.59/1.14)
id AA10396; Thu, 19 Apr 90 10:12:53 CDT
Date: Thu, 19 Apr 90 10:12:53 CDT
From: "Shashi Shekhar" <shekhar@cs.umn.edu>
Message-Id: <9004191512.AA10396@cs.umn.edu>
To: jmc@sail.stanford.edu
Subject: request for a paper
Prof. McCarthy,
I enjoyed the discussion of 'knows-about' predicate and
cooperation between experts in Minneapolis. I would appreciate
receiving a copy of your paper on "measure of the value of information"
modelling the interaction between a weatherman and a businessman.
Shashi
∂26-Apr-90 0919 JMC student papers
To: VAL
Thanks for the chance to look at them. Only the first
two or three seemed to understand and distinguish what
questions the two articles were addressing. I would
suggest that you ask Leslie to comment on such papers
in a more detailed way, either from her own point of
view or from what she knows of yours. Better, I suppose,
would be to have her point out where the students
have misinterpreted the intentions of the authors.
∂26-Apr-90 0952 JMC telephone date
To: scherlis@VAX.DARPA.MIL
1pm your time Tuesday, May 1.
Subjects: elephant, formal reasoning
∂26-Apr-90 1719 JMC quote
To: eaf@SUMEX-AIM.Stanford.EDU
Is it correct to quote you as believing that a
database of common sense knowledge will require
10 million facts.
∂26-Apr-90 1720 JMC quote
To: eaf@SUMEX-AIM.Stanford.EDU
Actually, what I wanted to know is whether you
believe that 10 million ordinary rules will do it.
∂26-Apr-90 2226 JMC re: [John McCarthy <JMC@sail.stanford.edu> : quot]
To: eaf@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu, 26 Apr 1990 22:22:35 PDT.]
Thanks. Incidentally, I discuss these estimates in lectures based
on my 1983 paper ``Some expert systems need common sense''. I have
no present plan for a new paper along those lines, so any
comment has and will appear only on a slide.
∂27-Apr-90 0847 JMC re: IEEE Expert Interview (reprint from last summer)
To: HOFFMAN@CSLI.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri 27 Apr 90 01:15:10-PDT.]
Either 11am or 3pm would be possible.
∂27-Apr-90 1729 JMC re: Parking
To: carlstea@SIERRA.STANFORD.EDU, ee-faculty@SIERRA.STANFORD.EDU,
ee-adminlist@SIERRA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from carlstea@sierra.Stanford.EDU sent Fri, 27 Apr 90 15:01:12 PDT.]
The University's new parking policy is probably based on the
popular, though false, idea that the individual transportation
provided by the automobile is on its way out. It is appropriate
for engineering departments to try to persuade Stanford to be
more objective about this rather than just joining a bandwagon.
∂27-Apr-90 1818 JMC Please tex
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
penros.1[w90,jmc] and send it to
Dr. Lawrence A. Shepp
AT&T Bell Laboratories
Murray Hill, NJ 07974
∂29-Apr-90 1213 Mailer "totalitarian vs. authoritarian" in Moscow News
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
Some years ago, Jeane Kirkpatrick introduced a distinction
between totalitarian and authoritarian regimes. The policy
implication of her distinction was that while authoritarian
regimes were not as good as democracies, the U.S. could
work with authoritarian regimes and pressure them towards
democracy, totalitarian regimes had to be opposed. Since
most of the existing authoritarian regimes according to
her criteria were right wing and most totalitarian ones
were left wing the distinction was challenged by liberals,
who opposed helping right wing regimes defend themselves
against left wing military attack. They did not accept
arguments that the left wing attackers were totalitarians
and were supported by the Soviet Union.
Now that communism is collapsing, the argument moves on.
1. Leftists say that the collapse of communist regimes
shows that the distinction was phony, because Kirkpatrick
had said that totalitarian regimes don't change.
2. Kirkpatrick's distinction between totalitarian and
authoritarian regimes has become popular among Soviet
intellectuals, because it corresponds with their
experience. When I was in Moscow last year, the
Institute of Philosophy was conducting a continuing
seminar on totalitarianism.
Here's a quote from Moscow News, 1990 No. 15, p.6
THE PRESIDENTIAL SYSTEM: FROM TOTALITARIANISM TO
DEMOCRACY
Historical precedents afford no simple answer to this
question. On the one hand, one should recall Germany's
tragety after unlimited powers were granted Hitler by a
castrated Reichstag (for four years). On the other
hand, in Franco's Spain, the Black Colonel's Greece
and, even Pinochet's Chile, dictatorial power
ultimately and peacefully evolved into democracy.
Wherein lies the fundamental difference? Germany was a
totalitarian regime, whereas the other three countries
were authoritarian regimes.
What sets authoritarianism apart from
totalitarianism? According to Raymond Aron, the French
political scientist, "the totalitarian phenomenon
emerges whenever one party gets the political monopoly
on power, and this party has an ideology which it
considers the absolute and official truth, for the
vindication of which the state retains its monopoly on
the means of persuasion and coercion." Other hallmarks
of totalitarianism include the state's monopoly on the
economy and the pseudo-democratic principle of the
"sovereignty of the masses."
In contrast the restrictions on freedom under
authoritarianism are seen almost permissive: this and
that has been forbidden, and as regards the rest you
are free to live the way you like. Moreover, the
restrictions usually affect political, rather than
personal liberties.
.
.
.
Thus, is Russia today in danger of repeating
its totalitarian past if an authoritarian system is
adopted? Yes.
.
.
.
The USSR is still in transition from
totalitarianism to authoritarianism, not from
authoritarianism to democracy.
.
.
.
We must acknowledge Christianity as the statewide scale
of moral values, as society's spiritual groundwork.
There are other interesting views expressed in the article,
but my purpose in excerpting it is to illustrate the
resonance of various Western (and even right wing) ideas
in the Soviet Union. It should also be emphasized that
it is no longer reasonable to regard publication of an
opinion in Moscow News as a sign that the opinion has
some official support. On most issues, they really have
a free press now. (I wouldn't be surprised if there were
still some restrictions in the areas of criticizing foreign
policy, revealing KGB secrets, and personal criticism of
Gorbachev and some others).
I agree with the article about the distinction between
totalitarianism and authoritarianism but not on some
other points. Regrettably, American experts on the
Soviet Union still don't take present Soviet writing
on the subject seriously. They take it only as
illustration but never argue with it.
∂30-Apr-90 0017 JMC
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
saaty.1
∂30-Apr-90 1931 JMC Lifschitz salary charge to teaching
To: wheaton@SUNBURN.Stanford.EDU
CC: VAL@SAIL.Stanford.EDU, CLT@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
It is my understanding that it is illegal to
charge the full salary to a research account of
someone who is teaching. This applies to
Vladimir's current teaching and also to the course
he taught last year.
