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Atomicity vs. Infinite Divisibility of Space

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Spatial Information Theory. Cognitive and Computational Foundations of Geographic Information Science (COSIT 1999)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNCS,volume 1661))

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Abstract

In qualitative spatial reasoning, the last ten years have brought a lot of results on theories of spatial properties and relations taking regions of space as primitive entities. In particular, the axiomatization of mereotopologies has been extensively studied. However, properties of space such as divisibility, density and atomicity haven’t attracted much attention in this context. Nevertheless, atomicity is especially important if one seeks to build a bridge between spatial reasoning and spatial databases approaches in areas like vision or GIS. In this paper we will investigate the possibility of characterizing such properties in spaces modeled by mereologies and mereotopologies. In addition, properties of atoms like extension and self-connectedness will be considered.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. IRIT-CNRS, Université Paul Sabatier, 118 route de Narbonne, 31062, Toulouse cedex 04, France

    Claudio Masolo & Claudio Masolo

  2. Dept. of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Padova, Via Gradenigo 6/A, 35131, Padova, Italy

    Laure Vieu

Authors
  1. Claudio Masolo
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  2. Laure Vieu
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Universität Hamburg, Fachbereich Informatik, Vogt-Kölln-Straße 30, D-22527, Hamburg, Germany

    Christian Freksa

  2. Department of Geography, State University of New York at Buffalo, Buffalo, NY, 14261, USA

    David M. Mark

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© 1999 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Masolo, C., Vieu, L. (1999). Atomicity vs. Infinite Divisibility of Space. In: Freksa, C., Mark, D.M. (eds) Spatial Information Theory. Cognitive and Computational Foundations of Geographic Information Science. COSIT 1999. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 1661. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-48384-5_16

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-48384-5_16

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-66365-2

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-48384-7

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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