- Invited: Andrea Sgarro (Trieste, Italia) and Oliviero Stock (Trento, Italia)
- Title: An Italian Tribute to Solomon Marcus
- Part 1: Machina poetica (Andrea Sgarro)
- Part 2: Lingvistica matematica: some strange consequences (Oliviero Stock)
- Part 3: Better artificial than nothing (Andrea interviewing Oliviero about his book: Meglio artificiale che niente, ed. Guerini ed associati, 2024)
- Abstract: An Italian tribute to Solomon Marcus Two „indirect” Italian pupils of Solomon Marcus, Oliviero Stock and Andrea Sgarro, will talk about how they first „met” him in an era when Romania was a locked-up country and Marcus had to disseminate his message across borders through his letters and his books. This had a durable impact on research in mathematical linguistics in the country of the two talkers; Oliviero Stock has recently published a book on the development of Artificial Intelligence in Italy („Better artificial than nothing”) which emphasizes Marcus’ role. For both talkers the possibility of at last actually meeting Solomon Marcus and experiencing his human kindness was a magical moment and a milestone in their lives.
- Wednesday, May 28, 2025, 17:00-18:30 (RO time)
- The event will take place in hall Spiru Haret, ground floor, Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science, University of Bucharest, Academiei 14, Bucharest, Romania
- Details: https://nlp.unibuc.ro/events.html
- https://unibuc.ro/seminarul-solomon-marcus-continua-cu-o-noua-conferinta-intitulata-an-italian-tribute-to-solomon-marcus-miercuri-28-mai-2025/
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Short bio:
Andrea Sgarro è stato professore ordinario di Informatica teorica all’Università di Trieste. I suoi interessi scientifici sono la teoria dell’informazione e dei codici, la crittografia, la gestione matematica delle conoscenze incomplete (incomplete knowledge management) e la linguistica computazionale. Suoi mentori sono stati Giuseppe O. Longo, Solomon Marcus e Janos Körner. E’ attivo nella comunicazione scientifica: i suoi libri, editi da Muzzio, Zanichelli e Mondadori, hanno aperto per la prima volta la nuova crittografia informatica a una platea di lingua italiana. I suoi hobby sono il flauto traverso barocco e le lingue: con diverso grado di competenza ne parla una decina. È il responsabile della sezione Scienza e tecnologia del Circolo della Cultura e delle Arti di Trieste.
Oliviero Stock is a Distinguished Fellow of FBK, Fondazione Bruno Kessler, Trento. He has been at FBK-irst (Institute for Scientific and Technological Research) since 1988 and
has been its director from 1997 to 2001. Before that he was with the National Council for Research in Pisa and in Rome. His scientific activity is in artificial intelligence, mainly natural language processing, intelligent user interfaces, cognitive technologies, technology for cultural heritage appreciation, computational humor, computational ethics. He is the author of over two
hundred and seventy peer-reviewed papers and author or editor of twelve volumes, has been a member of the editorial board of a dozen scientific journals, and a keynote speaker
at over eighty conferences. O.S. has been Chairman of the European Coordinating Committee for Artificial Intelligence (ECCAI, now EURAI), President of the Association for Computational
Linguistics and President of AI*IA, the Italian AI Association. Member of the Committee for the Best European AI Dissertation Award (2008-2015) established by ECCAI, member of the Scientific Advisory Board of DFKI, the German Research Institute for AI (2004-2019). He is an EURAI Fellow, a AAAI Fellow and a DFKI Fellow. In 2019 he received a doctorate honoris causa from the University of Haifa. He is the author, together with Yurij Castelfranchi, of a popularization book: Macchine come noi (Machines like us), Laterza 2000. In 2022 he published “In Barba a H.”, Bompiani, (not concerned with his research themes, but with history during the persecution against Jews) In September 2024 he published “Meglio artificiale che niente”, Guerini, a personal but
well documented account of the beginning of AI in Italy and the history of IRST, now FBK, the AI research institute in Trento.
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The „Solomon Marcus” Seminar
The „Solomon Marcus” seminar (https://nlp.unibuc.ro/events.html) is generally dedicated to mathematical and computational linguistics and natural language processing. In 2025, the seminar will focus on the personality of Solomon Marcus, one of the pioneers of mathematical and computational linguistics worldwide (https://ro.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solomon_Marcus), under UNESCO’s auspices, which will celebrate Solomon Marcus on his centenary.
Organizer: Liviu P. Dinu (Faculty of Mathematics and Informatics, Human Language Technologies Research Center, University of Bucharest, Romania) Email: ldinu@fmi.unibuc.ro