***Apologies for cross-posting***
***Please distribute to whom might be interested***

EXTENDED DEADLINE: 7 MAY 2006

Third Intl. Workshop on the Emergence and Evolution of Linguistic
Communication (EELC III). http://bdc.brain.riken.go.jp/eelc2006/

Rome, Italy, 30 Sept. - 1 Oct. 2006.

As part of the Simulation of Adaptive Behavior (SAB) conference
http://www.sab06.org/

Invited Speakers:
Peter Gardenfors (Lund University, Sweden),
Naoto Iwahashi (ATR, Japan),
Elena Lieven (Max Planck Institute, Germany),
Luc Steels (Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium),
Eörs Szathmáry (Eötvös Loránd University, Hungary)

Scope of the Workshop
Language is generally considered as the hallmark of human intelligence. One
important way to study why this is the case, is to investigate how
linguistic communication has evolved. In the past decade, this research area
has received a lot of attention from the scientific community and could be
considered as one of the main areas of Artificial Intelligence and Cognitive
Science. The EELC III workshop will focus on empirical and modelling
research on the emergence of symbol grounding and other aspects of
linguistic communication in language evolution and language acquisition. The
key questions relate to how symbolic communication can emerge from
interactions of individuals with their environment, including other
individuals, and how such communication can become meaningful to the
individual or population. Research methods that are used to study these
issues include experimental and observational studies on child language
acquisition and animal communication; theoretical and computational
modelling; and (robotic) simulations of adaptive behaviour. The workshop
aims to provide leading scientists in the interdisciplinary area of language
evolution and language acquisition a platform to present their latest
results and discuss areas of further research.

Until about 15 years ago, there was very little productive research in the
study of language evolution. However, with the increased advancements of
computational techniques and other empirical methods, the field of language
evolution has grown to become one of the major research areas in cognitive
science. While the field is largely interdisciplinary with contributions
from linguistics, psychology, neuroscience, biology, anthropology,
philosophy and computer science, the latter has proven to be among the most
influential disciplines. A reason for this is that empirical evidence on
language evolution is scarce and computer simulations offer a good testbed
for investigating hypotheses. One of the major driving forces for language
evolution is often considered to be language acquisition. Language can be
transmitted over subsequent generations if individuals can learn language.
Moreover, it has been claimed that the stages of children’s language
acquisition mirrors the stages of language evolution. So, the current EELC
will not only look at studies on the evolution of language, but also at
studies on language acquisition.

Although many computer simulations take the emergence of symbol grounding
for granted, recently there has been an increase in studies that focus on
issues relating to the emergence of grounded communication systems. The EELC
III will therefore have 'adaptive approaches to symbol grounding and beyond'
as its central theme, though contributions are not limited to this theme.


EELC Symposium Series
This workshop is the third edition of the successful workshop on the
Emergence and Evolution of Linguistic Communication. The first one was held
in 2004 in Kanazawa (Japan) under the auspices of the Japanese Society for
Artificial Intelligence (JSAI) and the second one in Hatfield (United
Kingdom) under the auspices of the Society for the Study of Artificial
Intelligence and Simulation of Behaviour (AISB). Details of the second EELC
are found on http://homepages.feis.herts.ac.uk/˜comqcln/EELC05.html. The
Third International Workshop on the Emergence and Evolution of Linguistic
Communication will be part of the Simulation of Adaptive Behavior
conference. The coincidence with SAB permits a better exchange with other
researchers working in the simulation of adaptive behaviour field.

Submission of Papers
We invite papers of maximum 12 A4 pages that fit within the scope of the
workshop. All papers should be submitted electronically in PDF to
paulv@... and formatted according to the instructions given at
http://bdc.brain.riken.go.jp/eelc2006/. All submissions will be acknowledged
and refereed by the international scientific programme committee. The
proceedings will be published as a LNCS/LNAI series by Springer.

Important Dates
Extended deadline for submissions: 7 May 2006
Notification of acceptance: 2 Jun. 2006
Camera ready copies: 30 Jun. 2006
Workshop (1st day): 30 Sep. 2006
Workshop (2nd day): 1 Oct. 2006

Program Chairs:
Paul Vogt (Tilburg University, The Netherlands), Chair;
Yuuya Sugita (RIKEN BSI, Japan), Co-Chair;
Elio Tuci (Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium), Co-Chair;
Chrystopher Nehaniv (University of Hertfordshire, UK), Co-Chair

Program Committee:
Takaya Arita (University of Nagoya, Japan),
Tony Belpaeme (University of Plymouth, UK),
Bart de Boer (University of Groningen, The Netherlands),
Angelo Cangelosi (University of Plymouth, UK),
Tecumseh Fitch (University of St. Andrews, UK),
Takashi Hashimoto (JAIST, Japan),
Jim Hurford (University of Edinburgh, UK),
Takashi Ikegami (University of Tokyo, Japan),
Simon Kirby (University of Edinburgh),
Caroline Lyon (University of Hertfordshire, UK),
Davide Marocco (ISTC, National Research Council, Italy),
Chrystopher Nehaniv (University of Hertfordshire, UK),
Stefano Nolfi (ISTC, National Research Council, Italy),
Kazuo Okanoya (RIKEN BSI, Japan),
Tetsuo Ono (Future University Hakodate, Japan),
Domenico Parisi (ISTC, National Research Council, Italy),
Akito Sakurai (Keio University, Japan),
Andrew Smith (University of Edinburgh, UK),
Kenny Smith (University of Edinburgh, UK),
Luc Steels (Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium),
Yuuya Sugita (RIKEN BSI, Japan),
Jun Tani (RIKEN BSI, Japan),
Satoshi Tojo (JAIST, Japan),
Elio Tuci (Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium),
Paul Vogt (Tilburg University, The Netherlands)

From: Ehlert-Abler <ehlert-abler@...>
Date: Sat, 11 Mar 2006 15:37:23 -0800
To: <langev@yahoogroups.com>
Subject: book: Structure of Matter, Structure of Mind

    I am pleased to announce the publications of my new book, "Structure of
Matter, Structure of Mind", which shows the foundations of UG universal
grammar in the shared source of sentences and equations.   Where equations
are symmetrical about the "equals", sentences of language are formed by
warping equations out-of-symmetry, thus.

    Equation -> NounPhrase­1 + Verb("equals") + NounPhrase­2
    Sentence -> NounPhrase­1 + VerbPhrase
                VerbPhrase -> Verb + NounPhrase­2

    Equations and sentences thus share a common source in nature.  Since
selective advantage is expressed by an equation, the evolution of a math
sense is a matter of finding the equation that shows why people can do
equations, which is circular.  Equations and sentences have their
foundations in something pre-biological, closer to foundations of physics.
It is really neat.  You can look up blurbs and a review on Amazon.com.

Abler, William L. 20045.
Structure of Matter, Structure of Mind.
Sofia: Pensoft ISBN 954­642­232-0 (outside USA).
www.pensoft.net
Philadelphia:  Bainbridge ISBN 1-891696­19­X (USA only).
www.transatlanticpub.com

Thank you for looking.
Bill Abler
Department of Geology
Field Museum
Chicago, Illinois 60605, USA
ehlert-abler@...

***Apologies for cross-posting***
***Please distribute to whom might be interested***

Third Intl. Workshop on the Emergence and Evolution of Linguistic
Communication (EELC III). http://bdc.brain.riken.go.jp/eelc2006/

Rome, Italy, 30 Sept. - 1 Oct. 2006.

As part of the Simulation of Adaptive Behavior (SAB) conference
http://www.sab06.org/

Invited Speakers:
Peter Gardenfors (Lund University, Sweden),
Naoto Iwahashi (ATR, Japan),
Elena Lieven (Max Planck Institute, Germany),
Eörs Szathmáry (Eötvös Loránd University, Hungary)

Scope of the Workshop
Language is generally considered as the hallmark of human intelligence. One
important way to study why this is the case, is to investigate how
linguistic communication has evolved. In the past decade, this research area
has received a lot of attention from the scientific community and could be
considered as one of the main areas of Artificial Intelligence and Cognitive
Science. The EELC III workshop will focus on empirical and modelling
research on the emergence of symbol grounding and other aspects of
linguistic communication in language evolution and language acquisition. The
key questions relate to how symbolic communication can emerge from
interactions of individuals with their environment, including other
individuals, and how such communication can become meaningful to the
individual or population. Research methods that are used to study these
issues include experimental and observational studies on child language
acquisition and animal communication; theoretical and computational
modelling; and (robotic) simulations of adaptive behaviour. The workshop
aims to provide leading scientists in the interdisciplinary area of language
evolution and language acquisition a platform to present their latest
results and discuss areas of further research.

Until about 15 years ago, there was very little productive research in the
study of language evolution. However, with the increased advancements of
computational techniques and other empirical methods, the field of language
evolution has grown to become one of the major research areas in cognitive
science. While the field is largely interdisciplinary with contributions
from linguistics, psychology, neuroscience, biology, anthropology,
philosophy and computer science, the latter has proven to be among the most
influential disciplines. A reason for this is that empirical evidence on
language evolution is scarce and computer simulations offer a good testbed
for investigating hypotheses. One of the major driving forces for language
evolution is often considered to be language acquisition. Language can be
transmitted over subsequent generations if individuals can learn language.
Moreover, it has been claimed that the stages of children’s language
acquisition mirrors the stages of language evolution. So, the current EELC
will not only look at studies on the evolution of language, but also at
studies on language acquisition.

