"CONDITIONALS, INFORMATION, AND INFERENCE"
May 13 - 15, 2002
Hagen, Germany
WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION
====================
Conditionals, most generally expressed as if-then-statements and also
termed default rules, are crucial pieces of information. They
represent, for instance, causal or plausible connections, bring
isolated facts together and help us obtain a coherent image of the
world. Conditional knowledge often is generic knowledge, which has
been acquired inductively from experience or learned from authorities.
Conditionals tie a flexible and highly interrelated network of links
along which reasoning is possible and which can be applied to
different situations.
Due to their non-Boolean nature, however, conditionals are not easily
dealt with. They are not simply true or false - rather, a conditional
"if A then B" provides a context, A, for B to be plausible (or true)
and must not be confused with "A entails B" or with the material
implication "not A or B". First work on conditional objects dates back
to Boole in the 19th century, and the interest in conditionals was
revived in the second half of the last century, when the emerging
Artificial Intelligence claimed for appropriate formal tools for
handling "generalized rules". Since then, conditionals have been the
topic of countless publications, each emphasizing their relevance for
knowledge representation, plausible reasoning, nonmonotonic inference,
and belief revision. Moreover, conditionals are closely related to
information, understood as reduction of uncertainty. To learn that,
in the context A, the proposition B is plausible, may reduce
uncertainty about B and hence is information. The ability to predict
such conditioned propositions is knowledge and as such (earlier)
acquired information.
To date, a diversity of default and conditional theories have been
brought forth, in quantitative as well as in qualitative frameworks,
but clear benchmarks are still in discussion. Therefore, the proper
handling of conditionals and information is still a challenge both
for theoretical issues and practical applications.
The aim of this workshop is to bring together researchers interested
in and working with conditionals and information processing, in order
to present new results, discuss open problems and intensify
cooperation. Special focuses will be put on the relationship between
conditionals and information, on the one hand, and on plausible
inference operations as the crucial link between antecedents and
conclusions of conditionals, on the other hand.
Areas of interest are:
* conditional logics,
* information theoretical approaches to conditionals,
* nonmonotonic and plausible inference,
* belief revision,
* conditional event theories,
* conditionals in probabilistics and possibilistics,
* cognitive and epistemic aspects of conditionals,
* systems and implementations,
* applications.
CALL FOR PAPERS
===============
For the workshop, we invite full papers on the themes listed above.
Submitted papers should not exceed 12 pages. Authors are requested
to specify the subarea(s) their paper belongs to, and to include a
list of keywords. Work reported should have not appeared elsewhere.
We strongly encourage electronic submission of papers in postscript or
pdf format. To submit a paper electronically, send an email message
to one of the Program Co-Chairs (see email addresses below) that
includes the following information: paper title, author names, email
address of contact author, and paper body (postscript or pdf format).
Authors unable to submit papers electronically should send 3 copies
of the complete paper to one of the Program Co-Chairs (see addresses
below).
The proceedings will be published as technical report, which will be
available at the workshop. Moreover, a publication of selected papers
in a volume published by Springer is planned.
IMPORTANT DATES
===============
Submission of papers: January 15, 2002
Acceptance decision by: February 28, 2002
Camera ready copy due: April 15, 2002
Workshop Meeting: May 13-15, 2002
WORKSHOP ORGANIZERS AND PROGRAM CO-CHAIRS
=========================================
Gabriele Kern-Isberner
Fachbereich Informatik
Lehrgebiet Praktische Informatik VIII
FernUniversitaet Hagen
P.O. Box 940
D-58084 Hagen, Germany
E-Mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Wilhelm Roedder
Fachbereich Wirtschaftswissenschaft
Lehrstuhl BWL, insb. Operations Research
FernUniversitaet Hagen
P.O. Box 940
D-58084 Hagen, Germany
E-Mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
LOCAL ORGANIZATION
==================
Friedhelm Kulmann
Fachbereich Wirtschaftswissenschaft
Lehrstuhl BWL, insb. Operations Research
FernUniversitaet Hagen
P.O. Box 940
D-58084 Hagen, Germany
E-Mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
WORKSHOP PROGRAM COMMITTEE
==========================
Salem Benferhat, Universite Paul Sabatier
Alexander Bochman, Holon Academic Institute of Technology
Gerhard Brewka, Universitaet Leipzig
Phil Calabrese, SPAWAR/NAVY San Diego
Jim Delgrande, Simon Fraser University
Didier Dubois, Universite Paul Sabatier
Angelo Gilio, Universita La Sapienza
Andreas Herzig, Universite Paul Sabatier
Thomas Lukasiewicz, TU Wien
Frantisek Matus, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic
Jeff Paris, University of Manchester
Simon Parsons, University of Liverpool
Hans Rott, Universitaet Regensburg
Manfred Schramm, TU Muenchen
Milan Studeny, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic
