LAWS@SRI-AI.ARPA (07/12/85)
From: AIList Moderator Kenneth Laws <AIList-REQUEST@SRI-AI> AIList Digest Friday, 12 Jul 1985 Volume 3 : Issue 92 Today's Topics: News - Center for Machine Intelligence, Journals -- IEEE Software & SPIE AI Issue, Book - A Vision of Knowledge Engineering ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu 11 Jul 85 22:39:16-PDT From: Ken Laws <Laws@SRI-AI.ARPA> Subject: Center for Machine Intelligence I have received an announcement of the formation of a new Center for Machine Intelligence under the co-directorship of Dr. Ashby Woolf and Prof. Lynn Conway (recently of DARPA). The center is being formed by Electronic Data Systems Corporation (subsidiary of GM) and the University of Michigan. Their address is 2001 Commonwealth Blvd., Ann Arbor, MI 48105, phone (313) 995-0900. -- Ken Laws ------------------------------ Date: Wednesday, 10 July 1985 08:20:16 EDT From: Duvvuru.Sriram@cmu-ri-cive.arpa Subject: Reminder -- IEEE Software A reminder that the last date for the submission of papers for the IEEE software special AI issue is July 15th. If anyone wants an extension till August 1st, send mail to sriram@cmu-ri-cive.arpa. Sriram FOR YOUR INFORMATION: The March 1986 issue of IEEE Software will address software aspects of knowledge-based systems developed for engineering applications. (IEEE Software is one of the prestigious magazines devoted to problems in Software engineering). ------------------------------ Date: Thu 11 Jul 85 22:32:33-PDT From: Ken Laws <Laws@SRI-AI.ARPA> Subject: SPIE AI Issue Mohan Trivedi tells me that SPIE (Society of Photo and Instrumentation Engineers) is planning a special AI issue of their journal early next year. This seems to be a follow-on to their recent conference on AI. Contact Dr. Trivedi at Electrical Engineering Dept. Louisiana State University Baton Rouge, LA 70803 Phone (504) 388-6826 soon if you are interested in contributing. Submitted papers need not be about optics. -- Ken Laws ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 7 Jul 85 14:36:30 edt From: Tom Scott <scott%bgsu.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa> Subject: A Vision of Knowledge Engineering I'm writing a manuscript, "A Vision of Knowledge Engineering", for Prentice-Hall. The intended audience of the textbook is undergraduate students in philosophy, management information science, and computer science. The parts of the book correspond to the audience: Part I (chapters 2-4) is concerned with the theoretical foundations of knowledge engineering and will focus on symbolic logic and epistemology, including both the empirical work of John Dewey, Rudolf Carnap, and Isaac Levi as well as the transcendental work of Immanuel Kant and Edmund Husserl. Part II (chapter 5) introduces topics from information management such as managerial cybernetics, decision support systems, and man/machine interaction (software engineering and human engineering). Part III (chapter 6) outlines the techniques and concepts of artificial intelligence that young knowledge engineers need to be on friendly terms with in order to design and implement applications programs such as knowledge-based expert systems. Here is an outline of the manuscipt: A VISION OF KNOWLEDGE ENGINEERING 1. Introduction 2. Intelligent Resources 2.1 The Age of Knowledge 2.2 The System of Intelligent Resources 2.3 Revision of Intelligent Resources 3. Deductive Knowledge 3.1 Logic Programming 3.2 Automated Reasoning 3.3 Deductive Systems 4. Deep Knowledge 4.1 Deliberate Expansion of Knowledge Bases 4.2 Structures of Consciousness 4.3 What Is Inductive Logic? 5. Information Management 5.1 Managerial Cybernetics 5.2 Decision Support Systems 5.3 The Unix Development Environment 6. AI Techniques 6.1 Concepts and Techniques 6.2 Applications 6.3 The AI Development Environment 7. Vision of Possibilities As I begin to close off the theoretical part (chapters 2-4), I'm looking for concrete systems and applications to write about in chapters 5 and 6. If anyone has suggestions about systems that I can review, please contact me at the address listed at the end of this article. * * * Here are three diagrams that summarize the approach to knowledge engineering that I've taken in the manuscript. The first diagram (figure 1) shows a canonical or ideal form that seems to underlie most (all?!) interactive knowledge systems. Figures 2 and 3 summarize the literature that I have found to be a good basis for teaching the theory and practice of knowledge systems and intelligent databases to young knowledge engineers. +---------+ ________ |knowledge|_________ | | base | | | +---------+ | | | | | | | +---------+ +---------+ +---------+ +---------+ +---------+ | expert |____| inter- |____|inference|____| inter- |____| user | | | | face | | engine | | face | | | +---------+ +---------+ +---------+ +---------+ +---------+ | | | | | | | +---------+ | ________ | black- | ________ | board | +---------+ Figure 1. An interactive knowledge system. Without much difficulty most block diagrams of knowledge systems can fit into this framework. 