Although many computer simulations take the emergence of symbol grounding
for granted, recently there has been an increase in studies that focus on
issues relating to the emergence of grounded communication systems. The EELC
III will therefore have 'adaptive approaches to symbol grounding and beyond'
as its central theme, though contributions are not limited to this theme.


EELC Symposium Series
This workshop is the third edition of the successful workshop on the
Emergence and Evolution of Linguistic Communication. The first one was held
in 2004 in Kanazawa (Japan) under the auspices of the Japanese Society for
Artificial Intelligence (JSAI) and the second one in Hatfield (United
Kingdom) under the auspices of the Society for the Study of Artificial
Intelligence and Simulation of Behaviour (AISB). Details of the second EELC
are found on http://homepages.feis.herts.ac.uk/˜comqcln/EELC05.html. The
Third International Workshop on the Emergence and Evolution of Linguistic
Communication will be part of the Simulation of Adaptive Behavior
conference. The coincidence with SAB permits a better exchange with other
researchers working in the simulation of adaptive behaviour field.

Submission of Papers
We invite papers of maximum 12 A4 pages that fit within the scope of the
workshop. All papers should be submitted electronically in PDF to paulv 'at'
ling.ed.ac.uk and formatted according to the instructions given at
http://bdc.brain.riken.go.jp/eelc2006/. All submissions will be acknowledged
and refereed by the international scientific programme committee. The
proceedings will be published as a LNCS/LNAI series by Springer.

Important Dates
Deadline for submissions: 30 Apr. 2006
Notification of acceptance: 2 Jun. 2006
Camera ready copies: 30 Jun. 2006
Workshop (1st day): 30 Sep. 2006
Workshop (2nd day): 1 Oct. 2006

Program Chairs:
Paul Vogt (Tilburg University, The Netherlands), Chair;
Yuuya Sugita (RIKEN BSI, Japan), Co-Chair;
Elio Tuci (Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium), Co-Chair;
Chrystopher Nehaniv (University of Hertfordshire, UK), Co-Chair

Program Committee:
Takaya Arita (University of Nagoya, Japan),
Tony Belpaeme (University of Plymouth, UK),
Bart de Boer (University of Groningen, The Netherlands),
Angelo Cangelosi (University of Plymouth, UK),
Tecumseh Fitch (University of St. Andrews, UK),
Takashi Hashimoto (JAIST, Japan),
Jim Hurford (University of Edinburgh, UK),
Takashi Ikegami (University of Tokyo, Japan),
Simon Kirby (University of Edinburgh),
Caroline Lyon (University of Hertfordshire, UK),
Davide Marocco (ISTC, National Research Council, Italy),
Chrystopher Nehaniv (University of Hertfordshire, UK),
Stefano Nolfi (ISTC, National Research Council, Italy),
Kazuo Okanoya (RIKEN BSI, Japan),
Tetsuo Ono (Future University Hakodate, Japan),
Domenico Parisi (ISTC, National Research Council, Italy),
Akito Sakurai (Keio University, Japan),
Andrew Smith (University of Edinburgh, UK),
Kenny Smith (University of Edinburgh, UK),
Luc Steels (Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium),
Yuuya Sugita (RIKEN BSI, Japan),
Jun Tani (RIKEN BSI, Japan),
Satoshi Tojo (JAIST, Japan),
Elio Tuci (Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium),
Paul Vogt (Tilburg University, The Netherlands)

*Apoplogies for multiple posting*

Dear Colleagues,

It is a pleasure to announce that a new special issue on Language
Acquisition and Evolution has been published in Adaptive Behavior 13(4).

This special issue contains six articles from leading scholars in the field
of language evolution modelling about interfaces between language evolution
and language acquisition. For details on the contents and full papers,
consult http://adb.sagepub.com/content/vol13/issue4/

Kind regards, Paul Vogt

Dr. Paul Vogt, Guest researcher
Induction of Linguistic Knowledge / Computational Linguistics
Tilburg University, The Netherlands
Phone: +44 131 6503960
Fax: +44 131 6503961
URL: http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~paulv/

International Workshop
                           on
         Emergent Languages for Multi-Agent Systems

                      (ELMAS-2006)

                    Call For Papers

                      May 8, 2006

           Future University Hakodate, Japan
             (conjunction with AAMAS-2006)
          http://www.isrl.uiuc.edu/amag/elmas06/

Recent years have witnessed an explosion of interest in the problem of
language emergence and evolution, with most of the scientific light
shining on issues in development and change in human language. (See,
e.g., http://www.isrl.uiuc.edu/amag/langev, the Language Evolution and
Computation information repository maintained at the University of
Illinois.) This general rise in interest is reflected specifically in
the growing number of papers related to this topic at many
conferences, including AAMAS. This growth in interest has been
accompanied, in MAS, by a growing sense that known approaches to
developing, using, and coordinating communication representations,
standards, conceptual ontologies, and collective semantics for
MAS---currently significant segments of the AAMAS conference---have
serious limitations of brittleness, rigidity, and lack of both
scalability and openness.

The science of emergent language and communication promises to shed
new light on these central MAS problems. Equally interesting,
techniques and models for emergent language, when addressed in MAS,
have many potential applications in other emerging and related fields
such as bioinformatics, genetic regulatory networks and cell
signaling, description/discovery regimes for web services, information
systems interoperability, and more. Such wide "external" relevance of
a core MAS issue will broaden the impact of MAS research, and will
bring new scientific problems and new researchers into the realm of
MAS, helping to grow the field and its importance.

As the number of researchers, the rate of publication, and the
recognition of relevance has increased, the need for community
building and knowledge sharing specifically in the area of emergent
languages for artificial, computational agents has also grown. The
time is ripe for a workshop on this topic, aiming to assemble
researchers who have recently been making important advances on
aspects of the problems, to have thorough discussions on their work,
to initiate new collaborations, and build new syntheses.

The ELMAS-2006 Workshop will bring together researchers working on
automated emergence and evolution of language for multi-agent systems
(MAS): how open MAS can autonomously create, converge, and
continuously adapt the concepts and languages they use for
representing and communicating critical information, such as that used
in planning, reasoning, coordination, and joint activity.

Papers are invited that address issues of emergent language in the
context of artificial, computational MAS, in any of the following
broad areas:

- Precursors for collective language emergence

- Collective emergence of concepts, symbols, and ontologies
representing both objects and events

- Language compositionality and structure

- Language convergence and coherence

- Utility of emergent language

- Interactions between language emergence and planning, learning, and
coordination

- Language emergence/evolution as a general model and practical
foundation for adaptive information systems

See the ELMAS-06 Workshop website at
http://www.isrl.uiuc.edu/amag/elmas06/ for more suggestions and
details on technical topics for the workshop.

ELMAS06 Submission Instructions

The language of the workshop in English and all materials submitted
must be written in English. Three types of submssions are encouraged:

   1. Full papers (up to 8 pages) presenting mature work.

   2. Extended Abstracts (up to two pages) presenting either early-stage
   or mature work.

   3. Short Abstracts (up to one page) describing proposed work or
   possible applications.

The field is new and developing, and serious conceptual papers are
welcome in any of these categories.

All material should be submitted in PDF, formatted according to the
ACM style guidelines found here:
http://www.acm.org/sigs/pubs/proceed/template.html (Same as AAMAS-06
papers). Please identify which type of submission you are making.

Submissions should be sent via email to the workshop email address:
"elmas06@...". Papers will be reviewed by Organizers and
Program Committee Members. A Proceedings will be published and
available at the workshop, and a followup publication such as LNAI or
a special journal issue is being pursued.

At least one author of any accepted submission must register and
attend the workshop.

Organizers (Alphabetically):

   Les Gasser, University of Illinois/Urbana-Champaign, US (gasser@...)
   Piotr Gmytrasiewicz, University of Illinois/Chicago, US (piotr@...)
   Claudia Goldman, University of Haifa, Israel (clag@...)
   Takashi Hashimoto, Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, Japan
(hash@...)
   Samarth Swarup, University of Illinois/Urbana-Champaign, US (swarup@...)

Important Dates:

   Deadline for all submissions: January 15, 2006
   Notification: February 19, 2006
   Submission of final camera-ready version: March 6, 2006
   Workshop: May 8, 2006 in Hakodate, Japan

Dear Jun Wang,

Could you please announce the following school on the Langev list?

Thank you,

===

International School on Semiotic Dynamics, Language and Complexity
Directors: Vittorio Loreto and Luc Steels
Ettore Majorana Foundation and Center For Scientific Culture
Erice, 12-15 December 2005

http://www.csl.sony.fr/tagora2005/

Semiotic Dynamics studies how the relations between language, concepts
expressed by language, and the objects language is about evolve in
populations of agents. Recently, social tagging sites and other types of
community software systems are showing a very vital new form of semiotic
dynamics. Millions of users now participate in tagging objects and in
coordinating tags and the categories they imply.

  From a scientific point of view, these developments are very exciting
because they can be tracked in real time and the tools of complex
systems science and cognitive science can be used to study them.

This School in the beautiful city of Erice is the first school ever to
focus on these phenomena. You will be able to attend top lecturers who
will report on the phenomena themselves, on human semiotic dynamics that
can be a source of inspiration for creating new types of social sharing,
and on tools that can be used to model and study the phenomena,
particularly their statistical properties. You can also participate in
hands-on workshops to quickly enter into this exciting new field and you
will have the opportunity to present your own work.

You can find more information about the School, speakers and
registration on the following website:

http://www.csl.sony.fr/tagora2005/

===

--
-----------------------------------

  Remi van Trijp

  Assistant Researcher
  Sony Computer Science Laboratory
  Language Group
  6, Rue Amyot
  75005 Paris

  PhD Student
  Department of Linguistics
  University of Antwerp

  +33 1 44 08 05 06
  http://www.remivantrijp.be
  remi@...

-----------------------------------

Semiotic Dynamics and Emergent Grammar

1-day satellite workshop related to the European Conference of Complex
Systems, Paris (France), 18 November 2005

For more detailed information, see: http://www.csl.sony.fr/emergent/

Topic:

The emergence of grammar remains one of the most challenging puzzles
of science. The key question is how there could be true level
formation, i.e. how a layer of syntactic and semantic categories and
constructions could arise to establish form-meaning mappings. The goal
of the workshop is to present and discuss empirical examples of the
emergence of new grammar, computer/robotic simulations of experiments
where such forms of emergence can be seen, or theoretical analysis of
self-organisation in language. Attempts will also be made to look at
level formation in other complex systems (particularly biology) and to
see whether a generic theory of level formation is possible.
Computational and robotic demonstrations form an important part of the
workshop.

Call for demonstrations:

If you are interested in giving a demonstration, please contact Remi
van Trijp (remi@...).

Apologies for multiple postings
----------------------------------------

Call for participation:

Tutorial on modelling language origins and evolution

5 September 2005

Part of the European Conference on Artificial Life, ECAL 2005, Kent,
England. http://www.ecal2005.org

Presenters: Bart de Boer, Paul Vogt and Tony Belpaeme

Evolutionary Linguistics is a new and rapidly growing field that has emerged
from the field of artificial life and that is concerned with modelling the
origins and evolution of language. It addresses questions such as the
evolution of speech, the origins of symbolic categories, grounding, the
origins of grammar, the prerequisites for human language, and origins of
symbolic communication. Although computational modelling research has
yielded interesting results, these are often misinterpreted or overlooked by
non-technically schooled researchers in the field. We feel this is partly
due to the way the complex and abstract models are presented. Scientists
lacking experience in computational modelling often find it difficult to
understand the underlying models and their results.

This tutorial offers an introduction for artificial life researchers who are
new to evolutionary linguistics and is aimed at understanding the field and
helping them set up computational experiments that address open issues. We
do this by presenting a thorough overview of the field and by discussing how
established ALife and AI techniques can be used to investigate the evolution
of language. To illustrate this we present a number of case studies. In
addition, we aim to provide suggestions of how to disseminate the research
to a multidisciplinary audience, which often include linguists,
anthropologists, archaeologists, psychologists and biologists.

Topics include:

- Introduction into the field of language evolution.
- Major research questions in the field of language evolution.
- Computational modelling of language evolution
         - What computer models can contribute to the understanding of the
           evolution of language?
         - How to set up a computational model to study language evolution?
         - What techniques to use for which problems?
         - What research topics are suitable for modelling?
- Case studies plus demonstrations.
- Disseminating modelling results to non-technical researchers.
- Possible applications.
- Some caveats on modelling and presenting results.


Objectives and target audience:

We aim our tutorial primarily at young researchers and PhD students in
ALife who wish to start (or just have started) researching the rapidly
growing field of language evolution and computation. In addition, the
tutorial is interesting to those researchers who have an interest in the
field of evolutionary linguistics. This tutorial will be specifically
tailored
for ALife researchers, a community we have not yet been able to reach on the
previous two occasions where the tutorial was given. To accommodate our
audience, the tutorial will contain a specially tailored introduction to
language evolution for ALife researchers.

At the end of the day, we hope the participants

- have an insight in the field of evolutionary linguistics, especially with
respect to the questions that are posed within the field.
- have become acquainted with the topics that have been studied within this
field together with an overview of the most prominent open questions, thus
allowing them to initiate their own research
- understand why researchers outside the ALife community have problems
understanding computer models, so that the participant would be able to
disseminate his/her results to a wider audience.

To allow each of the groups to follow the course, no other prerequisites are
required than a basic academic knowledge of AI.

For more information consult
http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~paulv/tutorial-ecal05.html, or contact Paul Vogt:
paulv ' at 'ling.ed.ac.uk.

Call for participation. Apologies for multiple posting. Please distribute.

Tutorial modelling language origins and evolution.

URL: http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~paulv/tutorial.html

31 July 2005. Edinburgh, Scotland.

Presenters: Paul Vogt, Bart de Boer and Tony Belpaeme.

Evolutionary Linguistics is a new and rapidly growing field that has emerged
from the field of artificial intelligence and that is concerned with
modelling the origins and evolution of language. It addresses questions such
as the evolution of speech, the origins of symbolic categories, grounding,
the origins of grammar, the prerequisites for human language, and origins of
symbolic communication. Although computational modelling research has
yielded interesting results, these are often misinterpreted or overlooked by
non-technically schooled researchers in the field. We feel this is partly
due to the way the complex and abstract models are presented. Scientists
lacking experience in computational modelling often find it difficult to
understand the underlying models and their results.

This tutorial offers an introduction for artificial intelligence researchers
who are new to evolutionary linguistics and is aimed at understanding the
field and helping them set up computational experiments that address open
issues. We do this by presenting a thorough overview of the field and by
discussing how established AI techniques can be used to investigate the
evolution of language. To illustrate this we present a number of case
studies. In addition, we aim to provide suggestions of how to disseminate
the research to a multidisciplinary audience, which often include linguists,
anthropologists, archeologists, psychologists and biologists.

For further information, please consult the tutorial web-page:
http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~paulv/tutorial.html


Dr. Paul Vogt, Research Fellow
Language Evolution and Computation Research Unit
School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences
University of Edinburgh
Phone: +44 131 6503960
Fax: +44 131 6503961
URL: http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~paulv/

Dear all,

I'm pleased to announce the availability of a recent PhD thesis on language
evolution:

   Self-organization and Language Evolution: System, Population and Individual

A pdf file of the thesis is available from:
http://www.ee.cityu.edu.hk/~jyke/phdthesis.htm

Your comments and advice are welcome.

Best regards,
Jinyun Ke


========
Abstract of the thesis
This thesis proposes a framework adopting the self-organization theory for the
study of language evolution. Self-organization explains collective behaviors
and evolution with the observation that the patterns at the global level in a
complex system are often properties spontaneously emergent from the numerous
local interactions among the individual components, and they cannot be
understood by only examining the individual components.

Language can be viewed as such emergent properties instead of products from
some innate blueprint in humans. We highlight the importance of recognizing
language at two distinctive but inter-dependent levels of existence, i.e. in
the idiolect and in the communal language, and a self-organizing process
existing at each of the two levels. It is necessary to clarify what phenomena
are properties of the idiolects, and what properties are the collective
behaviors at the population level.

In linguistics, however, very often an abstract language system is taken as
the object of analysis. This level of analysis disregards the distinction
between idiolect and communal language, and neglects the heterogeneous nature
of language at both levels. As a consequence, explanations for observed
patterns based on this abstract level of analysis are often inadequate.
However, this is a necessary step for linguists to identify interesting
phenomena in the first place. At this abstract level of analysis, the
self-organization framework can also be applied. It is assumed that the
abstract language system self-organizes. A study on homophony in languages is
taken as an example to illustrate the analysis at this level. It is shown that
the existence of homophony reflects several self-organization characteristics
in a dynamic process of language evolution, such as the predictable degree of
homophony, the disyllabification in Chinese dialects, the differentiation of
homophone pairs in grammatical class.

We are further interested in how the self-organization is implemented. To
answer this question, we need to look into the idiolects in this
self-organizing process, to know how the idiolects are formed and affect each
other. Language change provides an informative window in addressing these
issues. Language change is the result of the collective behaviors of
idiolects, even as it affects the idiolects. The heterogeneity among idiolects
is exposed to the greatest extent in on-going changes.

An on-going sound change in Cantonese is taken as a case study to scrutinize
the heterogeneity in the self-organizing processes. The fieldwork data reveal
a large degree of variation both in the population (VT-I) and in the set of
words (VT-II). Another type of variation (VT-III) is highlighted, that is, a
word may also show variation within one single speaker. But this VT-III within
speakers only exists in a proportion, but not all, of the words subject to the
change. Also we find that if a speaker has some words consistently in the
unchanged state and some words in the changed state, then this speaker must
have some other words in the variation state. Most speakers show the existence
of VT-III, but they vary in degree. The observed individual differences in the
degree of VT-III suggest that the large heterogeneity may be not only
accounted for by the variability of linguistic input, but also by individuals'
different learning styles.
We hypothesize two types of lexical learning styles, i.e. probabilistic and
categorical learning. These differences in learning styles suggest that when
we examine the agent's internal properties in the self-organization framework,
it is not only necessary to examine the commonalities among agents, but also
the differences among them.

