Machine Learning Algorithms for Problem Solving in Computational Applications

Visual calculating in shape grammars aligns with art and design, bridging the gap between seeing (Coleridge’s “imagination”) and combinatoric play (Coleridge’s “fancy”).In Shapes of Imagination, George Stiny runs visual calculating in shape grammars through art and design―incorporating Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poetic imagination and Oscar Wilde’s challenging corollary to see things as in themselves they really are not. Many assume that calculating limits art and design to suit computers, but shape grammars rely on seeing to prove otherwise. Rules that change what they see extend calculating to overtake what computers can do, in logic and with data and learning. Shape grammars bridge the categorical divide between seeing (Coleridge’s “imagination, or esemplastic power”) and combinatoric play (Coleridge’s “fancy”). Stiny shows that calculating without seeing excludes art and design. Seeing is key for calculating to augment creative activity with aesthetic insight and value. Shape gramma

An investigation of the role of educational privatization and technology in the crises of truth and agency.Today, conspiracy theories run rampant, attacks on facts have become commonplace, and systemic inequities are on the rise as individual and collective agency unravels. The Alienation of Fact explains the educational, technological, and ideological preconditions for these contemporary crises of truth and agency and explores the contradictions and competing visions for the future of education that lie at the center of the problem. Schools are increasingly reimagined as businesses, and high-stakes standardized testing and curricula, for-profit charter schools, and the rise of educational AI put capital and technology at the center of education. Yet even as our society demands measure, data, and facts, politicians and news outlets regularly make unfounded assertions. How should we make sense of the contradictions between the demand for radical data-driven empiricism and the flight fro

Discover the hidden electrical world inside your nervous system using DIY, hands-on experiments, for all ages. No MD or PhD required!The workings of the brain are mysterious: What are neural signals? What do they mean? How do our senses really sense? How does our brain control our movements? What happens when we meditate? Techniques to record signals from living brains were once thought to be the realm of advanced university labs . . . but not anymore! This book allows anyone to participate in the discovery of neuroscience through hands-on experiments that record the hidden electrical world beneath our skin and skulls. In How Your Brain Works, neuroscientists Greg Gage and Tim Marzullo offer a practical guide―accessible and useful to readers from middle schoolers to college undergraduates to curious adults―for learning about the brain through hands-on experiments. Armed with some DIY electrodes, readers will get to see what brain activity really looks like through simple neuroscience e

How people make decisions, size up situations, spot anomalies, and anticipate problems in real-world settings.Gary Klein, author of the bestselling Sources of Power, is the cognitive psychologist who discovered how people actually make decisions, particularly under time pressure and uncertainty. In Snapshots of the Mind, he offers a set of short essays―“snapshots” of different aspects of cognitive functioning in real-world settings that will help us learn to recognize the cognitive processes that underlie and drive performance. In these essays Klein provides practical tools for escaping fixation on initial hunches and learning to detect the ways that people make decisions, size up situations, spot anomalies, and anticipate problems. Snapshots of the Mind grows out of the Naturalistic Decision Making movement, which studies how decision makers handle uncertainty and complexity in high-stakes situations. In the essays, Klein examines how people make tough choices and assessments in the

An illustrated guide to exploring the Universe in three dimensions.Astronomers have made remarkable discoveries about our Universe, despite their reliance on the flat projection, or 2D view, the sky has offered them. But now, drawing on the vast stores of data available from telescopes and observatories on the ground and in space, astronomers are using 3D technology to go beyond a flattened view of the cosmos. In Stars in Your Hand, Kimberly Arcand and Megan Watzke offer an illustrated guide to exploring the Universe in three dimensions, with easy-to-follow instructions for creating models of stars and constellations using a 3D printer and 3D computer imaging. Stars in Your Hand and 3D technology make learning about space an adventure. Intrigued by the stunning images from high-powered telescopes? Using this book, you can fly virtually through a 3D spacescape and hold models of cosmic objects in your hand. Arcand and Watzke outline advances in 3D technology, describe some amazing recen