∂30-Apr-90 1935 JMC
To: wheaton@SUNBURN.Stanford.EDU
The whois database doesn't know about you.
∂30-Apr-90 1936 JMC
To: wheaton@SUNBURN.Stanford.EDU
I take it back; it's broken at the moment.
∂30-Apr-90 2115 JMC re: IEEE Interview
To: HOFFMAN@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon 30 Apr 90 20:56:17-PDT.]
I just looked at it. It's generally ok.
1. I'll pick the second variant sentence, because I don't want to
add anything.
2. Make changes as follows:
exhaust => go beyond
Machine Intelligence => AI
have not worked and wish => have not worked, and I wish
omit: I lowing sense:
∂01-May-90 0958 JMC conversation with Ruth Malen
To: CLT
She suggested I call Eleanora Jadwin, 856-0833, to talk about
evaluating Timothy's readiness. Jadwin is in charge of the
School District's young fives program. She was strongly in
favor of his going either to regular kindergarten or to the
young fives. All this means to me is that each institution,
whether it be Bing of the Palo Alto School District, thinks
it knows how to handle children best.
The young fives usually go to kindergarten
later, i.e. not to first grade. I wonder if "young fives"
isn't a euphemism for "dumb fives".
I asked her about skipping, and she said they were very
reluctant to do that. When I asked her how often it
happened, she said it hadn't happened even once in her
experience.
I asked about Timothy visiting a class, and she consulted
the secretary and said they didn't do that. It seems to
me that when we visited, they mentioned his visiting a
class as a possibility.
They want him registered as soon as possible. I was going
to do it today, but it seems my wallet has disappeared.
They require a birth certificate and proof of residence.
My current opinion is that we should enroll him in the
regular kindergarten and switch him to young fives or
Bing if there's a problem. The regular school starts
just after Labor Day, and Bing doesn't start till Stanford
does, so that would work out.
I'll call Jadwin.
∂01-May-90 1040 JMC progress in reading and writing
To: CLT
Timothy did quite a few more AT words, and spontaneously began
to copy words. I wrote PAT and he decided to write it too,
and did so reasonably successfully. So writing words is something
he has decided he wants to do.
∂01-May-90 1047 JMC
To: CLT
Young fives for next year is full, but Jadwin will phone one of us.
∂01-May-90 2135 JMC re: Thursdays appointment.
To: guha@NEON.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 1 May 1990 16:18:24 PDT.]
It looks like Friday at 11 would be ok.
∂02-May-90 1045 JMC re: Cognology
To: XIISWBIB%DDATHD21.BITNET@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed May 2 17:18:37 MEZ 1990.]
I don't believe I proposed cognology in a publication.
∂02-May-90 1355 JMC re: Cognology
To: XIISWBIB%DDATHD21.BITNET@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed May 2 19:56:02 MEZ 1990.]
Yes.
∂02-May-90 1358 JMC re: "The Meeting"
To: carlstea@SIERRA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 1 May 90 13:23:36 PDT.]
Do you know the name of the planner running the meeting?
∂02-May-90 1423 JMC Please get me
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
the following article. It may be simplest to find it in my filed copies
of Artificial Intelligence.
{\bf Davis, Randall; Buchanan, Bruce; and Shortliffe, Edward (1977)}:
``Production Rules as a Representation for a Knowledge-Based Consultation
Program,'' {\it Artificial Intelligence}, Volume 8, Number 1, February.
Also the following book from the library.
{\bf Shortliffe, Edward H. (1976)}:
Computer-Based Medical Consultations: MYCIN, American Elsevier, New York, NY.
∂02-May-90 1754 JMC reply to message
To: weening@Gang-of-Four.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 2 May 90 17:47:15 -0700.]
I'm sorry to hear about your father.
∂02-May-90 1824 JMC re: Parking
To: les@Gang-of-Four.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SHELBY.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from les@Gang-of-Four.Stanford.EDU sent 2 May 90 21:51:16 GMT.]
The cost estimate of $30K per car for a parking structure strikes me
as exaggerated, e.g. some creative bookkeeper loaded every possible
cost on it. Do you have a breakdown?
Nevertheless, if paid for on a straight line basis in 20 years,
this would be $1500 per permit. Taking Stanford's current ratio
that the actual number of parkers on a given day is 2/3 the
number of permits, this reduces to $1000 per permit. If this is
the real cost, they should eventually charge it, and expect
eventually to pay employees $1000 more per year than they
otherwise would.
Of course, doing it this way rather than making parking free and
paying less, gives about 30 percent to the Feds and California as
well as generating quite substantial bookkeeping costs.
However, the current dominant ideology would not like this, because
it regards imposing inconvenience on people for so-called environmental
reasons as a virtue.
Finally, I'm willing to bet money that when the oil crunch finally
comes, we will still manage to have cars as good as those we have
now, powered by electric batteries or liquid hydrogen. The
environmental ideologists will try to prevent this, but unless they
succeed all over the world, progress will win again. I can't imagine
the U.S. public agreeing to be austere when even one other country
actually solves the problem.
∂02-May-90 2005 JMC
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
ames.1, and the enclosure is ecomad[s90,jmc].
∂02-May-90 2044 JMC re: undergraduate lunch
To: jones@SUNBURN.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 2 May 1990 20:41:00 PDT.]
Yoav came too.
∂03-May-90 0015 Mailer re: There is more to it
To: MRC@CAC.WASHINGTON.EDU, HF.SXM@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
CC: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from MRC@CAC.Washington.EDU sent Wed, 2 May 1990 21:50:21 PDT.]
Everyone I know who has used a motorcycle for any length of time
has suffered significant injury.
∂03-May-90 1136 Mailer re: Bikes and Bikes
To: jim@BAROQUE.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from jim@baroque.Stanford.EDU sent 3 May 90 17:18:07 GMT.]
Jim Helman gives many reasons why motorcycles should be safer
than bicycles. I can't answer them and decided to cheat by
looking it up. The Statistical Abstract of the United States
says that in 1987 4,000 motorcyclists were killed in accidents
and 900 bicyclists. There were 5.1 million registered motorcycles
in 1987. 2.3 million bicycles were sold in 1987.
∂03-May-90 1501 JMC re: fall term visit
To: rabin%humus.huji.ac.il@FORSYTHE.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu, 3 May 90 19:13:48 +0300.]
Evidently I have sent you messages and you have sent me
messages that have not been received.
I will call the housing lady and send the biography.
This is the first I heard of the Vinton Hays lectures.
The arrangement you propose is fine with me. I'll send
titles and abstracts whenever you say to whomever you say.
Please acknowledge this and suggest someone else with whom
I can also communicate by email.
∂03-May-90 1504 JMC
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
Please send the following with a note that it is in
connection with the appointment of John McCarthy as
a visiting scholar for Fall 1990.
