JAKUB SZYMANIK

Institute for Logic, Language and Computation
University of Amsterdam

Science Park 107

P.O. Box 94242

1098 XG Amsterdam

The Netherlands

jakub.szymanik at gmail.com

Modality & Modalities, 23-24 May, Roskilde.

Abstract accepted at XPRAG-2013.

Logic, computability, and cognition at Nordic Spring School in Logic 2013

On 13th of June I'll talk about logic & cognition at Colloquium in Mathematical Philosophy, MCMP

Research:

I am an associate professor in cognitive modeling at the Institute for Logic, Language and Computation at the University of Amsterdam. I am affiliated with the Faculty of Humanities within the Research Priority Area Brain & Cognition. My research interests include logic, cognitive science, formal semantics, complexity theory, philosophy, and any combination of these. I try to use logical and computational tools for cognitive modeling and designing psychological experiments. In my current research, I'm mostly concerned with the logic and cognitive science of language and social interactions. I have been especially interested in computational and cognitive aspects of quantifier meaning. In January 2013 I started my NWO Veni project `What makes social interactions hard? A computational study of intentions, knowledge, and beliefs.'

Bio:

I studied philosophy, psychology, mathematics, and linguistics at the Individual Studies in the Humanities (MISH), University of Warsaw, where I obtained MA in the area of logic at the Institute of Philosophy. Then I went to Amsterdam and defended PhD at the Institute for Logic, Language and Computation. My advisors were Johan van Benthem, Marcin Mostowski, and Theo Janssen. I was working in the `Games and Linguistics' part of the GLoRiClass project funded by the European Community in the Marie Curie Program. My thesis work was about computational complexity and generalized quantifier theory. Directly after the graduation I was briefly teaching at the Cognitive Artificial Intelligence Program, Utrecht University and consulting for company SpeechConcept in machine translation. Next, I got a post-doctoral grant to work in the Department of Philosophy, Stockholm University. My project funded by the Swedish Research Council was devoted to language comprehension. I was involved in an experimental work, computational modeling and philosophical analysis in a collaboration with Peter Pagin. From Sweden, I went back to the Netherlands to join Rineke Verbrugge's NWO Vici project 'Cognitive systems in interaction: Logical and computational models of higher-order social cognition' in the the Institute of Artificial Intelligence and Cognitive Engineering of the University of Groningen. In the project I have developed an interest in the cognitive and computational constraints on social interaction.

Work in Progress:

Book project on computational semantics for quantifiers from a cognitive perspective
Jakub Szymanik. A note on the complexity of backward induction games, presented at RAIN, see the recent slides.
Marcin Zajenkowski, Maria Garraffa, and Jakub Szymanik. Working memory mechanism in proportional quantifier verification, under revision.
Jakub Szymanik. Ramsey properties as a source of intractability in natural language semantics, under revision.
Jakub Szymanik and Marcin Zajenkowski. Computational approaches towards monotonicity in sentence-picture verification, under revision. Slides
Jakub Szymanik, Livio Robaldo, Ben Meijering. On the identification of quantifiers' witness sets, under revision.
Marcin Zajenkowski, Rafał Styła, and Jakub Szymanik. Is the working memory overload associated with semantic processing impairments in schizophrenia?, submitted.
Marcin Zajenkowski and Jakub Szymanik. Intelligence, working memory and semantic processing: computational complexity predictions, under revision.
Alistair Isaac, Jakub Szymanik, Rineke Verbrugge. Logic and complexity in cognitive science, under revision for Trends in Logic book series in the honor of Johan van Benthem.
Camilo Thorne and Jakub Szymanik. Generalized Quantifier Distribution and Semantic Complexity, submitted.

Publications:

Jakub Szymanik, Shane Steinert-Threlkeld, Marcin Zajenkowski, and Thomas F. Icard III. Automata and Complexity in Multiple-Quantifier Sentence Verification, Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Cognitive Modeling, forthcoming.
Jakub Szymanik, Ben Meijering, and Rineke Verbrugge. Using intrinsic complexity of turn-taking games to predict participants' reaction times, Proceedings of the 35th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society, forthcoming.
Juha Kontinen and Jakub Szymanik. A characterization of definability of second-order generalized quantifiers with applications to non-definability. Journal of Computer and System Sciences, forthcoming. (see a preprint in LIRA yearbook 2011)
Cédric Dégremont, Lena Kurzen and Jakub Szymanik. Exploring tractability border in epistemic tasks, Synthese, 2012, online first.
Marcin Mostowski and Jakub Szymanik. Semantic bounds for everyday language, Semiotica, Vol. 188, Iss. 1/4, 2012, pp. 363-372 .
Livio Robaldo and Jakub Szymanik. Pragmatic Identification of the Witness Sets, Proceeding of the 8th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation, N. Calzolari et al. (Eds.), European Language Resources Association, Istanbul 2012.
Nina Gierasimczuk and Jakub Szymanik. Invariance properties of quantifiers and multiagent information exchange, Proceedings of 12th Meeting on Mathematics of Language, Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence 6878, M. Kanazawa, A. Kornai, M. Kracht and H. Seki (Eds.), 2011, Springer, Berlin, pp. 72-89.
Cédric Dégremont, Lena Kurzen and Jakub Szymanik. On the tractability of comparing informational structures, Proceedings of the Workshop 'Reasoning about Other Minds: Logical and Cognitive Perspectives', J. van Eijck, R. Verbrugge (Eds.), CEUR Workshop Proceedings 751, 2011, pp. 50-64. (see also extended version in Synthese, 2012)
Marcin Zajenkowski, Rafał Styła, and Jakub Szymanik. A computational approach to quantifiers as an explanation for some language impairments in schizophrenia, Journal of Communication Disorder, Vol. 44, 2011, pp. 595-600.
Jakub Szymanik and Marcin Zajenkowski. Contribution of working memory in the parity and proportional judgments, Belgian Journal of Linguistics, Vol. 25, 2011, pp. 189-206.
Iris van Rooij, Johan Kwisthout, Mark Blokpoel, Jakub Szymanik, Todd Wareham, and Ivan Toni. Intentional communication: Computationally easy or difficult?, Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, Vol. 5, 2011, pp. 1--18.
Nina Gierasimczuk and Jakub Szymanik. A note on a generalization of the Muddy Children Puzzle, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Theoretical Aspects of Rationality and Knowledge, K.Apt (Ed.), ACM Digital Library, 2011, pp. 257-264.
Juha Kontinen and Jakub Szymanik. Characterizing definability of second-order generalized quantifiers, Proceedings of the Workshop on Logic, Language, Information and Computation Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence 6642, L. Beklemishev and R. De Queiroz (Eds.), 2011, Springer, Berlin, pp. 187-200. (see also extended version in Journal of Computer and System Sciences, 2013)
Oliver Bott, Fabian Schlotterbeck, and Jakub Szymanik. Interpreting tractable versus intractable reciprocal sentences, Proceedings of the International Conference on Computational Semantics 9, J. Bos and S. Pulman (Eds.), SIGSEM, Oxford, 2011, pp. 75-84.
Jakub Szymanik. Computational complexity of polyadic lifts of generalized quantifiers in natural language, Linguistics and Philosophy, Vol. 33, Iss. 3, 2010, pp. 215-250.
Alistair Isaac and Jakub Szymanik. Logic in cognitive science: Bridging the gap between symbolic and connectionist paradigms, Journal of the Indian Council of Philosophical Research, Vol. XXVII, No 2, 2010, pp. 279-309. Also reprinted in: A New Survey of Active Directions in Modern Logic. Logic and Philosophy Today, A. Gupta, J. van Benthem (Eds.), Studies in Logic, Volume 30, College Publications, London, 2011, pp. 275-300.
Jakub Szymanik and Marcin Zajenkowski. Comprehension of simple quantifiers. Empirical evaluation of a computational model, Cognitive Science, 34(3), 2010, pp. 521-532.
Jakub Szymanik and Marcin Zajenkowski. Quantifiers and working memory, Proceedings of Amsterdam Colloquium 2009, Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence 6042, M. Aloni and K. Schulz (Eds.), Springer, Berlin, 2010, pp. 456-464.
Jakub Szymanik. Almost all complex quantifiers are simple, Proceedings of the 13th Meeting on Mathematics of Language, Lecture Notes in Computer Science 6149, C. Ebert, G. Jäger, M. Kracht, J. Michaelis (Eds.), Springer, Berlin, 2010, pp. 272-280. (see also extended journal version in Linguistics and Philosophy, 2010)
Nina Gierasimczuk and Jakub Szymanik. Branching quantification vs. two-way quantification, Journal of Semantics, Vol. 26, No. 4, 2009, pp. 329-366.
Jakub Szymanik and Marcin Zajenkowski. Improving methodology of quantifier comprehension experiments, Neuropsychologia, Vol. 47, No. 12, 2009, pp. 2682-2683.
Jakub Szymanik and Marcin Zajenkowski. Understanding quantifiers in language, Proceedings of the 31st Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society, N. A. Taatgen and H. van Rijn (Eds.), 2009, pp.1109-1115. (see also extended journal version in Cognitive Science, 2010)
Jakub Szymanik. The computational complexity of quantified reciprocals, Proceedings of the 7th International Tbilisi Symposium on Logic, Language, and Computation, Lecture Notes on Artificial Intelligence 5422, P. Bosh, D. Gabelaia, J. Lang (Eds.), Springer, Berlin 2009, pp. 139-152. (see also extended journal version in Linguistics and Philosophy, 2010)
Juha Kontinen and Jakub Szymanik. A remark on collective quantification, Journal of Logic, Language and Information, Vol. 17, No. 2, 2008, pp. 131-140.
Jakub Szymanik. A comment on a neuroimaging study of natural language quantifier comprehension, Neuropsychologia, Vol. 45, Iss. 9, 2007, pp. 2158-2160.
Jakub Szymanik. Strong Meaning Hypothesis from a computational perspective, Proceedings of the 16th Amsterdam Colloquium, M. Aloni, P. Dekker, F. Roelofsen (Eds.), 2007, Amsterdam, pp. 211-216. (see also extended journal version in Linguistics and Philosophy, 2010)
Jakub Szymanik. Semantyka obliczeniowa dla kwantyfikatorów monadycznych w języku naturalnym, Studia Semiotyczne 26, 2007, pp. 219-244.
Tadeusz Ciecierski and Jakub Szymanik. O hipotezie Bar-Hillela, Studia Semiotyczne 25, 2004, pp. 201-212.
Jakub Szymanik. Problemy z formą logiczną, Studia Semiotyczne 25, 2004, pp. 187-200.