5. Rule-Based Expert Systems (Buchanan & al. 1984) ======================================================= 4. Principles of Artificial Intelligence (Nilsson 1980) 3. Automated Reasoning (Wos & al. 1984) 2. Automated Theorem Proving (Loveland 1978) ======================================================= 1. Mathematical Logic (Shoenfield 1967) Figure 2. The five levels of knowledge engineering as seen from the theoretical perspective. The concept of a production system and the concept of representation-inference-control can be traced on each of the five levels. 5. Concepts and Terminology for the Conceptual Schema and the Information Base (van Griethuysen 1982) ===================================================== 4. Advances in Data Base Theory (Gallaire & al. 1981) 3. Towards a Logical Reconstruction of Relational Database Theory (Reiter 1984) 2. Automated Theorem Proving (Loveland 1978) ===================================================== 1. Mathematical Logic (Shoenfield 1967) Figure 3. The five levels of knowledge engineering and automated reasoning as seen from the practical perspective of deductively- augmented (intelligent) relational databases. The diagram is motivated by the practical need for intelligent deductions in large commercial databases. One more diagram, figure 4, helps round out this preliminary Vision. I drew figure 4 after using Argonne's Interactive Theorem Prover (ITP). ITP is a beautiful tool for giving young knowledge engineers experience and understanding of how to build a production system consisting of entities (the knowledge base of atomic and molecular clauses), operators (rules of inference), and control (strategies such as forward and backward demodulation and forward and backward subsumption). +------------+ ----------->| Choice |------------ | | strategies | | | +------------+ | | || | | || | | +---------------+ V +------------+ | | +------------+ | Backward |----| Knowledge |----| Inference | | strategies |----| base |----| rules | +------------+ | | +------------+ A +---------------+ | | || | | || | | +------------+ | | | Forward | | ------------| strategies |<----------- +------------+ Figure 4. Argonne National Laboratory's Interactive Theorem Prover (ITP). This diagram is adapted from Allen and Luckham 1970 and Wos et al. 1984 (section 4.4, "Order of Operations"). The flow of operations is clockwise, beginning with the choice strategies. ITP stops when the knowledge base exhibits an appropriate termination condition such as the null clause in refutation proofs. The corrpesondonce between ITP and an abstract production system is: ITP Production system -------------- ----------------- knowledge base entities inference rules operations strategies control That is why we ITP addicts are so excited about using ITP in knowledge engineering. ITP serves as an example of a production system and a production-system-building tool. If you've ever tried using Yaps in the University of Maryland Lisp environment, I think you'll agree that ITP is a lot simpler. I don't mean of course to tell people not to use the Maryland systems or other production-system-building tools. My intention here is only to recommend the Argonne system as the easiest way that I know of for new knowledge engineers to effortlessly gain full knowledge of production systems through ITP-based experience and understanding. Note the nice picture that results when we combine figure 1 (the interactive knowledge system) and figure 4 (ITP). Simply replace the middle section of figure 1 by figure 4. The knowledge bases in each diagram correspond well; the inference engine and blackboard of the interactive knowledge system correspond to the inference-rule module and strategy modules of ITP. The resulting picture is clean and neat. What more could a young knowledge engineer ask for? * * * I look forward to hearing your replies to these ideas. We are children of the cybernetic revolution and we are witnessing the rising sunshine of the Age of Enlightenment. Jai Guru Dev, Tom Scott Department of Mathematics and Statistics Bowling Green State University Bowling Green OH 43403-0221 Csnet: scott@bgsu UUCP: ...!cbosgd!osu-eddie!bgsuvax!scott Day phone: 419-372-2636 ------------------------------ End of AIList Digest ********************