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Host: Roskilde University
Homepage: http://www.philog.ruc.dk/phiconf1.html
Organizers: Vincent F. Hendricks and Stig Andur Pedersen
Description:
In the early 1960?s Hintikka published his seminal work on the logic of knowledge and belief.
Since then, epistemic and doxastic logics have grown into a mature discipline with many important
applications in philosophy, computer science, game theory, economics and linguistics to mention
of few areas of application. In philosophy, epistemic logic has contributed to the general
epistemological understanding of propositional knowledge. Artificial intelligence and knowledge
representation studies have profited from the tools, methods and systems of epistemic logic.
Epistemic logic has also proved quite important in game theory and economics in terms of
modelling for instance non-cooperative games of perfect information.
But epistemic logic suffers from a weakness, which it shares with many modal logics. Already in
1970 Dana Scott noted:
Here is what I consider one of the biggest mistakes of all in modal logic: concentration on a system with just one modal operator. The only way to have any philosophically significant results in deontic logic or epistemic logic is to combine these operators with: Tense operators (otherwise how can you formulate principles of change?); the logical operators (otherwise how can you compare the relative with the absolute?); the operators like historical or physical necessity (otherwise how can you relate the agent to his environment?); and so on and so on.
Even though this substantial criticism towards the way in which philosophical logic proceeds to a great extent still holds true, new results in epistemic logic suggest otherwise and begin to realize what Scott for long has wished for. Recently logicians have begun to develop multi-modal systems in which both epistemic, alethic and temporal operators can be defined in unified formal frameworks. These multi-modal systems have then been used to study new features of our cognition like how knowledge may evolve over time, knowledge in linear vs. branching time, the dynamics of knowledge databases, alethic modality and epistemic capabilities. The conference Dimensions in Epistemic Logic has to aims:
1.To track the history and development of epistemic logic from Hintikkas first formulations to its contemporary forms and consider some of the many applications in philosophy, computer science, economics etc. 2.To describe and discuss the developments of epistemic logic in multi-modal systems.
All lectures will be of such a nature that they can be followed by students and scholars of philosophy, computer science, linguistics etc. without deep professional training in epistemic logic but provided with general knowledge of foundational issues.
Date received: November 16, 2001
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