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From: jbn@GLACIER.STANFORD.EDU.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.ai.digest
Subject: Re:  AIList Digest   V5 #171
Message-ID: <17127@glacier.STANFORD.EDU>
Date: Fri, 10-Jul-87 14:37:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: glacier.17127
Posted: Fri Jul 10 14:37:00 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 12-Jul-87 23:41:30 EDT
References: <8707062225.AA18518@brillig.umd.edu>
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Reply-To: glacier!jbn (John B. Nagle)
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In article <8707062225.AA18518@brillig.umd.edu> hendler@BRILLIG.UMD.EDU
(Jim Hendler) writes:

>When I publish work on planning and
>claim ``my system makes better choices than planning program's>'' I cannot verify this other than by showing
>some examples that my system handles that 's can't.  But of 
>course, there is no way of establishing that  couldn't do
>examples mine can't and etc.  Instead we can end up forming camps of
>beliefs (the standard proof methodology in AI) and arguing -- sometimes
>for the better, sometimes for the worse.

     Of course there's a way of "establishing that  couldn't do
examples mine can't and etc."  You have somebody try the same problems on
both systems.  That's why you need to bring the work up to the point that others
can try your software and evaluate your work.  Others must repeat your
experiments and confirm your results.  That's how science is done.

     I work on planning myself.  But I'm not publishing yet.  My planning
system is connected to a robot and the plans generated are carried out in the
physical world.  This keeps me honest.  I have simple demos running now;
the first videotaping session was last month, and I expect to have more
interesting demos later this year.  Then I'll publish.  I'll also distribute
the code and the video.

     So shut up until you can demo.

						John Nagle