Audiences in argumentation frameworks

Although reasoning about what is the case has been the historic focus of logic, reasoning about what should be done is an equally important capacity for an intelligent agent. Reasoning about what to do in a given situation - termed practical reasoning in the philosophical literature - has important differences from reasoning about what is the case. The acceptability of an argument for an action turns not only on what is true in the situation, but also on the values and aspirations of the agent to whom the argument is directed. There are three distinctive features of practical reasoning: first, that practical reasoning is situated in a context, directed towards a particular agent at a particular time; second, that since agents differ in their aspirations there is no right answer for all agents, and rational disagreement is always possible; third, that since no agent can specify the relative priority of its aspirations outside of a particular context, such prioritisation must be a pr...

• Type: Journal
• Year: 2007
• Where: AI
• Authors: Trevor J. M. Bench-Capon, Sylvie Doutre, Paul E. Dunne
• Keywords: AI 2007, Artificial Intelligence, Distinctive Features, Practical Reasoning, Reasoning