On Revising Fuzzy Belief Bases

We look at the problem of revising fuzzy belief bases, i.e., belief base revision in which both formulas in the base as well as revision-input formulas can come attached with varying degrees. Working within a very general framework for fuzzy logic which is able to capture certain types of uncertainty calculi as well as truth-functional fuzzy logics, we show how the idea of rational change from “crisp” base revision, as embodied by the idea of partial meet (base) revision, can be faithfully extended to revising fuzzy belief bases. We present and axiomatise an operation of partial meet fuzzy base revision and illustrate how the operation works in several important special instances of the framework. We also axiomatise the related operation of partial meet fuzzy base contraction.This paper is an extended version of a paper presented at the Nineteenth Conference on Uncertainty in Arti.cial Intelligence (UAI’03).     

Revising Probabilities and Full Beliefs

Journal of Philosophical Logic - A new formal model of belief dynamics is proposed, in which the epistemic agent has both probabilistic beliefs and full beliefs. The agent has full belief in a...     

Revising Beliefs Towards the Truth

Belief revision (BR) and truthlikeness (TL) emerged independently as two research programmes in formal methodology in the 1970s. A natural way of connecting BR and TL is to ask under what conditions the revision of a belief system by new input information leads the system towards the truth. It turns out that, for the AGM model of belief revision, the only safe case is the expansion of true beliefs by true input, but this is not very interesting or realistic as a model of theory change in science. The new accounts of non-prioritized belief revision do not seem more promising in this respect, and the alternative BR account of updating by imaging leads to other problems. Still, positive results about increasing truthlikeness by belief revision may be sought by restricting attention to special kinds of theories. Another approach is to link truthlikeness to epistemic matters by an estimation function which calculates expected degrees of truthlikeness relative to evidence. Then we can study how the expected truthlikeness of a theory changes when probabilities are revised by conditionalization or imaging. Again, we can ask under what conditions such changes lead our best theories towards the truth.     

Composing and Revising a Counselor's Narrative

In exploring his narrative as counselor, this author was led to new growth and insights. Defining the counselor's narrative may be an important supplement to client narrative therapy.     

Revising Test Items to Increase Validity

Eight female interviewers varied their interview styles in interviewing 207 adults who had been involved in automobile accidents during a four-year period. A “professional” and a rapport or “interpersonal” style was used. Dependent variables consisted of reporting of events related to an automobile accident in which the respondent was the driver, and for which independent criterion data were available. In addition, the amount of health information reported was also analyzed. In spite of the respondents' more favorable attitudes towards the interpersonal interviews, accuracy was not significantly greater in these rapport interviews. In fact, significant interaction effects between interviewer style and recency of the accident were obtained. Respondents, however, reported more completely under rapport conditions. The results are interpreted within a cognitive, role-learning framework.     

Revising the Logic of Logical Revision

Philosophical Studies -     

Democratic presumptions

At the Leading Edge: New Visions of Science, Spirituality, and Society. Michael Toms, 4936 State Route 414, Burdett, New York: Larson Publications, 1991. Softcover, 386 pp. U.S. $14.95.

A Dream Deferred: America's Discontent and the Search for a New Democratic Ideal, Philip Slater, Beacon, Boston, $19.95, 1991, ISBN 0–8070–4304–4

The American Replacement of Nature, William Irwin Thompson, Doubleday, New York, $20, 1991, ISBN 0,385–42025–0

Reimagination of the World, A Critique of the New Age, Science, and Popular Culture, David Spangler and William Irwin Thompson, Bear and Company, Santa Fe, New Mexico, $12.95, 1991, ISBN 0–939680–92–0

The New Evolutionary Paradigm, Ervin Laszlo, (Ed.), Gordon &; Breach, New York, $60 (libraries) $36 (individuals), 1991, ISBN 2–88124–375–4

The Evolutionary Approach for Social Scientists, Ignazio Masulli, Gordon &; Breach, New York, $50 (libraries) $30 (individuals), 1991, ISBN 2–88124–376–2