A guide to the ethical questions that arise from our use of industrial robots, robot companions, self-driving cars, and other robotic devices.Does a robot have moral agency? Can it be held responsible for its actions? Do humans owe robots anything? Will robots take our jobs? These are some of the ethical and moral quandaries that we should address now, as robots and other intelligent devices become more widely used and more technically sophisticated. In this volume in the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series, philosopher Mark Coeckelbergh does just that. He considers a variety of robotics technologies and applications―from robotic companions to military drones―and identifies the ethical implications of their use. Questions of robot ethics, he argues, are not just about robots but, crucially and importantly, are about humans as well. Coeckelbergh examines industrial robots and their potential to take over tasks from humans; “social” robots and possible risks to privacy; and robots in he

A comprehensive resource on what lockdown drills are, why they are necessary, and how best to conduct them.The first book to offer a comprehensive examination of lockdown drills in K–12 schools, Lockdown Drills balances research findings with practical applications and implications. Schildkraut and Nickerson, school safety experts with complementary backgrounds in criminology and school psychology, review the historical precedents for lockdown drills, distinguish school lockdowns from other emergency procedures (such as active shooter drills), explain why they are conducted, present evidence-based research on their effectiveness, and describe how to conduct them according to best practices. Proponents of lockdown drills as a life-saving necessity, the authors help to bring much-needed standardization to how these drills are studied and conducted. The authors present common arguments for and against the inclusion of lockdown drills in emergency preparedness efforts, balancing their disc

Stories from the ER: a doctor shows how empathy, creativity, and imagination are the cornerstones of clinical care.To be an emergency room doctor is to be a professional listener to stories. Each patient presents a story; finding the heart of that story is the doctor’s most critical task. More technology, more tests, and more data won’t work if doctors get the story wrong. Empathy, creativity, and imagination are the cornerstones of clinical care. In Tornado of Life, ER physician Jay Baruch offers a series of short, powerful, and affecting essays that capture the stories of ER patients in all their complexity and messiness. Patients come to the ER with lives troubled by scales of misfortune that have little to do with disease or injury. ER doctors must be problem-finders before they are problem-solvers. Cheryl, for example, whose story is a chaos narrative of “and this happened, and then that happened, and then, and then and then and then,” tells Baruch she is "stuck in a tornado of li

How the cerebral cortex operates near a critical phase transition point for optimum performance.Individual neurons have limited computational powers, but when they work together, it is almost like magic. Firing synchronously and then breaking off to improvise by themselves, they can be paradoxically both independent and interdependent. This happens near the critical point: when neurons are poised between a phase where activity is damped and a phase where it is amplified, where information processing is optimized, and complex emergent activity patterns arise. The claim that neurons in the cortex work best when they operate near the critical point is known as the criticality hypothesis. In this book John Beggs―one of the pioneers of this hypothesis―offers an introduction to the critical point and its relevance to the brain.Drawing on recent experimental evidence, Beggs first explains the main ideas underlying the criticality hypotheses and emergent phenomena. He then discusses the critic

Why human skills and expertise, not technical tools, are what make projects succeed.The project is the basic unit of work in many industries. Software applications, antiviral vaccines, launch-ready spacecraft: all were produced by a team and managed as a project. Project management emphasizes control, processes, and tools―but, according to The Smart Mission, that is not the right way to run a project. Human skills and expertise, not technical tools, are what make projects successful. Projects run on knowledge. This paradigm-shifting book―by three project management experts, all of whom have decades of experience at NASA and elsewhere―challenges the conventional wisdom on project management, focusing on the human dimension: learning, collaboration, teaming, communication, and culture. The authors emphasize three themes: projects are fundamentally about how teams work and learn together to get things done; the local level―not an organization’s upper levels―is where the action happens; an

