Linguists tackle computational analysis of grammar
Thursday, February 26, 2015 - 07:30
in Mathematics & Economics
Children don't have to be told that "cat" and "cats" are variants of the same word—they pick it up just by listening. To a computer, though, they're as different as, well, cats and dogs. Yet it's computers that are assumed to be superior in detecting patterns and rules, not 4-year olds. John Goldsmith, the Edward Carson Waller Distinguished Service Professor of Linguistics and Computer Science, and graduate student Jackson Lee are trying to, if not to solve that puzzle definitively, at least provide the tools to do so.