Available online
Description
Understanding syntax is one approach to language. Another way is to look at the semantics or meaning of speech. We therefore concentrate in this programme on ideas which attempt to introduce knowle...dge of the real world into language comprehension. Concepts of 'semantic templates' and 'frames' are introduced and presented with the help of a participating studio audience.
Understanding syntax is one approach to language. Another way is to look at the semantics or meaning of speech. We therefore concentrate in this programme on ideas which attempt to introduce knowle...dge of the real world into language comprehension. Concepts of 'semantic templates' and 'frames' are introduced and presented with the help of a participating studio audience.
| Module code and title: | D303, Cognitive psychology |
|---|---|
| Item code: | D303; 16 |
| First transmission date: | 09-10-1978 |
| Published: | 1978 |
| Rights Statement: | |
| Restrictions on use: | |
| Duration: | 00:24:25 |
| + Show more... | |
| Producer: | Roger Penfound |
| Contributor: | Yorick Wilks |
| Publisher: | BBC Open University |
| Keyword(s): | Artificial Intelligence; Computers; Perception; Psychology |
| Footage description: | Yorick Wilks gives a lecture, before an invited audience, at the University of Essex. As an introduction to the content of the lecture he screens a short film showing a man ordering a meal in a restaurant. This demonstrates our expectations of behaviour which help us to resolve ambiguities in language. He now discusses words and the notion of primitives which capture the meaning of many other words. He explores the meaning primitives behind the verb 'fire at'. He puts these primitives into a meaning structure, a formula. This meaning structure is used to resolve sentence ambiguity. The ambiguous sentence, "he fired at the colt" is used to show how formulae might work. Yorick uses a semantic template to disambiguate the meaning of the sentence. Using such a device, a computer, when analysing a sentence, would select the most coherent word meaning. Next he considers a more complex example of ambiguity: "the soldiers fired at the women and I saw several of them fall". He shows how a computer could be programmed to understand such a sentence using a semantic template and inference rules. Some difficulties are presented by this method however. We see another film of the man paying for his meal in the restaurant with 'a large note'. This leads to the idea of using 'scripts'. Scripts are normal structures of behaviour, what normally happens in a stereotypical situation. Using a script, Yorick disambiguates the 'big note' problem in the restaurant. |
| Master spool number: | VTC/6HT/72727 |
| Production number: | 00525_2415 |
| Videofinder number: | 215 |
| Available to public: | no |