The Fifth Discipline. The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization, Peter M. Senge, Doubleday, New York, $19.95, 1990, ISBN 0–385–26094–6

Symbiosis as a Source of Evolutionary Innovation: Speciation and Innovation, Lynn Margulis and Rene Fester (Eds.), MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, $37.50, 454, Includes Index

One Earth, One Future: Our Changing Global Environment, Cheryl Simon Silver (with Ruth S. Defries for the National Academy of Sciences), National Academy Press, Washington, D.C., $14.95, 196, Includes Index

Toward a Transpersonal Ecology: Developing New Foundations for Environmentalism, Warwick Fox, Shambhala, Boston, MA, $16.95, 380, Includes Index

Gaia, A Way of Knowing: Political Implications of the New Biology, William Irwin Thompson (Ed.), The Lindisfarne Press, Great Barrington, MA, $10.95, 216

Gaia 2: Emergence, The New Science of Becoming, William Erwin Thompson, The Lindisfarne Press, Hudson, NY, $14.95, 272

A Replicative Perspective On Evolutionary Dynamics: The Organizing Process of the US Economy Elaborated Through Biological Metaphor, Mika Pantzar, Labour Institute for Economic Research, Helsinki, Finland, 274

Societal Systems: Planning, Policy and Complexity &; A Science of Generic Design: Managing Complexity through Systems Design, Vol I and II, John N. Warfield, Intersystems Publications, Salinas, CA, 1989 and 1990     

Democratic Privacy

This article proposes a novel justification for privacy rights based on the relationship between privacy and the democratic devices of voting and deliberation. Through an epistemic conception of democracy, I show that privacy, defined as epistemic inaccessibility, justifies a reliance on the vote as the voluntary mechanism of revealing citizen preferences, even in the face of theoretically more responsive methods. Respecting the inaccessibility of citizens' views ensures that democratic governments remain reliant on, rather than merely responsive to, the wills of their citizens. In addition, spaces of epistemic inaccessibility both motivate a basic form of deliberation between citizens and foster healthy deliberative practices by blunting the potentially corrosive effects of publicity. Privacy can thus be seen as a presupposition of core democratic institutions, and not just as an individual right possessed by members of a liberal-democratic polity. This new conceptualization provides a powerful additional justification for privacy rights and suggests an alternative approach to enacting privacy-protective measures.     

From Friendship to Marriage: Revising Kant

This paper examines Kant's accounts of friendship and marriage, and argues for what can be called an ideal of "moral marriage" based on Kant's notion of moral friendship. After explaining why Kant values friendship so highly, it gives an account of the ways in which marriage falls far short, according to Kant, of what friendship has to offer. The paper then argues that many of Kant's reasons for finding marriage morally impoverished compared with friendship are wrong-headed. The paper further argues that a few of Kant's views about friendship are false. The main point is that, when we slightly revise Kant's account of friendship and jettison Kant's misguided notions about marriage, we see that marriages can aspire to much of the same moral richness as friendships. Finally, the paper argues that this friendship model of marriage does not obscure the important ways in which marriages and friendships differ.     

Revising the Competitiveness Index using factor analysis

The Competitiveness Index is a 20-item true-false measure designed to assess the desire to win in interpersonal situations. To develop a more psychometrically sound form of the scale, 213 undergraduates were administered the original form and a modified version containing a 5-point Likert-type scale. An initial principal component analysis using a varimax rotation of the modified version yielded a four-factor solution accounting for 54.5% of the explained variance. Based on a subsequent reliability analysis. six items were dropped from the modified scale. A second analysis produced a two-factor solution accounting for 54.1% of the explained variance. Both factors (Enjoyment of Competition and Contentiousness) formed reliable subscales. The 14-item Revised Competitiveness Index had high internal consistency and was positively correlated with the original Competitiveness Index, the competitiveness subscales of the Work and Family Orientation Questionnaire, the Sports Orientation Questionnaire, and the Nach Naff measure of Need for Achievement.