[Probcogsci] Can we start a little early? Re: Next Week : Optimal Predictions in Everyday Cognition

[Roger Levy]

My lab meeting runs 2:30-4pm...


On Jul 6, 2009, at 12:45 PM, Vicente Malave wrote:

> Hi folks, turns out in my enthusiasm for Bayesian cognitive science I
> accidentally double-booked myself, and I have to be somewhere at 4.
> Are we okay with starting a little earlier? Either at 3 and have the
> full discussion, or at 3:30 and I'll just talk really fast. Let me
> know what works for you.
>
> On Thu, Jul 2, 2009 at 10:25 PM, Vicente Malave<vicente.malave at gmail.com 
> > wrote:
>> Next week we will be meeting (still 4pm, natcomp conference room),  
>> and
>> I will lead discussion.
>>
>> Two weeks ago, Ben asked "Where do the priors come from"? -The best
>> way to answer this is to look at a situation where we can determine
>> the prior, and ask if people's decisions are consistent with that.  
>> The
>> main paper we will be focusing on is "Optimal Predictions in Everyday
>> Cognition" by Griffiths and Tenenbaum.
>> http://cocosci.berkeley.edu/tom/papers/predictions.pdf
>> The task is to predict how long an event will last, given 1 data  
>> point
>> (the current duration). In this case for most of the events (i.e.
>> baking a cake) they were able to get a good prior. Its a very short
>> and simple paper, and we will work through all the math in the
>> appendix.
>>
>> This paper was inspired by
>> Implications of the Copernican principle for our future prospects, by
>> JR Gott III, published in Nature as a "Hypothesis"
>> http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v363/n6427/abs/363315a0.html
>> which estimates a number of interesting things using a the same
>> argument, including how long the journal Nature will exist, the
>> possibilities of colonizing the galaxy, and if SETI will find
>> extraterrestrial life. Its pretty interesting, but quite a tangent,
>> maybe we won't discuss this.
>>
>> Finally, when gathering these I found a recent paper by Mike Mozer,
>> Hal Pashler, and Hadjar Homaei (Cogsci Journal) directly  
>> contradicting
>> the optimal predictions paper. Their argument seems to be that
>> Griffiths and Tenenbaum have fit the aggregate prediction across
>> subjects. If you find yourself screaming out against the target
>> article, perhaps your criticisms will be contained here.
>> http://www.cs.colorado.edu/~mozer/papers/reprints/MozerPashlerHomaei2008.pdf
>>
>> So, for next week, read the "Optimal Predictions" paper, and come
>> prepared to discuss. Other readings are supplementary.
>> --
>> Vicente Malave
>>
>
>
>
> -- 
> Vicente Malave
>
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--

Roger Levy                      Email: rlevy at ling.ucsd.edu
Assistant Professor             Phone: 858-534-7219
Department of Linguistics       Fax:   858-534-4789
UC San Diego                    Web:   http://ling.ucsd.edu/~rlevy