Gul A. Agha's "Actors: A Model of Concurrent Computation in Distributed Systems (The MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1987, 144 pages, $25.00, ISBN 0-262-01092-5) is part of the MIT Press Series in Artificial Intelligence. This volume is edited by Patrick Winston, Michael Brady, and Daniel Bobrow.

I concentrate on this class of design 1989) that lays out the relation problems in this article. An example of an implicit function mapping from behavior to structure), typically in many engineering devices is safety: For conducted by means of a search or exploration example, a subsystem's role might only be in the space of possible subassemblies explained as something that prevents the of components. This accent on assembly is in leakage of a potentially hazardous substance, fact the origin of the frequent suggestion that and this function might never be explicitly design is a synthetic task. Only a vanishingly design specifications will usually mention a small number of objects in this space constitute number of constraints. The distinction even satisficing, not to mention optimal, between functions and constraints is hard to solutions. What is needed to make design formally pin down; functions are constraints practical are strategies that radically shrink on the behavior or properties of the device. However, it is useful to distinguish functions Set against the view of design as a deliberative from other constraints because functions are problem-solving process is the view of the primary reason that the device is desired. Artistic creations and weigh more than..."), the process of making scientific theories are often said by their creators the artifact from its description (manufacturability to have occurred to them in this Even when a plausible solution itself (for example, "I want a design within a occurs in this way, the proposal still needs to week"), and so on.

This article proposes connectionism as an alternative to classical cognitivism in understanding design. It also considers the difficulties encountered within a particular view of the role of explanations and typologies. Connectionism provides an alternative model that does not depend on the articulation of explanations and typologies.

Stuart Goldkind's book Machines and Intelligence: A Critique of Arguments against the Possibility of Artificial Intelligence (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1987, 139 pages, $29.95, ISBN 0-313-25450-8) considers and criticizes a collection of arguments against the possibility of AI.

Models of design processes provide guidance in the development of knowledge-based systems for design. The basis for such models comes from research in design theory and methodology as well as problem solving in AI. Three models are presented: decomposition, case-based reasoning, and transformation. Each model provides a formalism for representing design knowledge and experience in distinct and complementary forms.

After explicating the need for a large commonsense knowledge base spanning human consensus knowledge, we report on many of the lessons learned over the first five years of attempting its construction. We have come a long way in terms of methodology, representation language, techniques for efficient inferencing, the ontology of the knowledge base, and the environment and infrastructure in which the knowledge base is being built. We describe the evolution of Cyc and its current state and close with a look at our plans and expectations for the coming five years, including an argument for how and why the project might conclude at the end of this time.

Contrary to many prevailing approaches to knowledge acquisition, Laps, our expert-interviewing software, begins by soliciting cases from the expert, but it does not end there. Laps begins with a case in the form of a sample solution path elicited from the domain expert. This sample solution path is refined by a process called dechunking, which facilitates finding a model of the expert's reasoning process. Once these tables have been set up, the expert is able to produce row after row on his own until a complete rule base is built.

The second workshop in two years on the integration of knowledge-based systems with conventional computer techniques in agriculture and natural resource management (NRM) was held 18-19 August 1989 in Detroit, Michigan, in conjunction with the Tenth International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence. The workshop drew scientists from the United States and Canada, working in disciplines from engineering to entomology in universities, government, and industry. Twenty-two papers were presented at the workshop, after which participants were asked to discuss several key questions about the development, delivery, and use of knowledge-based systems in solving problems in agriculture and NRM.

The system, Hoist, performs fault diagnosis without the use of a repair expert or shallow rules. Its knowledge is coded directly from a structural specification of the Mark 45 lower hoist. In a mechanism like the lower hoist, the functional model must reason about forces, fluid pressures, and mechanical linkages; that is, it must reason about qualitative physics. Hypothetical reasoning, the process embodied in Hoist, has general utility in qualitative physics and reason maintenance.

The Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence held its 1990 Spring Symposium Series on March 27-29 at Stanford University, Stanford, California. This article contains a short summary of seven of the nine symposia that were conducted: AI and Molecular Biology, AI in Medicine, Automated Abduction, Case Based Reasoning, and Knowledge-Based Environments for Teaching and Learning.