In addition to empirical studies, this thesis employs computational modeling
as a major tool for investigation, as modeling provides effective ways to test
hypotheses beyond empirical studies, and suggests new questions. After a brief
review of the modeling studies in the field, some models developed in this
thesis for language origin and language change are reported.

The first model is to simulate the emergence of a consistent vocabulary from a
set of random mappings between meanings and forms. It emphasizes the
importance of implementing the actual process of interaction among agents, and
the cumulative effect on agents' linguistic behaviors. The model suggests that
the Saussurean sign with identical speaking and listening mappings may not be
a biological predisposition from natural selection, but rather a result from
the process of language learning and use. The process exhibits a
phase transition from a long period of small oscillation to an abrupt
convergence. Such phase transition is often observed in self-organizing
systems.

The second model simulates language change as innovation diffusion, and
examines the effects of various factors, including some concerning properties
of agents and some affecting agents' interactions. By comparing the outcome
under different conditions, the model illustrates the importance of
incorporating realistic assumptions, such as finite population size,
age-dependent propensity to change, different learning environment in a social
network, etc. The model compares the dynamics of language change in different
types of network structures and shows that in non-regular networks, the rate
of innovation diffusion increases little as population size increases. The
model also tests the effect of the two types of hypothesized learning styles,
and shows that in a population with the presence of probabilistic learners, an
innovation with a small advantage will easily spread into the population and
lead to a change. This may explain why language changes are so frequent.

This thesis demonstrates that both empirical and modeling studies on language
evolution can greatly benefit from adopting a self-organization framework. The
convergence and interplay of the two lines of exploration, i.e. biological
bases in agents and the long term effect of interactions among them, should
bring us a deeper understanding of how language has evolved and is evolving.

==========================================================
       Second International Symposium
on the Emergence and Evolution of Linguistic Communication
==========================================================

at the AISB'05 Convention 12-15 April 2005, Hatfield UK

http://homepages.feis.herts.ac.uk/~comqcln/EELC05.html

Deadline for submissions: 31 October 2004
Notification deadline:    22 November 2004

Call for papers: Emerging Artificial Societies

14 -15 April 2005
AISB Symposium
University of Hertfordshire, England

Human societies are self-organising and probably emerged in parallel
with the evolution of language and development of cultural artefacts.
This symposium will take as its topics:
         â–ª       current research about the processes and preconditions for
the
emergence of human societies;
         â–ª       experiments on artificial (i.e. computational) societies
designed
to shed light on generic processes of the emergence of societies;
         â–ª       the application of anthropological and sociological
knowledge to
the design of emergent societies of artificial agents
         â–ª       research on self-organising societies of embedded
computational
agents
         â–ª       architectures for computational agents capable of inhabiting
such
societies

By 'society', we mean here a collection of interacting (human or
computational) agents that share an external symbolic system (e.g. a
'language' and cultural symbols) and which possesses social structure
(e.g. normatively enforced and shared rules of behaviour). Thus,
contributions which consider for example the evolution of language; the
development and imposition of norms; the emergence of patterned
activity and their recognition by agents; and the design of socially
responsive agents will be welcomed.

The symposium will last two days (14 - 15 April) and will immediately
follow a related symposium on 'Socially inspired computing -
engineering with social metaphors', as parts of a convention on Social
Intelligence and Interaction in Animals, Robots and Agents organised by
the AISB (the Society for the Study of Artificial Intelligence and the
Simulation of Behaviour) at the University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield.
The AISB convention as a whole will include 15 individual symposia of
different lengths and topics at the same site. All meals and facilities
are shared by the convention in common. More details about the
convention can be found at their website,
http://aisb2005.feis.herts.ac.uk/ . All symposium participants will
have to register for the convention.

Programme Committee
         â–ª       Gusz Eiben (Free University Amsterdam)
         â–ª       Nigel Gilbert (University of Surrey)
         â–ª       Andras Lorincz (Budapest)
         â–ª       Ben Paechter (Napier University, Edinburgh)
         â–ª       Paul Vogt (Tilburg University, University of Edinburgh)

Contributing

Papers of about 6 - 8 pages that respond to the topics listed above are
invited. Papers should include an abstract of not more than 200 words
and should be submitted as an anonymous PDF file (i.e. with name and
affiliation details omitted) by email (including your name and contact
details) to the Symposium organiser, Nigel Gilbert, at
n.gilbert@..., by 31 October 2004. Submissions will be
acknowledged within 7 days.

Expressions of interest in attending the symposium (but without giving
a paper) are also invited, in the form of an abstract of not more than
200 words indicting your background and interest in the subject of the
symposium. Send these as plain text emails to the organiser.

Impotant dates

31 October 2004 Submissions due
22 November 2004 Notification of acceptance
17 December 2004 Camera ready copies due
14 January 2005 Early registration deadline
12-15 April 2005 AISB 2005 convention

It is likely that a selection of the papers will be published as a
special section in the Journal of Artificial Societies and Social
Simulation, http://jasss.soc.surrey.ac.uk/JASSS.html


Symposium URL:
http://www.soc.surrey.ac.uk/newties/emerging-art-soc.html



_______________________________________________________________________
Professor Nigel Gilbert,  Editor, Journal of Artificial Societies and
       Social Simulation, <http://www.soc.surrey.ac.uk/JASSS/>
          Centre for Research on Social Simulation (CRESS)
     Department of Sociology, University of Surrey, Guildford, UK.
         Tel:+44 1483 689173   N.Gilbert@...
                         <http://cress.soc.surrey.ac.uk/>

-- Call for Chapters --

"Artificial Cognition Systems"

A book edited by Angelo Loula, Ricardo Gudwin and João Queiroz

http://www.dca.fee.unicamp.br/projects/artcog/book/

* Chapter proposal deadline: October 30, 2004

(Please feel free to forward this Call to any colleague or associate, that
might be interested in the subject of this book.)

Introduction

How could sign processes be meaningful to the artificial agents and
systems? This is a recent major issue concerning experiments in
artificial intelligence and cognitive science. An early regard about
it was the statement of the symbol grounding problem. It has been
suggested that situatedness and embodiment are a first step towards
the development of grounded meaningful processes. But most of these
approaches rely on low-level cognitive processes, bringing up the
question of how could higher-level ones be comprised and how would
they interact with lower-level ones. It has been claimed that formal
theoretical support, such as from semiotics, especially when
associated to biologically inspired approaches, is one fertile
framework that accounts for the modeling and simulation of the
emergence and the development of different levels of meaning
processes. Bringing in a formal theoretical support and biologically
inspired approaches to computational experiments dealing with meaning
processes is a promising venture in the research of artificial systems
and agents, specially in the study of learning, adapting and evolving
autonomous agents, like epigenetic robotics, evolutionary robotics,
artificial life and simulations in adaptive behavior.

The Overall Objective of the Book

This book intends to propagate theoretical frameworks about meaning
processes and high-level cognitive processes to those starting to be
acquainted with the recent approaches to artificial agents and
systems, and also to those already familiar but seeking further
information about it. Besides, it will gather recent research efforts
concerning the development of new artificial systems, specially
biologically inspired artificial agents, focusing particularly on
their development of meaning processes. Researchers from diverse
fields will be invited to contribute to this project, as many others
will be asked to respond to call for contributions, trying to identify
recent research efforts. The growing research effort towards the
attainment of different meaning processes by artificial systems has
been constantly presenting new scientific and technological advances
to the artificial intelligence area. This book will present the most
promising accomplishments in this direction.

The Target Audience

Due to its inherited multi-disciplinarity, this book may have a
diverse audience composed of different communities. This audience
involves researchers from areas such as:  Computer Science, Artificial
Intelligence, Artificial Life, Cognitive Robotics, Computational
Neuroscience,  Computational Linguistics, Cognitive Science,
Semiotics, and Philosophy.


Recommended topics include but are not limited to the following:
* Formal theoretical discussions
* Embodiment and situatedness
* Meaningful adaptive behaviors
* Interactions between high and low level cognition
* Emergence of meaning processes
* Biologically inspired agents

SUBMISSION PROCEDURE
Researchers and practitioners are invited to submit on or before
October 30, 2004, a 2-5 page manuscript proposal clearly explaining
the mission and concerns of the proposed chapter. Authors of accepted
proposals will be notified by November 30, 2004 about the status of
their proposals and sent chapter organizational guidelines. Full
chapters are expected to be submitted by March 30, 2005. All submitted
chapters will be reviewed on a blind review basis. The book is
scheduled to be published by Idea Group, Inc., www.idea-group.com,
publisher of the Idea Group Publishing, Information Science
Publishing, IRM Press, CyberTech Publishing and Idea Group Reference
imprints.