2. CV. the deans office needs a cv+list of publications
to process your appointment. This is one of those
formalities that bereaaucrcies(?) thrive on.
If they have already contacted you please ignore
this, otherwise have your secretary send the material
to Martha Mooney, DAS Pierce Hall, Harvard University,
Cambridge MA,02138.
∂03-May-90 1620 JMC re: Bikes and Bikes
To: les@Gang-of-Four.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SHELBY.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from les@Gang-of-Four.Stanford.EDU sent 3 May 90 21:49:51 GMT.]
There's a discrepancy here. If there are 78.1 million bicyclists
and 2.3 million bicycles are sold per year, this suggests that
the average bicycle is 34 years old, which seems to me extremely
doubtful. Maybe the 2.3 million refers to American manufactured
bicycles.
∂03-May-90 1657 Mailer re: Motorcycle safety
To: MRC@CAC.WASHINGTON.EDU
CC: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from MRC@CAC.Washington.EDU sent Thu, 3 May 1990 15:43:59 PDT.]
The original question isn't who is at fault in most motorcycle
accidents. I grant that if motorcyclists drove better and people
drove automobiles better, there would be fewer accidents.
The question was whether it would be prudent for more Stanford
people to commute by motorcycle. It seems to me that some of the
mistakes I have made driving cars, even after many years, would have
led to serious injury instead of bent fenders had I been driving a
motorcycle. Therefore, I consider it not prudent for me to drive
motorcycles, because I don't see how I can avoid occasional inattention.
Mark's statistic that 92 percent of accidents occur in people's first
year of motorcycle riding has two interpretations. Perhaps within
a year people learn HOW to ride motorcycles, or perhaps within a year
people learn NOT to ride motorcycles.
My acquaintances who gave up motorcycles after injury did not seem to
me to be reckless people.
∂03-May-90 1732 Mailer re: Bikes and Bikes
To: LES@SAIL.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from LES rcvd 03-May-90 17:22-PT.]
The 2.3 million was my mistake in reading the Statistical Abstracts.
I took a table giving the dollar value of bicycles as giving the
number of bicycles. Fortunately, the average bicycle still doesn't
cost $1,000. The Statistical Abstract agrees with Les about 1985
exactly, and gives 5.2 million domestic and 7.4 million imports for
1987.
∂04-May-90 1024 JMC (→22633 11-May-90)
To: "#___JMC.PLN[2,2]"
I will be in Santa Cruz till Sunday and then in Spain till
Friday May 11.
∂06-May-90 1215 JMC re: SPP Abstract
To: harnad@CLARITY.PRINCETON.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun, 6 May 90 10:08:49 EDT.]
I'll send it next weekend when I get back from my trip to Spain.
∂11-May-90 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:
I will be in Santa Cruz till Sunday and then in Spain till
Friday May 11.
∂11-May-90 1452 JMC re: Knuth conversation
To: winkler@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 7 May 1990 10:49:35 PDT.]
Phyllis, I'm still jmc@sail for non junk mail.
∂12-May-90 1628 JMC Patel-Schneider
To: leora@IBM.COM, VAL@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
My immediate reaction is to give up on him and
hold our conference elsewhere. However, I could
phone him Monday and try to browbeat him or call
Bobrow (the current President I think) and complain.
What are your opinions?
I'm going to the Soviet Union for ten days starting
Tuesday, so I can either do something Monday or put
it off till I get back.
∂12-May-90 1757 JMC re: Young's Depth Area
To: ok@COYOTE.STANFORD.EDU, latombe@COYOTE.STANFORD.EDU,
rosenschein@TELEOS.COM
[In reply to message from ok@coyote.stanford.edu sent 12 May 1990 1630-PDT.]
I'm not sure Michael Young's proposed reading list is acceptable
to me as his proposed depth examiner. I would want to be able to
examine him on nonmonotonic reasoning, especially circumscription
and also to examine him on situation calculus and reasoning about
change. Some of the texts and review articles he cites cover these
matters to some extent, but I wouldn't be sure they would give him
the competence I would require.
Maybe you should get another depth examiner.
∂12-May-90 2134 JMC abstract
To: harnad@CLARITY.PRINCETON.EDU
If you get this before Monday, May 14, please email me
a copy of Pat Hayes's abstract for the Searle symposium.
We want to co-ordinate. I have a draft I'll send you
Monday after further revision.
Pat hasn't access to a terminal till Monday, and I'm
going on a trip to the Soviet Union on Tuesday.
∂12-May-90 2201 JMC book and article
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
Sydney Shoemaker, Journal of Philosophy, vol. 77 #4, April 1990
Constructive Combinatorics, by Stanton and White
∂13-May-90 0223 JMC visa
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
I got a phone call from the Soviet Consulate in SF saying
my visa is ready. Please arrange for it to be picked up.
∂14-May-90 1056 JMC re: Signatures
To: leslie%teleos.com@AI.SRI.COM
[In reply to message sent Mon, 14 May 90 10:38:35 PDT.]
Ask Pat mps@sail for my schedule.
∂14-May-90 1256 JMC re: michael young quals
To: shoham@HUDSON.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun, 13 May 1990 10:54:08 PDT.]
Yes, but he should be prepared for questions based on what I know - including
circumscription and my "First Order Theories of Individual Concepts and
Propositions". I am also going off tomorrow and will be back on May 28.
∂14-May-90 1258 JMC re: abstract
To: harnad@CLARITY.PRINCETON.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun, 13 May 90 13:54:47 EDT.]
Thanks for Pat's abstract. There is no danger of our becoming one
speaker, since I don't agree with his idea at all. My abstract
shortly.
∂14-May-90 1636 JMC re: history of LISP
To: RWF
[In reply to message rcvd 14-May-90 14:45-PT.]
No. It could have been had I read more of Kleene's book. I invented
it for writing the LISP eval function. Later I noticed that Quine
had used it somewhere (I don't now remember where), and that's why
I called it Cambridge Polish.
∂14-May-90 1704 JMC re: qual depth area
To: young@CS.Stanford.EDU, shoham@Hudson.Stanford.EDU
CC: latombe@COYOTE.STANFORD.EDU, rosenschein@TELEOS.COM,
ok@COYOTE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from shoham@Hudson.Stanford.EDU sent Mon, 14 May 1990 13:45:58 PDT.]
To be a bit more specific, you should have some familiarity with
the approaches to nonmonotonic reasoning that I know about and
can examine on, i.e. circumscription and its application to
reasoning about action and knowledge.
∂14-May-90 1754 JMC re: qual depth area
To: young@NEON.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 14 May 1990 17:48:05 PDT.]
I will do my best to emphasize topics relevant to communication, but
this may get you some questions whose answers I don't know. I'll be
back from Russia on the 28th, and we can talk between then and the
30th. On the 31st I go to the nonmonotonic conference and will be
back the 4th which is too close to your exam.
