Rob Milne: A Tribute to a Pioneering AI Scientist, Entrepreneur and Mountaineer

176 Pages·2006·4.43 MB·English

by  A. Bundy and S. Wilson

ROB MILNE: A TRIBUTE TO A PIONEERING AI
SCIENTIST, ENTREPRENEUR AND MOUNTAINEER
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Rob Milne: A Tribute to a Pioneering
AI Scientist, Entrepreneur and
Mountaineer
Edited by
Alan Bundy
School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh, UK
Assistant Editor
Sean Wilson
School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh, UK
Amsterdam • Berlin • Oxford • Tokyo • Washington, DC
© 2006 The authors.
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or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without prior written permission from the publisher.
ISBN 1-58603-639-4
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RobMilne:ATributetoaPioneeringAIScientist,EntrepreneurandMountaineer v
A.BundyandS.Wilson(Eds.)
IOSPress,2006
©2006Theauthors.Allrightsreserved.
Foreword
Thisfestschriftcelebratesthelifeofaremarkableman.
RobMilnediedwhileclimbingMountEverestearlyon5thJune2005NepalTime.
Hewas48.HeissurvivedbyhiswifeValandhistwochildrenAlexandRosemary.
Hisuntimelydeathwasatragedy,butRobpacked96yearsoflivingintohis48years
oflife.Inanyoneofhisthree“careers”—asahi-techentrepreneur,asanAIresearcher
and as a mountaineer — his achievements would have been enough for most ordinary
mortals. But Rob combined world-class success in all of them. This book covers all
these facets of his life. Each chapter has been contributed by one or more of his close
collaboratorsastheirtributetoRobandtohislegacy.
Rob’s ascent of Everest was to have been the culmination of a lifetime’s ambition
to climb the highest summits in each of the world’s seven continents. Everest was the
lastofthesesevensummits.Hewasonly400metresfromthetopwhenhediedfroma
suddenandmassiveheartattack.Hehadbeenanambitiousandsuccessfulmountaineer
sincehischildhoodinColorado.AsVal,saidinaradiointerview,“Robdiedatthetop,
doingwhatheloved”.Thiswastruenotjustofhismountaineering,butinallthespheres
ofhislife.
I first met Rob in 1978 in Boston, Massachusetts. He was just finishing his under-
graduate degree at MIT and had applied to be a PhD student at Edinburgh under my
supervision.IwasvisitingMITthatSummer,sowemettodiscusshisresearchproject.
Iwas quicklyintroducedtohis climbingexpertise.Heshowedmehowtoclimbaver-
tical brick wall using the gaps in the bricks as hand and foot holds. He invited me to
try; I declined.He came to Edinburgh that Autumn to work on machineunderstanding
ofmechanicsproblemswritteninEnglishaspartofourMechoproject:oneofthefirst
non-USexpertsystems.In1980,Robinitiatedhisprojecttoconquerthesevensummits
byclimbingDenali(MtMcKinley)inAlaska.Iremembergettingvertigojustbyreading
his subsequent article in our University Bulletin. Rob met Val at Edinburgh, and they
marriedin1981.
ClimbingDenalirequireddeterminationandpersistence.Robexhibitedthesequal-
itiesineverythinghedid,whichiswhyheachievedsomuch.Butitwasn’talwaysthe
bestapproach.WhenitcametohisPhDviva,Robsomehowgotthemisconceptionthat
to concede to his examiners on any point, however minor, would destroy his chances.
He,therefore,foughteverystepoftheway.Thevivalastedeighthours!Heobtainedhis
PhDin1983.
In 1982, Rob returned to the USA, where he worked first at the Wright-Paterson
AirforceBaseandthenatthePentagon.AtthePentagon,heintroducedAIresearchinto
theUSArmybyfoundingtheArmy AI Center,inwhichhewastheChief AI scientist.
ReturningtoScotlandin1986,hefoundedIntelligentApplications:oneofthefirstnon-
USexpertsystemcompanies.AfterexperimentingwithvariousAIproducts,IAfocused
onturbinemonitoringwithits‘Tiger’product.
Mostentrepreneursrunninginnovative,hi-techcompanieshavelittletimeforextra-
curricularactivity,butRobfoundtimebothforhismountaineeringandhisAIresearch.
vi
He continued to publish in the top journals and conferences, authoring over 75 papers
on knowledge-based systems, data-mining, qualitative reasoning, etc. He was a popu-
larspeaker,givingmanyinvitedtalksandtutorialsatmajorconferences.Heactedasa
bridgebetweenacademiaandindustry,forinstance,frequentlytalkingtoacademicson
thetechnologytransferprocess.
Robwasanaturalleader;hetirelesslyandselflesslygavehistimetohelporganise
theactivitiesinwhichhewasinvolved.Forinstance,inboththeBritishandEuropeanAI
communities,heregularlyservedonconferencecommittees,havingbeenchairofboth
theBritishComputerSociety’sSpecialistGrouponAIConferenceandoftheEuropean
Conference on Artificial Intelligence. He was an officer of both organisations, inclu-
dingbeingthePresidentofECCAI2000-04.Hewasalsotheinspirationbehindbringing
IJCAI-05toEdinburgh,beingtheLocalArrangementsChairuntilhisdeath.Robplayed
akeypartinsettinguptheEuropeanNetworkofExcellenceMONET(ModelBasedand
QualitativeSystems),andinasecondphaseitsTaskGroupBRIDGE(BridgingAIand
ControlEngineeringmodelbaseddiagnosisapproaches)thatfocusedondiagnosis.
RobplayedanactiveroleintheScottishSoftwareFederation(whichmergedtoform
ScotlandIS in 2000): the industry bodies for IT and software companies in Scotland.
Rob was a director of each organisation 1997–2002. He was a mentor to a number of
start-upcompaniesandguidedotherentrepreneursintheireffortstoestablishsuccessful
businesses.Inrecognitionofhisacademicandindustrialachievements,hewaselecteda
FellowoftheRoyalSocietyofEdinburghin2003.HewasalsoactiveinScottishMoun-
taineering Club, being Convener of the publications sub-committee and co-authoring a
bookontheCorbetts(the219Scottishhillsbetween2500ftand3000fthigh).In1997,
Rob became only the 1860th person to have climbed all the Munros (the 284 Scottish
mountainsover3000fthigh).Hewasakeenwinterclimber,helpingtoestablishanum-
berofhigh-gradenewclimbsthroughoutScotland.
Robsummeduphisattitudetolifeinaradiointerview,bysayingthatitwasimpor-
tanttowakeupeverymorningwithanexcitingchallengeinmind.Healwayssethimself
ambitiousgoalsthenattainedthembypersistenceanddetermination.Ambition,persis-
tenceanddeterminationarequalitiessometimesassociatedwithpeoplewhoaredifficult
togetonwith.NotsoRob.Hewasoneofthemostpleasantandeasy-goingpeopleithas
beenmypleasuretoworkwith.Wealreadymisshim.
AlanBundy
May25,2006
vii
Contents
Foreword v
Alan Bundy
Model Based Thoughts 1
Louise Trave-Massuyes
Adventures in Model-Based Reasoning 29
Chris Price
Combining Dimensional Analysis and Heuristics for Causal Ordering
– In Memory of Dr. Rob Milne – 39
Qiang Shen and Taoxin Peng
I-Ex: Intelligent Extreme Expedition Support 54
Stephen Potter, Austin Tate and Rob Milne
Applied Computational Humor and Prospects for Advertising 71
Oliviero Stock and Carlo Strapparava
Making Music with AI: Some Examples 90
Ramón Lopez de Mantaras
Intelligent Applications Ltd: A History 1986 to 2005 101
Charlie Nicol and Linsay Turbert
Rob Milne: The British Airways Years 126
Rick Magaldi
Rob and the BCS SGAI 133
Ann Macintosh
Rob Milne’s Contribution to the Young Software Engineer of the Year Awards 139
Ian Ritchie
Rob Milne the Mountaineer 141
Rab Anderson
Robert Milne – Mountain Writing & Scottish Mountaineering Publications Work 147
Ken Crocket
Experience of Robert William Milne 151
Author Index 167
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Rob Milne: A Tribute to a Pioneering AI Scientist, Entrepreneur and Mountaineer 1
A. Bundy and S. Wilson (Eds.)
IOS Press, 2006
© 2006 The authors. All rights reserved.
Model Based Thoughts
CA~EN and TIGER then and now