Important Dates
*     October 30, 2004: Proposal submission deadline
*     November 30, 2004: Notification of Acceptance
*     March 30, 2005: Full chapters are due
*     June 15, 2005: Notification about needed revisions
*     August 25, 2005: Revised chapters due
*     October 30, 2005: Final accepted chapters and disks


Inquiries and Submissions can be forwarded electronically (Word
document) or by mail to:

Angelo Loula, Ricardo Gudwin and João Queiroz
{angelocl, gudwin, queirozj)@dca.fee.unicamp.br
Editors of "Artificial Cognition Systems"

http://www.dca.fee.unicamp.br/projects/artcog/book/

DCA/FEEC/UNICAMP
Av. Albert Einstein - 400
Caixa Postal 6101
Campinas (SP)  13083-970
Brazil
Phones: +55 (19) 3788-3819, +55 (19) 3788-3706
Fax : +55 (19) 3289-1395

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2004 12:22:08 +0100
From: Paul Vogt <paulv@...>
To: Jun Wang <junwang4@...>
Subject: CFP: Adaptive Behavior: Special Issue on Language Acquisition and
     Evolution

Dear Jun,

Could you please distribute this call among the langev people, and add a
link to the url?

Many thanks, Paul

---------

Call for Papers: Language Acquisition and Evolution

Special Issue: Adaptive Behavior

Guest editor: Paul Vogt
Submission deadline: 15 November 2004
URL: http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~paulv/ab-cfp.html

It is widely believed that language has evolved through mutual
interactive behaviour of individuals within an ecological niche, through
individual adaptations and self-organisation. Humans communicate with
each other about events that happen in their environment. When novel
events occur, they might construct new internal representations of these
events - either by learning from other's behaviour or by inventing new
behaviour. They can then transmit this newly constructed knowledge to
other humans. By subsequent local interactions between individuals,
self-organisation can guide the emergence of a global structure called
language as has repeatedly been shown by several computer models.


Many computational studies on the evolution of language have primarily
focused on the idea that language is a complex dynamical adaptive
system, as outlined above. Central to these studies is the cultural
evolution of language, i.e. language is thought to have evolved based on
cultural transmissions rather than on biological adaptations. Cultural
transmission of language is impossible without the ability to learn
language. This special issue is inspired by a recent Symposium on
Language Evolution and Acquisition held at the 2004 Human Behavior &
Evolution Society conference, and focuses on the relation between
language origins, acquisition and evolution. Two main themes to be
explored are how could language acquisition mechanisms have evolved, and
the impact that particular acquisition skills may have had on the
evolution of language itself.


/Adaptive Behavior/ solicits papers that present synthetic studies that
explicitly focuses on the interface between language origins and/or
evolution, and language acquisition. The models should involve either
computer simulations or robotic platforms. However, those papers that
integrate models with psychological, linguistic or biological data are
particularly welcome. Papers in this special issue should not exceed the
equivalent length of 10 journal pages. See the web-site of the Adaptive
Behavior (http://www.isab.org.uk/journal/) for further instructions.


Topics include (though not restricted):

    * Evolution of
          o language acquisition skills.
          o joint attention.
          o corrective feedback.
    * Phonetics.
    * Lexicon formation.
    * Meaning inference.
    * Symbol grounding in language.
    * Emergence of syntax or grammar.
    * Language change.
    * Language diversity.

If you intend to submit a paper, please send a tentative title and
abstract to the guest editor (Paul Vogt, paulv@...). (This
would help to speed up the selection of reviewers.) If you are uncertain
whether your paper would satisfy the topic of this special issue, or if
you wish further information, please contact the guest editor too.


Important dates:

    * *15 November 2004: Submission deadline.*
    * 15 February 2005: Notification of acceptance.
    * 15 April 2005: Revised versions due.
    * 30 May 2005: Authors notified (for revised papers).
    * Late 2005: Special issue appears.

--
Dr. Paul Vogt, Research Fellow
Language Evolution and Computation Research Unit
School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences
University of Edinburgh
Phone: +44 (0)131 6503960
Fax: +44 (0)131 6503962
URL: http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~paulv

Date: Wed, 23 Jun 2004 16:47:29 +0100
From: Paul Vogt
Subject: Re: Conference announcement

This one is there too. Unfortunately with an overlapping date...

  ************** AISB 2005 CONVENTION ******
>
> Social Intelligence and Interaction in Animals, Robots and Agents
>
>           CALL FOR SYMPOSIUM PROPOSALS
>
> ************** DEADLINE: 31 July 2004 *********
>
> The Society for the Study of Artificial Intelligence and Simulation of
> Behaviour (AISB) is pleased to announce its forthcoming convention and
> to invite proposals for the Symposia which will largely constitute the
> event.
>
> DATES: from 12-15 April 2005 inclusive
>
> LOCATION: University of Hertfordshire, de Havilland Campus, Hatfield,
> England
>
> WEBSITE: aisb2005.feis.herts.ac.uk (to be updated regularly)
>
> FORMAT: up to ten serial/parallel Symposia on AI or Cognitive Science
> topics preferably related to the overall Convention theme of Social
> Intelligence and Interaction in Animals, Robots and Agents
>
> CONVENTION CHAIRS, ORGANIZERS and LOCAL ARRANGEMENTS:
> Kerstin Dautenhahn (General chair, K.Dautenhahn@...)
> Chrystopher Nehaniv (Vice-chair)
>
> Local Organizing Committee:
> Rene te Boekhorst
> Lola Canamero
> Kerstin Dautenhahn
> Chrystopher Nehaniv
> Daniel Polani
>
> ***********************************************************************
> THE AISB'05 SYMPOSIA
>
> By default an AISB'05 Symposium will last for two days within the four
> days of the Convention. However, we will also consider proposals for
> one-day and three-day Symposia.
>
> Each Symposium will have a Programme Chair, who will be responsible for
> administration of the programme, recruiting a programme committee,
> arranging the refereeing of extended abstracts for presentation of
> papers at the event, and collecting full papers for a pre-proceedings.
> It
> is hoped that each Symposium programme chair will try to arrange for
> post-Convention publication of revised papers from the Symposia in the
> form
> of book, special journal issue, etc. Given that the name of the Society
> includes the phrase "Simulation of Behaviour'' we welcome Symposia that
> have a Cognitive Science or interdisciplinary flavour as opposed to a
> more
> narrowly Artificial Intelligence flavour.
>
> ***********************************************************************
> OTHER ASPECTS OF THE CONVENTION
>
> We plan for there to be approximately four invited plenary keynote
> talks.
>
> ***********************************************************************
> CONVENTION THEME:
> SOCIAL INTELLIGENCE AND INTERACTION IN ANIMALS, ROBOTS AND AGENTS
>
> Humans are above all social animals. For artificially intelligent
> systems,
> can it be otherwise?
>
> Intelligence in humans and other animals has many facets and is
> expressed
> in a variety of ways in how the individual in its lifetime - or a
> population on an evolutionary timescale - deals with, adapts to, and
> co-evolves with the environment.  Traditionally, social or emotional
> intelligence has been considered different from a more problem-solving
> oriented view of human intelligence. However, more and more evidence
> from a
> variety of different research fields highlight the important role of
> social
> and emotional intelligence across all facets of intelligence in humans.
>
> The Convention theme Social Intelligence and Interaction in Animals,
> Robots
> and Agents reflects a current trend towards increasingly
> interdisciplinary
> approaches that are pushing the boundaries of traditional science and
> are
> necessary in order to answer deep questions regarding the social
> nature of
> intelligence in humans and other animals, as well as to address the
> challenge of synthesizing computational agents or robotic artifacts
> that
> show aspects of biological social intelligence. Exciting new
> developments
> are emerging from collaborations among computer scientists,
> roboticists,
> psychologists, sociologists, cognitive scientists, primatologists,
> ethologists and researchers from other disciplines, e.g. leading to
> increasingly sophisticated simulation models of socially intelligent
> agents, or to a new generation of robots that are able to learn from
> and
> socially interact with each other or people.  Such interdisciplinary
> work
> advances our understanding of social intelligence in nature, and leads
> to
> new theories, models, architectures and designs in the domain of
> Artificial
> Intelligence or other sciences of the artificial. New advancements in
> computer and robotic technology facilitate the emergence of multi-modal
> "natural" interfaces between computers or robots and people, including
> embodied conversational agents or robotic pets/assistants/companions
> that
> we are increasingly sharing our home and work space with. People tend
> to
> create relationships with such socially intelligence artifacts, and are
> even willing to accept them as helpers in healthcare, therapy or
> rehabilitation.  Thus, socially intelligent artifacts are becoming
> part of
> our lives, including many desirable as well as possibly undesirable
> effects, and Artificial Intelligence and Cognitive Science research can
> play an important role in addressing  many of the huge scientific
> challenges involved. Keeping an open mind towards other disciplines,
> embracing work from a variety of disciplines studying human as well as
> non-human animals, might help create artifacts that might not only do
> their
> job, but that do their job right.
>
> The overall theme therefore allows a very broad range of Symposia, for
> example:
>
> -Human-computer interaction
> -Robot companions
> -Evolution of Communication
> -Social learning in animals and robots
> -Socially intelligent agents
> -Creativity and culture
> -Developing social minds
> -Artificial societies and organizations
> -Evolutionary computation, machine learning, and interaction
>
> ***However, it is to be emphasized that
> PROPOSALS IN ALL AREAS OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND COGNITIVE SCIENCE
> WILL BE CONSIDERED***
>
> ***********************************************************************
> INTERNATIONAL NATURE
>
> Although the AISB may be thought of as a national AI society for the
> United Kingdom, we enthusiastically welcome Symposium proposals from
> anywhere in the world and participants from anywhere in the world in
> the
> Symposium programmes.
>
> ***********************************************************************
> MAKING A PROPOSAL
>
> Proposals should be made by EMAILING IN PLAIN TEXT to Kerstin
> Dautenhahn at
> K.Dautenhahn@..., enclosing the following information. (Prior
> informal email enquiries from possible proposers are welcomed):
>
> TITLE of Symposium
>
> NAME & AFFILIATION of Symposium Chair - including both postal and
> email addresses and both fax and telephone numbers.
>
> ABSTRACT for Symposium - not more than 200 words, explaining the
> remit of the Symposium. This should be suitable for inclusion in a
> call for papers.
>
> CASE FOR SUPPORT - not more than 1000 words, arguing the case for
> including your Symposium at the AISB'05 event. You may put observations
> about your own background and suitability in the Additional Comments
> section below.
>
> SYMPOSIUM LENGTH JUSTIFIACTION -- if you are proposing a Symposium of
> a length other than two days, please briefly indicate the reasons.
>
> PROGRAMME COMMITTEE - names and affiliations of (at least) four people
> who have agreed in principle to serve on your Symposium's programme
> committee. The programme committee should represent (at least) four
> different institutions, preferably including international
> participation.
> It should as far as possible cover the intended breadth of the
> Symposium,
> especially if it is multidisciplinary.
>
> ADDITIONAL COMMENTS -- no more than 500 words, on, for example, the
> relevance of your background to the proposed Symposium.
>
> BIBLIOGRAPHY -- any literature references cited above.
>
> Wording beyond the word limits will be deleted before the proposal is
> considered!!
>
> Proposals will be selected with the aid of the Committee of the AISB.
> Unless there are very special circumstances, please do not expect us to
> consider web pages or other documents referenced by the proposal.
>
> *** TO FACILIATE THE PROPOSAL CONSIDERATION PROCESS,
> PLEASE DO NOT SEND ANYTHING OTHER THAN PLAIN-TEXT EMAILS.
> SO, no Word attachments, postscript, HTML, etc.
>
> ***********************************************************************
> TIMETABLE
>
> Symposium Proposal submission deadline: 31 July 2004
> Notification re Symposium acceptance: 15th August 2004
> Suggested deadline for Call for Extended Abstracts: 10 September 2004
> Suggested Extended Abstract submission deadline: 31 October 2004
> Suggested Extended Abstract notification deadline: 30 November 2004
> Required submission deadline for Full Papers: 15 January 2005
>
> Convention: 12-15 April 2005
>
> ***********************************************************************
> *
> PLEASE NOTE SYMPOSIUM PROPOSAL DEADLINE: 31st July 2004!!!
> ***********************************************************************
> *