∂14-May-90 2221 JMC Please make sure
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
a telegram is sent to the Institute of Philosophy in Moscow
giving (again) my time and flight of arrival. It should be
to the attention of Arkady Blinov. Suppes's secretary Laura
can do it.
∂15-May-90 0803 JMC Let's postpone getting together
To: korf@CS.UCLA.EDU
Unless you have something special to discuss, I'd
like to postpone getting together to another time.
I haven't got definite results from my 15 puzzle
experiment yet and haven't had time to think more
about it. Occasions will arise for me to go to L.A.
this summer.
∂15-May-90 0807 JMC
To: korf@ucla
I'll be at the Howard Johnson's in Culver City tonight, however.
∂15-May-90 0810 JMC re: my resume
To: nsuzuki%jpntscvm.bitnet@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 15 May 1990 18:57 JST.]
I got your resume and showed it to Nils Nilsson. However, as
I told you I suspected, the position had already been offered
to Jeff Ullman, and he has now accepted.
∂15-May-90 0814 JMC re: Symposium on Computational Logic
To: jwl%compsci.bristol.ac.uk@NSFNET-RELAY.AC.UK
[In reply to message sent Mon, 14 May 90 19:38:00 BST.]
This is to accept your invitation to take part in the
Esprit symposium.
∂15-May-90 0824 JMC reply to message
To: mps@GANG-OF-FOUR.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 15 May 90 08:23:25 -0700.]
Thanks, I got the message.
∂15-May-90 0825 JMC (→22654 28-May-90)
To: "#___JMC.PLN[2,2]"
I will return from a trip to Moscow May 28.
∂15-May-90 0920 Mailer delay in aid to Nicaragua and Panama
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
The Democrats in Congress are delaying $840 million in proposed
aid to Panama and Nicaragua by attaching more than $3 billion
in unrelated amendments including one to pay for abortions
in Washington, D.C. which is sure to make Bush veto the bill.
I wonder why.
Is my dark conservative suspicion that many Democrats are so
disappointed by the UNO victory in Nicaragua that they hope
democracy will collapse in Nicaragua and Panama justified?
Liberals seem often to have a high sentimental regard for
communism in various forms.
President Chamorro has just appealed for an emergency
$40 million loan.
∂28-May-90 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 return from a trip to Moscow May 28.
∂28-May-90 0008 JMC reply to message
To: mps@Gang-of-Four.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 15 May 90 09:28:34 -0700.]
What did we do about AAAI-90? I guess I should go.
∂28-May-90 0009 JMC reply to message
To: mps@Gang-of-Four.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 15 May 90 09:29:37 -0700.]
Find out where I can buy Constructive Combinatorics.
∂28-May-90 0010 JMC re: Knuth
To: PHY
[In reply to message rcvd 15-May-90 14:13-PT.]
I've forgotten what Don wanted.
∂28-May-90 0012 JMC re: Hennessy Nomination
To: linvill@SIERRA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu, 17 May 90 22:34:27 PDT.]
I just got back from Moscow and will do whatever you say
about the Hennessy nomination.
∂28-May-90 0016 JMC re: between the devil and the deep sea
To: ai.guha@MCC.COM
[In reply to message sent Thu, 17 May 90 01:13 CDT.]
You didn't hear from me soon, because I was in Moscow. I
have read your paper and have comments. Also I am willing
to defend our approach against the criticisms you cite.
∂28-May-90 0019 JMC reply to message
To: visikka@CMX.NPAC.SYR.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri, 18 May 90 18:58:33 EDT.]
I have been on a trip till tonight. Call me about an appointment
on Monday pm.
∂28-May-90 0021 JMC reply to message
To: mps@Gang-of-Four.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu, 24 May 90 10:33:22 -0700.]
I think this is something I don't want to do.
∂28-May-90 0054 JMC re: phone message
To: taleen@SUNBURN.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 23 May 1990 9:22:11 PDT.]
Please send messages to JMC@SAIL - not to mccarthy.
∂28-May-90 0142 Mailer Gorbachev, Hoover and Manley
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
The least plausible hypothesis about why Gorbachev is
visiting Hoover is that he doesn't know what he is
doing.
Manley doubtless doesn't understand why G is visiting
Hoover rather than the Political Science Department
whose members have been far more sympathetic to Soviet institutions
and foreign policy goals than have Hoover people.
Here are two hypotheses. I favor the first.
1. G thinks Hoover people have been more accurate about
the Soviet Union than have other people at Stanford. For
example, the Soviets have just published The Great Terror
about Stalin's crimes written by Robert Conquest of Hoover.
Many Soviets have referred questioners to that book as
more informative than anything else available so far
in the Soviet Union. Another example: Mikhail Bernstam
may be the leading expert on Soviet demography.
2. G thinks playing up to conservatives is more important
than playing up to liberals, because the latter will go
along with any help the conservatives can be persuaded
to give the Soviet Union. I doubt this one, because
G is meeting with Bush and the U.S. power structure
anyway.
∂28-May-90 1613 JMC re: Urgent: SPP Abstract
To: harnad@CLARITY.PRINCETON.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 28 May 90 11:46:30 EDT.]
Sorry about the abstract. I intended to send it before I went on
my trip to Moscow. It's the next message.
∂28-May-90 1614 JMC Abstract for Searle symposium
To: harnad@CLARITY.PRINCETON.EDU
John Searle begins his (1990)
``Consciousness, Explanatory Inversion and Cognitive Science''
with
``Ten years ago in this journal I published an
article (Searle, 1980a and 1980b) criticising what I
call Strong AI, the view that for a system to have
mental states it is sufficient for the system to
implement the right sort of program with right inputs
and outputs. Strong AI is rather easy to refute and
the basic argument can be summarized in one sentence: {\it a
system, me for example, could implement a program for
understanding Chinese, for example, without
understanding any Chinese at all.} This idea, when
developed, became known as the Chinese Room Argument.''
The Chinese Room Argument can be refuted in one sentence:
{\it Searle confuses the mental qualities of one computational
process, himself for example, with those of another process that
the first process might be interpreting, a process that
understands Chinese, for example.}
That accomplished, the lecture will
discuss the ascription of mental qualities to machines
with special attention to the relation between syntax and
semantics, i.e. questions suggested by the Chinese Room
Argument. I will deal explicitly with Searle's four ``axioms'',
which, although they don't have a unique interpretation, suggest
various ideas worth discussing.
∂28-May-90 2321 JMC re: qual depth area
To: young@NEON.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 28 May 1990 23:18:27 PDT.]
I expect to be in Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons.
∂28-May-90 2348 Mailer re: East Berliner's account of the First Day (long)
To: holstege@NEON.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from holstege@Neon.Stanford.EDU sent 23 May 90 02:51:17 GMT.]
