Download COMPUTATIONAL COGNITIVE SYSTEMS

COMPUTATIONAL COGNITIVE SYSTEMS
The Case of Commonsense, Space, and Change
Mehul Bhatt
University of Bremen, Germany
www.mehulbhatt.org
Abstract:
A particular emphasis of my research initiatives in recent years has been on the formal and
computational characterisation of ‘space’ and ‘visuo-spatial’ problem-solving processes (e.g.,
abstraction, reasoning, learning) within a range of assistive technologies in domains such as
cognitive vision and robotics, architecture and urban design, and geographic information systems.
The central underlying theme has been that of reasoning about “space, events, actions, change, and
interaction”. The motivating question has been: how can expert analytical and commonsense
reasoning capabilities, as exhibited by humans in specific problem contexts, be used as a model and
benchmark for the development of collaborative cognitive interaction systems (concerned with
people assistance, assurance, and empowerment)? In this talk, I will formally and computational
characterise visuo-spatial “perceptual sense-making processes” that mediate sensing capability /
sensory data, and the formation of sensible impressions (e.g., abstractions, analogies, hypotheses
and theory formation, beliefs and their revision, argument formation) in expert domain-specific
problem solving (e.g., spatial design, geospatial analysis), or even in regular activities of everyday
living, working, and simply going around in the environment (e.g., cognitive vision for human activity
interpretation). In these contexts, fundamental topics and research questions in spatial
representation and reasoning, commonsense reasoning, formal semantics & conceptual inference,
and reasoning about action and change shall be presented. Once the significance of space, events,
actions, and change is established, I will present a general model of “Narrative Cognition” for
computational cognitive systems wrt. the range of domains being addressed, i.e., vision, robotics,
design, geography, where a general “narrative structure” encompassing spatio-temporal dynamics
clearly emerges. Driven by the significance of the “narrative form”, and by the ubiquity of spatiotemporal narrativisation in a range of dynamic phenomena, I propose to ontologically and formally
characterise a “computational model of narratives of space, actions, events, and change” as a basis
for visual and spatiotemporal thinking in a wide-range of application areas. I conclude by positioning
that at a methodological level, the proposed computational model of narrative cognition presents a
compelling approach toward integrating cognitively motivated theories of thinking and reasoning
(e.g., theory of mental models) with formal methods in artificial intelligence for knowledge
representation and reasoning & learning (e.g., about dynamic spatiotemporal phenomena).
SPEAKER BIOGRAPHY
Mehul Bhatt is professor (W1) of Human-Centered Cognitive Assistance within the Faculty of Mathematics and
Informatics at the University of Bremen, Germany. He is member of the Cognitive Systems group, and also
serves as principal investigator within the Spatial Cognition Research Center (SFB/TR 8). He obtained a
bachelors in economics (India), masters in information technology (Australia), and a PhD in computer science
(Australia). He has been a recipient of an Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship, a German Academic Exchange
Service award (DAAD), and an Australian Post-graduate Award (APA). Mehul’s basic research is at the
interface of Artificial Intelligence (focussing on logics of space, action, and change) and Computational
Cognitive Systems (focusing on spatial cognition and computation). Key topics include spatial representation &
reasoning, commonsense reasoning, applied ontology, human-computer interaction, and design cognition. The
research translates to applications in architecture design, geoscience, cognitive vision & robotics, and medical
informatics. Mehul has edited for journals: Spatial Cognition and Computation, Journal of Experimental and
Theoretical Artificial Intelligence (JETAI), Human-Centred Computing and Information Sciences, Ambient
Intelligence and Smart Environments, and Automation in Construction. Mehul has initiated and co-steered
initiatives such as: Spatio-Temporal Dynamics (STeDy), Space, Time, and Ambient Intelligence (STAMI),
SHAPES – The Shape of Things, and the International Association for Ontology and its Applications (IAOA)
SIG on ‘Design Semantics’. Mehul also served as co-chair for the DFG-NSF symposium on Spatial Cognition
for Architecture Design (SCAD 2011, USA); and the 27th Qualitative Reasoning Workshop (QR-2013,
Germany).