----- Original Message -----
From: "Simon Kirby " <simon@...>
To: <junwang4@...>
Cc: <lec+@...>
Sent: Wednesday, June 23, 2004 4:07 PM
Subject: Conference announcement


> This conference calls for papers on models of the evolution of
communication
> (among other things).
>
> Best,
> Simon
>

Date: Wed, 23 Jun 2004 16:07:26 +0100
From: Simon Kirby
Subject: Conference announcement

This conference calls for papers on models of the evolution of communication
(among other things).

Best,
Simon

Dear colleagues,

I'm pleased to announce the availability of the following article,
which appears in the current issue of Complex Systems (14:4) :

De Jong, E.D. and L. Steels. A Distributed Learning Algorithm
for Communication Development.

Available from: http://www.cs.uu.nl/~dejong/index.html#devcom

Abstract:
We study the question of how a local learning algorithm, executed by
multiple distributed agents, can lead to a global system of
communication. First, the notion of a perfect communication system is
defined. Next, two measures of communication system quality are
specified. It is shown that maximization of these measures leads to
perfect communication production. Based on this principle, local
adaptation rules for communication development are constructed. The
resulting stochastic algorithm is validated in computational
experiments. Empirical analysis indicates that a mild degree of
stochasticity is instrumental in reaching states that correspond to
accurate communication.

An online appendix to the article, including a Matlab implementation
of the algorithm, can be found here:
http://www.cs.uu.nl/~dejong/devcom/devcom.html

Any comments welcome.

Best regards,

Edwin de Jong
--------------------------------------------------------------------
                                          http://www.cs.uu.nl/~dejong

---



COMPUTER MUSIC RESEARCH

SCHOOL OF COMPUTING, COMMUNICATIONS AND ELECTRONICS

FACULTY OF TECHNOLOGY


PhD Studentship in Evolutionary Computation and Music



Studentship £10,000 pa + University fees (UK/EU)



Applications are invited for a three-year PhD Research Studentship in the
School of Computing, Communications and Electronics, at the University of
Plymouth, UK.



This project offers an outstanding opportunity for a student to join the
internationally praised Computer Music Research team of the University of
Plymouth to work in the emerging interdisciplinary field of Evolutionary
Computation and Music.



Evolutionary computation models and simulations are powerful tools for
developing and demonstrating specific theories of music that would otherwise
be difficult, if not impossible, to conceive.  As with the fields of
Psychoacoustics and Artificial Intelligence, which have greatly contributed
to our understanding of music, Evolutionary Computation is helping
scientists and musicologists to reveal important new aspects of our musical
capacity.



This project is aimed at the development and implementation of a
computational model of the evolution of musical grammars. The development of
such model will provide an important opportunity for enhancing our
understanding of the origins and evolution of musical styles. This
understanding will lead to the development of new approaches to the design
of computer-aided musical composition systems; for example, robotic systems
that learn to compose music by interacting with each other. This project
will be developed in close collaboration with the University of Plymouth¹s
Adaptive Behaviour & Cognition Research Group (Dr Angelo Cangelosi) and with
the Language Evolution and Computation Research Unit of the University of
Edinburgh (Dr Simon Kirby).



The studentship will commence on 1 September 2004.  Further particulars are
available from:

Carole Watson

Faculty of Technology

University of Plymouth

Plymouth, Devon PL4 8AA, UK

Tel: 01752 232339

E-mail: carole.watson@...



Informal enquiries may be made to Dr Eduardo Reck Miranda

E-mail: eduardo.miranda@...



See also: http://neuromusic.soc.plymouth.ac.uk/phd-vacancy2.html



Closing Date FOR APPLICATION: 12 NOON, MONDAY 31 MaY 2004

Dear colleague,


I send this posting to you as you or or someone you know might be
interesting in the following vacancy. Please distribute this to anyone
who might be interested.

Yours sincerely, Paul Vogt

This text is also available at
http://www.tilburguniversity.nl/employees/cml/vacancies/8100406.html.


Tilburg University is a specialized institute of learning and research,
with emphasis on social sciences and the humanities. It employs more
than 1600 people and has a student body of around 10,000. There are 19
colleges and 10 research institutes, which provide (postgraduate)
tuition and research of outstanding quality.

*Faculty of Arts*
In its education and research programme, the Faculty of Arts addresses
socially relevant domains in the field of language, communication,
information and literary culture. Important areas of interest are
business communication and digital media, discourse studies,
multilingualism in a multicultural society, culture and literature,
linguistics and artificial intelligence.

The section Computational Linguistics at Tilburg University (The
Netherlands) has, subject to the availability of financial resources, a
position available for a:

*RESEARCHER ON LANGUAGE EVOLUTION AND COMPUTATION (POSTDOC)*
(m/f, 38 hours a week, vacancy number 810.04.06)

*Project information*
The section Computational Linguistics at Tilburg University might
receive funding for 3 years for a postdoctoral researcher, starting 1
June 2004. The funding is part of a project entitled 'New and Emergent
World Models Through Individual, Evolutionary, and Social Learning' (NEW
TIES). This project is funded by the European Commission and is a joint
project with researchers from the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (The
Netherlands), Napier University (Edinburgh, UK), University of Surrey
(UK), Eotvos Lorand University (Budapest, Hungary) and Tilburg
University. See http://www.cs.vu.nl/~gusz/newties/newties.html
<http://www.cs.vu.nl/%7Egusz/newties/newties.html> for the project
home-page.

NEW TIES is a highly ambitious project that aims at simulating the
evolution of cultures in large populations of multi-agent systems
through indivudual and social learning of, e.g., behavioural skills and
language. The experiments will be set in a large computer network based
on peer-to-peer technology and another part of the project will focus on
monitoring how the culture (including language) evolves.
Central to this project is the part that studies evolution of
communication, language and cooperation in a large scale multi-agent
society. The researcher in Tilburg will be responsible for implementing
this central part.

*Main tasks*
The researcher's task will focus on the design of computational
experiments concerning the origins and evolution of communication,
language and cooperation. These experiments will have to be carried out
both as a stand alone experiment and integrated with the contribution of
the other partners in the project. Important areas within the research
are scalability, the symbol grounding problem, the emergence of
communication as such and the origins of grammatical structures as
described in workpackage 3 of the project proposal
(http://www.cs.vu.nl/~gusz/newties/newties.html
<http://www.cs.vu.nl/%7Egusz/newties/newties.html>). Part of the
research will be carried out in Edinburgh. In addition, the researcher
will be responsible for the local organisation of the computer network
(not necessarily the computer support).

