Not exactly : in praise of vagueness /

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Author / Creator:Deemter, Kees van.
Imprint:Oxford : New York : Oxford University Press, 2010.
Description:xvi, 341 p. : ill. ; 24 cm.
Language:English
Subject:
Format: Print Book
URL for this record:http://pi.lib.uchicago.edu/1001/cat/bib/7982528
Hidden Bibliographic Details
ISBN:9780199545902 (hardback)
0199545901 (hardback)
9780199645732 (pbk.)
0199645736 (pbk.)
Notes:Includes bibliographical references (p. 319-332) and index.
Summary:"Our daily lives are full of vagueness or fuzziness. When we describe someone as "tall," for example, it is as though there is a particular height beyond which a person can be considered "tall." In this stimulating book, Kees Van Deemter cuts across various disciplines--including artificial intelligence, logic, and computer science - to illuminate the nature and importance of vagueness. Van Deemter shows why vagueness is both unavoidable and useful, and he demonstrates how tempting - and how wrong--it often is to think in terms of black and white, instead of the richly graded spectrum of the world around us. Vagueness, the author argues, allows us to focus on what matters, leaving out irrelevant details, and adding texture to what would otherwise be unintelligible facts. The embrace of vagueness, however, comes at a price, for when degrees of grey are accepted, concepts like truth, belief, and proof lose their power, and we are banished from that paradise in which truth and falsity are the only possibilities' -- Publisher's description.