An updated edition of a widely used textbook, offering a clear and comprehensive presentation of mathematics for undergraduate economics students.This text offers a clear and comprehensive presentation of the mathematics required to tackle problems in economic analyses, providing not only straightforward exposition of mathematical methods for economics students at the intermediate and advanced undergraduate levels but also a large collection of problem sets. This updated and expanded fourth edition contains numerous worked examples drawn from a range of important areas, including economic theory, environmental economics, financial economics, public economics, industrial organization, and the history of economic thought. These help students develop modeling skills by showing how the same basic mathematical methods can be applied to a variety of interesting and important issues. The five parts of the text cover fundamentals, calculus, linear algebra, optimization, and dynamics. The onl

Experiments in architectural education in the post–World War II era that challenged and transformed architectural discourse and practice. In the decades after World War II, new forms of learning transformed architectural education. These radical experiments sought to upend disciplinary foundations and conventional assumptions about the nature of architecture as much as they challenged modernist and colonial norms, decentered building, imagined new roles for the architect, and envisioned participatory forms of practice. Although many of the experimental programs were subsequently abandoned, terminated, or assimilated, they nevertheless helped shape and in some sense define architectural discourse and practice. This book explores and documents these radical pedagogies and efforts to defy architecture’s status quo. The experiments include the adaptation of Bauhaus pedagogy as a means of “unlearning” under the conditions of decolonization in Africa; a movement to design for “every body,

The first comprehensive treatment of active inference, an integrative perspective on brain, cognition, and behavior used across multiple disciplines. Active inference is a way of understanding sentient behavior―a theory that characterizes perception, planning, and action in terms of probabilistic inference. Developed by theoretical neuroscientist Karl Friston over years of groundbreaking research, active inference provides an integrated perspective on brain, cognition, and behavior that is increasingly used across multiple disciplines including neuroscience, psychology, and philosophy. Active inference puts the action into perception. This book offers the first comprehensive treatment of active inference, covering theory, applications, and cognitive domains. Active inference is a “first principles” approach to understanding behavior and the brain, framed in terms of a single imperative to minimize free energy. The book emphasizes the implications of the free energy principle for un

Best practices for addressing the bias and inequality that may result from the automated collection, analysis, and distribution of large datasets.Human-centered data science is a new interdisciplinary field that draws from human-computer interaction, social science, statistics, and computational techniques. This book, written by founders of the field, introduces best practices for addressing the bias and inequality that may result from the automated collection, analysis, and distribution of very large datasets. It offers a brief and accessible overview of many common statistical and algorithmic data science techniques, explains human-centered approaches to data science problems, and presents practical guidelines and real-world case studies to help readers apply these methods. The authors explain how data scientists’ choices are involved at every stage of the data science workflow―and show how a human-centered approach can enhance each one, by making the process more transparent, aski

The proposal of a semantics for quotations using explanatory notions drawn from philosophical theories of pictures. In Quotations as Pictures, Josef Stern develops a semantics for quotations using explanatory notions drawn from philosophical theories of pictures. He offers the first sustained analysis of the practice of quotation proper, as opposed to mentioning. Unlike other accounts that treat quotation as mentioning, Quotations as Pictures argues that the two practices have independent histories, that they behave differently semantically, that the inverted commas employed in both mentioning and quotation are homonymous, that so-called mixed quotation is nothing but subsentential quotation, and that the major problem of quotation is to explain its dual reference or meaning―its ordinary meaning and its metalinguistic reference to the quoted phrase attributed to the quoted subject. Stern argues that the key to understanding quotation is the idea that quotations are pictures or have

A general formal theory of causal reasoning as a logical study of causal models, reasoning, and inference.In this book, Alexander Bochman presents a general formal theory of causal reasoning as a logical study of causal models, reasoning, and inference, basing it on a supposition that causal reasoning is not a competitor of logical reasoning but its complement for situations lacking logically sufficient data or knowledge. Bochman also explores the relationship of this theory with the popular structural equation approach to causality proposed by Judea Pearl and explores several applications ranging from artificial intelligence to legal theory, including abduction, counterfactuals, actual and proximate causality, dynamic causal models, and reasoning about action and change in artificial intelligence. As logical preparation, before introducing causal concepts, Bochman describes an alternative, situation-based semantics for

