Processing Inconsistency of Knowledge on Semantic Level

Ngoc Thanh Nguyen (Institute of Control and Systems Engineering, Wroclaw University of Technology, Poland)

Abstract: Inconsistency of knowledge may appear in many situations, especially in distributed environments in which autonomous programs operate. Inconsistency may lead to conflicts, for which the resolution is necessary for correct functioning of an intelligent system. Inconsistency of knowledge in general means a situation in which some autonomous programs (like agents) generate different versions (or states) of knowledge on the same subject referring to a real world. In this paper we propose two logical structures for representing inconsistent knowledge: conjunction and disjunction. For each of them we define the semantics and formulate the consensus problem, the solution of which would resolve the inconsistency. Next, we work out algorithms for consensus determination. Consensus methodology has been proved to be useful in solving conflicts and should be also effective for knowledge inconsistency resolution.

Keywords: conflicts, consensus methods, inconsistent knowledge

Categories: E.1, H.2.1, I.2.11, I.2.4