Books and Edited Volumes:

Special issue of Journal of Logic, Language, and Information on Logic and Cognition. Jakub Szymanik and Rineke Verbrugge (eds.), in preparation.
Proceedings of the Logic & Cognition Workshop at ESSLLI 2012, Opole, Poland, 13-17 August, 2012. Jakub Szymanik and Rineke Verbrugge (eds.), CEUR Workshop Proceedings, Volume 883, CEUR-WS.org, 2012.
Jakub Szymanik. Quantifiers in TIME and SPACE. Computational Complexity of Generalized Quantifiers in Natural Language, PhD Thesis, University of Amsterdam, 2009.
Front cover; Back cover; Defense slides
Book Kognitywistyka. O umyśle umyślnie i nieumyślnie. Jakub Szymanik and Marcin Zajenkowski (eds.), MISH, Warszawa, 2004.
Book Filozofia wobec nauk szczegółowych. Tadeusz Ciecierski, Lech Nijakowski, and Jakub Szymanik (eds.), MISH, Warszawa, 2002.

Invited Conference Lectures:

Playing Eleusis (with Nina Gierasimczuk), European Summer School in Logic, Language, and Information Student Session , Opole 2012.
A Tractability Border in Natural Language Semantics, International Conference on Cognitive Modeling 2012 Workshop `Scaling Models of Cognition to the Real World', Berlin 2012.
Intentional Communication: Computationally Easy or Difficult. A Comment on Robin Clark's "Face, Reputation, and Truth", Lorentz Center Workshop `Modeling Strategic Reasoning', Leiden 2012.
Generalizing Muddy Children Puzzle, Dagstuhl Seminar Computer Science & Problem Solving: New Foundations, Dagstuhl 2011.
Logic & Cognition Workshop, `Entia et Nomina' Workshop, Gdańsk 2011.
Quantifier Verification. Between Computational and Algorithmic Level, 3rd Workshop on Semantic Processing, Logic and Cognition, Tübingen 2011.
Logic & Cognition. The new psychologism in logic, 7th Conference on Argumentation `Cognition and Argument: An Insight into Real-Life Practice', Warsaw 2011.
Logic and Cognition, Logic and Philosophy Today, Dehli 2011.
Complexity, meaning, and quantifiers, Workshop on Vague Quantities and Vague Quantifiers, Berlin 2010.
Muddy Children Playground, Logic, Rationality and Intelligent Interaction, ESSLLI workshop, Copenhagen 2010.
Generalized Quantifiers. From Logic to Cognitive Science, Szklarska Poręba Workshop 2010.
Comprehension of Simple Quantifiers. Empirical Evaluation of a Computational Model, 2nd Workshop on Semantic Processing, Logic and Cognition, Tübingen 2009.
Computational Dichotomy between Reciprocals, Games in Logic, Language and Computation 14, Amsterdam 2007.
Modyfikatory typów i kwantyfikacja w języku naturalnym, Warsztaty Logiczne `Logika i kognitywistyka', Szklarska Poręba 2007.
Complexity of Quantifier Meaning, PALMYR 5 `Dynamic Perspectives on Meaning', Paris 2007.

