January 14 (Tue), 2014 HW1 assigned (exercises 1.1 and 1.3 [P], due Tuesday, January 21, 2014. Reading assigned: article by Brian Hayes linked to the course home page. Administrative information: textbook, syllabus, grading policy. Definitions of AI.
January 16 (Thu), 2014 More on definitions of AI. The definition of AI in the textbook. The Church-Turing Thesis and the (Newell-Simon) Physical Symbol System Hypothesis. John Searle's Chinese Room argument and Hector Levesque's Summation Room counterexample. Agents. Examples of agents (started): Robots, Teaching Agents.
January 21 (Tue), 2014 Change in the grading policy: see elsewhere in course web site. HW1 collected. Q1 (Quiz 1) with discussion of shallow and deep approaches, based on Brian Hayes's paper linked to the main course website. More examples of agents. Defining a solution (1.4.1 [P]). Knowledge representation (1.4[P]). Computational limits (1.5.8 [P]).
January 23 (Thu), 2014 Assigned reading: Chapters 1 and 2 [P]. Q2. Graded HW1 returned. Recall: see elsewhere on course website for updated grade policy. Dimensions of complexity (1.5). Prototypical agents (1.6). Chapter 1 completed.
January 28 (Tue), 2014 Class canceled, because the university is closed due to inclement weather.
January 30 (Thu), 2014 Q3. Ch.2 [P] started. Example of trading agent. Percept and command traces. Causal transductions. Belief states. Discussion of the robot applet at aispace.com. Brief demonstration of its use.
February 4 (Tue), 2014 Q4. Assignment: read carefully Ch.3 [P]. (Re-reading chs. 1-2 [P] is recommended.) Ch. 2[P] completed. The State-Space Approach to Problem Solving (Ch.3 [P], States and Search) started.
February 6 (Thu), 2014 Review of Q4. Reminder: read carefully chapter 3 [P]. The quiz results indicate that you need to re-read chapters 1-2 [P]. The State-Space Approach to Problem Solving, continued. Depth-first search.
February 11 (Tue), 2014 HW2 assigned, due on Thursday, February 13: Run by hand Dijkstra's Algorithm (as stated in slide 68 at http://www.cse.sc.edu/~mgv/csce580sp14/notes/580Ch3AIMA.ppt) on the example of Figure 3.2 [P] (also on slide 6 at http://www.cse.sc.edu/~mgv/csce580sp14/notes/580Ch3.ppt); show the OPEN and CLOSED lists with the g values of the nodes on those lists for each iteration of lines 2-6 from beginning to end. Breadth-First Search. Dijkstra's algorithm (a.k.a. lowest-cost-first search and the uniform-cost method).
February 13 (Thu), 2014 Class canceled due to inclement weather. (USC is closed.)
February 18 (Tue), 2014 HW2 collected. Uninformed (blind) search: DFS, BFS, Dijkstra's algorithm, depth-limited search, iterative deepending depth-first search. (Slides from AIMA used; they are on the course web site.)
February 20 (Thu), 2014 HW3 assigned: Exercises 3.3 and 3.4 [P], due 2014-03-04. Heuristics. Best-First Search and Heuristic Depth-First Search: examples, with emphasis on the difference between the two algorithms. Introduction to A*. Example of use of A*: traveling in Romania with the straight-line heuristic.
February 25 (Tue), 2014 HW2 returned and discussed. First three parts of Exercise 3.3 discussed in class. Example of A* search on the eight (sliding tile) puzzle using the "number of misplaced tiles" heuristic.
February 27 (Thu), 2014 Midterm.
March 4 (Tue), 2014 Midterm returned. HW3 due date changed to Tuesday, March 10, 2014. A* with and without monotone (consistent) heuristics. Computing heuristics by problem relaxation. Three properties of heuristics computed by problem relaxation.
March 6 (Thu), 2014 HW3 due date changed to Tuesday, March 18, 2014. Example of state-space search problem on which A* with non-monotone heuristics re-expands a closed node. Dynamic programming for state-space search: formula with example on a simple staged network, justification of formula from Bellman's principle of optimality, and discussion in detail of exercise 3.4(e). Brief introduction to the state-space search applet on the AISpace web site (link to the course web site via the textbook supplementary materials web site). The students are encouraged to use the applet during spring break.
