Amanda Rysling

Bio [2008]
Amanda Rysling is originally from Los Angeles, California, where she lived until 2007. She currently divides the majority of her time between New York, New York, and Wroclaw, Poland. During the school year, she attends New York University, where she is currently studying linguistics and mathematics, planning to graduate with a BA in 2011. She hopes to complete graduate studies in theoretical linguistics, and research in the field thereafter. While at school, she also starts on NYU's NCAA Division I Fencing Team, as a women's foilist. At the beginning of the summer, she makes it a point to travel to a place she has never visited before she settles in Wroclaw to train with the Wroclawianie Klub and Polish junior national fencing teams. While training, she works as a Polish-English interpreter for the international guests of the Polish fencing team.

Project Title
The Region of Rule Space of the Graphical Representation of the Sentence Trees of a Grammar

Project
The intent of this project is to explore the region of rule space of the graphical representation of the sentence trees of a grammar, beginning by enumerating the possible tree structures generated by the grammar under study. The nature of the structures generated by the transformational rules of this grammar will be determined; particularly explored will be their symmetry (or asymmetry) and their trends toward certain degrees of branching. In anticipation of the eventual recursive nature of the behavior exhibited, the depth of each tree will be limited. If possible, it will be determined through preliminary trial(s) the limit of depth which, when graphically represented, could potentially demonstrate interesting, complex, and/or unexpected behaviors. Dependent upon the efficacy of the execution of the first attempt(s), exploration will be furthered by enumerating tree structures of varying depths, natures, and grammars.

Favorite Radius 3/2 Rule
Rule chosen: 15987

I like the division of the space that this automaton creates. One perceives a diagonal division from the upper left corner to the bottom right corner. Above this division, it is very easy to see a pattern, one feels able to tell "what's going on." But beneath this division, one quickly becomes puzzled by the strong feeling that there is a pattern, but if asked the question, one would not be exactly able to explain the "goings-on." The presence of these two feelings generated by one space reminds me of the strange and inspiring impression that I felt upon first realizing the occurrence of randomness generated by deterministic rules.