Imitation in Animals and Artifacts

626 Pages·2002·4.11 MB·English

by  Kerstin Dautenhahn

Imitation in Animals and Artifacts
ComplexAdaptiveSystems (selected titles)
JohnH.Holland,ChristopherG.Langton,andStewartW.Wilson,advisors
AdaptationinNaturalandArtificialSystems:AnIntroductoryAnalysiswithApplicationsto
BiologyControl,andArtificialIntelligence,JohnH.Holland
GeneticProgramming:OntheProgrammingofComputersbyMeansofNaturalSelection,
JohnR.Koza
IntelligentBehaviorinAnimalsandRobots,DavidMcFarlandandThomasBo¨sser
GeneticProgrammingII:AutomaticDiscoveryofReusablePrograms,JohnR.Koza
Turtles,Termites,andTrafficJams:ExplorationsinMassivelyParallelMicroworlds,
MitchelResnick
ComparativeApproachestoCognitiveScience,editedbyHerbertL.Roitblatand
Jean-ArcadyMeyer
ArtificialLife:AnOverview,editedbyChristopherG.Langton
AnIntroductiontoGeneticAlgorithms,MelanieMitchell
CatchingOurselvesintheAct:SituatedActivity,InteractiveEmergence,andHumanThought,
HorstHendriks-Jansen
ElementsofArtificialNeuralNetworks,KishanMehrotra,ChilukuriK.Mohan,and
SanjayRanka
GrowingArtificialSocieties:SocialSciencefromtheBottomUp,JoshuaM.Epsteinand
RobertAxtell
AnIntroductiontoNaturalComputation,DanaH.Ballard
AnIntroductiontoFuzzySets:AnalysisandDesign,WitoldPedryczandFernandoGomide
FromAnimalstoAnimats5:ProceedingsoftheFifthInternationalConferenceonSimulation
ofAdaptiveBehavior,editedbyRolfPfeifer,BruceBlumberg,Jean-ArcadyMeyer,and
StewartW.Wilson
ArtificialLifeVI:ProceedingsoftheSixthInternationalConference,editedby
ChristophAdami,RichardK.Belew,HiroakiKitano,andCharlesE.Taylor
TheSimpleGeneticAlgorithm:FoundationsandTheory,MichaelD.Vose
AdvancesinGeneticProgramming:Volume3,editedbyLeeSpector,WilliamB.Langdon,
Una-MayO’Reilly,andPeterJ.Angeline
TowardaScienceofConsciousnessIII:TheThirdTucsonDiscussionsandDebates,edited
byStuartR.Hameroff,AlfredW.Kasniak,andDavidJ.Chalmers
TruthfromTrash:HowLearningMakesSense,ChrisThornton
FromAnimalstoAnimats6:ProceedingsoftheSixthInternationalConferenceon
SimulationofAdaptiveBehavior,editedbyJean-ArcadyMeyer,AlainBerthoz,
DarioFloreano,HerbertRoitblat,andStewartW.Wilson
LearningandSoftComputing:WithSupportVectorMachines,NeuralNetworks,and
FuzzyLogicModels,VojislavKecman
ArtificialLifeVII:ProceedingsoftheSeventhInternationalConference,editedby
MarkA.Bedau,JohnS.McCaskill,NormanH.Packard,andSteenRasmussen
EvolutionaryComputation:AUnifiedApproach,KennethA.DeJong
ImitationinAnimalsandArtifacts,KerstinDautenhahnandChrystopherL.Nehaniv
Imitation in Animals and Artifacts
editedbyKerstinDautenhahnandChrystopherL.Nehaniv
ABradfordBook
TheMITPress
Cambridge,Massachusetts
London,England
(2002MassachusettsInstituteofTechnology
Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthisbookmaybereproducedinanyformbyanyelectronic
ormechanicalmeans(includingphotocopying,recording,orinformationstorageandre-
trieval)withoutpermissioninwritingfromthepublisher.
ThisbookwassetinMeliorandHelveticaCondensedon3B2byAscoTypesetters,Hong
Kong.PrintedandboundintheUnitedStatesofAmerica.
LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Imitationinanimalsandartifacts/editedbyKerstinDautenhahnandChrystopherL.
Nehaniv.
p. cm.—(Complexadaptivesystems)
‘‘ABradfordbook.’’
PaperspresentedatameetingheldinEdinburgh,Scotland,Apr.7–9,1999.
Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex.
ISBN0-262-04203-7(alk.paper)
1.Imitation—Congresses. 2.Learninginanimals—Congresses.3.Machinelearning—
Congresses. I.Nehaniv,ChrystopherL.,1963– II.Dautenhahn,Kerstein. III.Series.
BF357.I47 2002
591.5014—dc21 2001054644
Contents
Preface ix
1 TheAgent-BasedPerspectiveonImitation 1
KerstinDautenhahnandChrystopherL.Nehaniv
2 TheCorrespondenceProblem 41
ChrystopherL.NehanivandKerstinDautenhahn
3 Vocal,Social,andSelf-ImitationbyBottlenosedDolphins 63
LouisM.Herman
4 AllospecificReferentialSpeechAcquisitioninGreyParrots(Psittacus
erithacus):EvidenceforMultipleLevelsofAvianVocalImitation 109
IreneM.Pepperberg
