%------------------------------------------------------------------------------% ILP Newsletter Volume 2, Number 3, 30th June 1995 %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% Editors: Saso Dzeroski and Nada Lavrac, Jozef Stefan Institute, Ljubljana, SI %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% Address all communication related to the ILP Newsletter to ilpnet@ijs.si To subscribe/unsubscribe send email with subject SUBSCRIBE/UNSUBSCRIBE ILPNEWS Send contributions in messages with subject heading ILPNEWS CONTRIBUTION Send comments and suggestions under subject heading ILPNEWS COMMENTS Back issues of the Newsletter and other information about ILPNET and ILP available via the World Wide Web (WWW), URL http://www-ai.ijs.si/ilpnet.html %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% Contents: - JAIR Articles on PAC-learnability of logic programs (Abstracts) - Paper "ILP: A Survey of European Research" published in AICom - Book review: ILP - Techniques and Applications - AIJ Special issue on relevance (Call for papers) - ICML'96, Bari, July 1996 (Call for papers) - Program and registration for - 5th International ILP Workshop ILP'95 (4-6 September 1995) - ESPRIT NOE's joint MLnet - Compulog Workshop (6 September 1995) - ESPRIT Project No. 6020 Inductive Logic Programming Open Day - Description of ILP related events, Leuven 4-8 Sept. 1995 - 5th International ILP Workshop ILP'95 (4-6 September 1995) - ESPRIT NOE's joint MLnet - Compulog Workshop (6 September 1995) - Compulog Net Area Meeting on Knowledge Representation and Reasoning (6-8 September 1995) - ESPRIT Project Inductive Logic Programming Open Day (7 September) Appendix: - AI and Mathematics, Internationsl Symposium 96 (Call for papers) - Genetic Programming, AAAI Fall Symposium Series 95 (Call for participation) - Genetic Programming, First Conference 96 (Call for papers) - Evolutionary Computation, International Conference 96 (Call for papers) %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% JAIR Articles on PAC-learnability of logic programs Readers of this group may be interested in the following two articles which were recently published in JAIR. (Instructions for accessing the ariticles are appended to the end of this msg.) Cohen, W.W. (1995a) "Pac-Learning Recursive Logic Programs: Efficient Algorithms", Volume 2, pages 501-539. PostScript: volume2/cohen95a.ps (339K) compressed, volume2/cohen95a.ps.Z (135K) Abstract: We present algorithms that learn certain classes of function-free recursive logic programs in polynomial time from equivalence queries. In particular, we show that a single k-ary recursive constant-depth determinate clause is learnable. Two-clause programs consisting of one learnable recursive clause and one constant-depth determinate non-recursive clause are also learnable, if an additional ``basecase'' oracle is assumed. These results immediately imply the pac-learnability of these classes. Although these classes of learnable recursive programs are very constrained, it is shown in a companion paper that they are maximally general, in that generalizing either class in any natural way leads to a computationally difficult learning problem. Thus, taken together with its companion paper, this paper establishes a boundary of efficient learnability for recursive logic programs. Cohen, W.W. (1995b) "Pac-learning Recursive Logic Programs: Negative Results", Volume 2, pages 541-573. PostScript: volume2/cohen95b.ps (342K) compressed, volume2/cohen95b.ps.Z (136K) Abstract: In a companion paper it was shown that the class of constant-depth determinate k-ary recursive clauses is efficiently learnable. In this paper we present negative results showing that any natural generalization of this class is hard to learn in Valiant's model of pac-learnability. In particular, we show that the following program classes are cryptographically hard to learn: programs with an unbounded number of constant-depth linear recursive clauses; programs with one constant-depth determinate clause containing an unbounded number of recursive calls; and programs with one linear recursive clause of constant locality. These results immediately imply the non-learnability of any more general class of programs. We also show that learning a constant-depth determinate program with either two linear recursive clauses or one linear recursive clause and one non-recursive clause is as hard as learning boolean DNF. Together with positive results from the companion paper, these negative results establish a boundary of efficient learnability for recursive function-free clauses. --------------------Instructions for Accessing Papers -------------- Each PostScript file is available via: -- comp.ai.jair.papers -- World Wide Web: The URL for our World Wide Web server is http://www.cs.washington.edu/research/jair/home.html -- Anonymous FTP from either of the two sites below: CMU: p.gp.cs.cmu.edu directory: /usr/jair/pub/volume2 Genoa: ftp.mrg.dist.unige.it directory: pub/jair/pub/volume2 -- automated email. Send mail to jair@cs.cmu.edu or jair@ftp.mrg.dist.unige.it with the subject AUTORESPOND, and the body GET VOLUME2/FILE-NM (e.g., GET VOLUME2/GROVE95A.PS) Note: Your mailer might find our files too large to handle. Also, note that compressed files cannot be emailed, since they are binary files. -- JAIR Gopher server: At p.gp.cs.cmu.edu, port 70. For more information about JAIR, check out our WWW or FTP sites, or send electronic mail to jair@cs.cmu.edu with the subject AUTORESPOND and the message body HELP, or contact jair-ed@ptolemy.arc.nasa.gov. %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% Paper "ILP: A Survey of European Research" published in AICom N. Lavrac and L. De Raedt: Inductive Logic Programming: A Survey of European Research, AI Communications 8 (1), pages 1-68, 1995 Abstract: ILP is a research area which has its roots in inductive machine learning and computational logic. The paper gives a survey of European research in this area. It first briefly introduces the field, then gives an overview of recent research results and directions and finally describes in more detail the research of some of the European institutions involved in ILP research within two European ILP projects: the ESPRIT III Basic Research Project No. 6020 Inductive Logic Programming and the PECO'92 European Inductive Logic Programming Scientific Network. %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% BOOK REVIEW Inductive Logic Programming - Techniques and Applications Nada Lavrac and Saso Dzeroski Ellis Horwood, Chichester, 1994 A review of the above book by Ross D. King, Imperial Cancer Research Fund, London, appears in Knowledge Engineering Review 9 (3), 1994, pages 311-312. %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% CALL FOR PAPERS Special Issue on RELEVANCE Journal: ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE Guest Editors: Russell Greiner, Devika Subramanian, Judea Pearl With too little information, reasoning and learning systems cannot work effectively. Surprisingly, too much information can also cause the performance of these systems to degrade, in terms of both accuracy and efficiency. It is therefore important to determine what information must be preserved, i.e., what information is "relevant". There has been a recent flurry of interest in explicitly reasoning about relevance in a number of different disciplines, including the AI fields of knowledge representation, probabilistic reasoning, machine learning and neural computation, as well as communities that range from statistics and operations research to database and information retrieval to cognitive science. Members of these diverse communities met at the 1994 AAAI Fall Symposium on Relevance, to seek a better understanding of the various senses of the term "relevance", with a focus on finding techniques for improving the performance of embedded agents by ignoring or de-emphasizing irrelevant and superfluous information. Such techniques will clearly be of increasing importance as knowledge bases, and learning