Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site ames.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!ittvax!dcdwest!sdcsvax!sdcrdcf!hplabs!ames!jaw From: jaw@ames.UUCP (James A. Woods) Newsgroups: net.ai Subject: Re: Humor & Seminar - Slimy Logic Message-ID: <548@ames.UUCP> Date: Wed, 3-Oct-84 00:50:35 EDT Article-I.D.: ames.548 Posted: Wed Oct 3 00:50:35 1984 Date-Received: Fri, 5-Oct-84 20:14:14 EDT References: <12302@sri-arpa.UUCP> Organization: NASA-Ames Research Center, Mtn. View, CA Lines: 33 # Fuzzy wuzzy was a bear... This B-Board article is a master parody, right down to the "so to speak" mannerism. Thanks for the entertainment! I took a couple of courses from Professor Zadeh at Berkeley in the 70s, not just in Fuzzy Logic, but also formal languages, where we all struggled with LALR(1) lookahead sets. The fuzzy controversy was raging then, with Prof. William Kahan, numerical analyst, being Zadeh's arch-enemy. Kahan was a natural devil's advocate, himself none too popular for raving on, in courses on data structures, a bit muchly about the way CDC 6400 Fortrash treated roundoff of the 60th bit. Apparently, there's some bad blood over the size of Zadeh's grants (NSF?) for his fuzzy baby. They both have had tenure for years, so maybe a pie-throwing contest would be appropriate. Anyway, looks like the fuzzy stuff is now making the rounds at MIT. Zadeh, who ironically wrote the book on linear systems (circa 1948), at least got the linguistics department hopping with the fuzzies, influencing the Lakoffs (George, mainly) to trade in their equally ad hoc transformational grammars for fuzzy logic. Kinda soured me on natural language theory, too. I mean, is there life after YACC? Old Lofti has left an interesting legacy via his children. Zadeh's daughter, I understand is a brilliant lawyer. One son, after getting his statistics Ph.D. at 20 or so, claims to have draw poker figured out. Bluffing is dealt with by simple probability theory. As I remember, "Winning Poker Systems" is one of those "just-memorize-the-equivalent-of- ten-phone-numbers-for-instant-riches" books. He worked his way through school with funds won in Emeryville poker parlors. Not too shabby, but not too fuzzy, either ... -- James A. Woods {ihnp4,hplabs,philabs}!ames!jaw (jaw@riacs.ARPA)