5 OnAvianImitation:CognitiveandEthologicalPerspectives 133
JohannesFritzandKurtKotrschal
6 ArtImitatesLife:ProgrammingbyExampleasanImitationGame 157
HenryLieberman
7 LearningtoFly 171
ClaudeSammut,ScottHurst,DanaKedzier,andDonaldMichie
8 ImitationofSequentialandHierarchicalStructureinAction:Experimental
StudieswithChildrenandChimpanzees 191
AndrewWhiten
9 ThreeSourcesofInformationinSocialLearning 211
JosepCallandMalindaCarpenter
Contents vi
10 TheMirrorSystem,Imitation,andtheEvolutionofLanguage 229
MichaelA.Arbib
11 Imitation:AMeanstoEnhanceLearningofaSyntheticProtolanguagein
AutonomousRobots 281
AudeBillard
12 RethinkingtheLanguageBottleneck:WhyDon’tAnimalsLearnto
Communicate? 311
MichaelOliphant
13 ImitationasaDual-RouteProcessFeaturingPredictiveandLearning
Components:ABiologicallyPlausibleComputationalModel 327
JohnDemirisandGillianHayes
14 ChallengesinBuildingRobotsThatImitatePeople 363
CynthiaBreazealandBrianScassellati
15 Sensory-MotorPrimitivesasaBasisforImitation:LinkingPerceptionto
ActionandBiologytoRobotics 391
MajaJ.Mataric´
16 ImitationorSomethingSimpler?ModelingSimpleMechanismsforSocial
InformationProcessing 423
JasonNobleandPeterM.Todd
17 ImitationasaPerceptualProcess 441
RobertW.Mitchell
18 ‘‘DoMonkeysApe?’’—TenYearsAfter 471
ElisabettaVisalberghiandDorothyFragaszy
19 TransformationalandAssociativeTheoriesofImitation 501
CeciliaHeyes
20 DimensionsofImitativePerception-ActionMediation 525
StefanVogt
21 GoalRepresentationsinImitativeActions 555
HaroldBekkeringandWolfgangPrinz
Contents vii
22 InformationReplicationinCulture:ThreeModesfortheTransmissionof
CultureElementsthroughObservedAction 573
OliverR.Goodenough
Appendix 587
Contributors 589
Index 591
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Preface
Imitation has traditionally been regarded as easy, and often scorn-
fully dismissed as trivial, ‘‘cheating,’’ or unworthy in comparison
to higher cognitive abilities. Yet this is an illusion. What does it
even mean for two behaviors to be the ‘‘same?’’ Explaining the
imitative abilities of humans and other animals has proved to be
a complex subject. The mechanisms are not well understood and
the connection to sociality, communication, and learning is deep,
as recent research from various disciplines has started to reveal.
Building robots and software agents that can imitate other artificial
or human agents in an appropriate way is an endeavor that
involves the deepest problems of connecting perception, experi-
ence, context, and action. These are some of the main issues
treated in this book.
This book grew out of the ‘‘Imitation in Animals and Artifacts’’
Symposium, which we organized in Edinburgh, Scotland (7–9
April 1999), under the auspices of the Society for the Study of
Artificial Intelligence and Simulation of Behaviour (AISB). Owing
to generous support by the Engineering and Physical Sciences
Research Council (EPSRC), we were able to invite a number of
established researchers in the field of imitation. This first inter-
disciplinary symposium attracted a very high level of interest from
researchers from a broad spectrum of scientific disciplines ranging
from animal behavior to artificial intelligence; from computer
science, software engineering, and robotics to experimental and
comparative psychology, neuroscience, primatology, and linguis-
tics. This diversity is also reflected in the contents of the present
volume. Issues of imitation, behavior matching, and observational
learning arise in all of these fields, although little or no communi-
cation of results on the closely related ideas has been established
between most of these disciplines. Together with more than forty
participants from the United Kingdom and other countries, this
mixture gave rise to an exciting and thought-provoking first at-
tempt at integrating research on imitation from two distinct com-
munities, namely, those researchers working in the sciences of the