Related Applications

There exist several types of software which each do alot of the things we need, however to accomplish our goals, the challenge is to synthesize the approaches used in these differing efforts. Most of these applications fall under a category interested in Personal Knowledge Bases. I list here by category the applications I have actually used. ~Kyle


Mind Mapping


FreeMind is a hierarchical tree building tool that allows for folding and assigning two-dimensional attributes. It also includes a java applet for displaying mind maps in a web browser.


FreePlane is the more powerful and more actively developing successor to FreeMind. It allows for some formula entry which can mimic spreadsheet functionality. It also allows users to create free nodes, as well as labelled links between nodes, making it possible to do concept mapping.


XMind provides users with a very comfortable mind mapping interface, which allows users to change the display structure of branches independently of each other. It also supports online sharing of mind maps, though it won't work if you make the map too large. It is not open-source however let alone free software.


Concept Mapping


CMaps is a very interesting peice of graph building software developed by cognitive scientists, with goals very similar to those of the 3rdMind. Their online archives include tons of concept maps already, and the application includes a function that allows users to calculate the match percent of two different concept maps in various ways.


Visual Understanding Environment (VUE) is slightly different, more feature rich perhaps, graph-based application. It offers a great deal of freedom in attempting to model one's knowledge, however it can get overwhelming very quickly.


Note-Taking


Evernote is a great way to capture ideas on the go and be able to find them again. It allows a user to sort notes into notebooks and those notebooks into stacks, giving it the same basic hierarchical structure as previously mentioned mind mapping applications. It is actually this simplistic interface that the 3rdMind phone app would most directly want to imitate, with the added mind mapping interface.


Modelling


Wolfram Mathematica is a program that embodies my vision of hyper-modular functionality made intuitive. The main difference between the other software I list here and the software I wish I had, is that they are not openly based on mathematically rigorous structure. The Wolfram Language is perhaps exactly what we need to bridge that gap. 

Related Research

To me, this idea relates to just about every aspect of cognitive and computer science. However some labs specifically interest me and I would like to share them with you. ~Kyle

 

Dr. Mario's DecideLab is the lab Kyle works in. Mario Fific is a mathematical cognitive psychologist who is interested in understanding the mental architecture underlying cognitive processes, especially those that relate to decision-making. He is currently advising Kyle in conducting a psycholinguistics experiment that will investigate the processing architecture in reading English words in a sentence.

 

The Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition is among the most impressive think tanks behind pushing for more efficient knowledge representation systems that can be used by humans and artificial agents. They are the creators of CMaps, and the authors of some of the most relevant literature to our goals.

 

Dr. Robert Golstones's Percepts and Concepts Laboratory consistently produces interesting papers having to do with distributed cognition, concept representation, similarity, and learning, all of which relate to this effort in meaningful ways.

  • This paper for example, provides the kind of information 3rdMind would use to structure study, or even teaching apps that run with our semantic data.

  • This paper is a good example of one that explores knowledge transfer between domains. It is of particular interest to us whether or not knowledge that is transferrable across domains could be represented structurally in a graph interface, with the same relationships but different nodes.

  • This paper is very encouraging for networked groups of people trying to come up with innovative solutions to a problem. We work better together!

 

The Center for Adaptive Behavior and Cognition at the Max Plank Institute, Berlin is a leader in investigating the types of things our effort seeks to teach. In their sensible approach to decision-making research they have developed many models of simple cognitive heuristics that accurately mimic how humans and animals make adaptive decisions. Some of these simple rules could actually help people understand their own thought processes better, and help them to improve their decision-making skills over all. This kind of scientifically grounded knowledge is exactly what we need a network like 3rdMind to distribute. 


Recently, the brain behind Scientific Arts Consulting built a Mathematica notebook for me in under an hour that saved me days worth of work in creating stimuli for a psycholinguistics experiment I am conducting. I found him on the Wolfram Language forum, which is exactly the kind of digital place I wish I could build, except with a mindmapping interface to aid in navigation. Forums in general, as indexed by Google, are the intellectual gold I to seek build upon.