Surely this letter must be a fake. According to the CIA, the per
capita GNP of East Germany (as of 1985) is greater than that of
West Germany. Given that, why would an East German be so
interested in opportunities to visit West Germany?
I was pointed to this "fact" by an article in Moscow News about a
conference in Washington about comparing Soviet and U.S. GNP and
military expenditures. The CIA estimates, published every year,
of these quantities have been challenged for the last ten years
by an American economist Igor Birman. The CIA estimated Soviet
GNP as about half that of the U.S. and Birman claimed it was only
14 percent of the U.S. value. Also Birman estimates the fraction
of GNP spent on the military in the USSR at 25 percent, and the
CIA estimate is much smaller. The U.S. fraction of GNP for
military expenditures is 6 percent.
The Washington conference included Soviet economists, including
people from the newly formed committees of the Supreme Soviet
charged with estimating these things. Their estimates agreed
with Birman's although independently developed. Some people
involved with the CIA estimates defended their methodology.
The Soviet parliamentarians agreed with Birman on Soviet
military expenditures also but said they still hadn't fully
penetrated their Government's secrecy even though their
positions entitle them to the facts.
One tidbit is that 4 million workers turned up this year to have
been left out of previous Soviet labor force statistics,
presumably because of a desire to conceal part of the defense
sector.
Moscow News said that the Statistical Abstract of the United
States put per capita GNP of East Germany ahead of West Germany
and that the estimate (presumably for East Germany) came from the
CIA. I checked in my 1989 Statistical Abstract, table 1411, p.
822, and Moscow News was right. It gives per capita GNP for West
Germany at in 1985 (in 1984 dollars) at $10,320 and that of East
Germany at $10,330 and lists the CIA as one of the sources.
Conservatives have long criticized the CIA for its estimates,
claiming they reflect a tendency to believe communist propaganda.
Maybe the CIA has been applying growth rate estimates
consistently for 40 years. A very small error in growth rate,
uncorrected and compounded for 40 years, could lead to a large
error in final result.
Oh, well, it appears we have a Central Stupidity Agency.
∂29-May-90 1234 JMC Mathpert
To: beeson@UCSCD.UCSC.EDU
Don Small
Colby College
Waterville, ME 04901
is using a computer to teach calculus and might be interested
in Mathpert.
∂29-May-90 1417 JMC re: reply to message
To: mps@Gang-of-Four.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 29 May 90 11:21:40 -0700.]
I never want on-campus housing and prefer what seems to be the
closest hotel.
∂29-May-90 1604 JMC
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
∂12-May-90 2201 JMC book and article
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
Sydney Shoemaker, Journal of Philosophy, vol. 77 #4, April 1990
Constructive Combinatorics, by Stanton and White
∂29-May-90 2257 Mailer re: should Russia pull out of the USSR?
To: mdbomber@PORTIA.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from mdbomber@portia.Stanford.EDU sent 30 May 90 00:18:04 GMT.]
Here's what seems to be going on with Russia and the USSR.
1. A Russian Supreme Soviet was recently elected. It is distinct
from the All-Union Supreme Soviet that was elected last Spring.
It contains a larger proportion of people who are against the
rule of the Communist Party including Sergei Kovalev, who had
just been released from prison when I met him in Spring 1988.
2. 25 percent of the Soviet GNP is spent on the military.
The military industry is concentrated in the Russian republic,
and the fraction of industry producing things people can use
is therefore smaller than elsewhere.
3. Control of industry is divided between All-Union ministries
and Republican ministries. The All-Union ministries are
particularly insensitive to local considerations like pollution
and providing public facilities, e.g. paving the roads near
a new plant.
4. Most of the speeches at the Russian Supreme Soviet used the
word sovereignty rather than independence, but there were some
rather strong suggestions. One speech I read suggested that
each republic should have its own army and the Union should be
like NATO. Sovereignty includes at least a Russian veto on
actions of the All-Union ministries in Russia.
5. These speeches were printed in Sovietskaya Rossiya, which
has been one of the most conservative newspapers. However,
its publisher is the Council of Ministers of the Russian
Republic, and the editors doubtless are noticing who their
new boss is going to be - Boris Yeltsin.
6. The sessions of the Russian Soviet have been televised
in Moscow, and have produced great excitement. In my hotel
last week, every other room I passed in the hall seemed to
have the speeches on loud enough to be heard in the corridor.
7. The Russian Republic includes many smaller nationalities
organized into so-called autonomous regions and other
kinds of special units. Spokesman for these peoples also
have their demands, but some of them were explicit in their
support of Yeltsin's sovereignty proposals.
8. I think one effect of increased Russian sovereignty will be to
divert presently military industry into producing civilian goods
and into creating infrastructure like roads and water supply.
∂30-May-90 0746 JMC re: Joe's Dinner
To: mps@GANG-OF-FOUR.STANFORD.EDU
CC: CLT@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 30 May 90 07:36:06 -0700.]
OK, I'll talk a little at Joe's dinner. I'll think about
whomelse to ask.
I abstain on LaVoy.
∂30-May-90 0942 JMC re: calenday
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 30-May-90 09:15-PT.]
No conflict.
∂30-May-90 1150 JMC re: Hennessy Nomination
To: linvill@SIERRA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 30 May 90 11:46:56 PDT.]
That's ok. I don't have special knowledge of what he has done.
∂30-May-90 1616 Mailer re: East Berliner's account of the First Day (long)
To: les@Gang-of-Four.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from les@Gang-of-Four.Stanford.EDU sent 30 May 90 21:26:01 GMT.]
Moscow News argues against Les's interpretation on the grounds
that the CIA also grossly underestimated Soviet military
expenditures.
∂30-May-90 1616 Mailer Moscow News
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
I have put the issue with several interesting stories, including
the one about comparing Soviet and U.S. GNP and military expenditures
in the CS lounge.
∂31-May-90 0736 JMC re: between the devil and the deep sea
To: ai.guha@MCC.COM
[In reply to message sent Thu, 31 May 90 01:37 CDT.]
I'll check over the copy I have to see if the comments look comprehensible.
I'm going to the nonmonotonic conference today and will be back Sunday
afternoon.
∂31-May-90 1340 JMC telephone appointment
To: scherlis@VAX.DARPA.MIL
Could you name a time at which I could phone you on Monday
or Tuesday? I note your latest message that includes welcome
for new ideas in the criteria for the plan.
∂31-May-90 1344 JMC address for papers
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
USSR
Moscow Region
141017 Mitishy - 17
ul. Bluchera, 24
Rodman, N.N.
∂02-Jun-90 1716 JMC re: Chinese Room
To: jfeldman%icsib2.Berkeley.EDU@JADE.BERKELEY.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu, 31 May 90 13:47:55 PDT.]
Not yet but maybe soon.