systems, become more comprehensive to accommodate real-world applications. To help consolidate leading research on relevance, the "Artificial Intelligence" journal is devoting a special issue to this topic. We are now seeking papers on (but not restricted to) the following topics: [Representing and reasoning with relevance:] reasoning about the relevance of distinctions to speed up computation, relevance reasoning in real-world KR tasks including design, diagnosis and common-sense reasoning, use of relevant causal information for planning, theories of discrete approximations. [Learning in the presence of irrelevant information:] removing irrelevant attributes and/or irrelevant training examples, to make feasible induction from very large datasets; methods for learning action policies for embedded agents in large state spaces by explicit construction of approximations and abstractions. [Relevance and probabilistic reasoning:] simplifying/approximating Bayesian nets (both topology and values) to permit real-time reasoning; axiomatic bases for constructing abstractions and approximations of Bayesian nets and other probabilistic reasoning models. [Relevance in neural computational models:] methods for evolving computations that ignore aspects of the environment to make certain classes of decisions, automated design of topologies of neural models guided by relevance reasoning based on task class. [Applications of relevance reasoning:] Applications that require explicit reasoning about relevance in the context of IVHS, exploring and understanding large information repositories, etc. We are especially interested in papers that have strong theoretical analyses complemented by experimental evidence from non-trivial applications. Authors are invited to submit manuscripts conforming to the AIJ submission requirements by 11 Sept 1995 to Russell Greiner or Devika Subramanian Siemens Corporate Research Department of Computer Science 755 College Road East 5141 Upson Hall, Cornell University Princeton, NJ 08540-6632 Ithaca, New York 14853 (609) 734-3627 (607) 255-9189 Papers will be a subject to a standard peer review. The first round of reviews will be completed and decisions mailed by 11 December 1995. The authors of accepted and conditionally accepted manuscripts will be required to send revised versions by 1 March 1996. The special issue is tentatively scheduled to appear sometime in 1996. We also plan to publish this issue as a book. Finally, to help us select appropriate reviewers in advance, authors should email us a title, set of keywords and a short abstract, to arrive by 4 September. To recap the significant dates: 4/Sep/95: Emailed titles, keywords and abstracts due 11/Sep/95: Manuscripts dues 11/Dec/95: First round decisions 1/Mar/96: revised manuscripts due ?? /96: special issue appears (tentative) %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% From: IN%"saitta@di.unito.it" 20-JUN-1995 ***************************************************************** ICML'96 13th International Conference on Machine Learning Bari (Italy), July 3-6th, 1996 ***************************************************************** First Call for Papers and Workshop Proposals ***************************************************************** General Information =================== The 13th International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML'96) will be held in Bari, Italy, during July 3-6th, 1996, with informal workshops on July 3rd. The purpose of the conference is twofold: firstly, to emphasize the potential of machine learning approaches for solving problems in a wide range of application domains, secondly, to highlight relationships between machine learning and other fields, such as statistics, pattern recognition, artificial intelligence, control theory, instructional and cognitive sciences, computational complexity theory and software engineering. Program ======= The scientific program will include invited talks, presentations of refereed papers and a session of general discussion. Submissions are invited in all areas of Machine Learning, including, but not limited to: Abduction Analogy Applications of machine learning Artificial neural networks Case-Based learning Cognitive models of learning Computational learning theory Explanation-based learning Formal models of learning Inductive learning Inductive logic programming Genetic algorithms Knowledge discovery in databases Learning and problem solving Multistrategy learning Reinforcement learning Representation change Scientific discovery Theory revision Paper Format ============ Submissions must be clearly legible, with good quality print. Papers are limited to twelve (12) pages, excluding title page and bibliography, but including all tables and figures. Papers must be printed on 8-1/2 x 11 inch paper or A4 format, using 12 point type (10 characters per inch), with no more than 40 lines per page. A separate title page must include the title of the paper, the email and postal addresses of all authors, and a clear summary of the main contributions of the paper. The title page of accepted papers will be made available via World-Wide Web before the conference take place. Double-sided printing in encouraged. Requirement for Submissions =========================== Please send five (5) copies of each submitted paper to the Conference Chair. Submissions must be received by January 21st, 1996. Electronic or Fax submissions are not acceptable. Notification of acceptance or rejection will be mailed to the first (or designated) author by March 8th 1996. Camera-ready accepted papers are due on April 6th, 1996. Review Criteria =============== Each submitted paper will be reviewed by at least two members of the Program or Advisory Committee, and will be judged on significance, originality and clarity. Papers addressing application issues are welcome. Simultaneous submission to other conferences must be explicitly declared. In the case of multiple acceptance, presentation at ICML'96 and inclusion in the proceedings is only granted upon withdrawal from the other conference(s). Workshop Proposals ================== Workshop proposals are invited in all areas of Machine Learning. Please send a two (2) page description of the proposed workshop, its objectives, organizer(s), and expected number of attendees. The proposal must be received by the Workshop Chair by December 15th, 1995. Descriptions of accepted workshops will be made available via World-Wide Web. Notification of acceptance or rejection will be mailed to the organizer by January 31st, 1996. Calls for Papers for accepted workshops will be responsibility of the organizer(s). Program Chair ============= Lorenza Saitta, University of Torino saitta@di.unito.it Dipartimento di Informatica Phone: (+39) 11 - 7429.214 Corso Svizzera 185, 10149 Torino (Italy) Fax: (+39) 11 - 751.603 Local Chair =========== Floriana Esposito, University of Bari esposito@vm.csata.it Dipartimento di Informatica Phone: (+39) 80 - 5443.264 Via Orabona 4, 70125 Bari (Italy) Fax: (+39) 80 - 5443.196 Workshop Chair ============== Stefan Wrobel (wrobel@gmdzi.gmd.de) ) GMD, FIT.KI Schlo Birlinghoven 53754 Sankt Augustin (Germany) Publicity Chair =============== Jeff Schlimmer (schlimme@eecs.wsu.edu School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Washington State University Pullman, WA 99164-2752 (USA) Advisory Committee ================== Jaime Carbonell (USA) William Cohen (USA) Kenneth De Jong (USA) Tom Dietterich (USA) Tom Mitchell (USA) Stuart Russell (USA) Derek Sleeman (UK) Paul Utgoff (USA) Organizing Committee ==================== Donato Malerba and Giovanni Semeraro (Italy) {malerbad, semeraro}@vm.csata.it Marco Botta and Filippo Neri (Italy) {botta, neri}@di.unito.it General Inquiries ================= Please address general inquiries to any of the members of the Organizing Committee or to the address: icml96@di.unito.it ICML'96 has its own page on the World-Wide Web in the URL at: http://www.di.unito.it/pub/WWW/ICML96/home.html This announcement is also available in PostScript in the URL at: ftp://ftp.di.unito.it/pub/ICML96/callforpapers.ps In order to receive further information, please send a note to the Publicity Chair. