Sometimes Updates Are Circumscription

Model-based revision of knowledge bases ex­ pressed as first-order theories was shown in [Winslett 88b] to be useful as a means of de­ scribing and reasoning about the effects of ac­ tions. This paper shows that model-based the­ ory revision is actually expressible as a form of circumscription. This shows that in cer­ tain applications, the cumbersome conceptu­ ally machinery of circumscription can be re­ placed by the intuitively simpler ideas of modelbased theory revision. Where theory revision techniques are insufficient to capture the se­ mantics of change in an application, circum­ scription will offer a more flexible environment. In addition, future advances in computing cir­ cumscription can be mapped to improvements in computing theory revisions, and vice versa.

• Type: Conference
• Year: 1989
• Where: IJCAI
• Authors: Marianne Winslett
• Keywords: IJCAI 1989, IJCAI 2007, Model-based Revision, Theory Revisions, The­ Ory Revision