Summary of Decidable Reasoning About Time in Finite-domain Situation Calculus Theories, by Till Hofmann et al.
Decidable Reasoning About Time in Finite-Domain Situation Calculus Theories
by Till Hofmann, Stefan Schupp, Gerhard Lakemeyer
First submitted to arxiv on: 5 Feb 2024
Categories
- Main: Artificial Intelligence (cs.AI)
- Secondary: Logic in Computer Science (cs.LO)
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| Summary difficulty | Written by | Summary |
|---|---|---|
| High | Paper authors | High Difficulty Summary Read the original abstract here |
| Medium | GrooveSquid.com (original content) | Medium Difficulty Summary The paper presents alternative approaches to representing time in cyber-physical systems, particularly in the Situation Calculus. The traditional method uses a real-valued fluent to attach a timestamp to each action and situation, but this approach is undecidable even when considering a finite domain of objects. Instead, the authors propose using timed automata theory, introducing clocks as real-valued fluents with restricted successor state axioms and comparison operators. This restriction enables decidability for the reachability problem in finite-domain basic action theories. The paper also applies its findings to Golog program realization, presenting a decidable procedure for determining an action sequence that successfully executes a given program. |
| Low | GrooveSquid.com (original content) | Low Difficulty Summary The paper helps us understand how to better represent time in systems that combine physical and digital parts. Currently, we use a method that adds a timestamp to each event, but this makes it hard to determine if a certain outcome is possible. The authors show that by using a different approach based on timed automata theory, we can solve this problem and make decisions about what actions to take. This has important implications for realizing programs in systems like these. |
