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The Roles of Knowledge and Representation in Problem Solving

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Second Generation Expert Systems

Abstract

Knowledge and representation are separate, but equally important, concepts for designing and analyzing knowledge-based systems: knowledge describes what systems do, and representations are how they do it. Knowledge-based systems can be designed that utilize multiple knowledge sources (partitioned into different types or levels of abstraction) and multiple representations (specialized for particular inferences). This paper argues for the importance of distinguishing between the concepts of knowledge and representation, and describes advantages and pitfalls of using multiple knowledge sources and representations. Examples are presented of systems that use various combinations of knowledge and representation as their main sources of problem-solving power.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Reid Simmons & Randall Davis

  2. School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, USA

    Reid Simmons & Randall Davis

Authors
  1. Reid Simmons
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  2. Randall Davis
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Service Systèmes Experts, Renault, 860 Quai Stalingrad, 92109, Boulogne-Billancourt, France

    Jean-Marc David

  2. Direction des Etudes et Recherches, Electricité de France, 1, Av. du Général de Gaulle, 92141, Clamart Cedex, France

    Jean-Paul Krivine

  3. School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University, 5000 Forbes Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA, 15213-3890, USA

    Reid Simmons

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© 1993 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Simmons, R., Davis, R. (1993). The Roles of Knowledge and Representation in Problem Solving. In: David, JM., Krivine, JP., Simmons, R. (eds) Second Generation Expert Systems. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-77927-5_2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-77927-5_2

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-77929-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-77927-5

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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