∂02-Jun-90 1717 JMC re: telephone appointment
To: SCHERLIS@DARPA.MIL
[In reply to message sent Thu 31 May 90 16:50:51-EDT.]
On Monday call home number 415 857-0672. The whole Quad
including MJH is blocked off Monday on account of Gorbachev.
∂02-Jun-90 1721 JMC re: notes for CS 350
To: pratt@CS.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri, 1 Jun 90 15:47:11 PDT.]
What is cs350?
∂03-Jun-90 1350 JMC re: committees for 90/91
To: nilsson@TENAYA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun, 3 Jun 90 13:44:57 PDT.]
I volunteer to continue on the Admissions Committee.
∂03-Jun-90 1351 JMC re: committees for 90/91
To: nilsson@TENAYA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun, 3 Jun 90 13:44:57 PDT.]
I also volunteer for Library and Publications.
∂03-Jun-90 1709 JMC re: circumscribing equality (your formulation)
To: rathmann@ECLIPSE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun, 3 Jun 90 16:38:26 PDT.]
I still have more thinking to do to puzzle out your formulation, but
consider the following.
1. Do <= as you did but write the axioms (exist h)(h(a') = a and
h(b')=b and (all x) (h(S(x) = S(h(x)).
2. Write a',b',S' < a,b,S as a',b',S' <= a,b,S and not(a,b,S <= a',b',S').
Using (exists h) gives a sentence that can be negated.
∂03-Jun-90 2131 JMC re: circumscribing equality (your formulation)
To: rathmann@ECLIPSE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun, 3 Jun 90 17:40:52 PDT.]
I have nothing against second order logic if it makes more
understandable formulas. This is because I regard making
algorithms for computation as a separate problem.
∂04-Jun-90 0944 JMC Abstract:
To: tajnai@CS.Stanford.EDU
Artificial Intelligence and Electronic Data Interchange
The object of this lecture is describe some of the
ideas of artificial intelligence (AI) that may help
expand the usability of electronic data interchange (EDI).
Business communication requires the use of intelligence.
For example, a person concerned with ordering goods from other
companies may have to take into account a reason why delivery may
be delayed or whether an offer of goods similar but cheaper
than those originally contemplated is acceptable.
An increasing amount of business communication involves
electronic data interchange in which a computer belonging to one
business communicates with a computer belonging to another. At
present EDI involves only the most routine communication for
which rigid formats are appropriate. As EDI expands it will
encounter limitations of the formats so far standardized, e.g.
X12, which standardizes some specific business documents like
invoices. The more ``intelligence'' can be put in the programs
that do EDI and the more flexible the formats allowed, the
more communication can be relegated to EDI. All these
financial whizzes that now have to telephone Japan in the
middle of the night will be able to get more sleep or even
go into some more productive line of work.
I used quotes on ``intelligence'' above, because the
first steps needn't involve much artificial intelligence.
Nevertheless, in the long run all intelligence we can achieve
in our programs will be useful.
Certain recent advances in artificial
intelligence will prove useful for programming business
communication. Since 1977, non-monotonic logic has developed
as part of AI research. Its use is appropriate for programs
that can take into account unexpected events that require
modifying normal procedures.
Besides the intelligence in the programs that use EDI,
some ideas from AI and (of all things) philosophy can help with
the communication itself. Business communication involves
questions, answers to questions, requests, authorizations,
promises and other of what the philosophers have called
``speech acts''. Questions should be comprehensible,
answers should be truthful and responsive and promises
should be authorized and kept. Elephant 2000 is a proposed
programming language whose inputs and outputs are formally
speech acts. This will allow formal verification that a program
answers questions responsively, makes only authorized
commitments and keeps the commitments it makes.
∂04-Jun-90 1025 JMC re: Hungary
To: rww@IBUKI.COM
[In reply to message sent Mon, 4 Jun 90 09:23:16 PDT.]
from my phon file: note spelling of name.
*Szeredi, Peter SZKI, Akademia u.17, Budapest, H-1054, Hungary 1982
> also Balint Domolki
∂04-Jun-90 1119 JMC re: Soviet Commerce
To: rww@IBUKI.COM
[In reply to message sent Mon, 4 Jun 90 09:17:43 PDT.]
1. Ershov died of stomach cancer in Dec 88.
2. Stefanyuk is alive and well in Moscow. I saw him
two weeks ago there.
3. Various people are well ahead of you in using Soviet
programmers. These include
>Schukin, Yefim 9 El Camino Drive, Corte Madera, CA 94925
* (office: 924-3560) (home: 927-1977)
and
>Rabinov, Arkady (home: 408 252-6871)
∂04-Jun-90 1123 JMC re: letter from Stefanuk
To: mostow@cs.RUTGERS.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 4 Jun 90 14:00:12 EDT.]
Stefanyuk gave me the letter two weeks ago in Moscow and asked me
to mail it for him in the U.S. Beyond that I have no connection
with the matter.
∂04-Jun-90 1218 JMC re: Paper on agreement
To: cphoenix@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 4 Jun 90 12:16:56 PDT.]
I doubt that the Elephant 2000 draft would be relevant to the problem
you are undertaking.
∂04-Jun-90 1222 JMC re: Paper on agreement
To: cphoenix@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 4 Jun 90 12:21:59 PDT.]
Nothing immediately comes to mind, but both Nilsson and Shoham
have been studying communication, and they or their students
may have considered agreements.
∂05-Jun-90 0950 JMC re: Carolyn Talcott
To: bundy@AIPNA.EDINBURGH.AC.UK
[In reply to message sent Tue, 5 Jun 90 15:11:21 BST.]
The email address is
clt@sail.stanford.edu
The SAIL computer is going away shortly, but we plan to preserve the
address indefinitely.
∂05-Jun-90 1030 JMC re: software law (an idle question)
To: beeson@UCSCD.UCSC.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 5 Jun 90 10:10:46 -0700.]
If the work was independent, they could not be sued under
copyright law for coming up with the same program. Of course, if
the internal symbols were the same, a jury might believe copying
was involved. This is the difference between copyright and
patent law. If the program was patented successfully and
defended successfully, coming up with the idea independently
wouldn't help the infringer. Copyrights need only be registers,
whereas patents must be granted by the Patent Offices of various
countries.
The issue currently being fought out is whether it is possible to
copyright or patent the style of the program. This what Apple is
suing Microsoft about. I forget which kind of law is involved.
Maybe it's trademark law.
