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An Ontological Modelling of Reason-Based Preferences

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AIxIA 2023 – Advances in Artificial Intelligence (AIxIA 2023)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNAI,volume 14318))

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Abstract

We present an ontological framework for the reason-based model of individual preferences introduced by F. Dietrich and C. List. According to this perspective, an agent prefers x to y if and only if the importance of the reasons motivating x outweighs the importance of the reasons motivating y. Firstly, we represent motivating reasons as concepts in Description Logic, to enable a rich ontological theory that provides a clear and shareable semantics of reasons. Secondly, we present a model to express preferences on combinations of reasons. Finally, we discuss how preferences on alternatives depend on preferences on motivating reasons. We present the framework in a knowledge-dependent way, meaning that the ontological background constrains the definable preferences on alternatives and reasons.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    In [7], this property is termed consistency. We term it coherence, although it refers here to a single model, the one where \(P_i\)s are interpreted. By contrast, the notion of coherence of a concept in \(\mathcal{D}\mathcal{L}s\) refers to the existence of a model where the concept is instantiated.

  2. 2.

    To avoid proliferation of symbols, we denote by \(\succ _M\) the ordering of the alternatives, while \(\succ \), with no index, indicates the ordering on sets of reasons.

  3. 3.

    In a lattice, \(\top \) is the infimum of the empty set.

  4. 4.

    In this paper, we assume that weights are aggregated by means of the sum, but other choices are possible (e.g. products, [17]).

  5. 5.

    This definition of the values returned by the concept base is termed “implication based” in [14].

  6. 6.

    That is, it is not true that, in every model, \(\varDelta \subseteq D_1^I\) nor that \(\varDelta \subseteq (D_1 \cap D_2)^I\).

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Acknowledgements

This research is partially supported by Italian National Research Project PRIN2020 2020SSKZ7R. I would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments on the preliminary version of this paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Genoa, Via Balbi 4, 1626, Genoa, Italy

    Daniele Porello

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  1. Daniele Porello
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Correspondence to Daniele Porello .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Rome Tor Vergata, Rome, Italy

    Roberto Basili

  2. Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy

    Domenico Lembo

  3. Roma Tre University, Rome, Italy

    Carla Limongelli

  4. National Research Council, Rome, Italy

    Andrea Orlandini

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Porello, D. (2023). An Ontological Modelling of Reason-Based Preferences. In: Basili, R., Lembo, D., Limongelli, C., Orlandini, A. (eds) AIxIA 2023 – Advances in Artificial Intelligence. AIxIA 2023. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 14318. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-47546-7_5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-47546-7_5

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