March 18 (Tue), 2014 HW4 assigned: exercise 4.1 [P], due Tuesday, 2014-03-25. HW3 collected. Ch.4 [P] ("Features and Constraints") started. Definitions (4.1 and 4.2). Generate and test (4.3). Solving CSPs (Constraint Satisfaction Problems) Using Search (4.4). Introduction to consistency algorithms (4.5, through page 121).
March 20 (Thu), 2014 HW5 assigned: exercise 4.3 [P], due Thursday, 2014-03-27. (Recall that HW4 is due on 2014-03-25; see above log entry.) HW3 returned and discussed. The general arc consistency algorithm, with examples.
March 25 (Tue), 2014 HW5 due date changed to April 1, 2014. HW4 collected and discussed briefly. More on general arc consistency. Domain splitting, with examples. The DPLL algorithm. Variable elimination, started.
March 27 (Thu), 2014 Variable elimination with examples. I recommend that students try to solve the CSP in Example 4.7 [P] using variable elimination; please consider each conjunct in the formula at the bottom at the example (e.g. B "less than" 3) as an individual constraint. Local search for CSPs, started. The AISpace applets for consistency and local search algorithms for CSPs, briefly described.
April 1 (Tue), 2014 HW4 is returned (with some comments but not graded) with a request to return it typed with the following restrictions: do only parts (a),(b),(c), and (d). Use the CSP applet for part (c) and include a figure in your submission that shows the network after arc consistency. The due date for the typed and revised HW4 is 2014-04-08 (Tuesday). HW5 is canceled for now; do not throw away the work done so far on exercise 4.3, because parts of it may be re-assigned! Discussion of parts (b) and (c) of exercise 4.3. Local search for CSPs. Basic greedy descent. Variations on search strategies. Evaluation of stochastic algorithms. Simulated annealing (basics). Genetic algorithm for optimization (basics).
April 3 (Thu), 2014 Variable elimination for Optimization: Non-Serial Dynamic Programming (Section 4.10.1 [P] and notes on the course website).
April 8 (Tue), 2014 HW4 resubmission collected. HW5 is still in suspended state. (Please keep your partial work for possible late submission request.) HW6 assigned, due Thursday, April 10: Exercise 4.11[P], with the following additional work: (1) Start by drawing the constraint network corresponding to Figure 4.15. Figure 4.15 is an "abstract constraint network," i.e. an interaction graph (as defined in the class of April 3 and in the NSDP notes on line) with labels on the edges, and therefore does not have constraint nodes. Interaction graphs (sometimes also called domain graphs) and constraint networks are very different when n-ary (n greated than 2) constraints are present. (2) Draw both the constraint network and the abstract interaction graph for parts (a) and (b). Notes on these points are linked under "Lectures" for today. Propositions and Inference (ch.5 [P]) started: section 5.1 and the beginning of 5.2.
April 10 (Thu), 2014 HW7 assigned, due Tuesday, April 15: exercises 5.3 and 5.4 [P]; please type your work or write it neatly. HW4 returned and discussed. HW6 collected. Propositions and Inference (ch.5 [P]) through section 5.2.
April 15 (Tue), 2014 HW8 assigned (programming assignment): exercise 5.6 [P]; please type your work and include a script showing use of AILog. Additional homework for students taking the course for graduate credit: exercise 5.2 [P], due on the last day of class. HW6 returned and discussed. HW7 collected. Propositions and Inference (ch.5[P]) through section 5.3.
April 17 (Thu), 2014 HW9 assigned: exercise 5.9 [P]. HW7 returned and discussed. HW8 collected. Propositions and Inference (ch.5 [P]) though much of section 5.4 ("Proving by Contradiction").
April 22 (Tue), 2014 HW9 collected. HW8 returned and discussed. Consistency-based diagnosis; bottom-down Horn clause interpreter to find conflicts. Complete knowledge assumption (5.5). Abduction (5.6), started.
April 24 (Tue), 2014 HW9 discussed but not yet returned. Most previous late HW returned. Discussion of final exam, which will be closed book and notes and cover the topics in chapters 3 through 5 [P]. Abduction (5.6[P]), minimal explanations, interventions, causal models (5.7[P]).