NAME_____________________________

COGS2010 Tutorial

Copycat

Read the online Copycat tutorial at http://www.cognitivescience.uq.edu.au/Copycat/Tutorial/

Answers can be filled in below

1. Introduction

Exercise 1: Context-dependent conceptual slippage plays a vital role in human perception. Find an example domain (such as character recognition mentioned above – but don’t use this one, try to be creative) where context-dependent conceptual slippage is required to deal with the noise in the environment. Give examples where this slippage takes place to illustrate your point.

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2. Copycat: a gentle overview

Exercise 1. To give you a feel for the domain in which Copycat works, write down all the possible solutions that you can think of for the following problems (give at least 3). To assist you, the number of solutions that both Copycat and human subjects have in common to each of the problems is given in parentheses

· abc : abd, kji : ? (5) _______________________________________

· abc : abd, iijjkk : ? (5) _______________________________________

· abc : abd, jffwww : ? (5) _______________________________________

Exercise 2. For TWO of your solutions to the problem abc : abd, kji : ?, write down the main mappings that you made in formulating a solution (i.e. what letter does the letter "c" correspond with in the target string "kji"), and suggest how these letters are "playing the same role." This may give you insight into the sorts of representations that you have used in formulating a solution.

Solution

What does “c” map to

How are they playing the same role?

Exercise 3. Using the descriptions given above, write down the rule explaining the initial transformation, and the modified rule for each of the solutions given below to the problem abc : abd, kji : ?. From the differences noted between these rules, write down the conceptual slippages that have occurred (if any), and give a brief explanation as to why these may have occurred.

abc : abd, kji : kjj

Initial Transformation Rule: __________________________________________

Modified Rule: _____________________________________________________

Slippages: _________________________________________________________

abc : abd, kji : kjh

Initial Transformation Rule: __________________________________________

Modified Rule: _____________________________________________________

Slippages: _________________________________________________________

abc : abd, kji : lji

Initial Transformation Rule: __________________________________________

Modified Rule: _____________________________________________________

Slippages: _________________________________________________________

Exercise 5. Copycat is initialized with the problem abc : abd, ijk : ?. Press the play button in the main control window, and watch Copycat solve the analogy. While watching, you should note the following:

What is the solution that results?

__________________________________

What are the descriptions attached to the groups “abc” and “ijk” (noted in the boxes underlying the groups)?

abc __________________________________

ijk ___________________________________

How do the activations for successor (sc), predecessor (pd), left (lf) and right (rt) look in comparison to each other (white with a red box around it means fully active)?

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

What approximately is the final temperature?

____________

Excercise 6. You can load Copycat's responses for previously run problems by going to the "File" pull-down menu, and selecting the item "Load Group Run." For each of the following problems, load the solutions by typing the string given in parentheses as the filename (once you have selected the "Load Group Run" item).

When you have typed in the filename, press OK, and wait a few moments while the data is loaded from the Web. When loaded, Copycat will display its responses over 1000 trials, in the form of a bar graph.

Write down Copycat's responses for the following problems, in order of frequency of response:

abc : abd, kji : ? (kji)

Responses: __________________________________

abc : abd, iijjkk : ? (iijjkk)

Responses: __________________________________

abc : abd, jffwww : ? (jffwww)

Responses: __________________________________

For ONE of the responses that you didn’t find, describe the solution that Copycat gave.

3. The Workspace

Exercise 1: Describe two analogies (both with the same source, but different targets as above), that illustrate the point that what properties come to mind about a situation or object is dependent on the analogy being made (mention how the properties that differ in your analogies).

Exercise 2. From the "File" pulldown menu, select "new". This will allow you to run a new problem. Type in the strings abc, abd and iijjkk in the initial string box, the modified string box and the target string box respectively, and click on OK. This will set up the problem abc : abd, iijjkk : ?.

Question 2.1 Are there any descriptions given to a letter in the abc or abd strings that were not given to the iijjkk string?

_____

Why?
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Question 2.2 Certain descriptions given to these letters can distinguish them from the other letters in the string that it is contained within. What are the distinguishing descriptions given to the letter "c" in the above problem?

_____________________________________________________________________

Question 2.3 Only two of the letters in the string "iijjkk" can be unambiguously described in terms of these initial descriptions. What are these letters, and the descriptions that identify them. ?

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Exercise 3: Given that they are adjacent letters, how would you describe the relationship between:

the letters a and b in the string abc?

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the letters a and b in the string cba?

_________________________________________________________________

the two letter js in the string iijjkk?

_________________________________________________________________

Exercise 4. load the problem abc : abd, kji : ? by using the File Pulldown menu, and selecting New and typing in the appropriate strings. Set the random seed of the problem to 68, by pulling down the "Run" menu and selecting Set Random Seed. Run the problem (by pressing Play from the Main Control window), and try to identify the kinds of bonds that are appearing as Copycat formulates a solution. You can press Pause at any time to pause the system, and Play to resume running.

