This paper describes an automatic monitoring system that constantly checks partial update in Web pages and notifies them to a user. While one of the most important advantages of the WWW is update of Web pages, we need to constantly check them out and this task takes much cognitive load. Thus applications to automatically check update of Web pages have been developed, however they can not deal with partial update like update in a particular cell in a table in a (...) Web page. Hence we developed a automatic monitoring system that checks such partial update. A user can give a system regions in which he/she wants to know the update in a Web page as training examples, and it is able to learn rules to identify the partial update by classification learning. By this learning, a user do not need to directly describe the rules. We implemented our system and some executed examples were presented. (shrink)

In this paper, we develop an organization method of page information agents for adaptive interface between a user and a Web search engine. Though a Web search engine indicates a hit list of Web pages to user’s query using a large database, they includes many useless ones. Thus a user has to select useful Web pages from them with page information indicated on the hit list, and actually fetch the Web page for investigating the relevance. Unfortunately, since the page information (...) on a hit list is neither sufficient nor necessary for a user, the adequate information is necessary for valid selection. However which information is adequate depends on a user and a task. Hence we propose adaptive interface AOAI in which different page information agents are organized through man-machine interaction. In AOAI, the page information agents indicating different page information on a hit list like the file-size, network traffic and a page title are prepared at first. A user evaluates them through searching with a search engine, and the agents are organized based on the evaluation. As results, different organizations are achieved depending on a user and a task. Finally we make experiments with subjects and find out AOAI is promising for adaptive interface between a user and a search engine. (shrink)

Developmental research suggests that young children tend to value dominant individuals over subordinates. This research, however, has nearly exclusively been carried out in Western cultures, and cross-cultural research among adults has revealed cultural differences in the valuing of dominance. In particular, it seems that Japanese culture, relative to many Western cultures, values dominance less. We conducted two experiments to test whether this difference would be observed in preschoolers. In Experiment 1, preschoolers in France and in Japan were asked to identify (...) with either a dominant or a subordinate. French preschoolers identified with the dominant, but Japanese preschoolers were at chance. Experiment 2 revealed that Japanese preschoolers were more likely to believe a subordinate than a dominant individual, both compared to chance and compared to previous findings among French preschoolers. The convergent results from both experiments thus reveal an early emerging cross-cultural difference in the valuing of dominance. (shrink)

Prior's three-valued modal logic Q was developed as a philosophically interesting modal logic. Thus, we should be able to modify Q as a temporal logic. Although a temporal version of Q was suggested by Prior, the subject has not been fully explored in the literature. In this paper, we develop a three-valued temporal logic $Q_t $ and give its axiomatization and semantics. We also argue that $Q_t $ provides a smooth solution to the problem of future contingents.

This paper presents what the authors call the ‘divergence problem’ regarding choosing between different future possibilities. As is discussed in the first half, the central issue of the problem is the difficulty of temporally locating the ‘active cause’ on the modal divergent diagram. In the second half of this paper, we discuss the ‘second-person freedom’ which is, strictly, neither compatibilist negative freedom nor incompatibilist positive freedom. The divergence problem leads us to two hypothetical views (i.e. the view of single-line determination (...) and that of one-off chance), and these views bring humans closer to the afree side – i.e. outside of the contrast between being free and being unfree. The afree side is greatly different from the ordinary human side. This paper tries to secure the second-person freedom as a substitute for the ordinary human freedom while preventing the divergence problem from arising. (shrink)

Anthropomorphic agents used in online-shopping need to be trusted by users so that users feel comfortable buying products. In this paper, we propose a model for designing trustworthy agents by assuming two factors of trust, that is, emotion and knowledgeableness perceived. Our hypothesis is that when a user feels happy and perceives an agent as being highly knowledgeable, a high level of trust results between the user and agent. We conducted four experiments with participants to verify this hypothesis by preparing (...) transition operators utilizing emotional contagion and knowledgeable utterances. As a result, we verified that users' internal states transitioned as expected and that the two factors significantly influenced their trust states. (shrink)

劇的転換を求められている新たな生命倫理の案内書。従来、医療分野に集中しがちであった内容を生命科学全体とさらに関連する社会的緊急課題―環境・人口・難民・人種などにまで拡大、包括して最適任者が興趣ある解説 で応える。.