*Profile*
The ideal candidate is an enthousiastic instigator and has a strong
background in language evolution and computation, modelling multi-agent
systems (preferably language models), evolutionary computation, machine
learning, linguistics and/or psycholinguistics. Java programming skills
are a further advantage. The candidate should have finished (or is about
to finish) his/her Ph.D. in the field of artificial intelligence,
artificial life, computational linguistics or another relevant area with
the cognitive sciences.

*Terms of employment*
The collective labour agreement of Tilburg University applies. The
selected candidate will get a three years contract (full-time). Pay
classification is according to level of experience and expertise, with a
minimum of 2.179,-- and a maximum of 3.453,-- euro per month (salary
scale 10). Furthermore, the usual facilities (desk, computer, some
travel money) are offered, as well as support with housing,
immigrations, etc.

*Information*
For further information, please contact Dr. Paul Vogt email:
p.a.vogt@... <mailto:p.a.vogt@...>,
http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~paulv <http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/%7Epaulv> or
consult the project's home page
http://www.cs.vu.nl/~gusz/newties/newties.html
<http://www.cs.vu.nl/%7Egusz/newties/newties.html>

*Applications*
Interested candidates should send in their application and CV before 26
April 2004 to: Tilburg University, Faculty of Arts, O.M. Zweekhorst,
M.A., Managing Director, Room U 40, P.O. Box 90153 5000 LE Tilburg The
Netherlands. Or by email: solliciterenFDL@...
<mailto:solliciterenFDL@...>.

It is the policy of the university to increase the number of women
employed. Also members of ethnic minority groups and handicapped are
especially invited to apply.

--
Dr. Paul Vogt
Researcher in Language Evolution and Computation
ILK / Computational Linguistics, Tilburg University
P.O.Box 90153, 5000 LE Tilburg, The Netherlands
http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~paulv/





--
Dr. Paul Vogt
Researcher in Language Evolution and Computation
ILK / Computational Linguistics, Tilburg University
P.O.Box 90153, 5000 LE Tilburg, The Netherlands
Tel: +31 13 4662787  Fax: +31 13 4663110
http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~paulv/

------


ANNOUNCEMENT:

The issue Vol. 22 No. 3 of Contemporary Music Review (Routledge) is
dedicated to the emerging topic of evolutionary music:

"Evolutionary Music: At the Crossroads of Evolutionary Computing and
Musicology." (Edited by Eduardo R Miranda)

It features papers by Phil Husbands, Simon Kirby, Peter Todd, Rodney
Berry, Ian Cross, and other pioneers in the field. List of contents &
abstracts, plus ordering information can be found here:

http://taylorandfrancis.metapress.com/link.asp?id=0afmrvf0kuj2

Excerpt of the preface:
-----------------------
Composers, perhaps more than any other class of artists, have always
been acutely aware of the scientific developments of their time. From
the discovery almost three thousand years ago of the direct relationship
between the pitch of a note and the length of a string or pipe, to the
latest computer models of human musical cognition and intelligence,
composers have always looked to science to provide new and challenging
ways to study and compose music.  Today, with the great scientific
advances being made in the field of evolutionary biology, from new
insights into the origins of humans and other species to complete
mappings of the genes that control our growth and development, it is
time to build a new approach to the study of music: evolutionary music.

For instance, the evolutionary approach to music composition is built
upon the three basic components of biological evolution: reproduction,
variation, and selection. Reproduction with variation has been a
hallmark of music production probably since its beginnings: people would
learn the songs of others, and perhaps make slight changes (accidentally
or intentionally) that could be incorporated into further performances.
In fact, technology has helped to take some of the variation out of this
reproductive process: printed scores allowed at least the underlying
musical intention to remain constant for some period of time, even if
the performances varied (like the distinction between an individual's
genetic instructions and the actual person who is built), and
reproducing pianos in the early 1900's enabled the exact replication of
the performance itself from the information stored in punched paper
rolls.  The separation of musical information (akin to genes) from
musical performance (akin to phenotypes, or bodies) and the
specification of the process to convert the former into the latter (akin
to
growth) also allowed tinkering with the information (and even the
conversion
processes) to produce new performances, reintroducing new possibilities
for variation into musical reproduction.

With the advent of faster information-processing technologies, faster
forms of musical reproduction and conversion from information into
performance have allowed these processes of reproduction and variation
to be applied to many musical ideas in parallel.  That is, computers
have enabled the processing of whole ³populations² of musical pieces,
rather than just the slow repetitive change of a single idea over time.
And once populations are possible, the third component of evolution can
be introduced: selection of some individuals in the population to
reproduce more than others.  So for instance, a computer system for the
evolution of musical themes could contain several themes at once, and
those that were somehow better  (as judged by a listener or an automatic
evaluation program, for example) could be used to form the basis of the
population of new themes making up the next generation, again through
the process of reproduction with variation. Exactly this idea has been
introduced in the visual realm by Richard Dawkins's Blind Watchmaker
program (in his book of the same name), and now musicians are beginning
to use it in the audio domain as well.

Evolutionary musical systems are an exciting new development for
composers and musicologists alike.  For composers, they provide an
innovative and natural means for generating musical ideas from a
specifiable set of primitive components and processes-reflecting the
compositional process of generating a variety of ideas by brainstorming
followed by selecting the most promising ones for further iterated
refinement.  For musicologists, evolutionary systems can model the
cultural transmission and change of a population's body of musical ideas
over time-for example, the development and maintenance of musical styles
within particular cultural contexts and their reorganization and
adaptation in response to cultural exchange.  In both cases, the musical
evolution can be influenced by a variety of constraints and tendencies
built into the system, such as realistic psychological factors that
influence the way that music is experienced, learned, stored, modified,
and passed on between individuals.

This issue of Contemporary Music Review features articles introducing
not only the applications of evolutionary music, but also the tools
needed to create and study evolutionary music systems. These tools are
drawn in part from research into the origins and evolution of biological
organisms, ecology, and cultural systems on the one hand, and in part
from computer simulation methodologies on the other. Contemporary
scientists seem to be increasingly shifting their attention from the
study of the composition of isolated matter to the study of the
functional characteristics of nature's tangled systems, including the
interactions between components of a system, the interconnection of
different systems, and the emergence of global patterns from local
behaviour. Consequently, new scientific methodologies and tools are
being devised for these new studies, most of which would not be possible
without computer technology: genetic algorithms to model evolutionary
processes applied to populations, cellular automata to study emerging
high-level patterns from simple local interactions, neural networks to
explore complex information processing via large numbers of simple
neurones, and adaptive games to understand the strategic interactions
between agents with possibly different goals. These tools can also be
combined, often under the rubric of artificial life, to create surrogate
artificial worlds populated by interacting simulated organisms in which
complex experiments can be performed that would otherwise be impossible.
These systems, as we show in this special issue, can also be used to
create and to study musical compositions and cultures in ways that have
never before been achieved.

--------------------------------------------------------------

MSc in the EVOLUTION OF LANGUAGE & COGNITION
One year taught Masters

University of Edinburgh, UK

--------------------------------------------------------------

REMINDER - Applications should be sent before March 31st (although
applicants *may* be considered after this date).

What is it that makes us human? How did our brains evolve? What are the
origins of human language? Why do we think the way we do? What are the
mechanisms of biological, cultural and linguistic evolution?

The University of Edinburgh is introducing a new MSc taught course as
part of its postgraduate programme in the Evolution of Language and
Cognition. Students will tackle the key questions that are at the heart
of the recent renaissance in the scientific study of the origins and
evolution of human language and cognition.

Human evolution is a topic for cognitive scientists, psychologists,
linguists, archaeologists, anthropologists, biologists, and computer
scientists. Because of this, the postgraduate programme will suit
students from a wide range of backgrounds. If you are interested in
learning more about the evolution of human cognition and language, and
about the many disciplines that contribute to its study, we'd like to
hear from you.

We are now accepting applications for entry to the MSc in September
2004. Applicants should aim to submit applications by March 31st.

To find out more about the course, and what it will be like to live and
work in Edinburgh, go to our website. Here you will also find full
details about how to apply.

http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/lec/elc

[Please feel free to pass on this email to anyone who might be
interested.]

--
Simon Kirby
Language Evolution & Computation Research Unit
School of Philosophy, Psychology & Language Sciences
University of Edinburgh
www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~simon

*Tutorial modelling language evolution for modellers and non-modellers*

Tuesday 30 March 2004
  From 12:30 – 17:30 hours.
(prior to and co-located with EVOLANG5, the 5^th Evolution of Language
Conference, Leipzig)

Venue: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
(exact details will be announced later, see
http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~paulv/tutorial-evolang5.html)

Organisers: Tony Belpaeme (Vrije Universiteit Brussel), Bart de Boer
(University of Groningen), Paul Vogt (Tilburg University, University of
Edinburgh).

Computational modelling is a popular and prominent part of the research
on the origins and evolution of language. Although computational
modelling research has yielded interesting results, these are often
misinterpreted or overlooked by non-modellers. We feel this is partly
due to the way the complex and abstract models are presented. Scientists
lacking experience in computational modelling often find it difficult to
understand the results. This is unfortunate, as computer modelling
research and more traditional research into the evolution of language
can gain a lot through interaction.