Note down the solution string, and the types of bonds (note the type and the direction) that are formed between the letters in the abc string and the kji string in the final solution.

· solution string =_____________________________________

· type of bonds in the abc string =________________________

· type of bonds in the kji string =_________________________

Exercise 5. Press "Stop" to reset the Workspace and then run the problem abc : abd, kji : ? using 68 as a random seed, and try to identify the kinds of groups that are appearing as Copycat formulates a solution. Note down the solution string, and the descriptions that are allocated to the groups abc, and kji.

· solution string = _______________________________________________

· descriptions that are attached to the abc group ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

· descriptions that are attached to the kji group ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Exercise 6. Rerun the previous problem, this time using a random seed of 177. Note down the solution string, and the descriptions that are allocated to the groups abc, and kji.

· solution string = _______________________________________________

· descriptions that are attached to the abc group _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

· descriptions that are attached to the kji group ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Because sameness groups are capable of acquiring descriptions regarding their letter-category, these groups themselves can be bonded to other objects, and can form high-level groups.

Exercise 7. Run the problem abc : abd, iijjkk : ? using 46 as a random seed. Explain how the string iijjkk has been perceived as a successor group.

Exercise 8. Run the problem abc : abd, cba : ? using 147 as a random seed and identify which descriptions allow the mapping of the two c’s together (i.e. what distinguishing descriptor(s) do these two objects have in common?).

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Exercise 9. Write down 4 possible rules that could be used to describe the transformation abc : abd. ?

(1)_______________________________________________________________

(2)_______________________________________________________________

(3)_______________________________________________________________

(4)_______________________________________________________________

Exercise 10. Run the problem abc : abd, kji : ? using a random seed value of 19, and note down the initial and the translated Rules. (The translated rule appears at the bottom of the Workspace at the end of a problem).

Initial Rule _______________________________________________________

Translated Rule ___________________________________________________

What correspondence contains the slippage that has been applied to the initial rule to derive the translated rule, and how was this correspondence allowed to form?

3. The Slipnet

Exercise 1. For the problem abc : abd, ijk : ?, write down the distinguishing descriptors for the letter "c", and from this, determine what objects in the target string it could be possibly mapped to.

Distinguishing descriptors :______________________________________________

Possible objects to map to: ______________________________________________

Exercise 2. Set up the problem abc : abd, ijk : ? using a random seed of 3. Now run the problem until Codelets Run = 70. Press Single Step, and describe the kind of bond that is formed at this time.

Bond ___________________________________________________

Continue pressing Single Step from the Main Control Window until the concept corresponding to this bond (i.e. either Successor or Predecessor) becomes fully active. Note that the direction of this bond also becomes active. What is the value of Codelets Run at this point?

______________

Exercise 3. To illustrate the influence of top-down pressures, run the previous problem (i.e using a random seed of 3) and note down the type of bonds that are used to describe the strings in the final solution.

Bonds _____________________________________________________________

Now press Stop to reset the problem, and Clamp the predeccessor concept in the minimised Slipnet. This is achieved by selecting the Clamp from the Slipnet Actions Window, and clicking on the node that you wish to clamp. A red circle should appear in the concept in the minimised Slipnet. Now fully activate this concept by selecting the eyedropper from the Slipnet Actions Window, and clicking on the node. Now set the random seed to 3, and run the problem. Note down the types of bonds that are now formed in the final solution.

Bonds: _____________________________________________________________

Exercise 4. Remove the clamp from the predecessor concept from the previous exercise (by selecting the Clamp from the Slipnet Actions Window, and clicking on the node). Now select the Arrow from the Slipnet Actions Window, and drag the concepts successor and predecessor to the Graph Area (Note: Nothing will appear in the Graph window until the Copycat is running a problem). Run the problem abc : abd, ijk : ?, using a Random seed of 4. You should note that the activations of predecessor and successor are related to the structures present in the Workspace.

In the following box, draw the graph of the activations of the successor and predecessor concepts.

4. The Coderack

Exercise 1. From the Visible pulldown menu, select the "Show Proposed Structures" item. This will make visible the intermediate steps that are being taken to build structure in the Workspace. These "Proposed Structures" are shown in green, with the darkness corresponding to the level of completion, with black corresponding to fully built structures.

Make sure the Workspace is Maximised and run the problem abc-abd, ijk-?, using a random seed value of 25. You should see several possible avenues being explored in parallel, with the proposed structures not straying too far from the structures that are built. This is similar to a column of ants, in which the ants at the front branch out in all directions, with the most promising pathway being taken by the colony.

Describe some of the alternatives that were explored.

5. The Temperature

Exercise 1. Load the group runs jffwww_100, jffwww_50 and jffwww_0, to see the effect of clamping the temperature at these levels. Compare these results to the original results, and comment about how the temperature affects the number of solutions that are derived, and the relative probability of the solutions.

Exercise 2. Why is it important that the system be capable at stopping at a high temperature (i.e. when not much structure has been built)?