1
Louise TRAVE-MASSUYES
LAAS−CNRS, France
Abstract. This paper is in memory of Rob Milne. It recalls the scientific
experience of the TIGER and TIGER SHEBA European projects that he led through
the presentation of CA~EN, a model-based diagnosis software that was devised
during the projects and integrated with the commercial tool TIGERTM. Several
lines of more recent work that all build on CA~EN are also presented. These
developments are closely related to the Qualitative Reasoning and Model Based
Diagnosis communities, represented by the MONET network of Excellence in
Europe. Their theories inspired this work and I like to believe that this work
inspired the communities in return. Rob Milne and myself were active members
of MONET.
Keywords. Model-based diagnosis, causal models, interval models, industrial
applications
Introduction
th
I met Rob Milne for the first time in 1988 during the 12 IMACS World Congress on
Scientific Computation in Paris, France, where I had to present a paper in the Second
Generation Expert Systems session. It was the time of the International Workshop on
Expert Systems and their Applications series and I got to meet Rob again in Avignon,
France. Avignon surroundings being the French paradise for limestone climbers, I
discovered that Rob and I not only shared a common passion for new technologies but
also for climbing and mountaineering. However I could not imagine at that time that
this was the start of a partnership that would stongly mark my life both professionally
2
and personally. This paper recalls the professional part of it .
The real kick-off event of the TIGER and TIGER-SHEBA projects was a phone call
from Scotland to Brazil in 1991. I was on sabbatical at Vitoria University and this little
university offered restricted facilities. In particular, I had no phone in my room, not
even in my building. So, I scrambled down the stairs of my building two per two as

1 LAAS-CNRS, 7 avenue du Colonel Roche, 31077 Toulouse, France; Email: [email protected].
2 I would like to flash some of the climbs that we partnered in the most mythical mountains all around the
world: North Face of Half Dome, Yosemite, USA, 1993; Major route at Mont Blanc, Alps, France, 1993;
Spigolo of Petite Aigille d’Ansabère in the Pyrénées, France, 1994; several climbs in Ben Nevis, Cairn
Gorns, Scotland; and Aconcagua (6962m), Argentina, 2003.