Seminar on Computational Creativity

58311304
4
Algoritmit ja koneoppiminen
Syventävät opinnot
The seminar will cover selected topics in the theory, methods, and applications of computational creativity. Priority is given to students who have taken the course Introduction to Computational Creativity or The Computational Foundations of Linguistic Creativity.
Vuosi Lukukausi Päivämäärä Periodi Kieli Vastuuhenkilö
2011 syksy 08.09-08.12. 1-2 Englanti Hannu Toivonen

Luennot

Aika Huone Luennoija Päivämäärä
To 14-16 C220 Hannu Toivonen 08.09.2011-29.09.2011
To 14-16 C220 Hannu Toivonen 13.10.2011-13.10.2011
To 14-17 C220 Hannu Toivonen 03.11.2011-08.12.2011

Information for international students

This seminar will work in English.

Yleistä

The goal of computational creativity is to model, simulate or enhance creativity. This seminar will mainly discuss algorithmically oriented research papers in different subfields of computational creativity, such as linguistic, musical and visual creativity, creativity support tools, and computational models of human creativity.

Learning objectives:

  • improve scientific and technical writing skills
  • improve scientific and technical presentation skills
  • learn about methods for computational creativity

Also see the global learning objectives of seminars at the department: http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/en/courses/seminaarien-ennakkoilmoittautuminen/matrix

Kurssin suorittaminen

Participants must have completed the course Scientific writing or have equivalent skills. A maximum of 12 students will be elected for the seminar on the basis of their application and previous studies.

Students complete this seminar by actively participating in its work: the work methods include studying scientific sources, writing reports and giving presentations, reading the reports of other participants and evaluating them, and actively following presentations.

The grading will be based on each student's own written work (1/3), oral presentation (1/3), and commentary on the reports of others as well as activeness in general (1/3). To pass the seminar, each of these components must be passed. (Active) attendance of seminar meetings is obligatory. Absense from at most two meetings is accepted (and will affect grading).

Seminar routines

Each student will have three roles in the seminar: (1) a writer and speaker, (2) reviewer of two other reports, (3) audience for the rest of the reports and oral presentations. For each of these roles, the seminar will use the following routines. All written material (outlines, reports, reviews, slides) will be delivered via Moodle (see link at top of the page).

Writer and speaker

  • Before the first meeting, get an overview of the area by reading the editorial 'Simon Colton, Ramon Lopez de Mantaras, Oliviero Stock: Computational Creativity: Coming of Age. AI Magazine Special Issue on Creativity (Fall, 2009). Vol 30, No 3.' (Go to www.aaai.org/ojs/index.php/aimagazine/article/view/2257/2096 and click on "Download this PDF file".)
  • In or immediately after the first meeting, each student will choose a topic for the seminar work (see tab "Provisional topics and literature" at the top of this page for suggestions) and a date is set for the oral presentation.
  • By 15 Sep, the student selects source material and familiarizes him/herself with it, and prepares an the outline of the report (1-2 pages).
  • Three weeks before the oral presentation the writer delivers his/her seminar report (see instructions below).
  • (Two other seminar participants evaluate the report and give their feedback on it within a week.)
  • One week before the oral presentation the writer delivers the final report, to be distributed to all participants, as well as slides for the oral presentation, delivered at this phase to the same two students to comment on.
  • On the agreed date, the oral presentation is given.

Reviewer

  • Each student reviews the reports of two other students. The time to carry out each review is one week, starting three weeks before the oral presentation.
  • The review will consist of (1) reading the report thoroughly, (2) possibly reading some of the original material, (3) providing written feedback (see instructions on a separate tab), and (4) discussing the report and the feedback with the writer and the other reviewer.
  • Several hours need to be reserved for carrying out a review. Start reading early so you have time to digest the report, to understand what the author tries to say, and to write detailed and constructive comments.

Audience

  • Every student is assumed to read each seminar report before it is presented orally, but no detailed study of the report is required. The report is available for reading one week before the oral presentation.
  • The audience is also assumed to active in the oral presentations: learning, commenting, asking questions.

Guidelines

Keep in mind that the written report and the oral presentation have partially different goals.

The oral presentation should explain the main ideas of the content, simplifying concepts when necessary. Depending on the topic, a good presentation should include many examples to illustrate the subject matter and only some choice technical details that are important and can be discussed thoroughly enough during the presentation. The oral presentation should last around 45 minutes.

For the report, put more emphasis on exactness and scientific representation. The report should be a product of the student, even though it is based on source material. For instance, the text in the report must be produced by the student (i.e., no copy-pasting), and the contents should reflect the conclusions, interests, background, and views of the student. You are encouraged to provide a personal view, but be clear in the report which parts are from literature and which ideas or views are your own. The report must contain technical material on a selected specific topic, i.e., it should not be just a summary or overview of the source material. Therefore, you must pick and choose what to discuss in your report in more detail, and the emphasis of the report may be quite different from the original articles. For the things you leave out, refer to the source material. A suitable length for the report is 10-15 pages. See, e.g., the page for the course Scientific writing for instructions (and links to further instructions): http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kurhila/tiki_k2007/coursedescription.html .

Kirjallisuus ja materiaali

Suitable topics and source literature is listed on the tab "Provisional topics and literature" (see top of page). Each student selects a topic for his/her report and presentations, and uses suitable scientific source material (typically 2 articles as key sources). You may use other literature, too. In any case, you must agree on your source literature with the seminar leaders in good time before you start.

Some articles are available in electronic format only from computers in the university network (and with suitable proxy settings in your browser or by a VPN connection).

Other information

This seminar is a pilot user of Turnitin (www.turnitin.com). "Turnitin improves the student writing cycle by preventing plagiarism and providing rich feedback to students."

Please, see blogs.helsinki.fi/plagiaattipilotti/ for more information about the pilot (unfortunately currently mostly in Finnish).

Use the feedback form at https://ilmo.cs.helsinki.fi/kurssit/servlet/Valinta?kieli=en to give feedback on the seminar!