Featuring an international team of authors, Neural Network Perspectives on Cognition and Adaptive Robotics presents several approaches to the modeling of human cognition and language using neural computing techniques. It also describes how adaptive robotic systems can be produced using neural network architectures. Covering a wide range of mainstream area and trends, each chapter provides the latest information from a different perspective.

Featuring an international team of authors, Neural Network Perspectives on Cognition and Adaptive Robotics presents several approaches to the modeling of human cognition and language using neural computing techniques. It also describes how adaptive robotic systems can be produced using neural network architectures. Covering a wide range of mainstream area and trends, each chapter provides the latest information from a different perspective.

Hybrid neural systems are computational systems which are based mainly on artificial neural networks and allow for symbolic interpretation or interaction with symbolic components. This book is derived from a workshop held during the NIPS'98 in Denver, Colorado, USA, and competently reflects the state of the art of research and development in hybrid neural systems. The 26 revised full papers presented together with an introductory overview by the volume editors have been through a twofold process of careful reviewing and revision. The papers are organized in the following topical sections: structured connectionism and rule representation; distributed neural architectures and language processing; transformation and explanation; robotics, vision, and cognitive approaches.

The second of a two-volume set, this book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the Second International Work-Conference on the Interplay between Natural and Artificial Computation, IWINAC 2007, held in La Manga del Mar Menor, Spain in June 2007. It contains all the contributions connected with biologically inspired methods and techniques for solving AI and knowledge engineering problems in different application domains.

A collection of stimulating studies on the past, the present, and the future of consciousness, Consciousness Evolving contributes to understanding some of the most important conceptual problems of our time. The advent of the modern synthesis together with the human genome project affords a platform for considering what it is that makes humans distinctive. Beginning with an essay that accents the nature of the problem within a behavioristic framework and concluding with reflections on the prospects for a form of immortality through serial cloning, the chapters are divided into three sections, which concern how and why consciousness may have evolved, special capacities involving language, creativity, and mentality as candidates for evolved adaptations, and the prospects for artificial evolution though the design of robots with specific forms of consciousness and mind. This volume should appeal to every reader who wants to better understand the human species, including its distinctive properties and its place in nature. (Series A)

Cognitive psychology is concerned with several mental processes, including those involved in perception, attention, learning, memory, problem solving, decision making and the use of language. It is often said that cognitive psychology tries to understand how people represent their experience and then use these representations to operate effectively. Cognitive psychology holds that people are not passive organisms whose mental representations are simple or direct reflections of the outside world. Rater, they are active processors of environmental events, and as such they bring their past knowledge and their biases to bear on how they perceive and understand all current events. Thus perceiving, imagining, thinking, remembering, forming concepts, and solving problems, indeed all aspects of people's mental lives, define the domain of cognitive exploration. This book presents important research which was carefully selected and screened for both current relevance and long-term advancement of the field.

The focus of the papers presented in these proceedings is on employing various methodologies and approaches for solving real-life problems. Although the mechanisms that the human brain employs to solve problems are not yet completely known, we do have good insight into the functional processing performed by the human mind. On the basis of the understanding of these natural processes, scientists in the field of applied intelligence have developed multiple types of artificial processes, and have employed them successfully in solving real-life problems. The types of approaches used to solve problems are dependant on both the nature of the problem and the expected outcome. While knowledge-based systems are useful for solving problems in well-understood domains with relatively stable environments, the approach may fail when the domain knowledge is either not very well understood or changing rapidly. The techniques of data discovery through data mining will help to alleviate some problems faced by knowledge-based approaches to solving problems in such domains. Research and development in the area of artificial intelligence are influenced by opportunity, needs, and the availability of resources. The rapid advancement of Internet technology and the trend of increasing bandwidths provide an opportunity and a need for intelligent information processing, thus creating an excellent opportunity for agent-based computations and learning. Over 40% of the papers appearing in the conference proceedings focus on the area of machine learning and intelligent agents - clear evidence of growing interest in this area.