We present a Spades bidding algorithm that is superior to recreational human players and to publicly available bots. Like in Bridge, the game of Spades is composed of two independent phases, \textit{bidding} and \textit{playing}. This paper focuses on the bidding algorithm, since this phase holds a precise challenge: based on the input, choose the bid that maximizes the agent's winning probability. Our \emph{Bidding-in-Spades} (BIS) algorithm heuristically determines the bidding strategy by comparing the expected utility of each possible bid. A major challenge is how to estimate these expected utilities. To this end, we propose a set of domain-specific heuristics, and then correct them via machine learning using data from real-world players. The \BIS algorithm we present can be attached to any playing algorithm. It beats rule-based bidding bots when all use the same playing component. When combined with a rule-based playing algorithm, it is superior to the average recreational human.

The ideas introduced in this book explore the relationships among rule based systems, machine learning and big data. Rule based systems are seen as a special type of expert systems, which can be built by using expert knowledge or learning from real data. The book focuses on the development and evaluation of rule based systems in terms of accuracy, efficiency and interpretability. In particular, a unified framework for building rule based systems, which consists of the operations of rule generation, rule simplification and rule representation, is presented. Each of these operations is detailed using specific methods or techniques.

Artificial intelligence is forcing industries to evolve at an incredible rate. By helping companies save time and money, AI is already revolutionizing productivity and customer service around the world. A Microsoft survey of more than 400 senior executives across eight global markets found that executives expect AI to benefit their businesses to positively impact growth, productivity, innovation, and job creation. A stunning 94% of them see AI as an important tool for solving strategic challenges. Artificial intelligence has already had a profound impact on the ways many industries do business ... [ ] every day.

--In this paper, we propose an efficient algorithm for mining novel'Set of Contrasting Rules'-pattern (SCR-pattern), which consists of several association rules. This pattern is of high interest due to the guaranteed quality of the rules forming it and its ability to discover useful knowledge. However, SCR-pattern has no efficient mining algorithm. We propose SCR-Apriori algorithm, which results in the same set of SCR-patterns as the state-of-the-art approache, but is less computationally expensive. We also show experimentally that by incorporating the knowledge about the pattern structure into Apriori algorithm, SCR-Apriori can significantly prune the search space of frequent itemsets to be analysed. I NTRODUCTION Association rules learning is a popular technique in data mining [1]. However, it is known that finding rules of high quality is not always an easy task [2]. This issue is even more significant in domains where the reliability of the obtained knowledge is required to be high (for example, in medicine). Also, association rules mining techniques usually generate a huge number of rules that have to be analysed by a human in order to choose meaningful and useful ones [3].

Answer Set Programming (ASP) is nowadays a dominant rule-based knowledge representation tool. Though existing ASP variants enjoy efficient implementations, generating an answer set remains intractable. The goal of this research is to define a new \asp-like rule language, 4SP, with tractable model generation. The language combines ideas of ASP and a paraconsistent rule language 4QL. Though 4SP shares the syntax of \asp and for each program all its answer sets are among 4SP models, the new language differs from ASP in its logical foundations, the intended methodology of its use and complexity of computing models. As we show in the paper, 4QL can be seen as a paraconsistent counterpart of ASP programs stratified with respect to default negation. Although model generation of well-supported models for 4QL programs is tractable, dropping stratification makes both 4QL and ASP intractable. To retain tractability while allowing non-stratified programs, in 4SP we introduce trial expressions interlacing programs with hypotheses as to the truth values of default negations. This allows us to develop a~model generation algorithm with deterministic polynomial time complexity. We also show relationships among 4SP, ASP and 4QL.