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Important dates =============== Workshop submission deadline: December 15, 1995 Paper submission deadline: January 21, 1996 Notification of workshop acceptance: January 31, 1996 Notification of paper acceptance: March 8, 1996 Camera-ready copy: April 6, 1996 %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% From: IN%"Luc.DeRaedt@cs.kuleuven.ac.be" "Luc De Raedt" 29-JUN-1995 ILP 95 : International Workshop on Inductive Logic Programming Leuven, 4-6 September 1995 Joint Workshop ESPRIT Networks of Excellence MLnet and Compulog ESPRIT Project No. 6020 Inductive Logic Programming Open Day =================================================================== SCIENTIFIC PROGRAM Monday, September 4 9h00 - 9h30 : Opening session 9h30 - 10h30 : Celine Rouveirol, Michele Sebag Constraint Inductive Logic Programming F. Bergadano, D. Gunetti, M. Nicosia, G. Ruffo Learning Logic Programs with Negation as Failure 10h30 - 11h00 : Coffee break 11h00 - 12h30 : Chowdhury Rahman Mofizur and Masayuki Numao Top-down Induction of Recursive Programs from Small Number of Sparse Examples T. Horvath and Gy. Turan Learning logic programs with structured background knowledge (extended abstract) Lionel Martin, Christel Vrain A three-valued framework for the induction of general programs 12h30 - 14h00 : Lunch 14h00 - 15h15 : Invited talk William Cohen (AT & T Bell Laboratories, U.S.A) 16h00 : Excursion to the brewery of Hoegaarden and barbecue in the castle of Horst Tuesday, September 5 9h00 - 10h30 : Irene Stahl The Efficiency of Bias Shift Operations in ILP Alipio Jorge and Pavel Brazdil Architecture for Iterative Learning of Recursive Definitions Lionel Martin, Christel Vrain MULT_ICN: an empirical multiple predicate learner 10h30 - 11h00 : Coffee break 11h00 - 12h30 : Peter Turney Low Size-Complexity Inductive Logic Programming: The East-West Challenge Considered as a Problem in Cost-Sensitive Classification A. Srinivasan, S.H. Muggleton, R.D. King Comparing the use of background knowledge by Inductive Logic Programming systems Raymond J. Mooney, Mary Elaine Califf Induction of First-Order Decision Lists: Results on Learning the Past Tense of English Verbs 12h00 - 14h00 : Lunch 14h00 - 15h30 : Short presentation of the posters Irene Stahl Compression Measures in ILP Zdravko Markov A Functional Approach to ILP Fumio Mizoguchi and Hayato Ohwada An Inductive Logic Programming Approach to Constraint Acquisition for Constraint-based Problem Solving Peter Geibel, Fritz Wysotzki Learning Context Dependent Concepts Nada Lavrac, Dragan Gamberger, Saso Dzeroski An approach to Dimensionality Reduction in Learning from Deductive Databases Jun Arima Automatic Logic Programming under Highly Redundant Background Knowledge Chowdhury Rahman Mofizur, Masayuki Numao Logic Program Synthesis as a Controlled Search through Appropriate Hypothesis Sub-Space Marc Champesme, Pierre Brezellec, Henry Soldano How to perform "good" search space reductions John M. Zelle, Cynthia A. Thompson, Mary Elaine Califf, Raymond J. Mooney Inducing Logic Programs without Explicit Negative Examples Uros Pompe, Igor Kononenko Naive Bayesian classifier within ILP-R Zoltan Alexin, Tibor Gyimothy, Henrik Bostrom Integrating Algorithmic Debugging and Unfolding Transformation in an Interactive Learner Dieter Fensel, Monika Zickwolff, Markus Wiese Learning First-Order Clauses with Frog 15h30 - 16h00 : Coffee break 16h00 - 17h30 : Poster exhibition 17h30 - 18h15 : Bussiness Meeting 19h00 - 21h00 : Reception Wednesday, September 6 : Joint MLnet - Compulog Workshop 8h45 - 9h00 : Opening session 9h00 - 10h30 : Peter Idestam-Almquist Efficient Induction of Recursive Definitions by Structural Analysis of Saturations Shan-Hwei Nienhuys-Cheng, Ronald de Wolf The Subsumption Theorem in Inductive Logic Programming: Facts and Fallacies A talk selected from the KRR meeting 10h30 - 11h00 : Coffee break 11h00 - 12h00 : Invited talk Anthonis Kakas (University of Cyprus) 12h00 - 13h00 : Invited talk Stephen Muggleton (Oxford University Computing Laboratories) 13h00 - 14h30 : Lunch 14h30 - 17h00 : Life Sattelite Teleconference on "Industrial Relevance of Computational Logic and Machine Learning" More details on the contents and on how to receive the teleconference via satellite will become availble soon. 17h00 - 17h30 : Closing session 18h30 : Guided walk through the "Groot Begijnhof" 19h30 : Buses leave for the conference dinner Thursday, September 7 : ESPRIT Project ILP Open Day 9h00 - 9h30 : Overview of the Project (Luc De Raedt) 9h30 - 10h00 : ILP Theory (David Page and Stephen Muggleton) 10h00 - 10h30 : Theory Revision and Multiple Predicate Learning (Stefan Wrobel) 10h30 - 11h00 : Coffee Break 11h00 - 11h30 : Imperfect Data Handling and Applications (Nada Lavrac and Saso Dzeroski) 11h30 - 12h00 : Predicate Invention (Irene Stahl) 12h00 - 12h30 : Declarative Bias (Celine Rouveirol) 12h30 - 14h00 : Lunch 14h30 - 16h00 : Technical Presentations by Members of the Consortium 16h00 - 16h30 : Coffee Break 16h30 - 17h30 : Technical Presentations by Members of the Consortium %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% From: IN%"Luc.DeRaedt@cs.kuleuven.ac.be" "Luc De Raedt" 29-JUN-1995 5th International Inductive Logic Programming Workshop (4-6 September 1995) ESPRIT NOE's joint MLnet - Compulog Workshop (6 September 1995) Compulog Net Area Meeting on Knowledge Representation and Reasoning (6-8 September 1995) ESPRIT Project no. 6020 Inductive Logic Programming Open Day (7 September) ============================================================================= The program contains the following items: - the 5th International Inductive Logic Programming Workshop from 4 to 6 September 1995; - a joint workshop of the ESPRIT Networks of Excellence in Computational Logic (Compulog) and Machine Learning (MLnet) on 6 September; - an area meeting on Knowledge Representation and Reasoning of the ESPRIT Network of Excellence Compulog from 6 to 8 September 1995; - an overview of the results of the ESPRIT project no. 6020 on Inductive Logic Programming on Thursday 7 September. These events are organised back-to-back in order to promote discussion among researchers in machine learning and computational logic. Sponsors include : - the ESPRIT Network of Excellence in Machine Learning (MLnet) - the ESPRIT Network of Excellence in Computational Logic (Compulog Net) - the ESPRIT Project on Inductive Logic Programming - the PECO Scientific Network ILPnet - the EOUN Project on "Advanced Computer Science" - the Department of Computer Science (K.U.Leuven) - the Logic Programming and Artificial Intelligence Lab (K.U.Leuven) More details on all these events can be obtained via WWW: http://www.cs.kuleuven.ac.be/~ilp95/ ======================================================================== 5th International Inductive Logic Programming Workshop (4-6 September 1995) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- ILP-95 is the 5th annual meeting of researchers in and practitioners of inductive learning in first order logic. Previous meetings have been organized in Viana de Castello (91), Tokyo (92), Bled (93), and Bad Honnef (94). Programme : ---------- The scientific program will include invited talks by - William Cohen (AT&T, USA), - Stephen Muggleton (Oxford University), and - Tony Kakas (University of Cyprus), and presentations of selected papers and posters. A more detailed programme is available via WWW. Registration : ------------ The registration fee for ILP 95 is - Before 1 August: 7,000 BEF; - After 1 August: 8,500 BEF; - On site: 10,000 BEF. it includes : - access to the scientific presentations - lunches and coffee breaks (from Monday till Wednesday); - a pre-print of the proceedings; - a copy of the post-conference ILP 95 volume to be published by IOS Press. This will be sent to all participants early 1996; - the excursion on Monday 4 September to the