2,114 research outputs found
Ideal Reasoners don’t Believe in Zombies
The negative zombie argument concludes that physicalism is false from the premises that p ∧¬q is ideally negatively conceivable and that what is ideally negatively conceivable is possible, where p is the conjunction of the fundamental physical truths and laws and q is a phenomenal truth (Chalmers 2002; 2010). A sentence φ is ideally negatively conceivable iff φ is not ruled out a priori on ideal rational reflection. In this paper, I argue that the negative zombie argument is neither a priori nor conclusive. First, I argue that the premises of the argument are true only if there exists an adequate finite ideal reasoner R that believes ◊(p ∧ ¬q) on the basis of not believing p→q on a priori basis. Roughly, a finite reasoner is a reasoner with cognitive limitations (e.g. finite memory). I argue that R is finite only if R reasons nonmonotonically and only approach ideal reflection at the limit of a reasoning sequence. This would render the argument nonconclusive. Finally, I argue that, for some q, R does not believe ◊(p ∧ ¬q) on the basis of not believing p→q on a priori basis (e.g. for q =‘something is conscious’). This would render the choice of an adequate q dependent on empirical information (and the argument a posteriori). I conclude that the negative zombie argument (and, maybe, all zombie arguments) is neither a priori nor conclusive
The lexicographic closure as a revision process
The connections between nonmonotonic reasoning and belief revision are
well-known. A central problem in the area of nonmonotonic reasoning is the
problem of default entailment, i.e., when should an item of default information
representing "if A is true then, normally, B is true" be said to follow from a
given set of items of such information. Many answers to this question have been
proposed but, surprisingly, virtually none have attempted any explicit
connection to belief revision. The aim of this paper is to give an example of
how such a connection can be made by showing how the lexicographic closure of a
set of defaults may be conceptualised as a process of iterated revision by sets
of sentences. Specifically we use the revision process of Nayak.Comment: 7 pages, Nonmonotonic Reasoning Workshop 2000 (special session on
belief change), at KR200
A Plausibility Semantics for Abstract Argumentation Frameworks
We propose and investigate a simple ranking-measure-based extension semantics
for abstract argumentation frameworks based on their generic instantiation by
default knowledge bases and the ranking construction semantics for default
reasoning. In this context, we consider the path from structured to logical to
shallow semantic instantiations. The resulting well-justified JZ-extension
semantics diverges from more traditional approaches.Comment: Proceedings of the 15th International Workshop on Non-Monotonic
Reasoning (NMR 2014). This is an improved and extended version of the
author's ECSQARU 2013 pape
- …