Brief book that introduces you to Zermelo-Fraenkel set theory. Anyone that has studied combinatorics / algebra / analysis is probably familiar with “naive set theory”, eg: union, intersection, complement, etc. But despite the book’s name, it introduces you to axiomatic set theory. The problem with naive (non-axiomatic) set theory is it allows you to construct…
Category: Textbooks
Construction Grammar and its Application to English by Martin Hilpert (7.8/10)
Ch1: Introducing Construction Grammar Traditionally, linguistic knowledge is thought of as having a lexicon and grammar component (the dictionary-and-grammar model), but construction grammar proposes that all linguistic knowledge is different constructions. The change is motivated by idiomatic expressions that are a sort of “appendix” in dictionaries. Yet we can’t represent idioms as fixed expressions because…
Fundamentals of Data Visualization by Claus O. Wilke (8.0/10)
Part 1: From Data to Visualization All figures should be reproducible from data and code, should not have to make manual adjustments in Illustrator, or you will be dissuaded from updating them, or you may forget how they’re generated. Figures may be “ugly” (aesthetically unpleasing), “bad” (unclear and confusing), or “wrong” (objectively incorrect). An aesthetic…
Syntax: A Generative Introduction by Andrew Carnie (8.4/10)
Ch1: Generative Grammar Generative syntax was first developed by Noam Chomsky, to try to capture what we know intuitively about syntax. Use scientific method to gather data, form hypotheses of rules, and check if they agree with native speaker judgements. Source of data can’t be solely from corpora, since these only have correct sentences, you…
Linguistic Fundamentals for NLP II by Bender and Lascarides (7.7/10)
Overall an okay but not superb book. The parts about pragmatics were the least familiar to me, but the writing was poor as a lot of advanced concepts were introduced too quickly for me. Ch2: What is Meaning? One way to represent meaning is by assigning logical forms to sentences. Modal logic adds the ability…
Fundamentals of Psycholinguistics by Fernandez and Cairns (8.3/10)
Ch1: Beginning Concepts Language has finite rules and symbols, but has infinite generation. Can think of language as a system to connect signals (acoustic, or words on a page) to meaning. This is done through phonology, morphology, syntax, etc. Linguistic competence is the knowledge of a language’s lexicon and grammar; linguistic performance is the ability…
Four Views on Free Will by Kane, Fischer, Pereboom, and Vargas (8.7/10)
Ch1: Libertarianism (Robert Kane) Libertarianism is the view that the universe is not deterministic, and this is necessary for FW; also, FW is necessary for moral responsibility. It’s closest to laymen’s intuitions about FW. Compatibilists attack it in two ways: (1) by claiming that determinism doesn’t conflict with FW, and (2) that indeterminism doesn’t necessarily…
The Lexicon: An Introduction by Elisabetta Jezek (8.2/10)
Ch1: Basic notions The lexicon is the set of words in a language, abstract object stores in our mind; a dictionary is a concrete object (printed book or electronic) that describes the lexicon. Dictionaries do not always store everything in the lexicon, either intentionally or unintentionally. A vocabulary can refer to either a lexicon or…
Understanding Syntax by Maggie Tallerman (8.5/10)
Overall impression: this book gives a well-rounded overview of syntax, good for an introduction and avoids most of the more theoretical issues. It’s split about 50/50 between English constructions and examples in other languages. This is a good balance, using English examples is easier to “ground” the theory to reality, while there are many ways…
Information Theory: A Tutorial Introduction by James V. Stone (8.0/10)
Ch1: What is Information? Information is quantified using bits, not to be confused with binary digit. A binary digit contains at most one bit of information, but may contain less (if it’s not equally likely to be 0 and 1). Ch2: Entropy of Discrete Variables Definition of entropy H(x) for discrete random variables. Entropy can…
Designing Voice User Interfaces by Cathy Pearl (7.3/10)
Voice user interfaces like Siri and Alexa have improved in some ways, but in many other ways are similar to IVR phone systems from the 1970s. This book goes through various things to look out for while designing them. For example: Be as brief as possible and use visual mode to display lots of information….
Fifty Challenging Problems in Probability by Frederick Mosteller (6.6/10)
A classic book with a bunch of random problems in elementary probability (but not statistics). They are not very difficult, ranging from easy to moderate in difficulty. Some of them touch on significant ideas (like random walks, coupon collector problem, German tank problem), but the majority are quite arbitrary (maybe suitable for a contest problem)….