Sunday, May 8, 2011
Deadline for submission of extended abstracts: IEEE HST
The deadline for submission of extended abstracts to the 2011 IEEE Conference on Technologies for Homeland Security is May 13, 2011. If the abstract is accepted, a full paper must be submitted by June 24, 2011. This conference will be held in Greater Boston, 15-17 November, 2011.
Saturday, May 7, 2011
Submission deadline: EPIA 2011
The deadline for submission of abstracts to the XV Portuguese Conference on Artificial Intelligence is May 10 2011. This conference will be held in Lisbon, Portugal, 10-13 October, 2011.
Deadline extension: EA 2011
The deadline for the 2011 Artificial Evolution conference (EA2011) has been extended to 15 May 2011. This conference will be held in Angers, France, 24-26 October, 2011.
Friday, May 6, 2011
Peer review
Maggie Koerth-Baker writes about peer review at one of my favourite places on the web, Boing Boing. This article does a good job of describing peer review for the general public, especially in regards to why it's a good thing and what problems exist with it. As a working scientist, I have a slightly different point of view on peer review.
Firstly, most reviewers have the good intention of trying to make the paper better. This is something that many new authors don't get: they may even see the reviewers' comments as an attack on their competence. But that's seldom the case, at least not in my experience. Publishing bad papers, or papers with unreliable results, benefits no one. Whenever I review a paper, the first thing I ask myself is, "what can I suggest that could improve this paper?".
Secondly, reviewers have a lot of power. It seems to be the norm now that editors won't challenge anything a reviewer writes, even if it is egregiously wrong. If a reviewer criticizes an author on completely spurious grounds (for example, the reviewer is out of date in the field the paper is in, or if the reviewer simply doesn't know as much as they think they do) most editors will just allow the review through. This places the onus of disproving the reviewer on the author, which means authors have to spend time arguing with a reviewer (via the editor) instead of actually improving their paper.
Thirdly, reviewers do not have a lot of time. I've reviewed a lot of papers, more than a hundred, at last count, and to be honest, most of them sat on my desk for a few weeks before I managed to read them. Recently, the time frame to perform a review has been getting smaller, so there's even less time to do a quality review.
Computational intelligence papers have certain aspects that make them a challenge to review. Firstly, most have a fair amount of mathematics in them, but the number of authors who still don't define the variables in each equation is disappointingly large. Secondly, most papers have empirical work that test the proposed algorithms. But, a large proportion of those still don't produce statistically valid results - repeated trials, varied parameters, independent test sets, and statistical tests of significant differences over the results. I have noticed some progress on this in the last few years, but nowhere near as much as I would like.
I think I'll have to write this up in a future post...
Firstly, most reviewers have the good intention of trying to make the paper better. This is something that many new authors don't get: they may even see the reviewers' comments as an attack on their competence. But that's seldom the case, at least not in my experience. Publishing bad papers, or papers with unreliable results, benefits no one. Whenever I review a paper, the first thing I ask myself is, "what can I suggest that could improve this paper?".
Secondly, reviewers have a lot of power. It seems to be the norm now that editors won't challenge anything a reviewer writes, even if it is egregiously wrong. If a reviewer criticizes an author on completely spurious grounds (for example, the reviewer is out of date in the field the paper is in, or if the reviewer simply doesn't know as much as they think they do) most editors will just allow the review through. This places the onus of disproving the reviewer on the author, which means authors have to spend time arguing with a reviewer (via the editor) instead of actually improving their paper.
Thirdly, reviewers do not have a lot of time. I've reviewed a lot of papers, more than a hundred, at last count, and to be honest, most of them sat on my desk for a few weeks before I managed to read them. Recently, the time frame to perform a review has been getting smaller, so there's even less time to do a quality review.
Computational intelligence papers have certain aspects that make them a challenge to review. Firstly, most have a fair amount of mathematics in them, but the number of authors who still don't define the variables in each equation is disappointingly large. Secondly, most papers have empirical work that test the proposed algorithms. But, a large proportion of those still don't produce statistically valid results - repeated trials, varied parameters, independent test sets, and statistical tests of significant differences over the results. I have noticed some progress on this in the last few years, but nowhere near as much as I would like.