MARC

LEADER 00000cam a2200000 a 4500
001 7982528
005 20130320154900.0
008 091116s2010 enka b 001 0 eng
003 ICU
010 |a  2009941589 
015 |a GBA994091  |2 bnb 
015 |a GBA994091  |2 dnb 
016 7 |a 015380181  |2 Uk 
019 |a 718695470 
020 |a 9780199545902 (hardback) 
020 |a 0199545901 (hardback) 
020 |a 9780199645732 (pbk.) 
020 |a 0199645736 (pbk.) 
035 |a (OCoLC)441191662  |z (OCoLC)718695470 
035 |a om2801561 
040 |a DLC  |b eng  |c DLC  |d UKM  |d BTCTA  |d BWKUK  |d BWK  |d YDXCP  |d MOF  |d FTB  |d VPI  |d BWX  |d OUN  |d DEBBG  |d CDX  |d UPZ  |d VP@  |d ALAUL  |d OMB  |d LMR  |d CWS  |d CHRRO  |d MIX  |d BDX  |d UKMGB 
049 |a CGUA 
050 0 0 |a B105.V33  |b D44 2010 
072 7 |a s1lg  |2 rero 
082 0 0 |a 401/.43  |2 22 
084 |a 5,1  |2 ssgn 
084 |a CC 2500  |2 rvk 
084 |a AP 16400  |2 rvk 
084 |a SG 700  |2 rvk 
084 |a SK 130  |2 rvk 
100 1 |a Deemter, Kees van.  |0 http://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/n95110302  |1 http://viaf.org/viaf/6649406 
245 1 0 |a Not exactly :  |b in praise of vagueness /  |c Dr Kees van Deemter. 
260 |a Oxford :  |a New York :  |b Oxford University Press,  |c 2010. 
300 |a xvi, 341 p. :  |b ill. ;  |c 24 cm. 
336 |a text  |b txt  |2 rdacontent  |0 http://id.loc.gov/vocabulary/contentTypes/txt 
337 |a unmediated  |b n  |2 rdamedia  |0 http://id.loc.gov/vocabulary/mediaTypes/n 
338 |a volume  |b nc  |2 rdacarrier  |0 http://id.loc.gov/vocabulary/carriers/nc 
504 |a Includes bibliographical references (p. 319-332) and index. 
505 0 |a Introduction : False clarity : Vagueness ; Paradox ; Academic perspectives on vagueness -- Part I. Vagueness, where one least expects it : Sex and similarity: on the fiction of species : What is a species? ; The Ensatina salamander ; Lessons learned -- Measurements that matter : A short history of the metre ; Obesity ; Poverty ; Intelligence ; Dialogue intermezzo: After the job interviews ; Scientific discovery and word meaning -- Identity and gradual change : Identity: the case of old number one ; Multiply objects ; Dialogue intermezzo: On old number one ; What makes a book? ; What makes a person? ; What is a language? Digression: protection against change ; So what? -- Vagueness in numbers and maths : Vagueness in mathematics ; Talking about numbers ; Which computer program is faster ; Statistical significance -- Part II. Theories of vagueness : The linguistics of vagueness : Chomsky's machine: computing grammatically ; Montague's machine: computing meaning ; The role of language corpora ; Vague adjectives ; The meaning of adjectives ; Vagueness and ambiguity ; Lack of specificity ; Prototypes ; Comparatives ; Packaging what we say: hedging ; Future work -- Reasoning with vague information : Reasoning with vague concepts ; The sorites paradox ; Vagueness as ignorance ; Similarity is in the eye of the beholder: the case of colour ; Dialogue intermezzo: On vagueness as ignorance ; Continuity and vagueness -- Parrying a paradox : Logic and paradox ; A crash course in classical logic ; First deviation: supervaluations and partial logic ; Second deviation: context-aware reasoning ; Third deviation: introspective agents -- Degrees of truth : Fuzzy logic ; Dialogue intermezzo: On fuzzy logic ; Fuzzy logic and the sorites paradox ; Probabilistic versions of many-valued logic ; What's wrong with degrees? -- Part III. Working models of vagueness : Artificial intelligence : A brief history of AI ; Artificial intelligence? ; Qualitative reasoning ; Applying fuzzy logic: an artificial doctor ; The future of AI -- When to be vague: computers as authors : Example: generating vague descriptions ; Dialogue intermezzo: What use is a theory? ; Tolerance revisited ; A game theory perspective ; Vagueness in the absence of conflict ; Why do we speak? -- The expulsion from Boole's paradise : Earlier questions revisited ; Coping with vagueness -- Epilogue : Guaranteed correct. 
520 |a "Our daily lives are full of vagueness or fuzziness. When we describe someone as "tall," for example, it is as though there is a particular height beyond which a person can be considered "tall." In this stimulating book, Kees Van Deemter cuts across various disciplines--including artificial intelligence, logic, and computer science - to illuminate the nature and importance of vagueness. Van Deemter shows why vagueness is both unavoidable and useful, and he demonstrates how tempting - and how wrong--it often is to think in terms of black and white, instead of the richly graded spectrum of the world around us. Vagueness, the author argues, allows us to focus on what matters, leaving out irrelevant details, and adding texture to what would otherwise be unintelligible facts. The embrace of vagueness, however, comes at a price, for when degrees of grey are accepted, concepts like truth, belief, and proof lose their power, and we are banished from that paradise in which truth and falsity are the only possibilities' -- Publisher's description. 
650 0 |a Vagueness (Philosophy)  |0 http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh91005134 
650 0 7 |a Linguistik.  |2 swd 
650 0 7 |a Logik.  |2 swd 
650 0 7 |a Vagheit.  |2 swd 
650 7 |a flou (esthétique)  |x intelligence artificielle  |x linguistique.  |2 rero 
650 7 |a imprécis  |x intelligence artificielle  |x linguistique.  |2 rero 
650 0 7 |a Linguistik.  |0 (DE-588)4074250-7  |2 gnd 
650 0 7 |a Logik.  |0 (DE-588)4036202-4  |2 gnd 
650 0 7 |a Vagheit.  |0 (DE-588)4199400-0  |2 gnd 
650 7 |a Vagueness (Philosophy)  |2 fast  |0 http://id.worldcat.org/fast/fst01163683 
903 |a HeVa 
929 |a cat 
999 f f |i 62e5fa05-6369-590e-bdbe-b9e0b1c0bf25  |s 430193e4-2c3a-5fbf-b205-387cbddc7b5e 
928 |t Library of Congress classification  |a P325.5.A46 D44 2010  |l JRL  |c JRL-Gen  |i 5521415 
927 |t Library of Congress classification  |a P325.5.A46 D44 2010  |l JRL  |c JRL-Gen  |e ABST  |b 092600618  |i 8735481