brewery of Hoegaarden, and later to the Castle of the Red Knight (Horst), where a barbecue will be held; - the reception on Tuesday 5 September, jointly with the other meetings. On Wednesday 6 September there will be a conference dinner, organised jointly with the other meetings. The price for the dinner is 2000 BEF. Persons having difficulties in paying the registration fee may contact the conference office at ilp95@cs.kuleuven.ac.be. ======================================================================== ESPRIT NOE's joint MLnet - Compulog Workshop (6 September 1995) ---------------------------------------------------------------- The aim of this workshop is to bring together researchers and practitioners of machine learning and computational logic and to make research and applications of one field accessable to the other. Programme : --------- The scientific program will include invited talks by - Stephen Muggleton (Oxford University), - Tony Kakas (University of Cyprus), - 3 to 4 regular presentations (selected from the ILP95 workshop and the KRR meeting), and - a life satelite teleconference on "Industrial Relevance of Computational Logic and Machine Learning" Sponsors : Compulog Net, MLnet, EOUN Project More details on the teleconference will become availabe soon via WWW. Registration : ------------ Registration will be limited to about 115 persons. Registration is - free of charge for people registering for ILP 95 or the Compulog KRR area meeting. - 1000 BEF for others. The registration fee includes : - lunch and coffee breaks; - access to the scientific meeting; - the reception on Tuesday 5 September, jointly with the other meetings. On Wednesday 6 September there will be a conference dinner, organised jointly with the other meetings. The price for the dinner is 2000 BEF. ===================================================================== Compulog Net Area Meeting on Knowledge Representation and Reasoning (6-8 September 1995) --------------------------------------------------------------------- Following the workshops at London (1992) and Lisbon (1993), this meeting aims to provide a forum for discussion between researchers active on issues of Knowledge Representation and Reasoning in Computational Logic. The scientific program will consist of invited talks and presentations of selected abstracts. Registration for the meeting will be limited (on a first come first served basis), but free of charge. Registration includes : - lunch and coffee breaks; - access to the scientific meetings; - the reception on Tuesday 5 September, jointly with the other meetings. On Wednesday 6 September there will be a conference dinner, organised jointly with the other meetings. The price for the dinner is 2000 BEF. ========================================================================== ESPRIT Project no. 6020 Inductive Logic Programming Open Day (7 September) -------------------------------------------------------------------------- On this day, members of the ILP consortium will give an overview of the most significant results obtained by the project. Programme (tentative): --------- In the morning, overviews of the 5 workparts of the project will be given: - Overall Summary (Luc De Raedt) - ILP Theory (David Page and Stephen Muggleton), - Theory Revision (Stefan Wrobel), - Predicate Invention (Irene Stahl), - Imperfect Data Handling and Applications (Nada Lavrac and Saso Dzeroski) , and - Declarative Bias (Celine Rouveirol). In the afternoon, more technical presentations will be given around key developments in the project. Registration for this day will be free of charge, and will only include coffee breaks. _____________________________________________________________________________ LEUVEN SEPTEMBER WORKSHOPS REGISTRATION FORM ONE FORM PER PARTICIPANT PLEASE Registration for (mark with X): [ ] ILP 95 (4-6 September) - Before 1 August: 7,000 BEF; - After 1 August: 8,500 BEF; - On site: 10,000 BEF. [ ] ESPRIT NOE's joint MLNet - Compulog Workshop (6 September) - free of charge for people registering for ILP 95 or the Compulog KRR area meeting. - 1000 BEF for others. [ ] Compulog Net Area Meeting on KRR (6-8 September) - free of charge [ ] ESPRIT project 6020 Open Day (7 September) - free of charge [ ] Reception (5 September) - included in registration for ILP 95, joint Workshop, and KRR meeting [ ] Conference Dinner (6 September) - 2000 BEF Total Registration Fee: ......... BEF PERSONAL DATA Last Name:........................................................ First Name:....................................................... Organisation:..................................................... Address:.......................................................... Postal Code:........................... City:.................................. Country:............................... Telephone:............................. Fax:................................... FOR EASE OF COMMUNICATION, PLEASE ADD YOUR E-MAIL ADDRESS E-mail:................................ Registration is only final after transfer of the registration fee via bank transfer (in BEF - Belgian Francs) into bank account 431-0375301-75 (K.U.Leuven - Congresrek. LPAI, Kredietbank). Note also that the number of participants is limited and will be allocated on a first come first serve basis. This registration form should be sent to ILP95 Registration c/o Timshel Conference Service J.B. van Monsstraat 8 B-3000 LEUVEN (Belgium) tel +32-16-29.00.10 fax +32-16-29.05.10 e-mail: info@timshel.be _____________________________________________________________________________ ============================================================================= ACCOMMODATION INFORMATION ============================================================================= HOTEL INFORMATION A sufficient number of hotel rooms in different price categories have been reserved in Leuven. All hotel rooms in Leuven are located within walking distance from the conference site. Participants are requested to indicate their choice of hotel category on the accommodation form. It is important to note that another large conference will also be held in Leuven at the same time as ILP 95. We advise you to make hotel reservations as soon as possible. The accommodation form should be sent back by surface mail, e-mail or fax to the address above (c/o Timshel). All hotel bookings will be handled by Timshel Conference Service. Rooms will be allocated on a first come, first served basis, according to availability. Please note that the hotel booking will only be made final after receiving a deposit. Only then will Timshel Conference Service forward your hotel voucher. Only payments in Belgian francs, either by Eurocheque or by credit card can be accepted. All room rates per night include breakfast, service and taxes, unless mentioned otherwise. INVOICING After receiving your accommodation form, you will be invoiced for a deposit by Timshel Conference Service. Bookings received after 21 July 1995 cannot be guaranteed because of the limited number of rooms available during the conference period. CANCELLATIONS In case of cancellation of accommodation before 1 August 1995, 1000 BEF will be withheld from the deposit paid, the rest will be refunded. If accommodation is cancelled after 1 August 1995, the deposit cannot be refunded. HOTELS: (1) Garden Court Holiday Inn Hotel - Leuven - Class A A 3-star hotel located in the town centre (15 min walk from the railway station) and next to the conference site. Rooms with double-sized bed, private bathroom, direct-dial telephone, TV and radio Free car park (only a limited number of parking places) Rate : 3600 BEF per room + 450 BEF per person for buffet breakfast (2) Binnenhof Hotel - Class B Situated in the centre of Leuven, near the railway station and the conference site. Rooms with private bathroom, telephone, radio and colour-TV, desk and sitting area. Parking facilities Rate: single 2800 or 3000 (luxe) BEF - double 3200 or 3400 (luxe) BEF (3) Jackson's Hotel-Leuven - Class B A small hotel in the town centre. Modern rooms with private bathroom, telephone, radio, TV Parking facilities Rate : single 2500 BEF - double 2900 BEF (4) Hotel New Damshire - Class B Small, comfortable hotel in the cultural heart of Leuven (close to the "Oude Markt"). Modern rooms with private bathroom, safe, minibar, color TV, connection for PC. Smoker and non-smoker rooms Rate: single 2900 BEF - double 3800 BEF (5) Student rooms - Class C Cheap rooms, with moderate comfort. These rooms have no private bathroom. There is no hotelservice: you have to let us know on beforehand at what time you will arrive. Breakfast can be taken in the student restaurant nearby. Rate : single: 1000 BEF (no double rooms available) _____________________________________________________________________________ ACCOMMODATION FORM ONLY ONE FORM PER ROOM PLEASE Please complete this form and return with payment not later than JULY 21, 1995 PERSONAL DATA Last Name:........................................................ First Name:....................................................... Organisation:..................................................... Address:.......................................................... Postal Code:........................... City:.................................. Country:............................... Telephone:............................. Fax:................................... FOR EASE OF COMMUNICATION, PLEASE ADD YOUR E-MAIL ADDRESS E-mail:................................ HOTEL ACCOMMODATION CLASS SINGLE DOUBLE A O O B O O C O O Arrival date:................................................. Departure date:............................................... PAYMENT I authorise to charge my credit card for the amount of 5,000 BEF Cardname: O Visa O Eurocard/Mastercard Expiry date:............................. Cardnumber:.............................. Name of cardholder:................................... Date:.................................... Signature:............................... Payments preferably by credit card. Otherwise you can also pay via bank transfer (in BEF) into bank account 734-3250933-84 (Timshel, CERA Bank, Blandenstraat 77, B-3053 Haasrode, BELGIUM, SWIFT-code BE 33). Hotel rooms will be allocated on a first-come first-served basis and will only be final after receiving the deposit. After we have received your deposit, you will receive a hotel voucher with all the necessary information. _____________________________________________________________________________ ============================================================================= PRACTICAL INFORMATION ============================================================================= CONFERENCE LOCATION Leuven is one of Europe's most ancient university towns, and it is ideally located. The town of Leuven itself came into full bloom a few centuries before the University was founded. Straddling the banks of the then navigable Dijle river and the trade-route from Bruges to the Rhine territories, Leuven grew to become a major trade and textile centre. Leuven was, up to the end of the 13th century, also the residence of the dukes of Brabant. Town and university have known many periods of prosperity. The town hall, churches, cloisters and colleges stand silent witness to those days and make Leuven the interesting place it is. Leuven is only 25 km away from Brussels, the capital city of Belgium, and the centre of the European Community. ADDRESS FOR ACCOMMODATION INFORMATION AND RESERVATION ILP95 Accommodation request c/o Timshel Conference Service J.B. van Monsstraat 8 B-3000 LEUVEN (Belgium) tel +32-16-29.00.10 fax +32-16-29.05.10 e-mail: info@timshel.be During the conference: For problems or questions regarding accommodation, travel and return to the airport, please contact a representative of Timshel Conference Service at the Conference Secretariat in the lobby of Erasmushuis (see below). This service will be available every day from 9 - 11 hrs. THE CONFERENCE The conference will be held in Mgr. Sencie-Instituut Erasmusplein 2 3000 Leuven and Erasmushuis Blijde Inkomststraat 21 3000 Leuven TELEFAX DURING THE CONFERENCE : +32 - 16 - 32 79 96 Dept. of Computer Science Celestijnenlaan 200A 3001 Heverlee Please mark clearly : - the recepient of the fax, and - that the recepient participates to the workshops. ACCESS TO LEUVEN (A) From Brussels International Airport (Zaventem) 1. By taxi : A taxi takes about 25 min from Brussels Airport To Leuven. A single journey will cost about 1800 BEF. 2. Car Rental : Several Car Rental Companies have a desk at Brussels Airport. 3. By train : There are train connections every 20 min from the Airport to Brussels (North or Central station). There you have to take a train to Leuven (see below). The journey takes about 1 hour to Leuven Railway Station through Brussels North or Central Station. The fare is about 200 BEF. (B) If you are not travelling by plane: 1. Leuven can easily be reached by car, since it is situated near a number of main motorways (E40 and A2). 2. There are train connections from Brussels every 30 minutes. Leuven Railway Station is a 10 to 15 minute walk from the conference site. A taxi should take you to your hotel within 15 minutes at a cost of less than 500 BEF. There is no underground in Leuven. PARKING Unfortunately, we cannot provide free parking space at the conference location. There is a big parking garage near the conference site (less than a 5 minute walk), where you can park for several hours. Note that police in Leuven is very active in writing parking tickets if you are parked near a run-out parking meter, or if you park without a special card behind your windshield limiting the parking time (this card is obligatory throughout the town centre if you are not parked at a parking meter!). BANK INFORMATION Banks, exchange, post office Banks in town are open from 9.00 - 16.00 hrs. Main post office in town is open until 18.00 hrs. EMERGENCIES IN BELGIUM The number for emergency calls is 100. INSURANCE DISCLAIMER While the organising committee and secretariat of the conference make every effort to ensure the safety and well being of all conference members and associates, responsibility cannot be taken for any accidents or damage that may occur during the conference. %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% APPENDIX ILP Newsletter Volume 2, Number 3, 30th June 1995 %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% CALL FOR PAPERS Fourth International Symposium on --------------------------------------- ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND MATHEMATICS --------------------------------------- January 3-5, 1996, Fort Lauderdale Marina Marriott, Florida General Chair: Martin Golumbic, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan Conference Chair: Frederick Hoffman, Florida Atlantic University Program co-chairs: Henry Kautz and Bart Selman AT&T Bell Labs Publicity Chair: Ugur Halici, Middle East Technical University Program Committee: Fahiem Bacchus (Waterloo) * Rachel Ben-Eliyahu (Technion) Endre Boros (Rutgers) * Alan Bundy (Edinburgh) * Marco Cadoli (Rome) James Crawford (Oregon) * Ernest Davis (NYU) * Rina Dechter (Irvine) Boi Faltings (EPFL) * Melvin Fitting (CUNY) * Eugene Freuder (New Hampshire) Erol Gelenbe (Duke) * Matt Ginsberg (Oregon) * Georg Gottlob (Vienna) Russell Greiner (Siemens) * Adam Grove (NEC) * Joseph Halpern (Almaden) Leo Joskowicz (Yorktown Heights) * Helene Kirchner (Nancy) Daphne Koller (Berkeley) * Richard Korf (UCLA) * Gerhard Lakemeyer (Bonn) Jean-Louis Lassez (Yorktown Heights) * Maurizio Lenzerini (Rome) Hector Levesque (Toronto) * Alon Levy (Bell Labs) * Vladimir Lifschitz (Texas) Alan Mackworth (UBC) * Witkor Marek (Kentucky) * Steven Minton (NASA Ames) Pandurang Nayak (NASA Ames) * Bernhard Nebel (Ulm) * Anil Nerode (Cornell) Ilkka Niemela (Helsinki) * Christos Papadimitriou (UCSD) * Jan Plaza (Miami) Teodor Przymusinski (UC Riverside) * Mauricio Resende (AT&T) Stuart Russell (Berkeley) * Elisha Sacks (Purdue) * Robert Schapire (Bell Labs) Yoav Shoham (Stanford) * Mark Stickel (SRI) * Moshe