Behold!

Diagrammatics: The art of thinking with diagrams by Zenon Kulpa

Diagrammatics, or diagrammatic representation and reasoning, concerns the use of diagrams in information processing and communication by humans and computers. Diagrammatic representation uses diagrams to represent data and knowledge, and diagrammatic reasoning uses direct manipulation and inspection of a diagram as the primary means of inference. Diagrams are a visual kind of analogical (or direct) knowledge representation mechanism that is characterized by a parallel (though not necessarily isomorphic) correspondence between the structure of the representation and the structure of the represented. For more details, see e.g. Diagrams - an excellent introduction to main issues of the field in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

My current work in this area concerns mostly

• Mathematical applications of diagrams, in particular the diagrammatic representational system for interval analysis, with applications in reasoning about interval relations, interval arithmetic, and interval linear equations (see the Intervals section in my list of publications).
• The problem of errors in diagrammatic representations and reasoning (see the Section 5 of my selected contributions page).
• I was also reading a general lecture on "Fundamentals of Diagrammatics," at computer science faculties of some colleges in Poland.

Further references:

• Information about my recent larger work:
  Zenon Kulpa, Diagrammatic Interval Analysis with Applications.

• Information about my older larger work:
  Zenon Kulpa, From Picture Processing to Interval Diagrams.

• My older survey paper:
  Z. Kulpa: [Diagrammatic representation and reasoning.
  Machine GRAPHICS & VISION, Vol. 3, Nos. 1/2, 1994, 77-103.
  [PDF file, 431KB]
  See also the diagrammatics section in my list of publications.

• Some general references:
  • M. Anderson, B. Meyer, P. Olivier, eds., Diagrammatic Representation and Reasoning, Springer-Verlag, Berlin 2002.
  • Special Issue on Diagrammatic Representation and Reasoning (edited by me) of the Machine GRAPHICS & VISION journal: Vol. 6, No. 1, 1997.
  • J. Glasgow, N. Hari Narayanan, B. Chandrasekaran, eds., Diagrammatic Reasoning: Cognitive and Computational Perspectives, AAAI Press, Menlo Park, CA / The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 1995.
  • E.R. Tufte, Envisioning Information. Graphics Press, Cheshire, CT, 1989.
  • J. Bertin, Semiology of Graphics: Diagrams, Networks, Maps. University of Wisconsin Press, 1983.
  • R. Arnheim, Visual Thinking, University of California Press, Berkely, CA, 1969.

• Diagrammatics mailing list:
  • <diagrams@csli.stanford.edu>
    Subscription requests: <diagrams-request@csli.stanford.edu>.

• Diagrammatics, or Thinking with Diagrams -
  an updated version of my Position Statement for the Thinking with Diagrams '97 workshop;
• Diagrammatic Tools for Science -
  an updated version of my Research Summary for the Thinking with Diagrams '98 workshop.

See also:

Professional interests
Selected publications
Professional biography
Qualitative Analysis

Personal interests

my Institute

my Department

my Home