Artificial Intelligence?
...representation and use of symbolic information (as opposed to using numbers only) and studies heuristic processes (as opposed to algorithmic processes in which there is a guarantee of success in a finite time). Chess, for example requires reasoning about plausible moves and requires representing symbolic features of a game, such as threats and control. AI programs have been criticised because they lack ‘common sense’. People use propositions to guide them through many situations, which AI lacks. How can computers do something similar to using ‘common sense’. Common sense reasoning may be captured as a very large set of facts together with their exception conditions, ie; “Water runs downhill, UNLESS its 1. under pressure 2. in non liquid form… In the development of the INTERNIST program Dr Jack Myers added about 100,000 ‘common sense’ facts of medicine to improve the programs performance (Miller et al, 1984). The ‘default-reasoning’ is one such mode in which a program assumes the general fact holds in a situation unless it is contradicted by a more specialised piece of knowledge. Taxonomic hierarchies ...