This book is a critical discussion of the principle of compositionality, the thesis that the meaning of a complex expression is fully determined by the meanings of its constituents and its structure. The aim of this book is to clarify what is meant by this principle, to show that its traditional justification is insufficient, and to discuss some of the problems that have to be addressed before a new attempt can be made to justify it.

In this book leading scholars from every relevant field report on all aspects of compositionality, the notion that the meaning of an expression can be derived from its parts. Understanding how compositionality works is a central element of syntactic and semantic analysis and a challenge for models of cognition. It is a key concept in linguistics and philosophy and in the cognitive sciences more generally, and is without question one of the most exciting fields in the study of language and mind. The authors of this book report critically on lines of research in different disciplines, revealing the connections between them and highlighting current problems and opportunities. The force and justification of compositionality have long been contentious. First proposed by Frege as the notion that the meaning of an expression is generally determined by the meaning and syntax of its components, it has since been deployed as a constraint on the relation between theories of syntax and semantics, as a means of analysis, and more recently as underlying the structures of representational systems, such as computer programs and neural architectures. The Oxford Handbook of Compositionality explores these and many other dimensions of this challenging field. It will appeal to researchers and advanced students in linguistics and philosophy and to everyone concerned with the study of language and cognition including those working in neuroscience, computational science, and bio-informatics.

This book originates from the International Symposium on Compositionality, COMPOS'97, held in Bad Malente, Germany in September 1997. The 25 chapters presented in revised full version reflect the current state of the art in the area of compositional reasoning about concurrency. The book is a valuable reference for researchers and professionals interested in formal systems design and analysis; it also is well suited for self study and use in advanced courses.

This book repairs and revives the Theory of Knowledge research program of Russell’s Principia era. Chapter 1, 'Introduction and Overview', explains the program’s agenda. Inspired by the non-Fregean logicism of Principia Mathematica, it endorses the revolution within mathematics presenting it as a study of relations. The synthetic a priori logic of Principia is the essence of philosophy considered as a science which exposes the dogmatisms about abstract particulars and metaphysical necessities that create prisons that fetter the mind. Incipient in The Problems of Philosophy, the program’s acquaintance epistemology embraced a multiple-relation theory of belief. It reached an impasse in 1913, having been itself retrofitted with abstract particular logical forms to address problems of direction and compositionality. With its acquaintance epistemology in limbo, Scientific Method in Philosophy became the sequel to Problems. Chapter 2 explains Russell’s feeling intellectually dishonest. Wittgenstein’s demand that logic exclude nonsense belief played no role. The 1919 neutral monist era ensued, but Russell found no epistemology for the logic essential to philosophy. Repairing, Chapters 4–6 solve the impasse. Reviving, Chapters 3 and 7 vigorously defend the facts about Principia. Studies of modality and entailment are viable while Principia remains a universal logic above the civil wars of the metaphysicians.

The Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Psychology, Second Edition is an invaluable guide and major reference source to the key topics, problems, concepts, and debates in philosophy of psychology and is the first companion of its kind. A team of renowned international contributors provide forty-eight chapters, organized into six clear parts: Historical background to philosophy of psychology Psychological explanation Cognition and representation The biological basis of psychology Perceptual experience Personhood. The Companion covers key topics, such as the origins of experimental psychology; folk psychology; behaviorism and functionalism; philosophy, psychology and neuroscience; the language of thought, modularity, nativism, and representational theories of mind; consciousness and the senses; dreams, emotion, and temporality; personal identity; and the philosophy of psychopathology. For the second edition, six new chapters have been added to address the following important topics: belief and representation in nonhuman animals; prediction error minimization; contemporary neuroscience; plant neurobiology; epistemic judgment; and group cognition. Essential reading for all students of philosophy of mind, science, and psychology, The Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Psychology will also be of interest to anyone studying psychology and its related disciplines.

Edited in collaboration with FoLLI, the Association of Logic, Language and Information, this book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 8th International Tbilisi Symposium on Logic, Language, and Computation, TbiLLC 2009, held in Bakuriani, Georgia, in September 2009. The 20 revised full papers included in the book were carefully reviewed and selected from numerous presentations given at the symposium. The focus of the papers is on the following topics: natural language syntax, semantics, and pragmatics; constructive, modal and algebraic logic; linguistic typology and semantic universals; logics for artificial intelligence; information retrieval, query answer systems; logic, games, and formal pragmatics; language evolution and learnability; computational social choice; historical linguistics, history of logic.

John Collins presents an analysis of the problem of the unity of the proposition - how propositions can be both single things and complexes at the same time. He surveys previous investigations of the problem and offers his own solution, which is defended from both philosophical and linguistic perspectives.

Publisher Description

This book constitutes the refereed best selected papers of the 4th International Workshop on Parameterized and Exact Computation, IWPEC 2009, held in Copenhagen, Denmark, in September 2009. The 25 revised full papers presented together with 2 invited talks were carefully reviewed and selected from 52 submissions. The topics addressed cover research in all aspects of parameterized and exact computation and complexity, including but not limited to new techniques for the design and analysis of parameterized and exact algorithms, parameterized complexity theory, relationship between parameterized complexity and traditional complexity classifications, applications of parameterized and exact computation, implementation issues of parameterized and exact algorithms, high-performance computing and fixed-parameter tractability.

Summary Functional Reactive Programming teaches the concepts and applications of FRP. It offers a careful walk-through of core FRP operations and introduces the concepts and techniques you'll need to use FRP in any language. Purchase of the print book includes a free eBook in PDF, Kindle, and ePub formats from Manning Publications. About the Technology Today's software is shifting to more asynchronous, event-based solutions. For decades, the Observer pattern has been the go-to event infrastructure, but it is known to be bug-prone. Functional reactive programming (FRP) replaces Observer, radically improving the quality of event-based code. About the Book Functional Reactive Programming teaches you how FRP works and how to use it. You'll begin by gaining an understanding of what FRP is and why it's so powerful. Then, you'll work through greenfield and legacy code as you learn to apply FRP to practical use cases. You'll find examples in this book from many application domains using both Java and JavaScript. When you're finished, you'll be able to use the FRP approach in the systems you build and spend less time fixing problems. What's Inside Think differently about data and events FRP techniques for Java and JavaScript Eliminate Observer one listener at a time Explore Sodium, RxJS, and Kefir.js FRP systems About the Reader Readers need intermediate Java or JavaScript skills. No experience with functional programming or FRP required. About the Authors Stephen Blackheath and Anthony Jones are experienced software developers and the creators of the Sodium FRP library for multiple languages. Foreword by Heinrich Apfelmus. Illustrated by Duncan Hill. Table of Contents Stop listening! Core FRP Some everyday widget stuff Writing a real application New concepts FRP on the web Switch Operational primitives Continuous time Battle of the paradigms Programming in the real world Helpers and patterns Refactoring Adding FRP to existing projects Future directions