dimensions of argumentation in social media ekaw2012 2012 10 11

Copyright 2011 Digital Enterprise Research Institute. All rights reserved.

Digital Enterprise Research Institute www.deri.ie

Enabling Networked Knowledge

Dimensions of Argumentation in Social Media

Jodi Schneider1, Brian Davis1, and Adam Wyner2

1Digital Enterprise Research Institute, NUI Galway2Department of Computer Science, University of Liverpool

EKAW, Galway, Ireland Thursday 11 th October 2012

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Want to reuse social media data

Growing amount of social media data Want to reuse data Need to analyse & structure it



Key Point

The overall popularity of an opinion is not as important as the reasons supporting it

Image: http://www.nickmilton.com/2012/03/when-people-trust-crowds.html



Arguments

Claim: Jaffa Cakes are cakesJustification: official EU ruling; cakes go hard when

stale

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https://twitter.com/robeastaway/status/135838892694839296



Arguments

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Claim: If Canon does not make the repair, you should take them to small claims court.

Justification: it’s easy, cheap, and can be done online; it’s within your rights



Knowledge bases of social media

Growing amount of social media data Want to reuse data Need to analyse & structure it

Envision:Knowledge bases of social media Query Make a representation we can reason with

– even in the face of inconsistency.



Oops!

People disagree Inconsistency is bad for knowledge bases! How do we reconcile & resolve the inconsistencies?



Argumentation to the Rescue!

People disagree Inconsistency is bad for knowledge bases! How do we reconcile & resolve the inconsistencies?

Argumentation! Claims Justifications Contrary Claims & Disagreements…



Formal Representations

Argumentation Frameworks

Variety of Semantics – can be used to choose best options



Calculate best options (non-contradictory opinions)

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Wyner, van Engers, & Bahreini. From Policy-making Statements to First-order Logic. EGOV 2010



Formal Representations

Argumentation Schemes Appeal to Expert Opinion Appeal to Popular Opinion From Analogy Slippery Slope ....

Indicate Relevant “Critical Questions” for a discussion Patterns for Information Extraction (SWAIE 2012)

John Danaher, http://philosophicaldisquisitions.blogspot.ie/2010/03/argumentation-schemes-part-1.html



Goal

Extract arguments from text. Reconstruct argumentation into formal

representations. Make a representation that we can reason with even

in the face of inconsistency.



How to automate?

What aspects of social media are relevant to extracting and representing argumentation?



Dimensions of (Argumentative) Expression

Genre Metadata Properties of users Goals of a particular dialogue Context Informal language Implicit info Sentiment techniques Subjectivity and objectivity

Genre

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Metadata

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Properties of Users

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Goals

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Goals of #election2012 tweets?

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Related Papers

Schneider and Wyner. “Identifying Consumers' Arguments in Text”, SWAIE 2012 at EKAW 2012.

Wyner, Schneider, Atkinson, and Bench-Capon. “Semi-Automated Argumentative Analysis of Online Product Reviews.” In 4th International Conference on Computational Models of Argument (COMMA 2012).

Wyner and Schneider. ''Arguing from a point of view'', Agreement Technologies 2012.

October 9, 201221



Acknowledgments

Project Funding Science Foundation Ireland Grant No. SFI/08/CE/I1380 (Líon-2) Short-term scientific mission (STSM 1868) from the COST Action

ICO801 on Agreement Technologies FP7-ICT-2009-4 Programme, IMPACT Project, Grant Agreement

Number 247228

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Thanks!

Questions? Contacts:

Jodi Schneider [email protected]@jschneider

Brian Davis [email protected] Adam Wyner [email protected]

mailto:[email protected]









Examples of Arguments in Social Media

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Arguments

Claim: Jaffa Cakes are cakesJustification: official EU ruling; cakes go hard when

stale

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https://twitter.com/robeastaway/status/135838892694839296

27http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Heath_Totten



Arguments

Claim: does not merit an articleJustification: hasn’t played

since 2008, mediocre record

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http://www.amazon.co.uk/review/R34F9M7871K2W0/ref=cm_cr_rev_detmd_pl?ie=UTF8&asin=B004M8S152&cdForum=FxM7A99WYT0UJ9&cdMsgID=Mx35ZEPGH4SV7JK&cdMsgNo=1&cdPage=1&cdSort=oldest&cdThread=Tx1C124R97075W9&store=photo#Mx35ZEPGH4SV7JK



Arguments

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Claim: If Canon does not make the repair, you should take them to small claims court.

Justification: it’s easy, cheap, and can be done online; it’s within your rights

http://www.vangrondelle.com/2010/10/ekaw-2010/



Arguments

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Claim: The in-use paper category is important. Justification: Provides a platform for research scaling up

to enterprise scale.



Enabling Networked Knowledge34

etc


Enabling Networked Knowledge35

Using Argumentation

Mark & help resolve inconsistencies Provide justifications & explanations



Formalism: Abstract argumentation frameworks

AF = hA; attacki, where A is a set of arguments and attack a binary relation on A.

A variety of semantics are available to evaluate the arguments.



Formalism: argumentation schemes

Presumptive patterns of reasoning

Position To Know 1. Ms. Peters is in a position to know whether Mr. Jones was at

the party. 2. Ms. Peters asserts that Mr. Jones was at the party. 3. Therefore, presumptively, Mr. Jones was at the party.



Key Point

The overall popularity of an opinion is not as important as the reasons supporting it

Image: http://www.nickmilton.com/2012/03/when-people-trust-crowds.html



Key Point

overwhelming numbers of people may not matter

Photograph DAVID GILES/PA NEWS WIRE/AP PHOTO - February 7, 2011 New Yorker via http://www.vincentskeltis.com/blog/2011/2/7/crowd-crush.html



Key Point

as much as a particular reason against it

http://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebrity-news/crowd-crush-mars-jls-no1-431245

dimensions of argumentation in social media ekaw2012 2012 10 11

Technology

networked knowledge19

networked knowledge10

networked knowledge5

networked knowledgeoct

aspects of social media

dimensions of argumentation

data need

argumentation schemesappeal