Today's computers are becoming ever more versatile. They are used in various applications, such as for education, entertainment, and information services. In other words, computers are often required to not only inform users of information but also communicate with them socially. Previous studies explored the design of ambient light displays and suggested that such systems can convey information to people in the periphery of their attention without distracting them from their primary work. However, they mainly focused on using ambient lights (...) to convey certain information. It is still unclear whether and how the lights can influence people's perception and decision-making. To explore this, we performed three experiments using a ping-pong game, Ultimatum game, and Give-Some game, in which we attached an LED strip to the front-bottom of a computer monitor and had it display a set of light expressions. Our evaluation of the results suggested that expressive lights do affect human perception and decision-making. Participants liked and anthropomorphized the computer more when it displayed light animations. Particularly, they perceived the computer as positive and friendlier when it displayed green and low intensity light animation, while red and high intensity light animation was perceived as negative and more hostile. They consequently behaved with more tolerance and cooperation to the computer when it was positive compared with when it was negative. The findings can open up possibilities for the design of ambient light systems for various applications where human-machine interaction is needed. (shrink)

This paper discusses a way to create social innovation around 2040. With such innovation, social restrictions that are regarded as being inevitable in the current society can be eliminated. First, it is necessary to determine how to approach the innovation. Symbiotic technology is one of the promising technologies for achieving social innovation. It is the fusion of scientific technology and socio-technology. Its elemental technologies are classified into two categories: technologies for converging the real and cyber worlds and those for integrating (...) hetero-systems. This paper describes examples of those technical categories and introduces the challenges of the first step toward social innovation. (shrink)

The BTB domain is a protein–protein interaction motif that is found throughout eukaryotes. It determines a unique tri‐dimensional fold with a large interaction surface. The exposed residues are highly variable and can permit dimerization and oligomerization, as well as interaction with a number of other proteins. BTB‐containing proteins are numerous and control cellular processes that range from actin dynamics to cell‐cycle regulation. Here, we review findings in the field of transcriptional regulation to illustrate how the high variability of the BTB (...) has allowed related transcription factors to evolve different functional abilities. We then report how recent work has showed that, in spite of their high sequence divergence and apparently unrelated functions, many BTB‐containing proteins have at least one shared role: the recruitment of degradation targets to E3 ubiquitin ligase complexes. Taken together, these findings illustrate diverse and convergent functions of a versatile protein–protein interaction domain. BioEssays 28: 1194–1202, 2006. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Occupational therapy often uses craft activities as therapeutic tools, but their therapeutic effectiveness has not yet been adequately demonstrated. The aim of this study was to examine changes in frontal midline theta rhythm and autonomic nervous responses during craft activities, and to explore the physiological mechanisms underlying the therapeutic effectiveness of occupational therapy. To achieve this, we employed a simple craft activity as a task to induce Fmθ and performed simultaneous EEG and ECG recordings. For participants in which Fmθ activities (...) were provoked, parasympathetic and sympathetic activities were evaluated during the appearance of Fmθ and rest periods using the Lorenz plot analysis. Both parasympathetic and sympathetic indices increased with the appearance of Fmθ compared to during resting periods. This suggests that a relaxed-concentration state is achieved by concentrating on craft activities. Furthermore, the appearance of Fmθ positively correlated with parasympathetic activity, and theta band activity in the frontal area were associated with sympathetic activity. This suggests that there is a close relationship between cardiac autonomic function and Fmθ activity. (shrink)