I think I'll have to write this up in a future post...
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Ten rules for good writing
Henry Gee writes about The ten rules for excellent writing. Not that there's actually ten rules in the article, but it's a nice title. The rules he does discuss are:
Rule 1: Write Every Day
Rule 2: Write as you would speak
Rule 3: Stick to the point
Rule 4: Take A Break
Rule 5: Finish it
Rule 6: Avoid cliché
I am trying to follow Rule 1 more often: this blog helps, and I also have a backlog of papers to deal with.
Rule 2 ties back to the idea of having a narrative in scientific papers, as discussed in this post. Scientific articles do expect a certain level of formality and a certain writing style: I have even heard of an author having to fight to get a journal to accept an article written in the active voice.
Sticking to the point (Rule 3) isn't all that hard for me, but I know I can improve - I have been told that my writing is a bit "information light".
Take a break (Rule 4) - always a good idea, and the best thing about having multiple projects on the go is that you can take a break from one project by working on another. That way, you are getting being productive while taking a break.
I also need to follow Rule 5 with more care: my backlog of papers isn't getting any smaller. One pitfall with this in science is that most papers have multiple authors, and they tend to be just as busy, if not more so, than you are. So, papers get delayed, because your coauthors don't have time to deal with them. One tactic I have found useful to is set a deadline: if they don't get back to you before the deadline, you assume that the paper is OK and can be submitted as is.
Rule 6 - are there cliches in scientific writing? Submit your favourites in the comments.
Rule 1: Write Every Day
Rule 2: Write as you would speak
Rule 3: Stick to the point
Rule 4: Take A Break
Rule 5: Finish it
Rule 6: Avoid cliché
I am trying to follow Rule 1 more often: this blog helps, and I also have a backlog of papers to deal with.
Rule 2 ties back to the idea of having a narrative in scientific papers, as discussed in this post. Scientific articles do expect a certain level of formality and a certain writing style: I have even heard of an author having to fight to get a journal to accept an article written in the active voice.
Sticking to the point (Rule 3) isn't all that hard for me, but I know I can improve - I have been told that my writing is a bit "information light".
Take a break (Rule 4) - always a good idea, and the best thing about having multiple projects on the go is that you can take a break from one project by working on another. That way, you are getting being productive while taking a break.
I also need to follow Rule 5 with more care: my backlog of papers isn't getting any smaller. One pitfall with this in science is that most papers have multiple authors, and they tend to be just as busy, if not more so, than you are. So, papers get delayed, because your coauthors don't have time to deal with them. One tactic I have found useful to is set a deadline: if they don't get back to you before the deadline, you assume that the paper is OK and can be submitted as is.
Rule 6 - are there cliches in scientific writing? Submit your favourites in the comments.
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Conference paper deadline: iCAST 2011
The deadline for submitting papers to the 3rd International Conference on Awareness Science and Technology (iCAST 2011) is June 1, 2011. This conference is co-sponsored by the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society and will be held in Dalian, China, September 27-30, 2011.
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
IEEE Computational Intelligence Society Social Media Presences
The Computational Intelligence Society of the IEEE now has presences on social media sites:
Twitter
Facebook
LinkedIn
These presences result from the work of the Computational Intelligence Society's Social Media Subcommittee, which I have the privilege of serving on.
These presences result from the work of the Computational Intelligence Society's Social Media Subcommittee, which I have the privilege of serving on.
Conference paper deadline: ICAIS 2011
The deadline for submitting papers to the International Conference on Adaptive and Intelligent Systems 2011 (ICAIS 2011) is June 10, 2011. This conference is co-sponsored by the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society and will be held in Klagenfurt, Austria, September 6-8, 2011.
Monday, May 2, 2011
Competition: describe fuzzy logic in a video
Via the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society's Twitter feed comes word of the following competition: Create a video that explains fuzzy logic and its applications to an audience of high school students or the general public in a format suitable for posting on YouTube.
