Author Archives: Brian Hopkins

A proposal for a test of a machine’s capability to perform human-like conversation. Described by Alan Turing in the 1950 paper “Computing machinery and intelligence”, it proceeds as follows.  A human judge engages in a natural language conversation with two other parties, one a human and the other a machine, and both hidden by a …

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See Growth cone

A word or an expression used figuratively of what is considered to be the literal or normal form, object or event. There are four different classes of tropes: metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, and irony, with analogy and simile being sub-classes of metaphor and synecdoche of metonymy.  See Analogy, Metaphor, Metonymy, Synecdoche

A hypothetical variable defined as the part of an observed item indicating the measurement of an attribute of interest. The true score is traditionally assumed to be uncorrelated with the error score and is the reason why several different observed items are correlated.  See Error score, Measurement error, Residuals

The most prevalent form of Down’s syndrome in which each cell contains an extra 21st chromosome in an otherwise diploid cell, often by non-disjunction (a chromosomal mutation resulting in cells having too many or one too few chromosomes). See Chromosome, Diploid, Diploid, Down’s syndrome, Mosaicism

A view put forward by Robert J. Sternberg that there are three different aspects of intelligence: analytical intelligence, creative intelligence, and practical intelligence. See Intelligence, Theory of multiple intelligences

An organism learns through producing a series of approximations and receiving feedback from the environment as to which approximations are more effective.  The organism is not guided by an internal theory or concept, but may at first emit behaviours at random.  Some behaviors are reinforced by the environment, and thus they are emitted more often, …

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A change in level of behavior following a pattern that is described by, for example, polynomials of first order (linear trend), second order (quadratic trend), third order (cubic trend), or higher order.  See Developmental function, Developmental trajectories, Polynomial

A system of writing in which the relationships between letters and sounds are largely consistent for reading (but usually less so for spelling), and the language contains exception words (e.g., in Finnish and Italian) . See Exception words

A form of chromosomal mutation, it is the process by which all or part of one chromosome becomes attached to another chromosome, and which can result in serious congenital disorders. Translocations can be balanced (no loss or gain of chromosomal material) or unbalanced (overall or partial loss of chromosomal material) . See Chromosome, Down‚was syndrome