Computational Semantics
Encyclopedia
Computational semantics is the study of how to automate the process of constructing and reasoning with meaning representations
of natural language
expressions. It consequently plays an important role in natural language processing
and computational linguistics
.
Some traditional topics of interest are: construction of meaning representation
s, semantic underspecification
, anaphora
resolution, presupposition
projection, and quantifier scope resolution. Methods employed usually draw from formal semantics
or statistical semantics
. Computational semantics has points of contact with the areas of lexical semantics
(word sense disambiguation
and semantic role labeling
), discourse semantics, knowledge representation
and automated reasoning
(in particular, automated theorem proving
). Since 1999 there has been an ACL
special interest group on computational semantics, SIGSEM.
Semantics
Semantics is the study of meaning. It focuses on the relation between signifiers, such as words, phrases, signs and symbols, and what they stand for, their denotata....
of natural language
Natural language
In the philosophy of language, a natural language is any language which arises in an unpremeditated fashion as the result of the innate facility for language possessed by the human intellect. A natural language is typically used for communication, and may be spoken, signed, or written...
expressions. It consequently plays an important role in natural language processing
Natural language processing
Natural language processing is a field of computer science and linguistics concerned with the interactions between computers and human languages; it began as a branch of artificial intelligence....
and computational linguistics
Computational linguistics
Computational linguistics is an interdisciplinary field dealing with the statistical or rule-based modeling of natural language from a computational perspective....
.
Some traditional topics of interest are: construction of meaning representation
Semantic analysis (linguistics)
In linguistics, semantic analysis is the process of relating syntactic structures, from the levels of phrases, clauses, sentences and paragraphs to the level of the writing as a whole, to their language-independent meanings. It also involves removing features specific to particular linguistic and...
s, semantic underspecification
Underspecification
In theoretical linguistics, underspecification is a phenomenon in which certain features are omitted in underlying representations. Restricted underspecification theory holds that features should only be underspecified if their values are predictable. For example, in English, all front vowels are...
, anaphora
Anaphora (linguistics)
In linguistics, anaphora is an instance of an expression referring to another. Usually, an anaphoric expression is represented by a pro-form or some other kind of deictic--for instance, a pronoun referring to its antecedent...
resolution, presupposition
Presupposition
In the branch of linguistics known as pragmatics, a presupposition is an implicit assumption about the world or background belief relating to an utterance whose truth is taken for granted in discourse...
projection, and quantifier scope resolution. Methods employed usually draw from formal semantics
Formal semantics (linguistics)
In linguistics, formal semantics seeks to understand linguistic meaning by constructing precise mathematical models of the principles that speakers use to define relations between expressions in a natural language and the world which supports meaningful discourse.The mathematical tools used are the...
or statistical semantics
Statistical semantics
Statistical semantics is the study of "how the statistical patterns of human word usage can be used to figure out what people mean, at least to a level sufficient for information access"...
. Computational semantics has points of contact with the areas of lexical semantics
Lexical semantics
Lexical semantics is a subfield of linguistic semantics. It is the study of how and what the words of a language denote . Words may either be taken to denote things in the world, or concepts, depending on the particular approach to lexical semantics.The units of meaning in lexical semantics are...
(word sense disambiguation
Word sense disambiguation
In computational linguistics, word-sense disambiguation is an open problem of natural language processing, which governs the process of identifying which sense of a word is used in a sentence, when the word has multiple meanings...
and semantic role labeling
Semantic Role Labeling
Semantic role labeling is a task in natural language processing consisting of the detection of the semantic arguments associated with the predicate or verb of a sentence and their classification into their specific roles.-References:...
), discourse semantics, knowledge representation
Knowledge representation
Knowledge representation is an area of artificial intelligence research aimed at representing knowledge in symbols to facilitate inferencing from those knowledge elements, creating new elements of knowledge...
and automated reasoning
Automated reasoning
Automated reasoning is an area of computer science dedicated to understand different aspects of reasoning. The study in automated reasoning helps produce software which allows computers to reason completely, or nearly completely, automatically...
(in particular, automated theorem proving
Automated theorem proving
Automated theorem proving or automated deduction, currently the most well-developed subfield of automated reasoning , is the proving of mathematical theorems by a computer program.- Decidability of the problem :...
). Since 1999 there has been an ACL
Association for Computational Linguistics
The Association for Computational Linguistics is the international scientific and professional society for people working on problems involving natural language and computation. An annual meeting is held each summer in locations where significant computational linguistics research is carried out...
special interest group on computational semantics, SIGSEM.
Further reading
- Blackburn, P., and Bos, J. (2005), Representation and Inference for Natural Language : A First Course in Computational Semantics, CSLI Publications. ISBN 1575864967.
- Bunt, H., and Muskens, R. (1999), Computing Meaning, Volume 1, Kluwer Publishing, Dordrecht. ISBN 1402002904.
- Bunt, H., Muskens, R., and Thijsse, E. (2001), Computing Meaning, Volume 2, Kluwer Publishing, Dordrecht. ISBN 1402001754.
- Eijck, J. van, and C. Unger (2010): Computational Semantics with Functional Programming. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-75760-7
- Wilks, Y., and Charniak, E. (1976), Computational Semantics: An Introduction to Artificial Intelligence and Natural Language Understanding, North-Holland, Amsterdam. ISBN 0444111107.
External links
- Special Interest Group on Computational Semantics (SIGSEM) of the Association for Computational Linguistics (ACL)
- IWCS - International Workshop on Computational Semantics (endorsed by SIGSEM)
- ICoS - Inference in Computational Semantics (endorsed by SIGSEM)