Why environmental learning is crucial for understanding the connected challenges of climate justice, tribalism, inequity, democracy, and human flourishing.How can we respond to the current planetary e

The Game Boy Advance platform as computational system and cultural artifact, from its 2001 release through hacks, mods, emulations, homebrew afterlives.In 2002, Nintendo of America launched an interna

An economic analysis of what distributed ledgers can do, examining key components and discussing applications in both developed and emerging market economies.Distributed ledger technology (DLT) has th

Ten laws of simplicity for business, technology, and design that teach us how to need less but get more.Finally, we are learning that simplicity equals sanity. We're rebelling against technology that'

Why technology is not an end in itself, and how cities can be “smart enough,” using technology to promote democracy and equity.Smart cities, where technology is used to solve every problem, are hailed

Reclaiming fun as a meaningful concept for understanding games and play.“Fun” is somewhat ambiguous. If something is fun, is it pleasant? Entertaining? Silly? A way to trick students into learning? Fu

An authoritative treatment of urban computing, offering an overview of the field, fundamental techniques, advanced models, and novel applications.Urban computing brings powerful computational techniqu

A project-based guide to the basics of deep learning.This concise, project-driven guide to deep learning takes readers through a series of program-writing tasks that introduce them to the use of deep

A concise history of GPS, from its military origins to its commercial applications and ubiquity in everyday life.GPS is ubiquitous in everyday life. GPS mapping is standard equipment in many new cars

Deming's classic work on management, based on his famous 14 Points for Management."Long-term commitment to new learning and new philosophy is required of any management that seeks transformation. The

A textbook for students with limited background in mathematics and computer coding, emphasizing computer tutorials that guide readers in producing models of neural behavior.This introductory text teac

A book that uses domain-general learning theory to explain recurrent trajectories of language change.In this book, Vsevolod Kapatsinski argues that language acquisition—often approached as an isolated

An examination of the global trade and traffic in discarded electronics that reframes the question of the "right" thing to do with e-waste.The prevailing storyline about the problem of electronic wast

An examination of the global trade and traffic in discarded electronics that reframes the question of the “right” thing to do with e-waste.The prevailing storyline about the problem of electronic wast

The history of the grid, the world's largest interconnected power machine that is North America's electricity infrastructure. The North American power grid has been called the world's largest machin

All areas of biology and medicine contain rhythms, and these behaviors are best understood through mathematical tools and techniques. This book offers a survey of mathematical, computational, and anal

What can artificial intelligence teach us about the mind? If AI's underlying concept is that thinking is a computational process, then how can computation illuminate thin

This book will introduce the newly discovered endocannabinoid system in a scholarly manner to a broadly educated audience interested in learning what is known about cannabinoids, both plant derived an

Multiagent systems are made up of multiple interacting intelligent agents -- computational entities to some degree autonomous and able to cooperate, compete, communicate, act flexibly, and exercise co

The third edition of Java Precisely provides a concise description of the Java programming language, version 8.0. It offers a quick reference for the reader who has already learned (or is learning) Ja

One of Tanya Reinhart's major contributions to linguistic theory is the development of the Theta System (TS), a theory of the interface between the system of concepts and the linguistic computational

One of Tanya Reinhart's major contributions to linguistic theory is the development of the Theta System (TS), a theory of the interface between the system of concepts and the linguistic computational

Emissions trading schemes figure prominently among policy instruments used to tackle the problem of climate change, and the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS), begun in 2005, is the larg

Our increasingly integrated world relies on networks both physical and virtual to transfer goods and information. The Internet is a network of networks that connects people around the world in a real-