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17 October 2019, ILLC Lecture, Martha Lewis

Speaker: Martha Lewis
Title: Compositionality in Semantic Spaces
Date: Thursday 17 October 2019
Time: 11:00
Location: Room F1.15, Science Park 107, Amsterdam

Abstract:

We interact with computers every day, and often using something like human language. There is therefore a huge amount of research going into how to represent human language and reasoning computationally. Modelling words as vectors has been one of the most successful approaches over recent years. However, it is not immediately clear how to combine word vectors together to make phrases and sentences. On the other hand, formal semantics gives a clear account of how to compose words, but it is not so obvious how to represent their meanings. I will give an overview of the model I work with that shows how to combine word vectors using formal semantics, and go on to describe a number of extensions to this model that address its limitations. These include: (1) representing words or concepts within a conceptual space with meaningful dimensions, giving potential for common-sense reasoning; (2) building word vectors with hierarchical structure, enhancing reasoning capabilities; and (3) neural network-inspired methods for building word representations that improve flexibility. I'll finish by giving an overview of research plans for the future.

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