Tennenholtz (Technion) Leslie Valiant (Harvard) * Moshe Vardi (Rice) * Pierre Wolper (Liege) APPROACH OF THE SYMPOSIUM The International Symposium on Artificial Intelligence and Mathematics is the fourth of a biennial series. Our goal is to foster interactions among mathematics, theoretical computer science, and artificial intelligence. The meeting includes paper presentation, invited speakers, and special topic sessions. Topic sessions in the past have covered computational learning theory, nonmonotonic reasoning, and computational complexity issues in AI. The editorial board of the Annals of Mathematics and Artificial Intelligence serves as the permanent organizing committee for the series. SUBMISSIONS DEADLINE: SEPTEMBER 1st, 1995 FORMAT: Extended abstracts (up to 10 double-spaced pages). TO: Email (postscript): selman@research.att.com Or, send five copies to Bart Selman AT&T Bell Laboratories, Room 2T-414 600 Mountain Avenue Murray Hill, NJ 07974 USA Authors will be notified of acceptance or rejection on October 14th, 1995. Authors will be invited to submit within one month after the Symposium a final full length version of their paper to be considered for inclusion in a thoroughly refereed volume of the series Annals of Mathematics and Artificial Intelligence, J.C. Baltzer Scientific Publishing Co. SPONSORS The Symposium is partially supported by the Annals of Math and AI, Florida Atlantic University, and the Florida- Israel Institute. Other support is pending. Partial travel subsidies may be available to junior researchers. INFORMATION For further information and future announcements contact: Frederick Hoffman, Florida Atlantic University, Department of Mathematics, PO Box 3091, Boca Raton, FL 33431, USA E-mail: hoffman@acc.fau.edu or hoffman@fauvax.bitnet %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% Call for Participation GENETIC PROGRAMMING 1995 AAAI Fall Symposium Series Cambridge, Massachusettes November 10 - 12, 1995 (Friday-Sunday) Chairs: Eric V. Siegel, Columbia University John R. Koza, Stanford University Committee: Lee Altenberg, Duke University David Andre, Stanford Univerisity Peter J. Angeline, Loral Federal Systems Robert Collins, USAnimation, Inc. Frederic Gruau, Stanford University Kim Kinnear, Adaptive Computing Technology Brij Masand, GTE Labs Sidney R. Maxwell, Borland International Conor Ryan, University College Cork Andy Singleton, Creation Mechanics, Inc. Walter Alden Tackett, Neuromedia Astro Teller, Carnegie Mellon University Genetic programming (GP) extends the genetic algorithm to the domain of computer programs. In genetic programming, populations of programs are selectively bred to solve problems. Genetic programming can solve problems of system identification, classification, control, robotics, optimization, game-playing, and pattern recognition. Starting with a primordial ooze of hundreds or thousands of randomly created programs composed of functions and terminals appropriate to the problem, the population is progressively evolved over a series of generations by applying the operations of Darwinian selection and crossover (sexual recombination). Topics of interest for the symposium include: The theoretical basis of genetic programming Applications of genetic programming Rigorousness of validation techniques Hierarchical decomposition, e.g. automatically defined functions Competitive coevolution Automatic parameter tuning Representation issues Genetic operators Establishing standard benchmark problems Parallelization techniques Innovative variations The format of the symposium will encourage interaction and discussion, but will also include formal presentations. Persons wishing to make a presentation should submit an extended abstract of up to 2500 words of their work in progress or completed work. For those abstracts accepted, full papers will be due at a date closer to the symposium. Persons not wishing to make a presentation are asked to submit a one-page description of their research interests since there may be limited room for participation. Submit your abstract or one-page description as plain text electronically by Friday April 14, 1995, with a hard-copy backup to: Eric V. Siegel AAAI GP Symposium Co-Chair Columbia University Department of Computer Science 500 W 120th Street New York, NY 10027, USA fax: 212-666-0140 e-mail: evs@cs.columbia.edu Sponsored by the American Association for Artificial Intelligence 445 Burgess Drive Menlo Park, CA 94025 (415) 328-3123 sss@aaai.org %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% FIRST CALL FOR PAPERS (Version 1.0) GP-96 - GENETIC PROGRAMMING 96 July 28 - 31 (Sunday - Wednesday), 1996 Fairchild Auditorium Stanford University Stanford, California This first genetic programming conference will bring together people from the academic world, industry, and government who are interested in genetic programming. The conference program will include contributed papers, tutorials, an invited speaker, and informal meetings. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, - new applications of genetic programming - theory - extensions and variations of genetic programming - parallelization techniques - mental models, memory, and state - operator and representation issues - relations to biology and cognitive systems - implementation issues - war stories Proceedings will be published by The MIT Press. HONORARY CHAIR (AND INVITED SPEAKER) John Holland, University of Michigan GENERAL CHAIR John Koza, Stanford University PROGRAM COMMITTEE (In Formation): - Russell J. Abbott, California State University, Los Angeles and The Aerospace Corporation - David Andre, Stanford University - Peter J. Angeline, Loral Federal Systems - Wolfgang Banzhaf, University of Dortmund, Germany - Samy Bengio, Centre National d'Etudes des Telecommunications, France - Scott Brave, Stanford University - Walter Cedeno, Primavera Systems Inc. - Nichael Lynn Cramer, BBN System and Technologies - Patrik D'haeseleer, University of New Mexico - Bertrand Daniel Dunay, System Dynamics International - Frederic Gruau, Stanford University - Richard J. Hampo, Ford Motor Company - Simon Handley, Stanford University - Hitoshi Hemmi, ATR, Kyoto, Japan - Thomas Huang, University of Illinois - Hitoshi Iba, Electrotechnical Laboratory, Japan - Martin A. Keane, Econometrics Inc. - Mike Keith, Allen Bradely Controls - Kenneth Marko, Ford Motor Company - Kenneth E. Kinnear, Jr., Adaptive Computing Technology - W. B. Langdon, University College, London - Martin C. Martin, Carnegie Mellon University - Sidney R Maxwell III - David Montana, BBN System and Technologies - Dr. Heinz Muehlenbein, GMD Research Center, Germany - Peter Nordin, University of Dortmund, Germany - Howard Oakley, Institute of Naval Medicine, United Kingdom - Franz Oppacher, Carleton University, Ottawa - Una-May O`Reilly, Carleton University, Ottawa - Michael Papka, Argonne National Laboratory - Timothy Perkis - Justinian P. Rosca, University of Rochester - Conor Ryan, University College Cork, Ireland - Malcolm Shute, University of Brighton - Eric V. Siegel, Columbia University - Karl Sims - Andrew Singleton, Creation Mechanics - Lee Spector, Hampshire College - Walter Alden Tackett, Neuromedia - Astro Teller, Carnegie Mellon University - Patrick Tufts, Brandeis University - V. Rao Vemuri, University of Califonia at Davis - Darrell Whitley, Colorado State University - Alden H. Wright, University of Montana - Byoung-Tak Zhang, GMD, Germany EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE OF PROGRAM COMMITTEE (In Formation) SPECIAL PROGRAM CHAIRS The main focus of the conference (and about two-thirds of the papers) will be on genetic programming. In addition, papers describing recent developments in closely related areas of evolutionary computation (particularly those addressing issues common to various areas of evolutionary computation) will be reviewed by special program committees appointed and supervised by the following special program chairs. - GENETIC ALGORITHMS: David E. Goldberg, University of Illinois - CLASSIFIER SYSTEMS: Rick