Some Refereed Talks:

A Note on the Complexity of Backward Induction Games, Reasoning and Interaction at NASSLLI, Austin 2012.
Computational Approaches Towards Monotonicity in Sentence-Picture Verification, Texas Linguistics Society Conference, Austin 2012.
Invariance Properties of Quantifiers & Multi-agent Information Exchange, 12th Mathematics of Language, Nara 2011.
Schizophrenic Patients Find Proportional Quantification Difficult Due to Working Memory Deficits, Proper Use of Quantification in Ordinary Language, Ljubljana 2011.
A Generalization of the Muddy Children Puzzle, 13th conference on Theoretical Aspects of Rationality and Knowledge, Groningen 2011.
Characterizing Definability of Second-Order Generalized Quantifiers, 18th Workshop on Logic, Language, Information and Computation, Philadelphia 2011.
Monotonicity in Quantifier Verification, Sinn und Bedeutung 15, Saarbrücken 2010.
Working Memory and Quantifiers, Utterance Interpretation and Cognitive Models III, Brussels 2010.
Quantifiers and Working Memory, Amsterdam Colloquium, Amsterdam 2009.
Almost All Complex Quantifiers are Simple, Eleventh Meeting on Mathematics of Language, Bielefeld 2009.
Understanding Quantifiers in Language, The Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, Amsterdam 2009.
How Complex is Language?, Szklarska Poręba Workshop 2009.
A Remark on Collective Quantification, Szklarska Poręba Workshop 2008.
Computational Complexity and the Strong Meaning Hypothesis, 7th International Symposium on Language, Logic and Computation, Tbilisi 2007.
Verifiable Fragments of Language: Everyday Language Quantifiers, Szklarska Poręba Workshop 2007.
The Notion of Computational Complexity in Psycholinguistics. Empirical evidence, European Society for Philosophy and Psychology Annual Meeting, Belfast 2006.
Computational Complexity of Some Ramsey Quantifiers in Finite Models, Logic Colloqium, Nijmegen 2006.
Hintikka's Thesis Revisited, Szklarska Poręba Workshop 2006.
Computational Basis for Natural Language Quantifiers Comprehension, European Society for Psychology and Philosophy Annual Meeting, Lund 2005.
Defining the Meanings of Quantifiers, Prague International Colloquium "Logic, Games and Philosophy: Foundational Perspectives", Prague 2004.
Can Every Indexical Sentence be Translated into Standing Sentence?, Epistemological Controversies, Toruń 2003.

Seminar talks:

Quantifier Transformations, Knowledge Representation and Data Base Research Center, Bolzano 2012.
Complexity of Backward Induction Games, Logic and Interactive Rationality Seminar, Amsterdam 2012.
Agent-oriented Perspective on Epistemic Reasonings, Theoretical Philosophy Seminar, Lund 2012.
Multi-agent Information Exchange, Artificial Intelligence Colloquium, Groningen 2012.
Complexity Measures in Cognitive Science, Psychological Research Methods Seminar, Amsterdam 2012.
Model Transformations, Logic and Interactive Rationality Seminar, Groningen 2011.
The Complexity of the Sentence-picture Verification, Multi-agent Systems Group Seminar, Groningen 2011.
Characterizing Definability of Collective Quantifiers in Natural Language, CogSci Forum, Warsaw 2011.
Characterizing Definability of Second-order Generalized Quantifiers in Natural Language, The Logic Seminar, Gothenburg 2011.
An Alternative Story of Muddy Children, Logic Seminar, Helsinki 2010.
Monotonicity and Quantifiers, Logic, Language, and Mind Seminar, Stockholm 2010.
Monotonicity in Quantifier Verification, Department of Linguistics Seminar, Tübingen 2010.
MOST, Seminar on Psycholinguistics and Processing of "most", Tübingen 2010.
Quantifier Processing, Research Seminar in Logic and Language, Tilburg 2010.
Data Complexity of the Quantifier Fragments in Natural Language, GLoRiClass Farewell, Amsterdam 2010.
Collective Quantification, Type-shifting, and Complexity, Leiden Utrecht Semantic Happening, Utrecht 2009.
Most of the NPs aren't NP-hard,Generalized Quantifiers: Formal Semantics Meets Computation and Cognition, Amsterdam 2009.
Understanding Quantifiers, Theoretical Cognitive Science Group Meeting, Nijmegen 2009.
Complexity of Quantifiers,Computational Linguistics Seminar, Amsterdam 2009.
Quantifiers, Automata and Language Comprehension, Logic Tea, Amsterdam 2008.
Experimenting with some non-Fregean quantifier combinations, Logic, Language, and Reasoning Seminar, Amsterdam 2008.
Computational Insights into Meaning, GLoRiClass Halftime Event, Amsterdam 2008.
Obliczeniowy model rozumienia kwantyfikatorów w świetle badań neuropsychologicznych, Forum Kognitywistyczne, Warszawa 2007.
Quantifiers Comprehension. A Comment on Existing Studies and Proposition of the New Experiment, Logic, Language, and Reasoning Seminar, Amsterdam 2007.
Quantifiers, Games and Complexity, GloRiClass Seminar, Amsterdam 2006.