RE: NPR, Godel, Semantic Web

[Danny Ayers <danny@panlanka.net>]

>Without a system of stereotypes ("for any" and "there
>always exists") to help us draw conclusions, a logic
>is only a brute force search algorithm on data. We
>failed to find a magic.
>The Semantic Web could hit the wall of Goedel if it
>attempts to get meta-conclusions. Without
>meta-conclusions to work on, are we looking at a
>data search framework on the Web? In that case,
>inefficiency of formal deduction is an issue.

I would suggest that traditional formal deduction, resolution etc, though
powerful within a well-defined system are only likely to be of localised
utility in such a heterogeneous environment as the web. What I think stands
a chance of being really useful are some of the techniques from the fuzzy
and neural net fields, some of which are already accepted as practicable for
data mining (e.g. Bayesian inference). The same things get described
differently in different contexts and by different describers, but patterns
can be matched. It's an inexact world, we need inexact reasoning.