185 research outputs found

    Towards unsupervised ontology learning from data

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    Data-driven elicitation of ontologies from structured data is a well-recognized knowledge acquisition bottleneck. The development of efficient techniques for (semi-)automating this task is therefore practically vital - yet, hindered by the lack of robust theoretical foundations. In this paper, we study the problem of learning Description Logic TBoxes from interpretations, which naturally translates to the task of ontology learning from data.In the presented framework, the learner is provided with a set of positive interpretations (i.e., logical models) of the TBox adopted by the teacher. The goal is to correctly identify the TBox given this input. We characterize the key constraints on the models that warrant finite learnability of TBoxes expressed in selected fragments of the Description Logic ε λ and define corresponding learning algorithms.This work was funded in part by the National Research Foundation under Grant no. 85482

    Reasoning with Contexts in Description Logics

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    Harmelen, F.A.H. van [Promotor]Schlobach, K.S. [Copromotor

    Get my pizza right: Repairing missing is-a relations in ALC ontologies (extended version)

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    With the increased use of ontologies in semantically-enabled applications, the issue of debugging defects in ontologies has become increasingly important. These defects can lead to wrong or incomplete results for the applications. Debugging consists of the phases of detection and repairing. In this paper we focus on the repairing phase of a particular kind of defects, i.e. the missing relations in the is-a hierarchy. Previous work has dealt with the case of taxonomies. In this work we extend the scope to deal with ALC ontologies that can be represented using acyclic terminologies. We present algorithms and discuss a system

    In Memoriam: William J. Stuntz

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    Bill made a lot of errors in his articles. I know that, because he told me so, often in graphic detail, sometimes years after writing them; sometimes days. As anyone familiar with Bill or his work knows, this sort of harsh self-criticism bespeaks not any laxity or insouciance on Bill’s part, or even a false modesty, but rather an intense commitment to intellectual rigor, and (even more astounding for a legal academic) actually “getting it right.

    Hospital accounting and the history of health-care rationing

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    Focussing on the period from 1948 to 1997, this paper examines the history of rationing in the British National Health Service (NHS), with special reference to the role of hospital accounting in this context. The paper suggests that concerns regarding rationing first emerged in the 1960s and 1970s in response to the application of economic theories to the health services, and that rationing only became an issue of wider concern when the NHS increasingly came to resemble economic models of health services in the early 1990s. The paper moreover argues that, unlike in the USA, hospital accounting did not play a significant role in allocating or withholding health resources in Britain. Rudimentary information systems as well as resistance from medical professionals are identified as significant factors in this context
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