Many people view arts and sciences as being different because sciences yield objective answers to problems whereas arts produce subjective experiences I argue that art and science are on a continuum in which artists work with possible worlds whereas scientists are constrained to working in this world. But sometimes perceiving this world differently is the key to making discoveries. Thus, arts a...

In this paper, the relationship between the thermodynamic and historical arrows of time is studied. In the context of a simple combinatorial model, their definitions are made more precise and in particular strong versions (which are not compatible with time symmetric microscopic laws) and weak versions (which can be compatible with time symmetric microscopic laws) are given. This is part of a l...

In this paper, we analyze the relationship between commitment and obligation from a logical viewpoint. The principle of commitment implying obligation is proven in a specific logic of action preference which is a generalization of Meyer’s dynamic deontic logic. In the proposed formalism, an agent’s commitment to goals is considered as a special kind of actions which can change her deontic prefe...

What is a matrix characterization? We give a formal answer to this question by the deenition of matrix systems. They provide a framework in which all major existing matrix characterizations can be presented uniformly and also support the development of new ones. We describe how to develop a matrix characterization from a sequent calculus. Once a matrix characterization exists, a close relation ...

Do mathematical expressions have intensions, or merely extensions? If we accept the standard account of intensions based on possible worlds, it would seem that the latter is the case – there is no room for nontrivial intensions in the case of non-empirical expressions. However, some vexing mathematical problems, notably Gödel’s Second Incompleteness Theorem, seem to presuppose an intensional co...

3 Actions: Moving Between Situations 4 3.1 Representing Actions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 3.1.1 Add and Delete Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 3.1.2 Direct and Indirect Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 3.2 Computing the Results of Actions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ....

It is natural to think that a standard, Kripke-style semantics for quantified modal logic (QML) is incompatible with the view that no individual can exist in more than one possible world, a view that seems to require a Lewis-style, counterpart-theoretic semantics instead. Strictly speaking, however, this thought is wrong-headed. A standard semantics regards a modal statement such as ‘I might ha...

The specification, design, and verification of agent-oriented systems depends upon having clear, intuitive formalisms for reasoning about the properties of such systems. In this paper, we consider agents whose state comprises the three mental attitudes of belief, desire, and intention. While the static relationships among these entities has had considerable attention, the manner in which these ...

In this paper, we propose to define the update of a scenario (sequence of observations at different time points) by a piece of information (value of a fluent or event occurrence) at a given time point. This operation computes the possible world evolutions (called trajectories) satisfying this piece of information that are the most in accordance with the initial scenario. It enables us to identi...