Representation And Inference For Natural Language

by Blackburn, Patrick

• ISBN13: 9781575864969
• ISBN10: 1575864967
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2005-04-06
• Publisher: Stanford Univ Center for the Study

Summary

How can computers distinguish the coherent from the unintelligible, recognize new information in a sentence, or draw inferences from a natural language passage? Computational semantics is an exciting new field that seeks answers to these questions, and this volume is the first textbook wholly devoted to this growing subdiscipline. The book explains the underlying theoretical issues and fundamental techniques for computing semantic representations for fragments of natural language. This volume will be an essential text for computer scientists, linguists, and anyone interested in the development of computational semantics.

Author Biography

Patrick Blackburn is director of research at INRIA, France's national organization for research in computer science. Johan Bos is a senior researcher at the School of Informatics at the University of Edinburgh.

Table of Contents

Preface	vii
Introduction	xi
First-Order Logic	1	(54)
First-Order Logic	1	(18)
Three Inference Tasks	19	(10)
A First-Order Model Checker	29	(15)
First-Order Logic and Natural Language	44	(11)
Lambda Calculus	55	(50)
Compositionality	55	(4)
Two Experiments	59	(7)
The Lambda Calculus	66	(7)
Implementing Lambda Calculus	73	(13)
Grammar Engineering	86	(19)
Underspecified Representations	105	(50)
Scope Ambiguities	105	(4)
Montague's Approach	109	(3)
Storage Methods	112	(15)
Hole Semantics	127	(28)
Propositional Inference	155	(48)
From Models to Proofs	155	(3)
Propositional Tableaus	158	(10)
Implementing Propositional Tableau	168	(6)
Propositional Resolution	174	(11)
Implementing Propositional Resolution	185	(6)
Theoretical Remarks	191	(12)
First-Order Inference	203	(56)
A First-Order Tableau System	204	(5)
Unification	209	(6)
Free-Variable Tableaus	215	(4)
Implementing Free-Variable Tableaus	219	(6)
First-Order Resolution	225	(6)
Implementing First-Order Resolution	231	(4)
Off-the-Shelf Theorem Provers	235	(7)
Model Building	242	(17)
Putting It All Together	259	(50)
Baby Curt	259	(5)
Rugrat Curt	264	(3)
Clever Curt	267	(5)
Sensitive Curt	272	(5)
Scrupulous Curt	277	(4)
Knowledgeable Curt	281	(12)
Helpful Curt	293	(16)
Running the Software -- FAQ	309	(2)
Propositional Logic	311	(4)
Automated Reasoning for First-Order Logic	315	(4)
Notation	319	(2)
References	321	(14)
Author Index	335	(4)
Prolog Index	339	(4)
Subject Index	343