Logic Programming And Nonmonotonic Reasoning

This Festschrift is published in honor of Gerhard Brewka on the occasion of his 60th birthday and contains articles from fields reflecting the breadth of Gerd's work. The 24 scientific papers included in the book are written by close friends and colleagues and cover topics such as Actions and Agents, Nonmonotonic and Human Reasoning, Preferences and Argumentation.

In the late 1990s, AI witnessed an increasing use of the term 'argumentation' within its bounds: in natural language processing, in user interface design, in logic programming and nonmonotonic reasoning, in Al's interface with the legal community, and in the newly emerging field of multi-agent systems. It seemed to me that many of these uses of argumentation were inspired by (of­ ten inspired) guesswork, and that a great majority of the AI community were unaware that there was a maturing, rich field of research in Argumentation Theory (and Critical Thinking and Informal Logic) that had been steadily re­ building a scholarly approach to the area over the previous twenty years or so. Argumentation Theory, on its side; was developing theories and approaches that many in the field felt could have a role more widely in research and soci­ ety, but were for the most part unaware that AI was one of the best candidates for such application.

Many approaches in the field of nonmonotonic and "commonsense" reasoning are actually different representations of the same basic ideas and constructions. This book gives a logical formalization of the original, explanatory approach to nonmonotonic reasoning.

Many approaches in the field of nonmonotonic and "commonsense" reasoning are actually different representations of the same basic ideas and constructions.