Finland, in the spirit of Norway and Denmark, introduced ranking system for academic publication channels (referring to scientific journals, conference series, book publishers etc.) called as Jufo (i.e. "Julkaisufoorumi" in Finnish, "Publication Forum" in English) in 2010, together with the renewed university legislation. The ranking of a publication channel, ranging from 0 (non-peer- reviewed) to 3 (most distinguished academic publication forums), is decided by a specially nominated panel of a particular scientific discipline. These panels decide the rankings based on their academic expertise in regular meetings. Because the rankings are directly linked to the allocated funding of the universities, there has been and is a lot of discussion about the fairness and objectivity of the ranks. A versatile analysis of the 2015 Jufo-rankings was done in [10]. There, by using association rule mining, decision trees, and confusion matrices with respect to Norwegian and Danish ranks, it was shown that most of the expert-based rankings could be predicted and explained with machine learning methods. Moreover, it was found out that those publication channels, for which the Finnish expert-based rank is higher than the estimated one, are characterized by higher publication activity or recent upgrade of the rank. Hence, the outcomes of the system, the publication ranks, need to be assessed and evaluated regularly and rigorously. 1

Planning is a critical component of any artificial intelligence system that concerns the realization of strategies or action sequences typically for intelligent agents and autonomous robots. Given predefined parameterized actions, a planning service should accept a query with the goal and initial state to give a solution with a sequence of actions applied to environmental objects. This paper addresses the problem by providing a repository of actions generically applicable to various environmental objects based on Semantic Web technologies. Ontologies are used for asserting constraints in common sense as well as for resolving compatibilities between actions and states. Constraints are defined using Web standards such as SPARQL and SHACL to allow conditional predicates. We demonstrate the usefulness of the proposed planning domain description language with our robotics applications.

This paper proposes a tentative and original survey of meeting points between Knowledge Representation and Reasoning (KRR) and Machine Learning (ML), two areas which have been developing quite separately in the last three decades. Some common concerns are identified and discussed such as the types of used representation, the roles of knowledge and data, the lack or the excess of information, or the need for explanations and causal understanding. Then some methodologies combining reasoning and learning are reviewed (such as inductive logic programming, neuro-symbolic reasoning, formal concept analysis, rule-based representations and ML, uncertainty in ML, or case-based reasoning and analogical reasoning), before discussing examples of synergies between KRR and ML (including topics such as belief functions on regression, EM algorithm versus revision, the semantic description of vector representations, the combination of deep learning with high level inference, knowledge graph completion, declarative frameworks for data mining, or preferences and recommendation). This paper is the first step of a work in progress aiming at a better mutual understanding of research in KRR and ML, and how they could cooperate.

In this paper, we introduce the increasing belief criterion in association rule mining. The criterion uses a recursive application of Bayes' theorem to compute a rule's belief. Extracted rules are required to have their belief increase with their last observation. We extend the taxonomy of association rule mining algorithms with a new branch for Bayesian rule mining~(BRM), which uses increasing belief as the rule selection criterion. In contrast, the well-established frequent association rule mining~(FRM) branch relies on the minimum-support concept to extract rules. We derive properties of the increasing belief criterion, such as the increasing belief boundary, no-prior-worries, and conjunctive premises. Subsequently, we implement a BRM algorithm using the increasing belief criterion, and illustrate its functionality in three experiments: (1)~a proof-of-concept to illustrate BRM properties, (2)~an analysis relating socioeconomic information and chemical exposure data, and (3)~mining behaviour routines in patients undergoing neurological rehabilitation. We illustrate how BRM is capable of extracting rare rules and does not suffer from support dilution. Furthermore, we show that BRM focuses on the individual event generating processes, while FRM focuses on their commonalities. We consider BRM's increasing belief as an alternative criterion to thresholds on rule support, as often applied in FRM, to determine rule usefulness.

People often talk about artificial intelligence as if it were all one thing. It's more accurate to think of AI as a collection of approaches to problems. An AI system usually combines several approaches, doing whatever produces the best results. The design of a piece of software needs to decide what problem domain it will cover. In other words, what class of problems will it deal with? The narrower the domain is, the easier the job.