A Logical Theory of Nonmonotonic Inference and Belief Change

the long version

This monograph provides logical foundations and a uniform description for nonmonotonic reasoning and belief change. The approach to both these subjects is based on a powerful notion of an epistemic state that subsumes both existing models for nonmonotonic inference and current models for belief change. Many results and constructions in the book are completely new and have not appeared earlier in the literature. The book is primarily intended for experts in Artificial Intelligence and Knowledge Representation who are interested in tools for describing commonsense reasoning tasks as well as in representation capabilities of such tools. It is also of interest to general logicians.