Skip to main content
Log in

Prolegomena to Concise Theories of Action

  • Published:
Studia Logica Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

A new methodology for developing theories of action has recently emerged which provides means for formally evaluating the correctness of such theories. Yet, for a theory of action to qualify as a solution to the frame problem, not only does it need to produce correct inferences, but moreover, it needs to derive these inferences from a concise representation of the domain at hand. The new methodology however offers no means for assessing conciseness. Such a formal account of conciseness is developed in this paper. Combined with the existing criterion for correctness, our account of conciseness offers a framework where proposed solutions to the frame problem can be formally evaluated.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Baker, A., ‘A simple solution to the Yale shooting problem’, in Proceedings of the International Conference on Principles of Knowledge Representation and Reasoning, pages 11-20, 1989.

  2. Davis, E., Representations of Commonsense Knowledge, Morgan Kaufmann, 1990.

  3. Genesereth, M. R., and N. J. Nilsson, Logical Foundations of Artificial Intelligence, Morgan Kaufmann, 1987.

  4. Hanks, S., and D. McDermott, ‘Default reasoning, non-monotonic logics, and the frame problem’, in Proceedings of the National (U.S.A.) Conference on Artificial Intelligence, pages 328-333, 1986.

  5. Hass, A. R., ‘The case for domain-specific frame axioms’, in Proceedings of the 1987 Workshop on the Frame Problem, 1987.

  6. Kartha, G. N., ‘Two counterexamples related to baker's approach to the frame problem’, Artificial Intelligence 69:379-391, 1994.

    Google Scholar 

  7. Kartha, G. N., and V. Lifschitz, ‘Actions with indirect effects (preliminary report)’, in J. Doyle, E. Sandewall, and P. Torasso, editors, Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on Principles of Knowledge Representation and Reasoning, pages 341-350, Morgan Kaufmann, 1994.

  8. Lin, F., and Y. Shoham, ‘Provably correct theories of action (preliminary report)’, in Proceedings of the National (U.S.A.) Conference on Artificial Intelligence, pages 349-354, 1991.

  9. Mccain, N., and H. Turner, ‘A causal theory of ramifications and qualifications’, in Proceedings of the Fourteenth International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence, pages 1978-1984, Morgan Kaufmann, 1995.

  10. Mccarthy, J., ‘Circumscription — a form of non-monotonic reasoning’, Artificial Intelligence 13:27-39, 1980.

    Google Scholar 

  11. McCarthy, J., ‘Applications of circumscription to formalizing common sense knowledge’, Artificial Intelligence 28:89-116, 1986.

    Google Scholar 

  12. McCarthy, J., and P. Hayes, ‘Some philosophical problems from the standpoint of artificial intelligence’, Machine Intelligence 4:463-502, 1969.

    Google Scholar 

  13. Peppas, P., and W. Wobcke, ‘On the use of epistemic entrenchment in reasoning about action’, in B. Neumann, editor, Proceedings of the Tenth European Conference on Artificial Intelligence, pages 403-407, John Wiley and Sons, 1992, Vienna, Austria.

    Google Scholar 

  14. Sandewall, E., Features and Fluents, Oxford University Press, 1994.

  15. Shanahan, M., Solving the Frame Problem, MIT Press, 1997.

  16. Shoham, Y., Reasoning About Change: Time and Causation from the Standpoint of Artificial Intelligence, MIT Press, Cambridge, England, 1988.

    Google Scholar 

  17. Winslett, M., Updating Logical Databases, Cambridge University Press, 1990.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Peppas, P., Koutras, C.D. & Williams, MA. Prolegomena to Concise Theories of Action. Studia Logica 67, 403–418 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1010516501232

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1010516501232

Navigation