21.878, Calls: Cognitive Science, Computational Ling/USA

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LINGUIST List: Vol-21-878. Mon Feb 22 2010. ISSN: 1068 - 4875.

Subject: 21.878, Calls: Cognitive Science, Computational Ling/USA

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1)
Date: 20-Feb-2010
From: Robert Ross < robert.j.ross at gmail.com >
Subject: Computational Spatial Language Interpretation Workshop
 

	
-------------------------Message 1 ---------------------------------- 
Date: Mon, 22 Feb 2010 12:33:11
From: Robert Ross [robert.j.ross at gmail.com]
Subject: Computational Spatial Language Interpretation Workshop

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Full Title: Computational Spatial Language Interpretation Workshop 
Short Title: CoSLI 

Date: 15-Aug-2010 - 15-Aug-2010
Location: Mt. Hood / Portland, Oregon, USA 
Contact Person: Robert Ross
Meeting Email: robert.j.ross at gmail.com
Web Site: http://www.cosli.org 

Linguistic Field(s): Cognitive Science; Computational Linguistics 

Call Deadline: 01-May-2010 

Meeting Description:

Workshop on Computational Spatial Language Interpretation (CoSLI)
In conjunction with Spatial Cognition 2010
Mt Hood / Portland Oregon, Aug 15 2010
http://www.cosli.org

The CoSLI workshop provides a venue for discussion and advancement of spatial
language meaning and understanding. The workshop aims to draw together the often
orthogonal views on formal symbolic and embodied spatial language interpretation
in order to foster theories which adequately draw on both geometric and
functional spatial language meaning. 

Call for Papers
 
Description:
Competence in spatial language modelling is a cardinal issue in disciplines
including Cognitive Psychology, Computational Linguistics, and Computer Science.
Within Cognitive Psychology, the relation of spatial language to models of
spatial representation and reasoning is considered essential to the development
of more complete models of psycholinguistic and cognitive linguistic theories.
Within Computer Science and Computational Linguistics, the development of a wide
class of so-called situated systems such as robotics, virtual characters, and
Geographic Information Systems is heavily dependent on the existence of adequate
models of spatial language in order to allow users to interact with these
systems when standard graphical, textual, or tactile modes of communication are
infeasible or inconvenient.

Competence in spatial language requires that we assign appropriate meaning to
spatial terms such as projective, perspective, topological, distance, and path
descriptive markers. However, it is not the case that a given linguistic unit
such as a spatial preposition has a meaning that can be described in terms of a
single qualitative or quantitative model. The same preposition can have multiple
meanings, and such variance must be handled through either underspecified models
that can be stretched to particular situations, or models which incorporate
multiple disparate meanings that are assigned to terms as a situation invites,
or models that take into account vague interpretations in situated contexts. In
spite of some formal proposals in this area, such heterogeneous meaning accounts
are rarely seen in practical computational systems. Moreover, while early models
of spatial term interpretation focused on the geometric interpretation of
spatial language, it is now widely recognized that spatial term meaning is also
dependent on functional and pragmatic features. Competent models of spatial
language must thus draw on complex models of situated meaning, and while some
early proposals exist, it is not at all clear how geometric, functional and
pragmatic features should be integrated in computational models of spatial
language interpretation.

Aims:
The aim of this workshop is to draw together the often orthogonal views on
formal symbolic and embodied spatial language interpretation in order to foster
theories which adequately draw on both geometric and functional spatial language
meaning. On one hand, formal symbolic approaches have attempted to assign
meaning to spatial terms through well defined theories that provide a natural
symbolic backbone to connect spatial meaning with heterogeneous sources of
knowledge and reasoning. These symbolic models, however, often simplify and
generalize spatial term meanings and ignore their various situated
interpretations. On the other hand, embodied quantitative interpretation models
assign meaning to spatial terms through spatial templates which relate the
symbolic level to sub-symbolic knowledge such as sensory-motor information and
spatial representations more suited to real situated systems. These quantitative
models, however, often define templates in a rigid way that allows only few
generalizations. By drawing together these formal symbolic and embodied models
of spatial meaning we wish to move the research community towards models of
spatial meaning which couple embodied geometric and functional features in order
to improve and support situated natural language interpretation systems.

Submissions:
We particularly welcome contributions that address the following:

- Computational models of spatial language that incorporate both geometric and
functional or pragmatic context either in terms of implemented systems,
computational models, empirical findings, or position papers that make clear a
novel approach to this problem

More generally we also invite papers that address topics including:

- Computational models of spatial language interpretation based on formal
symbolic and qualitative theories
- Computational models of spatial language interpretation based on embodied or
quantitative models
- Connectionist theories of spatial language meaning
- Dynamic systems models of spatial term meaning
- Empirically motivated models of spatial term meaning
- Implemented robotics and situated systems which incorporate models of spatial
language interpretation
- Computational models of spatial language interpretation based on spatial
calculi or spatial ontologies
- Uncertain or vague theories and applications for spatial language
interpretation systems

All papers should be submitted in English as PDF documents. We welcome papers of
length 6-8 pages formatted in accordance with the Springer LNCS style (see
http://www.springer.de/comp/lncs/authors.html).

Submissions can be made shortly via the EasyChair website. Submission
information is available from the workshop website at: http://www.cosli.org

Important Dates:
Submission Deadline: 1 May
Notification of Acceptance / Rejection: 15 June
Updated Paper Due: 15 July
Workshop: 15 August

Organizers:
Robert Ross
Artificial Intelligence Group
Dublin Institute of Technology
Ireland 	

Joana Hois
SFB/TR8 Spatial Cognition
University of Bremen
Germany 	

John Kelleher
Artificial Intelligence Group
Dublin Institute of Technology
Ireland

Program Committee:
- John Bateman, University of Bremen, Germany
- Brandon Bennett, University of Leeds, UK
- Kenny Coventry, Northumbria University, UK
- Max J. Egenhofer, University of Maine, USA
- Carola Eschenbach, University of Hamburg, Germany
- Ben Kuipers, University of Michigan, USA
- Reinhard Moratz, University of Maine, USA
- Philippe Muller, Université Paul Sabatier, France
- Robert Porzel, University of Bremen, Germany
- Terry Reigier, UC Berkeley, USA
- David Schlangen, University of Potsdam, Germany





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