∂05-Jun-90 1325 JMC my resume
To: lenat@MCC.COM
∂15-May-90 0319 nsuzuki%jpntscvm.bitnet@Forsythe.Stanford.EDU my resume
Received: from Forsythe.Stanford.EDU by SAIL.Stanford.EDU with TCP; 15 May 90 03:19:20 PDT
Received: by Forsythe.Stanford.EDU; Tue, 15 May 90 03:20:59 PDT
Received: by JPNTSCVM (Mailer R2.03B) id 9256; Tue, 15 May 90 18:58:33 JST
Date: Tue, 15 May 1990 18:57 JST
From: Norihisa Suzuki <nsuzuki%jpntscvm.bitnet@Forsythe.Stanford.EDU>
Subject: my resume
To: Professor John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU>
Dear John,
I sent you my resume by Fax and Airmail. Please let me know if
anything happens.
Regards, Nori
∂06-Jun-90 0942 JMC
To: ME
ns is garbling.
∂06-Jun-90 0942 JMC
To: ME
Is there some way to tell if the TIP is down?
∂06-Jun-90 2250 JMC Please decorate
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
gibbon.1. Have you been entering letters in the file letter[let,jmc]?
∂07-Jun-90 1048 JMC re: speaking of seccesionist states from federations
To: H.HARPER@MACBETH.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@MACBETH.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from H.HARPER@Macbeth.Stanford.EDU sent Thu 7 Jun 90 01:52:12-PDT.]
No more and no less than at any other time in the last 20 years.
The New York Times has an article about Quebec secessionist
sentiments today.
∂11-Jun-90 0854 JMC Please do this for me.
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
∂08-Jun-90 0854 njacobs@vax.darpa.mil ISTO Software Technology Community Meeting
Received: from vax.darpa.mil (darpa.mil) by SAIL.Stanford.EDU with TCP; 8 Jun 90 08:54:20 PDT
Received: from sun45.darpa.mil by vax.darpa.mil (5.61/5.61+local)
id <AA02720>; Fri, 8 Jun 90 11:36:07 -0400
Posted-Date: Fri 8 Jun 90 11:25:12-EDT
Received: by sun45.darpa.mil (4.1/5.51)
id AA19954; Fri, 8 Jun 90 11:25:13 EDT
Date: Fri 8 Jun 90 11:25:12-EDT
From: Nicole L. Fields <NJACOBS@DARPA.MIL>
Subject: ISTO Software Technology Community Meeting
To: SW-PI@vax.darpa.mil
Message-Id: <644858712.0.NJACOBS@VAX.DARPA.MIL>
Mail-System-Version: <SUN-MM(218)+TOPSLIB(128)@VAX.DARPA.MIL>
MEMORANDUM FOR DISTRIBUTION
SUBJECT: 1990 ISTO Software Technology Community Meeting
The Information Science and Technology Office (ISTO) of the Defense
Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is sponsoring a Software
Technology Community Meeting for invited researchers and government
officials on 27-29 June in Washington, DC.
The workshop will be held at the Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington, DC.
You are asked to reserve your room and to make arrangements for
payment yourself. A special workshop rate of $82.43 plus taxes is available.
Rooms will held until 12 June, so call early and be sure to identify
yourself as part of the ISTO Software Technology Community Meeting.
The number is (202) 234-0700. Since space at the workshop is limited,
it is necessary that everyone planning to attend notify Nicole Jacobs as
soon as possible either by phone at (202) 694-5800 or by electronic
mail at njacobs@vax.darpa.mil.
Please plan your travel so that you can attend the first session
beginning at 12:30 PM Wednesday, 27 June and the last session ending
at 3:30 PM Friday, 29 June. The workshop registration desk will be
open from 11:00 to 1:00 on that day. Additional information on the
meeting and registration will be sent to everyone by the end of next week.
If anyone has any special dietary requirements please contact
Nicole Jacobs by COB Wednesday, 13 June.
-------
∂11-Jun-90 1321 JMC re: LICS Mailing list
To: THEORY-A@VM1.NODAK.EDU, lics@CS.CMU.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 11 Jun 90 14:22:06 -0400.]
NAME (first, middle initial, last):
John McCarthy
POSTAL ADDRESS:
Computer Science Dept.
Stanford, CA 94305
EMAIL ADDRESS(ES):
jmc@sail.stanford.edu
*******
Would you be satisfied with receiving LICS CALLS FOR PAPERS
(and similar announcements) via EMAIL ONLY? (yes/no)yes
Would you be satisfied with receiving FINAL PROGRAMS and
REGISTRATION FORMS via email only? (yes/no)yes
[Note: you will need to print registration forms and send
them along with a check by PHYSICAL mail].
*******
Optional information (might be used in relation to paper submittals):
--------------------
PHONE: 415 723-4430
FAX/TELEX: (fax: 415 725-7411)
∂11-Jun-90 1601 JMC
To: guha@MCC.COM
%aiedi[s90,jmc] Artificial Intelligence and Electronic Data Interchange
tajnai@cs
Abstract:
Artificial Intelligence and Electronic Data Interchange
The object of this lecture is describe some of the
ideas of artificial intelligence (AI) that may help
expand the usability of electronic data interchange (EDI).
Business communication requires the use of intelligence.
For example, a person concerned with ordering goods from other
companies may have to take into account a reason why delivery may
be delayed or whether an offer of goods similar but cheaper
than those originally contemplated is acceptable.
An increasing amount of business communication involves
electronic data interchange in which a computer belonging to one
business communicates with a computer belonging to another. At
present EDI involves only the most routine communication for
which rigid formats are appropriate. As EDI expands it will
encounter limitations of the formats so far standardized, e.g.
X12, which standardizes some specific business documents like
invoices. The more ``intelligence'' can be put in the programs
that do EDI and the more flexible the formats allowed, the
more communication can be relegated to EDI. All these
financial whizzes that now have to telephone Japan in the
middle of the night will be able to get more sleep or even
go into some more productive line of work.
I used quotes on ``intelligence'' above, because the
first steps needn't involve much artificial intelligence.
Nevertheless, in the long run all intelligence we can achieve
in our programs will be useful.
Certain recent advances in artificial
intelligence will prove useful for programming business
communication. Since 1977, non-monotonic logic has developed
as part of AI research. Its use is appropriate for programs
that can take into account unexpected events that require
modifying normal procedures.
Besides the intelligence in the programs that use EDI,
some ideas from AI and (of all things) philosophy can help with
the communication itself. Business communication involves
questions, answers to questions, requests, authorizations,
promises and other of what the philosophers have called
``speech acts''. Questions should be comprehensible,
answers should be truthful and responsive and promises
should be authorized and kept. Elephant 2000 is a proposed
programming language whose inputs and outputs are formally
speech acts. This will allow formal verification that a program
answers questions responsively, makes only authorized
commitments and keeps the commitments it makes.
∂12-Jun-90 0946 JMC
To: tajnai@CS.Stanford.EDU
I will make videotape Wednesday morning and Fed Exp Wed pm. What address for Fed Exp?