Riolo, University of Michigan - EVOLUTIONARY PROGRAMMING: David Fogel, University of California at San Diego - EVOLUTION STRATEGIES: PROPOSALS HEREBY SOLICITED TUTORIALS Tutorials will overview (1) genetic programming, (2) closely related areas of evolutionary computation, and (3) neural networks, machine learning, and introductory molecular biology. Most tutorials will be on Sunday, July 28, 1996 and specific times and dates will be announced later. - INTRODUCTION TO GENETIC PROGRAMMING: John Koza, Stanford University - MACHINE LANGUAGE GENETIC PROGRAMMING: Peter Nordin, University of Dortmund, Germany - GENETIC PROGRAMMING USING BINARY REPRESENTATION: Wolfgang Banzhaf, University of Dortmund, Germany - GENETIC ALGORITHMS: David E. Goldberg, University of Illinois - EVOLUTIONARY PROGRAMMING: David Fogel, University of California at San Diego - EVOLUTIONARY COMPUTATION FOR CONSTRAINT OPTIMIZATION: Zbigniew Michalewicz, University of North Carolina - CLASSIFIER SYSTEMS: Robert Elliott Smith, University of Alabama - MOLECULAR BIOLOGY FOR COMPUTER SCIENTISTS: Russell B. Altman, Stanford University -NEURAL NETWORKS David E. Rumelhart, Stanford University - MACHINE LEARNING: Pat Langley, Stanford University - OTHER GENETIC PROGRAMMING TUTORIALS: PROPOSALS HEREBY SOLICITED INFORMATION FOR SUBMITTING PAPERS: Wednesday, January 10, 1996 is the deadline for receipt at the address below of seven (7) copies of each submitted paper. Papers are to be in single-spaced, 12-point type on 8 1/2" x 11" or A4 paper (no e-mail or fax) with full 1" margins at top, bottom, left, and right. Two-sided printing is preferred. Papers are to contain ALL of the following 9 items within a maximum of 10 pages, in this order: (1) title of paper, (2) author name(s), (3) author physical address(es), (4) author e-mail address(es), (5) author phone number(s), (6) a 100-200 word abstract of the paper, (7) the paper's category (chosen from one of the following five alternatives: genetic programming, genetic algorithms, classifier systems, evolutionary programming, or evolution strategy), (8) the text of the paper (including all figures and tables), and (9) bibliography. All other elements of the paper (e.g., acknowledgements, appendices, if any) must come within the maximum of 10 pages. Review criteria will include significance of the work, novelty, sufficiency of information to permit replication (if applicable), clarity, and writing quality. The first-named author (or other designated author) will be notified of acceptance or rejection and reviewer comments by approximately Monday, February 26, 1996. Details of the style of the camera-ready paper will be announced later, but will resemble the SAB-94 and ALIFE-94 conferences recently published by the MIT Press. The deadline for the camera- ready, revised version of accepted papers will be announced later but will be approximately Wednesday, March 20, 1996. Proceedings will be published by The MIT Press and will be available at the conference. One of the authors will be expected to present each accepted paper at the conference. HOUSING: Stanford is about 40 miles south of San Francisco, about 25 miles south of the SF airport, and about 25 miles north of San Jose. There are numerous hotels of all types adjacent to, or near, the campus (many along El Camino Real Avenue in Palo Alto and nearby Mountain View). An optional housing and meals package will be available from the Conference Department at Stanford and will be announced later. FOR MORE INFORMATION: E-mail: GP96@Cs.Stanford.Edu GP-96 Conference c/o John Koza Computer Science Department Margaret Jacks Hall Stanford University Stanford, CA 94305-2140 USA %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% %------------------------------------------------------------------------------% CALL FOR PAPERS 1996 IEEE International Conference on Evolutionary Computation (ICEC'96) May 20-22, 1996, Nagoya, Japan Co-sponsored by IEEE Neural Network Council (NNC) and Society of Instrument and Control Engineers (SICE) Topics: Theory of evolutionary computation, Applications of evolutionary computation, Efficiency / robustness comparisons with other direct search algorithms, Parallel computer implementations, Artificial life and biologically inspired evolutionary computation, Evolutionary algorithms for computational intelligence, Comparisons between difference variants of evolutionary algorithms, Machine learning applications, Genetic algorithm and selforganization, Evolutionary computation for neural networks, Fuzzy logic in evolutionary algorithms Submission Procedure: Prospective authors are invited to submit papers related to the listed topics for oral or poster presentation. Five (5) copies of the paper must be submitted for review. Papers should be printed on letter size white paper, written in English in two-column format in Times or similar font style, 10 points or larger with 2.5 cm margins on all four sides. A length of four pages is encouraged, and a limit of six pages, including figures, tables and references will be enforced. Centered at the top of the first page should be the complete title of the paper and the name(s), affiliation(s) and address(es) of the author(s). All papers (except those submitted for special sessions - which may have different deadlines - see information on special sessions below) should be sent to: Toshio Fukuda, General Chair Nagoya University Dept. of Micro System Engineering and Dept. of Mechano-Informatics and Systems Furo-cho, Chikusa-ku, Nagoya 464-01, JAPAN Phone: +81-52-789-4478, Fax: +81-52-789-3909, Email: fukuda@mein.nagoya-u.ac.jp ICEC'96 will be organized in conjunction with the conference of Artificial Life (May 16-18, 1996, Kyoto, JAPAN). General Chair: Toshio Fukuda Nagoya University fukuda@mein.nagoya-u.ac.jp Program Co-chairs: There are several special sessions organized for the 3rd IEEE ICEC '96; so far these include: *********************************************************** Constrained Optimization, Constraint Satisfaction and EC *********************************************************** Organized by Gusz Eiben, chair (Utrecht University, gusz@cs.ruu.nl) Dave Corne (University of Edinburgh,dave@aifh.ed.ac.uk) Jurgen Dorn (Technical University of Vienna, dorn@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at) Peter Ross (University of Edinburgh, peter@aisb.ed.ac.uk) Evolutionary Computation has proved its merit in treating difficult problems in, for example, numerical optimization and machine learning. Nevertheless, problems where constraints on the search space (i.e., on the candidate solutions) play an important role have received relatively little attention. In real-world problems, however, the presence of constraints seems to be rather the rule than the exception. The class of constrained problems can be divided into Constraint Satisfaction Problems (CSP) and Constrained Optimization Problems (COP). This special session addresses both subclasses, and aims to explore the extent to which EC can usefully tackle problems of these kinds. All correspondence regarding this special session should be addressed to: A.E. Eiben Department of Computer Science, Utrecht University P.O.Box 80089, 3508 TB Utrecht, The Netherlands Phone: +31-(0)30-533619, Fax: +31-(0)30-513791, Email: gusz@cs.ruu.nl ******************************************** Evolutionary Artificial Neural Networks ******************************************** Organized by X. Yao (The University of New South Wales, xin@cs.adfa.oz.au) Evolutionary Artificial Neural Networks (EANNs) can be considered as a combination of artificial neural networks (ANNs) and evolutionary search algorithms. Three levels of evolution in EANNs have been studied recently, i.e., the evolution of connection weights, architectures, and learning rules. Major issues in the research of EANNs include their scalability, generalization ability and interactions among different levels of evolution. This special session will serve as a forum for both researchers and practitioners to discuss these important issues and