Definition
There are many applications where the fact that a given event occurred is known, but where there is uncertainty about exactly when that event occurred. Such events are called temporally indeterminate events. Probabilistic temporal databases attempt to store information about events that are both temporally determinate and temporally indeterminate. For the latter, they specify a set of time points (often an interval) – it is known that the event occurred at some time point in this set. The probability that the event occurred at a specific time point is given by a probability distribution or by one of a set of probability distributions.
Historical Background
There is no shortage of events that are known to have certainly occurred, but where the exact dates are not known with certainty. For instance, the exact date of the extinction of dinosaurs is unknown – nor does the historical record show the...
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Subrahmanian, V.S. (2009). Probabilistic Temporal Databases. In: LIU, L., ÖZSU, M.T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Database Systems. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-39940-9_406
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-39940-9_406
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