Jeff Thompson visiting

Posted by chris on August 29, 2014

Jeff Thompson from UCLA is visiting the group today and will be giving a seminar entitled, ‘Networking for Reliable Knowledge,’ looking at the connection between information-centric networking and argumentation.

Abstract. For an information system to deliver reliable knowledge, it must reliably access the raw supporting data and provide a means to evaluate the concluded knowledge based on that data. For reliable data access, we review future internet architectures for information-centric networking which address the problem of broken and compromised links, and we focus on features of cryptographic hash-based links. For evaluating knowledge, we review knowledge representation using argumentation systems with a focus on assumption-based arguments. Finally, we sketch a system which uses argumentation to deliver reliable knowledge which is supported by secure hash-based links to evidence, is independent of storage location or central authority and implements knowledge revision from new evidence.

Brief biography. Jeff has been a staff software engineer for the future internet Name Data Networking (NDN) project at the University of California, Los Angeles since 2013 where he develops networking libraries for C++, JavaScript, Python and Java. As an undergraduate, he studied computer science and electrical engineering at MIT. His Masters work was in microrobotics and automation at the UC Berkeley Biomimetic Millisystems Lab. Jeff’s industry experience includes software architecture, API design and release management for a commercial cryptography library and creating tool automation and a semantic tracking database system for a micromachine manufacturing facility. As an independent researcher, Jeff develops open-source software for logic and argumentation systems for knowledge representation.

We’ll be in Wolfson in the QMB at noon, 29th August 2014. All welcome.