exchange their latest research results/ideas in the area. All correspondence regarding this special session should be addressed to: Xin Yao Department of Computer Science, University College, The University of New South Wales Australian Defence Force Academy Canberra, ACT 2600, Australia Phone: +61 6 268 8819, Fax: +61 6 268 8581, Email: xin@csadfa.cs.adfa.oz.au ****************************************** Evolutionary Robotics and Automation ****************************************** Organized by J. Xiao (University of North Carolina, xiao@uncc.edu) More and more researchers are applying evolutionary computation techniques to challenging problems in robotics and automation, where classical methods fail to be effective. In addition to being vastly applicable to many hard problems, evolutionary concepts inspire many researchers as well as users to be fully creative in inventing their own versions of evolutionary algorithms for the specific needs of different domains of problems. This special session serves as a forum for exchanging research results in this growing interdisciplinary area and for encouraging further exploration of the fusion between evolutionary computation and intelligent robotics and automation. All correspondence regarding this special session should be addressed to: Jing Xiao Department of Computer Science, University of North Carolina - Charlotte Charlotte, NC 28223 Phone: (704) 547-4883, Fax: (704) 547-3516, Email: xiao@uncc.edu ************************* Genetic Programming ************************* Organized by John R. Koza (Stanford University , Koza@Cs.Stanford.Edu) Lee Spector (Hampshire College, LSPECTOR@hampshire.edu) Yuji Sato (Hitachi Ltd. Central Research Lab., yuji@crl.hitachi.co.jp) The goal of automatic programming is to create, in an automated way, a computer program that enables a computer to solve a problem. Genetic programming extends the genetic algorithm to the domain of computer programs. In genetic programming, populations of program are genetically bred to solve problems. Genetic programming is a domain-independent method for evolving computer programs that solves, or approximately solves, a variety of problems from a variety of fields, including many benchmark problems from machine learning and artificial intelligence such as problems of control, robotics, optimization, game playing, and symbolic regression (i.e., system identification, concept learning). Early versions of genetic programming evolved programs consisting of only a single part (i.e., one main program). All correspondence regarding this special session should be addressed to: John R. Koza Computer Science Department, Margaret Jacks Hall, Stanford University Stanford, California 94305-2140 USA Phone: 415-723-1517, Fax: 415-941-9430, Email: Koza@Cs.Stanford.Edu ********************************************** Self-adaptation in Evolutionary Algorithms ********************************************** Organized by Guenter Rudolph (ICD Informatik Centrum Dortmund e.V., Rudolph@LS11.InformatikUni-Dortmund.de) Evolutionary algorithms (EAs) with the ability to adapt internal strategic parameters (like population size, mutation distribution, type of recombination operator, selective pressure etc.) during the search process usually find better solutions than variants with fixed strategic parameters. Self-adaptation is very useful if different (fixed) parameter settings produce large differences in the solution quality of the algorithm. Most experiences are available for (real-coded) EAs whose individuals adapt their mutation distributions (or step sizes). Here, the property to adjust the step size is induced by competitive pressure among individuals. Evidently, self-adapting mechanisms can be realized by competing subpopulations as well. The potential of those EAs is essentially unexplored. All correspondence regarding this special session should be addressed to: Guenter Rudolph ICD Informatik Centrum Dortmund e.V. Joseph-von-Fraunhofer-Str. 20, D-44227 Dortmund, Germany Phone: +49-(0)231-9700-365, Fax: +49-(0)231-9700-959, Email: Rudolph@LS11.Informatik.Uni-Dortmund.de ********************************************** Evolutionary Algorithms and Fuzzy Systems ********************************************** Organized by Witold Pedrycz (University of Manitoba, pedrycz@ee.umanitoba.ca) Fuzzy sets (FS) and evolutionary algorithms have been already successfully applied to many areas including fuzzy control and fuzzy clustering. There are a number of facets of symbiosis between the technologies of FS and GA. On one hand evolutionary computation enriches the optimization environment for fuzzy systems. On the other, fuzzy sets supply a new macroscopic and domain-specific insight into the fundamental mechanisms of evolutionary algorithms (including fuzzy crossover, fuzzy reproduction, fuzzy fitness function, etc.). The objective of this session is to foster further interaction between researchers actively engaged in FS and GAs. All correspondence regarding this special session should be addressed to: Witold Pedrycz Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Manitoba Winnipeg Canada RT 2N2 Phone: (204) 474-8380, Fax: (204) 261-4639, Email: pedrycz@ee.umanitoba.ca ********************************************************************* BE DARWINIAN: MAKE YOUR EVOLUTIONARY-BASED OPTIMIZATION ALGORITHM COMPETE WITH ALL OTHERS ********************************************************************* Organised by Hugues Bersini and Marco Dorigo from IRIDIA - ULB - Brussels. A special competition session will be organized during the 1996 IEEE International Conference on Evolutionary Computing in which all candidate evolutionary-based algorithms will compete on benchmark problems of real and combinatorial optimization. The rules of this competition will be announced in a near future but basically they will present the benchmark problems together with some standard results (best solution, computer time to reach it, etc...) to at least reproduce (but hopefully improve) for being accepted to participate in the session. This competition first aims at clarifying a situation which is every day more confused (just look at the email on the GA list) on the real potentialities of evolutionary-based or evolutionary-inspired algorithms as compared with classical optimization algorithms (Hill-Climbers, Simplex, ..) and less classical ones (Simulated annealing, Tabu search). Secondly it aims at establishing a firm standard and a natural selectionist test for each improvements on previous algorithms which recurrently appear in conferences like ICGA, PPSN and IEEE. The winner algorithms will be joined together and presented in a book to be released following the conference. All correspondence regarding this special session should be addressed to: Hugues Bersini IRIDIA , cp 194/6, Universite Libre de Bruxelles 50, av. Franklin Roosevelt, 1050 Bruxelles - Belgium Phone:+32.2650.27.33, Fax:+32.2650.27.15, Email:bersini@ulb.ac.be Submission to Special Sessions: Four (4) copies of complete papers (6 pages maximum) should be submitted to each session organizer. All papers will be reviewed. ******************************************************************************** The deadline for proposals for organizing other special sessions during the 3rd IEEE ICEC '96 is August 20, 1995; submit your proposal to any Program Co-Chairs. ******************************************************************************** Program Committee: Treasurer: Chisato Numaoka ( Sony Computer Science Lab.) Publication Chair: David Fogel ( Natural Selection Inc.) Publicity Co-Chairs: Pierre Borne(Ministere de l'Education Nationale), Takanori Shibata(MEL) Local Arrangement Chair: Takeshi Furuhashi ( Nagoya Univ. ) *************************************** Prof. Toshio Fukuda Nagoya University, Dept. of Micro System Engineering & Dept. of Mechano-Informatics and Systems Furo-cho, Chikusa-ku, Nagoya 464-01 JAPAN phone: +81-52-789-4478 fax: +81-52-789-3909 / 3115 E-mail: fukuda@mein.nagoya-u.ac.jp ***************************************