In the Land of Invented Languages
In the Land of Invented Languages

Author: Arika Okrent

Publisher: Random House

Published: 2009-05-19

Total Pages: 354

ISBN-13: 0385529716

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Here is the captivating story of humankind’s enduring quest to build a better language—and overcome the curse of Babel. Just about everyone has heard of Esperanto, which was nothing less than one man’s attempt to bring about world peace by means of linguistic solidarity. And every Star Trek fan knows about Klingon. But few people have heard of Babm, Blissymbolics, Loglan (not to be confused with Lojban), and the nearly nine hundred other invented languages that represent the hard work, high hopes, and full-blown delusions of so many misguided souls over the centuries. With intelligence and humor, Arika Okrent has written a truly original and enlightening book for all word freaks, grammar geeks, and plain old language lovers.

From Elvish to Klingon
From Elvish to Klingon

Author: Michael Adams

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2011-10-27

Total Pages: 301

ISBN-13: 0191631604

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

How are languages invented? Why are they invented? Who uses them? What are the cultural effects of invented languages? This fascinating book looks at all manner of invented languages and explores the origins, purpose, and usage of these curious artefacts of culture. Written by experts in the field, chapters discuss languages from Esperanto to Klingon and uncover the motives behind their creation, and the outcomes of their existence. Introduction by Michael Adams Linking all invented languages, Michael Adams explains how creating a language is intimidating work; no one would attempt to invent one unless driven by a serious purpose or aspiration. He explains how the origin and development of each invented language illustrates inventors' and users' dissatisfaction with the language(s) already available to them, and how each invented language expresses one or more of a wide range of purposes and aspirations: political, social, aesthetic, intellectual, and technological. Chapter 1: International Auxiliary Languages by Arden Smith From the mythical Language of Adam to Esperanto and Solrésol, this chapter looks at the history, linguistics, and significance of international or universal languages (including sign languages). Chapter 2: Invented Vocabularies: Newspeak and Nadsat by Howard Jackson Looking at the invented vocabularies of science fiction, for example 1984's 'Newspeak' and Clockwork Orange's 'Nadsat', this chapter discusses the feasibility of such vocabularies, the plausibility of such lexical change, and the validity of the Sapir-Whorfian echoes heard in such literary experiments. Chapter 3: 'Oirish' Inventions: James Joyce, Samuel Beckett, Paul Muldoon by Stephen Watt This chapter looks at literary inventions of another kind, nonsense and semi-nonsense languages, including those used in the works of James Joyce and Samuel Beckett. Chapter 4: Tolkien's Invented Languages by Edmund Weiner Focussing on the work of the accomplished philologist J.R.R. Tolkien, the fifteen languages he created are considered in the context of invented languages of other kinds. Chapter 5: Klingon and other Science Fiction Languages by Marc Okrand, Judith Hendriks-Hermans, and Sjaak Kroon Klingon is the most fully developed of fictional languages (besides Tolkien's). Used by many, this chapter explores the speech community of 'Trekkies', alongside other science fiction vocabularies. Chapter 6: Logical Languages by Michael Adams This chapter introduces conlangs, 'constructed languages'. For example, Láaden, created to express feminine experience better than 'patriarchal' languages. Chapter 7: Gaming Languages and Language Games by James Portnow Languages and games are both fundamentally interactive, based on the adoption of arbitrary sign systems, and come with a set of formal rules which can be manipulated to express different outcomes. This being one of the drivers for the popularity of invented languages within the gaming community, James Portnow looks at several gaming languages and language games, such as Gargish, D'ni, Simlish, and Logos. Chapter 8: Revitalized Languages as Invented Languages by Suzanne Romaine The final chapter looks at language continuation, renewal, revival, and resurrection - in the cases of Gaelic, Welsh, Cornish, and Breton - as well as language regulation.

