Professor Thomas Marlowe has been a member of the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science at Seton Hall University for almost 40 years, and has taught a wide variety of courses in both disciplines. Until he went on phased retirement in 2017, he was coordinator and advisor for the Computer Science program. Professor Marlowe enjoys working with students and with professional colleagues—almost all his research is collaborative. His professional interests include in mathematics, abstract algebra and discrete mathematics; in computer science, programming languages, real-time systems, and software engineering, and pedagogy; and in information science, collaboration and knowledge management. The connection between graphs and algebraic structures is a recurrent theme.

Professor Marlowe has Ph.D. in Computer Science, from Rutgers, The State University, and a Ph.D. in Mathematics, also from Rutgers. Professor Marlowe has many publications and academic distinctions, with over 100 publications in refereed conferences and journals in mathematics, computer science and information science. Some of the more recent and more significant include:

• J. Marlowe, J.R. Laracy, “Logic as a Key to Integrating the Curriculum for STEM Majors”, Journal on Systemics, Cybernetics and Informatics: JSCI Volume 15 - Number 4 - Year 2017, pp. 63-71, ISSN: 1690-4524 (Online)
• Kirova, T.J. Marlowe, C.S. Ku, “Monitoring and Reducing Application Fragility through Traceability and Effective Regression Testing”, Genie Logiciel, No 115, 2-9, December 2015.
• Rountev, S. Kagan, T. J. Marlowe, “Interprocedural Dataflow Analysis in the Presence of Large Libraries”, Proceedings of CC 2006, 216, Lecture Notes in Computer Science 3923, 2006.
• P. Masticola, T. J. Marlowe, B. G. Ryder, "Multisource Data Flow Problems'', ACM Transactions on Programming Languages and Systems, 17 (5), 777 -803, September 1995.
• D. Stoyenko, T. J. Marlowe, "Polynomial-Time Program Transformations and Schedulability Analysis of Parallel Real-time Programs with Restricted Resource Contention'', Journal of Real-Time Systems, 4 (4), 1992.
• J. Marlowe, B. G. Ryder, "Properties of data flow frameworks: A unified model'', Acta Informatica, 28 (2), 121 -164, 1991.

Professor Marlowe has been a member on more than 10 Ph.D. thesis and 5 M.S. thesis committees, member of more than 25 conference program committees, and reviewer for numerous conferences, journals, and grants. He is the founder of an ongoing professional conference, and has been active with the IIIS and the WMSCI multi-conference.

Dr. Bruce E. Peoples has over 27 years experience in researching and developing advanced complex training, performance, decision, and production support systems and has architected several advanced, “self learning” systems.  His research activities led to the filing of over 50 Invention Disclosures and 15 Patent Applications.  His inventions include the development of a cutting edge BCI system that controls the flight of an unmanned aerial vehicle using only thoughts.  Dr. Peoples also designed and led development of the first paperless learning media production system that mass-produced digital “modular” information objects, also known as Sharable Content Objects (SCOs) that could be used standalone, as aggregations, or in Performance Support Systems and Decision Support Systems, in any delivery environment, without changing “module” code.  In recognition of his past research, Dr. Peoples was awarded a Raytheon 2006 Excellence in Technology award.  Dr. Peoples has been active in several International Standards Committees, developing the standards necessary for implementing “next gen” Information Communication Technologies on a global scale.  He is Chair Emeritus of an ISO/IEC Standard Committee, ISO/IEC JTC1 SC 36 Information Technology for Learning, Education and Training.  Dr. Peoples was awarded BS and MS degrees from Clarion University of Pennsylvania, and a PhD degree from Université Paris 8  Saint-Denis, France.

Professor Nagib Callaos is the Founding President of the a 32 years old Multi-Disciplinary Organization oriented to 1) solve real life problems which mostly require multi-disciplinary teams and 2) to synergistically relate all disciplinary and inter-disciplinary departments of the University Simon Bolivar with the public and the private sectors as well as with business and the Venezuelan society at large. He is also the Founding President of the IIIS and the Founding Editor in Chief of the Journal of Systemics, Cybernetics, and Informatics (JSCI). He is former Dean of Research and Development of the University Simon Bolivar.

Professor Callaos was also the founding president of several organizations on research, development, and technological innovation, e.g. The Foundation of Research and Development of the University Simon Bolivar, the founding president of the Venezuelan Fund for Technological Innovations (created by presidential decree), which required the evaluation of projects from any discipline as well as technological innovations that required multi-disciplinary teams, The Venezuelan Association of Executives in Patents and Copyrights. As a professional, Dr. Callaos was for many years consultant in Information Systems in the largest corporations in Venezuela including its Central Bank. In this context he is the Founding president of a consulting 32 years old consulting firm in information systems and software engineering.  His main research, academic, and professional activities, along almost 50 years were in the area of Systemic Methodologies of Information System Development, Group Decision Support Systems, and Action-Research mainly via Operations Research. He tutored more than 100 undergraduate and graduate theses and produced more than 100 research papers and reflection articles. He has also edited, or co-edited many books, mostly conferences proceedings.

Julie Thompson Klein (Interdisciplinarity: history, theory, and practice, 1990) who, up to our knowledge, wrote the most comprehensive book on Inerdisciplinarity. About the 40% of the book was used to list her references. With regards to interdisciplinary rigor she wrote:

"Interdiciplinary work is often attacked for lacking rigor. However, rigor is not diminished. Rather, it is shifted from disciplinary criteria to a new interdisciplinary objective, to what (Singleton, 1983) a core sense of “interdisciplinary rigor.” There are no scholarly defined standards for judging interdisciplinary works but Stephen Schneider’s three criteria for disciplinary excellence are quite appropriate. Excellence of interdisciplinary research can be measured in terms of (1) disciplinary clarity, (2) clarity of cross-disciplinary communications, and (3) the utilization and combination of existing knowledge from many fields to help solve a problem or to raise or advance knowledge about a new issue (Shneider, 1977)."

A purpose of this conversational session is to present a very clear way to assure a higher level of rigor in interdisciplinary communication, as related to disciplinary rigor. A main reason why “Interdisciplinary work is often attacked for lacking rigor” is probably because confusing the notions of precision and rigor. Disciplinary rigor is fundamentally based on the respective method and semiotic system. To translate from a disciplinary semiotic system to an inter-disciplinary one requires an additional creativity at the syntactical, semiotic and pragmatic level. This, in turn, potentially requires the creation of analogies (via analogical thinking), metaphors, and similes. These three notions are different and should not be confused or, much less, taken as synonyms. We usually are similar to our parents, but we are no metaphors or analogies of them. Metaphors are expressive tools while, analogies are thinking processes that usually precede and provide input to logical thinking (induction, deduction, abduction, etc.)

A second purpose of this conversational session is to provide a first step for a multi-author article(s), i.e. a collection of short research-essays (800-1500 words each) with the objective of generating a special issue of the journal; which, necessarily, should be based on the short essay provided to the attendees and/or on the reflections that might emerge from this conversational session.

Shneider, S. N. (1977). Climate Change and World Predicamentemt: A case Study for inter-Disciplinary Research. Climate Change, 1, 21-43.

Singleton, R. J. (1983). Interdisciplinary Teaching with Humanists: Reflections of a Biological Scientist. Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 26 (2), 304-314.

Thompson Klein, J. (1990). Interdisciplinarity: history, theory, and practice. Detroit: Wayne State University Press.