Logic List Mailing Archive

Postdoctoral position (1+2y) on the "What-If Machine", Madrid (Spain), Deadline: 27 Jan 2014

The European project WHIM ("The What-If Machine") investigates the 
following model for creative idea generation: (a) collect and analyse some 
information about a domain, to form a shallow world view of that domain 
(b) form a set of what-if style ideas from the analysis using notions of 
surprise, semantic tension and incongruity (c) assess, rank and select 
ideas based on the quality and quantity of narratives that can be 
generated using each idea, and (d) use the world view, idea and narratives 
in linguistic renderings, taking into account notions of relevancy, 
expansion, obfuscation and affect.

In the frame of this project, the Universidad Complutense de Madrid (NIL 
research group) will undertake the following two tasks: generating a set 
of conceptually-described narratives for each what-if style idea suggested 
by the What-If Machine, and developing metrics for establishing the 
relative quality of a given instance of such narratives.

One postdoctoral research position is available to work in this project. 
The position is for a full-time postdoctoral researcher with annual salary 
42,800 euro. The positions are for one year, with the possibility of 
renewal for a further two years, starting from 27th January 2014.

Candidates are expected to have a PhD degree and a first degree in 
Computer Science or related field. They should have research experience in 
computational treatment of narrative, knowledge representation, natural 
language generation, and Java programming. Additional experience in 
planning, agents, case-based reasoning, grammars and/or web services will 
be considered a plus.

Candidates will be expected to take up significant responsibilities in the 
tasks of narrative generation and narrative evaluation.

Other merits and aspects are clarified in the call (in Spanish):

http://www.ucm.es/data/cont/media/www/pag-9306/AnexoConvocatoria%20PAI%2...<http://www.ucm.es/data/cont/media/www/pag-9306/AnexoConvocatoria%20PAI%2014NOV13.pdf>

The description of the position is listed there under the code WHIM Grant 
agreement no: 611560. The application period will close on November 21st, 
and candidates should follow the call instructions. The instance and 
regulations (in Spanish) can be found in:

http://www.ucm.es/personal-de-apoyo-a-la-investigacion-%28pai%29

http://www.ucm.es/personal-de-apoyo-a-la-investigacion

More info and FAQ (Spanish): http://nil.fdi.ucm.es

For further details and clarifications, contact pgervas@sip.ucm.es