[PlanetKR] Final CFP for NRAC 2009: Nonmonotonic Reasoning, Action and Change at IJCAI-09

Benjamin Johnston johnston at it.uts.edu.au
Thu Mar 26 11:00:38 EST 2009


================================
NRAC 2009: Final Call for Papers
================================

http://innovation.it.uts.edu.au/nrac/

The IJCAI-09 Workshop on Nonmonotonic Reasoning, Action and Change
Pasadena, California; July 11, 2009

Submission deadline: April 2, 2009
Notification date: April 17, 2009
Camera ready submission deadline: May 8, 2009
Workshop: July 11, 2009
IJCAI-09 conference: July 11-17, 2009


We invite submissions of research papers for presentation at NRAC 2009, 
The IJCAI-09 Workshop on Nonmonotonic Reasoning, Action and Change. NRAC 
2009 is a one-day workshop to be held in Pasadena, California as part of 
the International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI-09) 
workshop program (July 11-13).


Workshop Aims
-------------

An intelligent agent exploring a rich, dynamic world, needs cognitive 
capabilities in addition to basic functionalities for perception and 
reaction. The abilities to reason nonmonotonically, to reason about 
actions, and to change one's beliefs, have been identified as 
fundamental high-level cognitive functions necessary for common sense. 
Research in all three areas has made significant progress during the 
last two decades of the past century. It is, however, crucial to bear in 
mind the common goal of designing intelligent agents. Researchers should 
be aware of advances in all three fields since often advances in one 
field can be translated into advances in another. Many deep 
relationships have already been established between the three areas and 
the primary aim of this workshop is to further promote this 
cross-fertilization. A closer look at recent developments in the three 
fields reveals just how fruitful such cross-fertilization can be.

Comparing and contrasting our current formalisms for Nonmonotonic 
Reasoning, Reasoning about Action and Belief Revision helps identify the 
strengths and weaknesses of the various methods available. It is an 
important activity that allows researchers to evaluate the 
state-of-the-art. Indeed a significant advantage of using logical 
formalisms as representation schemes is that they facilitate the 
evaluation process. Moreover, following the initial success, more 
complex real-world applications are now within grasp. An 
implementational testbed is a primary means by which existing theories 
of nonmonotonic reasoning, action, and change are evaluated. 
Experimentation with prototype implementations not only helps to 
identify obstacles that arise in transforming theoretical solutions into 
operational solutions, but also highlights the need for the improvement 
of existing formal integrative frameworks for intelligent agents at the 
ontological level.

For the purpose of developing practical solutions to real-world 
problems, some obvious questions arise: What nonmonotonic logics and 
what theories of action and change have been implemented? Which ones are 
implementable? What can be learned from existing applications? What is 
needed to improve their scope and performance?

Despite the progress over the last few years, these questions and other 
related problems for theories of nonmonotonic reasoning, action, and 
change, still remain open. We hope to explore new approaches to these 
problems during the workshop.

This workshop will bring together researchers from all three areas with 
the aim to:

Compare and evaluate existing formalisms.
* Report on new developments and innovations.
* Identify new open problems in all three areas.
* Identify possibilities of solution transferral between the areas.
* Identify important challenges for the advancement of the areas.


Format of the Workshop
----------------------

Like previous NRAC workshops, we hope NRAC 2009 to be a highly 
participatory and discussion-oriented forum. The day will begin with a 
distinguished invited speaker, and will conclude with a panel on the hot 
issues identified during the day. Authors of accepted papers will 
present their work, with ample time for discussion.

A complete program will be made available as soon as a final decision on 
accepted papers has been made.


Registration and Participation
------------------------------

Registration for NRAC 2009 is managed by IJCAI. Forms and Information on 
registration, pricing, travel and accommodation are available on the 
IJCAI-09 website. Participants are strongly urged to register as soon as 
possible to take advantage of discounted registration fees and to secure 
accommodation.

We welcome participation and submission from all members of the 
Artificial Intelligence research community.


Submission Requirements
-----------------------

NRAC-09 paper submissions must be formatted according to the IJCAI-09 
paper guidelines at http://ijcai-09.org/.

Papers must not exceed 8 formatted pages. Overlength papers will not be 
accepted for publication. Papers must be submitted electronically in PDF 
format by the due date April 2, 2009. Notification of acceptance will be 
given by April 17, 2009.

Please ensure the author names and affiliation are under the title.

Submissions should emphasize and justify their innovation and
significance.

Please note: Papers should describe new unpublished work. Accepted 
IJCAI-09 Papers and Posters will not be accepted at NRAC-09.

Submission website:
http://www.easychair.org/conferences/?conf=nrac2009

Printed proceedings will be offered as working notes to delegates, and 
will be published online (with an ISBN) through the ePress of the 
University of Technology, Sydney.


Workshop Chairs and Contact Details
-----------------------------------

Any inquiries about the event should be directed to either of the
workshop chairs:

Benjamin Johnston
   Innovation and Enterprise Research Laboratory
   Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology
   University of Technology, Sydney
   Broadway, Sydney NSW 2007 Australia
   johnston at it.uts.edu.au
   Phone: +61 4 0070 3832

Andreas Herzig
   Logic, Interaction, Language, and Computation Group
   Institut de Recherche en Informatique de Toulouse (IRIT)
   Universite Paul Sabatier
   118 route de Narbonne
   F-31062 Toulouse Cedex 9 France
   herzig at irit.fr
   Phone: +33 56155 8123
   Fax: +33 56155 6258


Program Committee
-----------------

* Eyal Amir, University of Illinois (USA)
* Gerhard Brewka, University of Leipzig (Germany)
* Xiaoping Chen, University of Science and Technology China (China)
* Jim Delgrande, Simon Fraser Unviersity (Canada)
* Patrick Doherty, University of Linkoping (Sweden)
* Jerome Lang, Universite Paul Sabatier (France)
* Fangzhen Lin, Hong Kong Univ. of Science & Tech (China)
* Wei Liu, University of Western Australia (Australia)
* Thomas Meyer, National ICT Australia (Australia)
* Leora Morgenstern, IBM T.J.Watson Research Center (USA)
* Maurice Pagnucco, University of NSW (Australia)
* Pavlos Peppas, University of Patras (Greece)
* Erik Sandewall, Linkoping University (Sweden)
* Michael Thielscher, Dresden University of Technology (Germany)
* Mary-Anne Williams, University of Technology, Sydney (Australia)


More Information
----------------

More information about NRAC 2009, including any recent changes and news, 
is available at the following address:
http://innovation.it.uts.edu.au/nrac/




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