Hybrid Artificial Intelligence Systems
Hybrid Artificial Intelligence Systems

Author: Emilio Corchado

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2008-09-10

Total Pages: 785

ISBN-13: 3540876553

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This volume constitutes the proceedings of the Third International Workshop on Hybrid Artificial Intelligence Systems, HAIS 2008, held in Burgos, Spain, during September 24-26, 2008. The 93 papers presented, together with 4 invited talks, were carefully reviewed and selected from 280 submissions. The topics covered are agents and multi-agent systems; evolutionary computation; connectionist models; optimization sysetms; fuzzy logic systems; classification and classifiers; cluster analysis; video and image analysis; learning systems, algorithms and applications; hybrid systems based on negotiation and social network modelling; real world applications of HAIS under uncertainty; hybrid intelligent systems for multi-robot and multi-agent systems; applications of hybrid artificial intelligence in bioinformatics; and novel approaches to genetic fuzzy systems.

Hybrid Artificial Intelligent Systems, Part II
Hybrid Artificial Intelligent Systems, Part II

Author: Manuel Grana Romay

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2010-06-14

Total Pages: 556

ISBN-13: 3642138039

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

th The 5 International Conference on Hybrid Artificial Intelligence Systems (HAIS 2010) has become a unique, established and broad interdisciplinary forum for researchers and practitioners who are involved in developing and applying symbolic and sub-symbolic techniques aimed at the construction of highly robust and reliable problem-solving techniques, and bringing the most relevant achievements in this field. Overcoming the rigid encasing imposed by the arising orthodoxy in the field of arti- cial intelligence, which has led to the partition of researchers into so-called areas or fields, interest in hybrid intelligent systems is growing because they give freedom to design innovative solutions to the ever-increasing complexities of real-world pr- lems. Noise and uncertainty call for probabilistic (often Bayesian) methods, while the huge amount of data in some cases asks for fast heuristic (in the sense of suboptimal and ad-hoc) algorithms able to give answers in acceptable time frames. High dim- sionality demands linear and non-linear dimensionality reduction and feature extr- tion algorithms, while the imprecision and vagueness call for fuzzy reasoning and linguistic variable formalization. Nothing impedes real-life problems to mix diffic- ties, presenting huge quantities of noisy, vague and high-dimensional data; therefore, the design of solutions must be able to resort to any tool of the trade to attack the problem. Combining diverse paradigms poses challenging problems of computational and methodological interfacing of several previously incompatible approaches. This is, thus, the setting of HAIS conference series, and its increasing success is the proof of the vitality of this exciting field.

Unraveling the Voynich Codex
Unraveling the Voynich Codex

Author: Jules Janick

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2018-08-16

Total Pages: 419

ISBN-13: 3319772945

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Unraveling the Voynich Codex reviews the historical, botanical, zoological, and iconographic evidence related to the Voynich Codex, one of the most enigmatic historic texts of all time. The bizarre Voynich Codex has often been referred to as the most mysterious book in the world. Discovered in an Italian Catholic college in 1912 by a Polish book dealer Wilfrid Voynich, it was eventually bequeathed to the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library of Yale University. It contains symbolic language that has defied translation by eminent cryptologists. The codex is encyclopedic in scope and contains sections known as herbal, pharmaceutical, balenological (nude nymphs bathing in pools), astrological, cosmological and a final section of text that may be prescriptions but could be poetry or incantations. Because the vellum has been carbon dated to the early 15th century and the manuscript was known to be in the collection of Emperor Rudolf II of the Holy Roman Empire sometime between 1607 and 1622, current dogma had assumed it a European manuscript of the 15th century. However, based on identification of New World plants, animals, a mineral, as well as cities and volcanos of Central Mexico, the authors of this book reveal that the codex is clearly a document of colonial New Spain. Furthermore, the illustrator and author are identified as native to Mesoamerica based on a name and ligated initials in the first botanical illustration. This breakthrough in Voynich studies indicates that the failure to decipher the manuscript has been the result of a basic misinterpretation of its origin in time and place. Tentative assignment of the Voynichese symbols also provides a key to decipherment based on Mesoamerican languages. A document from this time, free from filter or censor from either Spanish or Inquisitorial authorities has major importance in our understanding of life in 16th century Mexico. Publisher's Note: For the eBook editions, Voynichese symbols are only rendered properly in the PDF format.