In this paper, we propose a Future View system that assists user's usual Web browsing. The Future View will prefetch Web pages based on user's browsing strategies and present them to a user in order to assist Web browsing. To learn user's browsing strategy, the Future View uses two types of learning classifier systems: a content-based classifier system for contents change patterns and an action-based classifier system for user's action patterns. The results of learning is applied to crawling by Web (...) robots, and the gathered Web pages are presented to a user through a Web browser interface. We experimentally show effectiveness of navigation using the Future View. (shrink)

In this paper, illocutionary acts of commanding will be differentiated from perlocutionary acts that affect preferences of addressees in a new dynamic logic which combines the preference upgrade introduced in DEUL (dynamic epistemic upgrade logic) by van Benthem and Liu with the deontic update introduced in ECL II (eliminative command logic II) by Yamada. The resulting logic will incorporate J. L. Austin’s distinction between illocutionary acts as acts having mere conventional effects and perlocutionary acts as acts having real effects (...) upon attitudes and actions of agents, and help us understand why saying so can make it so in explicit performative utterances. We will also discuss how acts of commanding give rise to so-called “deontic dilemmas” and how we can accommodate most deontic dilemmas without triggering so-called “deontic explosion”. (shrink)

Some arguments beg the question. Question-begging arguments are bad arguments and cannot increase the level of justification one has for the conclusion. Question-begging arguments, unlike some other bad arguments, need not suffer the problem of having unjustified premises. Even if the premises are justified and even if the premises entail the conclusion, a question-begging argument fails to have any force when it comes to increasing one's justification for the conclusion. For example, many regard Moore's famous response to skepticism as a (...) question-begging argument: 1. I have hands . . . via perception 2. If I have hands, then I am not a handless brain in a vat 3. I am not a handless brain in a vat . . . from 1 and 2, modus ponensWhat about this piece of reasoning makes many feel uneasy? Nonskeptics will agree that Moore is justified in believing . They will also agree that he is justified in believing . In fact, under normal circumstances there will be no dispute that Moore knows the premises. The premises entail the conclusion and Moore knows this, too. In other words, the argument is sound, and is known to be sound. Yet many feel the argument begs the question. Why? (shrink)

We propose an AI-assisted design concept exploration tool, the “Character Space Construction”. Concept designers explore and articulate the target product aesthetics and semantics in language, which is expressed using “Design Concept Phrases”, that is, compound adjective phrases, and contrasting terms that convey what are not their target design concepts. Designers often utilize this dichotomy technique to communicate the nature of their aesthetic and semantic design concepts with stakeholders, especially in an early design development phase. The CSC assists this designers' cognitive (...) activity by constructing a “Character Space”, which is a semantic quadrant system, in a structured manner. A CS created by designers with the assistance of the CSC enables them to discern and explain their design concepts in contrast with opposing terms. These terms in a CS are retrieved and combined in the CSC by using a knowledge graph. The CSC presents terms and phrases as lists of candidates to users from which users will choose in order to define the target design concept, which is then visualized in a CS. The participants in our experiment, who were in the “arts and design” profession, were given two conditions under which to create DCPs and explain them. One group created and explained the DCPs with the assistance of the proposed CSC, and the other did the same task without this assistance, given the freedom to use any publicly available web search tools instead. The result showed that the group assisted by the CSC indicated their tasks were supported significantly better, especially in exploration, as measured by the Creativity Support Index. (shrink)

We present an annotation scheme describing the argument structure of judgement documents, a central construct in Japanese law. To support the final goal of this work, namely summarisation aimed at the legal professions, we have designed blueprint models of summaries of various granularities, and our annotation model in turn is fitted around the information needed for the summaries. In this paper we report results of a manual annotation study, showing that the annotation is stable. The annotated corpus we created contains (...) 89 documents. We also designed and implemented the first two stages of an algorithm for the automatic extraction of argument structure, and present evaluation results. (shrink)