Our tutorial offers non-modellers an introduction that is aimed at
helping them interpret computational modelling results in the field of
language evolution. In addition, we aim to provide (beginning) modellers
suggestions of how to disseminate their research to a multi-disciplinary
audience.

The tutorial is organised in three sections of 90 minutes each, and will
cover the following subjects:

- What is computational modelling?
- How can computational modelling be of interest to cognitive science
and linguistics?
- How does one start building a computational model?
- What techniques are used?
- What research topics are suitable for modelling?
- Practical examples.
- Some caveats.

Details about registration will be anounced later at.


For more information, please contact p.a.vogt@...

--------------------------------------------------------------------

           MSc/PhD in the EVOLUTION OF LANGUAGE & COGNITION
               One year taught Masters & PhD programme

                     University of Edinburgh, UK

--------------------------------------------------------------------

What is it that makes us human? How did our brains evolve? What are the
origins of human language? Why do we think the way we do? What are the
mechanisms of biological, cultural and linguistic evolution?

The University of Edinburgh is introducing a new Postgraduate Programme in
the Evolution of Language and Cognition. Students will tackle the key
questions that are at the heart of the recent renaissance in the scientific
study of the origins and evolution of human language and cognition.

The programme consists of two components: an interdisciplinary 1 year taught
Masters degree, and a supervised PhD. Students will apply for one of the
other degree, depending on background and experience. The MSc year can be
used as preparation for the PhD.

Human evolution is a topic for cognitive scientists, psychologists,
linguists, archaeologists, anthropologists, biologists, and computer
scientists. Because of this, the postgraduate programme will suit students
from a wide range of backgrounds. If you are interested in learning more
about the evolution of human cognition and language, and about the many
disciplines that contribute to its study, we'd like to hear from you.

We are now accepting applications for entry to the MSc in September 2004,
and for entry to the PhD at any time.

To find out more about the course, and what it will be like to live and work
in Edinburgh, go to our website. Here you will also find full details about
how to apply.

http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/lec/elc

[Please feel free to pass on this email to anyone who might be interested.]

--
Simon Kirby
Language Evolution & Computation Research Unit
School of Philosophy, Psychology & Language Sciences
University of Edinburgh
www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~simon

Dear All,

The preliminary programme for the LEC workshop at this year's European
Summer School for Logic, Language and Information is now online at:

http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~simon/esslli.html

Please pass this on to anyone you think might be interested in attending
- it looks like it will be a very exciting workshop!

Best wishes,
Simon

--
Simon Kirby           Language Evolution and Computation Research Unit
simon@...                Theoretical and Applied Linguistics
http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~simon/               University of Edinburgh

I'm forwarding this from Angelo Cangelosi.

Simon

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------


                       UNIVERSITY OF PLYMOUTH (UK)
                     Centre for Thinking and Language
                         Department of Psychology
                                   and
                  Centre for Neural and Adaptive Systems
                           School of Computing

                    Two post doctoral Research Fellows

                 Computational modelling of quantifiers:
         The relative influence of scalar and contextual factors.



Two fixed-term post-doctoral Research Fellows (Salary: £22,191) are
required for a period of one year eight months in the first instance to
work on an EPSRC-funded collaborative project with Dr Kenny Coventry
(Centre for Thinking and Language, Department of Psychology), Dr Angelo
Cangelosi (Centre for Neural and Adaptive Systems, School of Computing)
and Prof. Steve Newstead (Centre for Thinking and Language, Department
of Psychology), at the University of Plymouth.

The objective of the research is to develop a computational model for
vague quantifiers using neural networks based on experimental data with
human participants. One of the positions will primarily involve the
design and collection of experimental data from human participants, and
the other post will primarily involve connectionist computational
modelling. However, candidates possessing both computational and
experimental skills are particularly encouraged to apply.

Ref : 5183/HSCI  (based in the Centre for Thinking and Language,
Department of Psychology), the applicant must have a PhD in one of the
Cognitive Sciences (Psychology/Linguistics/Computer Science), with
expertise in experimental methodologies and analyses.

Ref : 5183/HSCI  (based in the Centre for Neural and Adaptive Systems,
School of Computing), the applicant must have a PhD in one of the
Cognitive Sciences (Computer Science/Psychology/Linguistics), with
expertise in cognitive and neural network modelling and programming
skills.

The appointees will be working collaboratively as part of a larger
interdisciplinary research team (see:
http://www.psychology.plymouth.ac.uk/research/slg/
www.tech.plymouth.ac.uk/soc/staff/angelo

Anyone wishing to discuss the posts should contact Dr Kenny Coventry
(kcoventry@...) or Dr Angelo Cangelosi
(acangelosi@...).

To apply, contact Plymouth University's Personnel Department
(personnel@...) or write to Personnel Department, 6 Portland
Villas, University of Plymouth, Drake Circus, Plymouth, Devon PL4 8AA,
United Kingdom. Application forms can be downloaded at
www.plymouth.ac.uk/vacancies

Plymouth University is an Equal Opportunities employer.

CLOSING DATE :THURSDAY 1 MAY 2003

--------------------- Angelo Cangelosi, PhD ------------------------

Principal Lecturer
Centre for Neural and Adaptive Systems
School of Computing, University of Plymouth
Drake Circus
Plymouth PL4 8AA (UK)

E-mail: acangelosi@...
http://www.tech.plym.ac.uk/soc/staff/angelo
(tel) +44 1752 232559 (fax) +44 1752 232540

(Apologies for multiple copies. Please forward to anyone you think might
be interested.)

***
EXTENSION: the deadline for abstracts has been extended to 20th March
***

-------

Language Evolution and Computation Workshop/Course
at the European Summer School in Logic Language and Information, Vienna

ESSLLI: 18-29 Aug 2003
Workshop/Course: 25-29 Aug 2003

http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~simon/esslli.html

-------

As part of the European Summer School in Logic Language and Information
to be held in Vienna, there will be a workshop/course on computational
approaches to language evolution. More details can be found at the
website.

At this stage, we are looking for submissions by email in the form of
long abstracts (up to two pages). Upon acceptance, we will request
longer papers for a proceedings volume. All abstracts will be reviewed
by the organiser and at least one other referee.

All participants must register for ESSLLI2003, and find their own
funding for travel and accommodation.

Submission deadline for long abstracts: 20th March 2003
Notification of acceptance: 14th April 2003
Deadline for full papers: 19th May 2003

Contact: Simon Kirby <simon@...>

--
Simon Kirby              Language Evolution and Computation Research
Unit
simon@...                   Theoretical and Applied
Linguistics
http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~simon/                  University of
Edinburgh

(Apologies for multiple copies. Please forward to anyone you think might
be interested! Note: the deadline for abstracts is at the end of
February.)

-------

Language Evolution and Computation Workshop/Course
at the European Summer School in Logic Language and Information, Vienna

ESSLLI: 18-29 Aug 2003
Workshop/Course: 25-29 Aug 2003

http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~simon/esslli.html

-------

As part of the European Summer School in Logic Language and Information to
be held in Vienna, there will be a workshop/course on computational
approaches to language evolution. More details can be found at the website.

At this stage, we are looking for submissions by email in the form of long
abstracts (up to two pages). Upon acceptance, we will request longer papers
for a proceedings volume. All abstracts will be reviewed by the organiser
and at least one other referee.

All participants must register for ESSLLI2003 (at a reduced rate for those
presenting a paper), and find their own funding for travel and
accommodation.

Submission deadline for long abstracts: 28th February 2003
Notification of acceptance: 14th April 2003
Deadline for full papers: 19th May 2003

Contact: Simon Kirby <simon@...>

--
Simon Kirby              Language Evolution and Computation Research Unit
simon@...                   Theoretical and Applied Linguistics
http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~simon/                  University of Edinburgh

I am forwarding this message from Seth Bullock and Jason Noble.

Simon

---------- Forwarded message ----------
==================================================================

Hello,

We'd like to draw your attention to some current job vacancies at the
University of Leeds, in an effort to increase the quality of
applicants from the fields of adaptive behaviour, artificial life,
computational biology, behaviour-based robotics, etc.

The School of Computing is currently advertising faculty positions at
the levels of Lecturer, Senior Lecturer, Reader, and Chair.  For
details, please click on the "Vacancies" link on the School's home
page, www.comp.leeds.ac.uk/home.html.

The biosystems group within the school (currently comprising 6 faculty
plus 10 postgrads & postdocs) is growing fast.  Leeds has a
well-regarded computing department: for details of our 5 rating in the
previous Research Assessment Exercise, please see the School homepage.
The School offers a supportive environment for computational
modelling, bio-inspired computing, etc., with powerful
high-performance computing and visualization facilities, newly
refurbished lab space, strong links with biology research groups, and
most importantly enthusiasm for this kind of work at the highest
levels in the University.

http://www.comp.leeds.ac.uk/research/
http://www.informatics.leeds.ac.uk/

If you have a research interest and track record in the general area
of biosystems, and if you are interested in applying for one of these
posts, please get in touch with us.


Cheers,
Seth Bullock and Jason Noble.

seth@...
jasonn@...

Informatics Research Institute
School of Computing
University of Leeds, UK


======================================================================