First prize is $3000, second prize is $2000 and third prize is $1000. Interest must be registered by the 10th of June and the deadline for submitting videos is the 10th of September.
First prize is $3000, second prize is $2000 and third prize is $1000. Interest must be registered by the 10th of June and the deadline for submitting videos is the 10th of September.
Sunday, May 1, 2011
Call for second-round submissions: ICNS'11-FSKD'11
The deadline for second-round submissions to the The 7th International Conference on Natural Computation and The 8th International Conference on Fuzzy Systems and Knowledge Discovery (ICNS'11-FSKD'11) is 16 May 2011. These conferences will be held jointly in Shanghai, China, 26-28 July, 2011.
Saturday, April 30, 2011
Science writing doesn't have to be boring writing
A brief article by Jo Marchant at the Guardian shows that scientific writing doesn't have to be dry and boring.
Writing scientific papers is an essential part of any scientist's job. They are the primary means by which scientists communicate their techniques and findings to other scientists, and they are increasingly becoming the primary metric by which the value of a scientist is measured. During my career, I've read probably thousands of published papers, reviewed about a hundred papers as part of the peer-review process, and written more than fifty papers of my own. But how many of them were written really well? Not many at all - and I include my own papers in this statement, some of which send even me to sleep.
Scientific writing does need to be as unambiguous of possible, and computational intelligence papers have the disadvantage of often requiring a fair amount of mathematics. But is it really that difficult to introduce more of a narrative to our papers? And would reviewers allow such papers to be published?
Writing scientific papers is an essential part of any scientist's job. They are the primary means by which scientists communicate their techniques and findings to other scientists, and they are increasingly becoming the primary metric by which the value of a scientist is measured. During my career, I've read probably thousands of published papers, reviewed about a hundred papers as part of the peer-review process, and written more than fifty papers of my own. But how many of them were written really well? Not many at all - and I include my own papers in this statement, some of which send even me to sleep.
Scientific writing does need to be as unambiguous of possible, and computational intelligence papers have the disadvantage of often requiring a fair amount of mathematics. But is it really that difficult to introduce more of a narrative to our papers? And would reviewers allow such papers to be published?
Friday, April 29, 2011
Conference paper deadline: SMAP 2011
The paper submission deadline for the 6th International Workshop on Semantic Media Adaptation and Personalization (SMAP 2011) is May 10, 2011. This workshop is co-sponsored by the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society and will be held in Vigo, Spain, December 1-2, 2011.
Thursday, April 28, 2011
Conference paper deadline: ICIC 2011
The deadline for paper submitted to the 2011 International Conference on Intelligent Computing (ICIC 2011) is May 20, 2011. This deadline has been shifted back from April 20. The date for notification of paper acceptance is April 30, so time travel may be involved. This conference will be held in Zhengzhou, China, August 11 - 14, 2011.
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Conference submission deadline: INMIC 2011
The deadline for abstracts submitted to the 2011 14th International Multitopic Conference (INMIC) is June 10 2011. This conference deals with a wide range of topics (hence the name) including artificial intelligence and fuzzy systems. The conference will be held in Karachi, Pakistan, December 22-24, 2011.
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Conference paper deadline: CSE-11
The deadline for papers submitted to the ICGST International Conference on Computer Science and Engineering 2011 (CSE-11) is 15 August 2011. This conference will be held in Istanbul, Turkey, 19-21 December, 2011.
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Registration for IJCNN 2011 Open
Registration for the 2011 International Joint Conference on Neural Networks is now open. This conference will be held in San Jose, California, 31 July - 5 August, 2011.
Register at http://www.ijcnn2011.org/registration.php by June 30 for a reduced rate.
IJCNN is one of the leading conference on artificial neural networks. It is jointly sponsored by the International Neural Network Society (INNS) and the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society.
Register at http://www.ijcnn2011.org/registration.php by June 30 for a reduced rate.
IJCNN is one of the leading conference on artificial neural networks. It is jointly sponsored by the International Neural Network Society (INNS) and the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society.