∂12-Jun-90 1002 JMC dissenter on parking report
To: hk.pjs@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
As one who dissents from the idea that it is necessary to reduce
demand for parking at Stanford I would like to know the name of
the person who is writing the minority report in order to reinforce
his dissenting arguments, assuming that is the direction of the
dissent.
∂12-Jun-90 1155 JMC
To: clt@GANG-OF-FOUR.STANFORD.EDU
∂12-Jun-90 1151 E1.I85@Forsythe.Stanford.EDU
Received: from Forsythe.Stanford.EDU by SAIL.Stanford.EDU with TCP; 12 Jun 90 11:51:09 PDT
Date: Tue, 12 Jun 90 11:53:30 PDT
To: jmc@sail
From: "Voy Wiederhold" <E1.I85@Forsythe.Stanford.EDU>
Dear John and Carolyn,
We would like to invite you to a party after the graduation
on Sunday for Peter Rathmann. It will be at our house in Palo Alto
at 3PM with Chinese food etc. Please bring your little one too.
Our address is 471 Matadero Ave. (about 1/2 mi. south of
Page Mill on the East side of EC).
Hope you can come.
Voy
∂13-Jun-90 0809 JMC handout
To: tajnai@CS.STANFORD.EDU, MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
Instead of including visuals on the videotape, I will refer
to pages of a handout I will email. Please make sure that
enough copies are made for everyone.
∂13-Jun-90 0845 JMC phone Ablex
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
Ablex publishers is getting out the collection of my papers, and it
should be imminent. The collection will be the best source of one
of the papers I'll mention in my talk and refer to in the handout.
I'd like to mention when it will be available in the handout if
you can find out by calling them. I think they're in NY or Boston, but
I'm not sure, because Vladimir has been dealing with them. The
library could help you find the city.
∂13-Jun-90 1005 JMC re: aidocjmc
To: shoham@HUDSON.STANFORD.EDU, nilsson@CS.STANFORD.EDU,
tajnai@CS.STANFORD.EDU, MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message from shoham@Hudson.Stanford.EDU sent Wed, 13 Jun 1990 9:48:25 PDT.]
Thanks Yoav. A videotape has been prepared. Its length is 29 minutes, 55 seconds,
so someone will have to fill in for the remaining 5 seconds. Come to think of it,
MCC will put a title on the front, so with the title in will run over the specified
30 minutes. I'll transmit the handout today or tomorrow morning to Pat both on
SAIL and on Gang-of-Four.
∂13-Jun-90 1211 JMC re: aidocjmc
To: tajnai@HUDSON.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 13 Jun 1990 11:39:09 PDT.]
Can I infer that you are videotaping the whole show tomorrow for
sending to forum members. I hereby agree to including my videotape.
Incidentally, there will be a bill for the cost of the videotaping.
I don't suppose it will be large as such things go, because they
didn't have to do any editing except for putting the title page
in front.
∂13-Jun-90 1214 JMC re: Ablex
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message rcvd 13-Jun-90 11:38-PT.]
Thanks for the info about Ablex. I saw an envelope which was claimed
to include the videotape wrapped for pickup by Federal Express.
∂13-Jun-90 1433 JMC reply to message
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message rcvd 13-Jun-90 14:20-PT.]
OK, I'll mail you a message when it's done. Yes, thanks about Ablex.
Did they spell Common Sense as one word or was that your doing?
Since I'm sure it's too late to change anything, it's just a question
of getting the title right as a reference. By the way, what's their
city?
Federal Express has the videotape, so panic if it doesn't come tomorrow
morning.
∂13-Jun-90 1437 JMC re: patel-schneider's address
To: LEORA@IBM.COM
[In reply to message sent Wed, 13 Jun 90 17:27:27 EDT.]
Thanks, but I think a phone call might work better. If you
have his phone number please email it. Otherwise, I'll ask for it
by email.
∂13-Jun-90 1458 JMC Please collect
To: MPS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
the current version of aiedi.1 from Maple. I plan to
change it, so don't have it reproduced yet. However, it
will do if the computer breaks before I make more changes.
∂14-Jun-90 2023 JMC
To: ME
Please start forwarding to go4.
∂16-Jun-90 1902 JMC
To: ME
junk mail is still being written on sail
∂19-Jun-90 1503 JMC
To: jmc-lists@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
test
∂21-Jun-90 0351 JMC fyi
To: stallman@AI.MIT.EDU
Automakers, Insurers Clash On Copyrighting Auto Part Design
WASHINGTON (AP) - Automakers and insurers disagree over copyright
protection for product designs.
The auto industry urged Congress on Wednesday to approve legislation
that would prohibit independent manufacturers from copying a part's
original design for a decade after it first appears on the market.
The bills would protect consumers from shoddy imitation parts, auto
lobbyists told the House Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual
Property and Administration of Justice.
''Imitation sheet metal parts are often of lesser quality in fit,
finish and durability,'' said Kenneth W. Myers of Ford Motor Co.
He spoke on behalf of the Motor Vehicle Manufacturers Association,
which represents the Big Three U.S. automakers.
Opponents, led by insurers, said the legislation was designed to
squelch competition in the lucrative replacement parts industry,
which generated $52 billion in sales in 1988. The price of parts will
soar if the bills are passed, they said.
''American consumers will have to pay hundreds of millions of
dollars a year in monopoly profits to ... auto manufacturers and they
will get nothing in return,'' said C.A. Ingham, vice president of
State Farm Insurance Co.
AP-NY-06-21-90 0525EDT
***************
∂21-Jun-90 1803 JMC trouble
To: ME
xinitremote gives me a gray screen and windows after a long time.
Asking for a SAIL login window works, albeit a narrow window.
Asking for an emacs window doesn't give a window.
$[6~
∂24-Jun-90 1231 Mailer Leninism to Reaganism
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU, jmc@Gang-of-Four.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
Liberals, including some on su-etc, have expressed sympathy
with us conservatives over losing the Soviet Union as an
enemy. Well, that's their image of conservatives, but surely
they should agree that the news is giving American conservatives
some compensation.
Consider today's New York Times story from Leningrad by Bill Keller
entitled "Lenin's City of Revolution is Turning its Back on Him".
Keller quotes Pyotr S. Filipov, a member of the Leningrad Soviet
as saying, "I agree with those who say we must hurry quickly away
from Marxism-Leninism, through socialism, to Reaganism."
The leader of the despondent communist opposition in the City
Council, Viktor Sazonov, said his faction has been losing
ground as wavering Marxists defect.
"Just last week we had the votes to block business by withholding
our votes and preventing a quorum," he said on Monday. "Today
we cannot stop them from electing their mayor on the first ballot."
So deeply has Lenin's legacy fallen into disfavr that some in the
new leadership are contemplating a referendum as early as next year
to restore the city's original name, St. Petersburg.
All this may be overoptimism on Keller's part, but you have to
admit that we conservatives are getting some compensation for the
loss of the cold war....