Applications of paraconsistency in data and knowledge bases (Q1840972)

Classical first-order logic is a powerful tool for reasoning. However, it does not handle inconsistencies in a useful way, because every formula can be deduced from an inconsistent set of formulas. The term ``paraconsistency'' is often used to refer to various approaches that have been applied to deal with inconsistencies in a less global manner. With the growing advent of distributed and often inconsistent databases over the last years, there has been growing interest in paraconsistency amongst researchers in databases and knowledge bases. Knowledge bases are often built by putting together information from various sources. It is quite likely that inconsistencies may arise in such systems. This article surveys applications of paraconsistency in data and knowledge bases. It considers three kinds of works, which have been done by extending the set of truth values to a larger lattice, using maximal consistent subsets of an inconsistent knowledge base, and extending first-order logic with additional operators (typically modal operators). This article is short, instructive, and helps grasp an overview on paraconsistency in the context of deductive databases.