Sunday, April 17, 2011
Upcoming webinar
From the IEEE computational intelligence society:
IEEE CIS Webinar
Title: "Type-2 Fuzzy Logic Controllers: A way Forward for Fuzzy Systems in Real World Environments"
Speaker: Prof. Hani Hagras, School of Computer Science and Electronic Engineering, University of Essex (UK)
Date: April 26, 2011, Tuesday
Time: 10:00 a.m. – 11:30 p.m. (EDT) (i.e., Toronto, Ontario) or 3:00 p.m.– 4:30 p.m. (BST, i.e., British Summer Time) (i.e., London, UK)
Website:http://ieee-cis.org/members/webinars/
IEEE CIS Webinar
Title: "Type-2 Fuzzy Logic Controllers: A way Forward for Fuzzy Systems in Real World Environments"
Speaker: Prof. Hani Hagras, School of Computer Science and Electronic Engineering, University of Essex (UK)
Date: April 26, 2011, Tuesday
Time: 10:00 a.m. – 11:30 p.m. (EDT) (i.e., Toronto, Ontario) or 3:00 p.m.– 4:30 p.m. (BST, i.e., British Summer Time) (i.e., London, UK)
Website:
Thursday, April 14, 2011
FuzzyCOPE 3
After many years of being absent from the web, the FuzzyCOPE 3 website is now back online.
I developed FuzzyCOPE 3 at the University of Otago in 1998-1999. FuzzyCOPE 3 is an integrated environment for data processing and fuzzy-neural network modelling. After I left Otago, it was taken off of the web, but I've noticed that people are still searching for it. So, for historical reasons, I have decided to put it back up. There won't be any more bug fixes or updates, but hopefully people will find it useful. Also, there probably won't be a FuzzyCOPE 4, unless someone wants to pay me to do it.
The new address for FuzzyCOPE 3 is http://software.watts.net.nz/FuzzyCOPE3/
A paper describing FuzzyCOPE 3 is available here. The complete citation for this paper is:
1999 - Watts, M., Woodford, B., and Kasabov N., FuzzyCOPE - A Software Environment for Building Intelligent Systems - the Past, the Present and the Future, in: Emerging Knowledge Engineering and Connectionist-based Systems, Proceedings of the ICONIP/ANZIIS/ANNES’99 Workshop "Future directions for intelligent systems and information sciences", Dunedin, 22-23 Nov.1999, N.Kasabov and K.Ko (eds) 188-192.
I developed FuzzyCOPE 3 at the University of Otago in 1998-1999. FuzzyCOPE 3 is an integrated environment for data processing and fuzzy-neural network modelling. After I left Otago, it was taken off of the web, but I've noticed that people are still searching for it. So, for historical reasons, I have decided to put it back up. There won't be any more bug fixes or updates, but hopefully people will find it useful. Also, there probably won't be a FuzzyCOPE 4, unless someone wants to pay me to do it.
The new address for FuzzyCOPE 3 is http://software.watts.net.nz/FuzzyCOPE3/
A paper describing FuzzyCOPE 3 is available here. The complete citation for this paper is:
1999 - Watts, M., Woodford, B., and Kasabov N., FuzzyCOPE - A Software Environment for Building Intelligent Systems - the Past, the Present and the Future, in: Emerging Knowledge Engineering and Connectionist-based Systems, Proceedings of the ICONIP/ANZIIS/ANNES’99 Workshop "Future directions for intelligent systems and information sciences", Dunedin, 22-23 Nov.1999, N.Kasabov and K.Ko (eds) 188-192.
Saturday, April 2, 2011
Conference paper deadline: AI 2011
The deadline for papers submitted to the 24th Australasian Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AI 2011) is 28 June 2011. This conference will be held in Perth, Western Australia, 5th to 8th December, 2011.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Conference paper deadline: IEEE CIFEr 2012
The deadline for papers submitted to the IEEE Computational Intelligence in Financial Engineering and Economics Conference, 2012 (CIFEr 2012) is 21 October, 2011. This conference will be held in New York City, 30 March 2012.
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