1、Seeking Explanations:Abduction in Logic,Philosophy of Scienceand Arti cal IntelligenceAtocha Aliseda-LLeraSeeking Explanations:Abduction in Logic,Philosophy of Scienceand Arti cal IntelligenceILLC Dissertation Series 1997-4institute for logic, language and computationFor further information about IL
2、LC-publications, please contactInstitute for Logic, Language and ComputationUniversiteit van AmsterdamPlantage Muidergracht 241018 TV Amsterdamphone: +31-20-5256090fax: +31-20-5255101e-mail: illcwins.uva.nlSEEKING EXPLANATIONS:ABDUCTION IN LOGIC, PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCEAND ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCEa dis
3、sertationsubmitted to the department of philosophyinterdepartmental program in philosophy and symbolic systemsand the committee on graduate studiesof stanford universityin partial fulfillment of the requirementsfor the degree ofdoctor of philosophyByAtocha Aliseda-LLeraAugust 1997Promotor: Prof.dr.
4、J. van BenthemFaculteit Wiskunde en InformaticaUniversiteit van AmsterdamPlantage Muidergracht 241018 TV AmsterdamThe investigations were supported by the Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico,Instituto de Investigaciones Filoso cas.Copyright c1997 by Atocha Aliseda-LLeraISBN: 9074795730ContentsAc
5、knowledgements ix1 What is Abduction?Overview and Proposal for Investigation 11.1 What is Abduction? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11.2 The Founding Father: C.S. Peirce . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101.3 Philosophy of Science . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6、 . . . . . . . 141.4 Arti cial Intelligence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181.5 Further Fields of Application . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221.6 A Taxonomy for Abduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261.7 Thesis Aim and Overview . . . . . . . .
7、 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 322 Abduction as Logical Inference 352.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 352.2 Directions in Reasoning:Forward and Backward . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 372.3 Formats of Inference:Premises and Backgr
8、ound Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 392.4 Inferential Strength: A Parameter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 422.5 Requirements for Abductive Inference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 452.6 Styles of Inference and Structural Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 502.7 St
9、ructural Rules For Abduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 552.8 Further Logical Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66vii2.9 Discussion and Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 732.10 Further Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
10、 . . . . . . . . 742.11 Related Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 753 Abduction as Computation 793.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 793.2 Procedural Abduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 803.3 Intr
11、oduction to Semantic Tableaux . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 823.4 Abduction with Tableaux . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 873.5 Generating Abductions in Tableaux . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 903.6 Tableaux Extensions and Closures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12、 . 933.7 Computing Plain Abductions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 993.8 Consistent Abductive Explanations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1033.9 Explanatory Abduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1063.10 Quality of Abductions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13、 . . . . . . . . . . 1073.11 Further Logical Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1103.12 Discussion and Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1153.13 Further Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1163.14 Related Work . . . . .
14、. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1174 Scienti c Explanation and Epistemic Change 1194.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1194.2 Scienti c Explanation as Abduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1204.3 Abduction as Epistemic Change
15、 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1364.4 Explanation and Belief Revision . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1584.5 AGM Postulates for Contraction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161A Algorithms for Chapter 3 163Abstract 175Bibliography 177viiiAcknowledgementsIt is a privile
16、ge to have ve professors on my reading committee representing thedi erent areas of my Ph.D. program in Philosophy and Symbolic Systems: ComputerScience, Linguistics, Logic, Philosophy, and Psychology.Tom Wasow was the rst person to point me in the direction of abduction. Hegave me useful comments on
17、 earlier versions of this dissertation, always insisting thatit be readable to non experts. It was also a pleasure to work with him this last yearcoordinating the undergraduate Symbolic Systems program.Dag nn Fllesdal encouraged me to continue exploring connections between ab-duction and philosophy
18、of science. YoavShohamandPat Suppes gavemevery goodadvice about future expansions of this work. Jim Greeno chaired my defense and alsogave me helpful suggestions. For their help with my dissertation, and for the classesin which they taught me, I am very grateful.Tomy advisor, Johan van Benthem, I o
19、er my deepest gratitude. He is a wonderfulteacher and mentor. Among many things, Johan taught me that basic notions in logicmay give rise to the most interesting questions. Working with him meant amazementand challenge, and his passion for logic is an endless inspiration to my work.I received help f
20、rom numerous other people and institutions. For inspiring con-versations, invaluable bibliography, and constructive criticism in early stages of thisproject, I wish to thank: Carmina Curco, Pablo Gervas, Dinda Gorlee, Jerry Hobbs,Marianne Kalsbeek, Geert-Jan Kruij , Ralf Muller, David Pearce, and Vctor Sanchez-Valencia. I would also liketothank the organizers and participants of the ECAI96Workshop on Abductive and Inductive Reasoning to whom I had the opportunityto present a small part of this dissertation. Moreover, I thank the students in theix