The purpose of the present study was two-fold. First we examined whether visible motion appearance was altered by the spatial interaction between invisible and visible motion. We addressed this issue by means of simultaneous motion contrast, in which a horizontal test grating with a counterphase luminance modulation was seen to have the opposite motion direction to a peripheral inducer grating with unidirectional upward or downward motion. Using a mirror stereoscope, observers viewed the inducer and test gratings with one eye, and (...) continuous flashes of colorful squares forming an annulus shape with the other eye. The continuous flashes rendered the inducer subjectively invisible. The observers’ task was to report whether the test grating moved upward or downward. Consequently, simultaneous motion contrast was observed even when the inducer was invisible . Second, we examined whether the observers could correctly respond to the direction of invisible motion: It was impossible. (shrink)

In his “A new argument for evidentialism” (Shah, Philos Q 56(225): 481–498, 2006 ), Nishi Shah argues that the best explanation of a feature of deliberation whether to believe that p which he calls transparency entails that only evidence can be reason to believe that p. I show that his argument fails because a crucial lemma that his argument appeals to cannot be supported without assuming evidentialism to be true in the first place.

The mental fatigue elicited by working and studying consumed mental resources, thereby eliciting a declined performance and an increased mental stress. The long-term continuous work and study, which is typical for modern workers and students, can increase mental fatigue and health risks. Previous studies reported that the natural environment has a restorative of mental resources and reducing stress. However, it is difficult for urban workers and students to take sufficient breaks in real natural environment. We conducted an experiment to examine (...) whether brief and indirect exposure to the natural environment elicits a restorative of attention and reducing stress. Twenty-five undergraduate and graduate students from the university of modern city participated in the experiment. The experiment involved measuring the changes in the task performance of the participants and the subjective mental workload, while the attention restoration was indexed from physiological response over time. The participants had two types of resting periods in the middle of the task, i.e., by looking at a blank display or by watching a nature video having scenes of, e.g., a forest, small waterfall, and rustling leaves. The results indicate that the natural environment indirectly depicted through the nature videos does not affect the task performance and the subjective mental workload but decreases the SCL. The results of the physiological response suggest that having rest periods depicting the natural environment, even if indirectly and briefly, can restore the directed attention for the task. This experiment revealed a useful method of resting for urban workers and students to restore their attention to a task. (shrink)

Approximately one in two hundred persons in the Marshall Islands have active tuberculosis. We examine the historical antecedents of this situation in order to assign ethical responsibility for the present situation. Examining the antecedents in terms of Galtung’s dialectic of personal versus structural violence, we can identify instances in the history of the Marshall Islands when individual subjects made decisions with large-scale ecologic, social, and health consequences. The roles of medical experimenters, military commanders, captains of the weapons industry in particular, (...) and industrial capitalism in general are examined. In that, together with Lewontin, we also identify industrial capitalism as the cause of tuberculosis, we note that the distinction between personal versus structural violence is difficult to maintain. By identifying the cause of the tuberculosis in the Marshall Islands, we also identify what needs be done to treat and prevent it. (shrink)

Male white-rumped munias sing syntactically simpler songs than their domestic counterparts, Bengalese finches. The differences in song structure may reflect differences in natural selection pressures between wild and domestic environments. Deacon (2010) proposed song simplicity of the wild strain could be subject to natural selection. We hypothesized the selection pressure may be species identification. Thus, we compared song variations in relation to ecological factors and dispersal history of white-rumped munias to understand song evolutionary processes. We found geographic variations of song (...) syntactical complexity. The difference of song syntactical complexity did not corresponded to genetic distance, but did to that of the proportion of mixed flocks with sympatric related species. Birds that inhabited the areas with more mixed flocks sang simpler songs. The song complexity might be constrained to intensify distinct conspecific signals from related species. Our field work provided empirical evidence supporting a proposal made by Deacon (2010). Keywords: birdsong; evolution; masking hypothesis; Bengalese finches; song geographic variation; genetic variation. (shrink)

Male white-rumped munias sing syntactically simpler songs than their domestic counterparts, Bengalese finches. The differences in song structure may reflect differences in natural selection pressures between wild and domestic environments. Deacon proposed song simplicity of the wild strain could be subject to natural selection. We hypothesized the selection pressure may be species identification. Thus, we compared song variations in relation to ecological factors and dispersal history of white-rumped munias to understand song evolutionary processes. We found geographic variations of song syntactical (...) complexity. The difference of song syntactical complexity did not corresponded to genetic distance, but did to that of the proportion of mixed flocks with sympatric related species. Birds that inhabited the areas with more mixed flocks sang simpler songs. The song complexity might be constrained to intensify distinct conspecific signals from related species. Our field work provided empirical evidence supporting a proposal made by Deacon. Keywords: birdsong; evolution; masking hypothesis; Bengalese finches; song geographic variation; genetic variation. (shrink)

In this paper, we propose a framework for searching information through both the WWW and a human group. Though information retrieval using a searc engine in the WWW is very useful, we can not acquire local information owned by persons and not explicitly described in text. A user knows neither where target information is in the WWW nor who knows in a human group. Thus we integrate the information retrieval in the WWW with that in a human group, develop a (...) heterogeneous information search system HERIS as a multi-agent system. We develop this framework as multi-agent system consisting of user agents and search engine agents, and use contract net protocol to communication among the agents. A user agent and a search engine agent are assigned to a user and a search engine. Each of the agents maintains a user profile and a search engine profile. When a user gives a query to a system, it selectively searches information resources consisting the WWW and user group. Finally a user acquires integrated results of a hit list from the WWW and a audio/video connection to a user who can answer the query. It was found through experimental evaluation that information retrieval using a human group as an information resource is valid and a search with HERIS has a different character from conventional search engines. (shrink)

In motion-induced blindness , a target within rotating random dots is occasionally hidden from observers’ consciousness during observation. In the present study, a red ring-like cue was centered on a target and presented immediately after observers reported subjective disappearance of the target in MIB . The radius of the cue was systematically modulated. Observers quickly regained awareness of the disappeared object only after they were provided with a pinpoint cue of its location. We also found that a flickering cue at (...) 1 Hz hindered MIB when the radius of the cue was critically small . Furthermore, abrupt onset of a small square was enough to regain awareness of the target . Successful revival of the target with a small cue indicates that critical spatial distribution of visual attention determines what in the visual scene is included in visual awareness. (shrink)

One prominent feature of belief is that a belief cannot be formed at will. This paper argues that the best explanation of this fact is that belief formation is a process that takes aim at the truth. Taking aim at the truth is to be understood as causal responsiveness of the processes constituting belief formation to what facilitates achieving true beliefs. The requirement for this responsiveness precludes the possibility of belief formation responding to intentions in a way that would count (...) as forming a belief at will. (shrink)

Backgrounds: Transcranial direct current stimulation is a non-invasive brain stimulation technique for the treatment of several psychiatric disorders, e.g., mood disorders and schizophrenia. Therapeutic effects of tDCS are suggested to be produced by bi-directional changes in cortical activities, i.e., increased/decreased cortical excitability via anodal/cathodal stimulation. Although tDCS provides a promising approach for the treatment of psychiatric disorders, its neurobiological mechanisms remain to be explored.Objectives: To review recent findings from neurophysiological, chemical, and brain-network studies, and consider how tDCS ameliorates psychiatric conditions.Findings: (...) Enhancement of excitatory synaptic transmissions through anodal tDCS stimulation is likely to facilitate glutamate transmission and suppress gamma-aminobutyric acid transmission in the cortex. On the other hand, it positively or negatively modulates the activities of dopamine, serotonin, and acetylcholine transmissions in the central nervous system. These neural events by tDCS may change the balance between excitatory and inhibitory inputs. Specifically, multi-session tDCS is thought to promote/regulate information processing efficiency in the cerebral cortical circuit, which induces long-term potentiation by synthesizing various proteins.Conclusions: This review will help understand putative mechanisms underlying the clinical benefits of tDCS from the perspective of neurotransmitters, network dynamics, intracellular events, and related modalities of the brain function. (shrink)