Decision-making processes, including the ones related to ill-structured problems, are of considerable significance in the area of construction projects. Computer-aided inference under such conditions requires the employment of specific methods and tools (non-algorithmic ones), the best recognized and successfully used in practice represented by expert systems. The knowledge indispensable for such systems to perform inference is most frequently acquired directly from experts (through a dialogue: a domain expert - a knowledge engineer) and from various source documents. Little is known, however, about the possibility of automating knowledge acquisition in this area and as a result, in practice it is scarcely ever used. lt has to be noted that in numerous areas of management more and more attention is paid to the issue of acquiring knowledge from available data. What is known and successfully employed in the practice of aiding the decision-making is the different methods and tools. The paper attempts to select methods for knowledge discovery in data and presents possible ways of representing the acquired knowledge as well as sample tools (including programming ones), allowing for the use of this knowledge in the area under consideration.
The main aim of the article is an analysis of the privatization of pedagogical knowledge using an example of one of the alternative pedagogies (Montessori Method). We claim that nowadays, pedagogical knowledge is treated as economic capital, and therefore subject to modifications characteristic for neoliberal culture. In our analysis we implement qualitative focus interviews conducted with various members of the Montessori community (teachers, owners and administrators of schools) who have gained access to a rare commodity – that is, knowledge regarding the teaching methodology of this particular pedagogical approach.
The results of this empirical research point to mechanisms characteristic for making pedagogical knowledge classiffied and „gilded”, mechanisms that limit it to the closed space of a particular discourse society. We conclude that this ‘inbred’ form of knowledge transfer can lead to an inability to renew meanings and, as a consequence, to the replacement of critical and in depth pedagogical considerations with a form of dogma that may be culturally inadequate and reproduced as a technical procedure, which is far from what Montessori herself wrote about the method.
In the era of Industry 4.0, the automation of processes in the life cycle of a product seems
to be a necessity. Although programming CNC machines with CAM systems make it possible,
it is necessary to effectively acquire knowledge about the programming process and
technological requirements for effective automation. The paper presents a method for decomposition
of knowledge about the CNC machine programming process based on acquiring
knowledge from various sources, both from technologists as well as on the basis of analysis
of archival CNC control programs. To decompose the programming process, it is proposed
to apply the knowledge model described by various attributes. Verification of the method
is shown in the process of knowledge decomposition for manufacturing special production
tooling.
Recently, the topic of ontologies has growing attention from the IT community. Various processes of ontology creation, integration, and deployment have been proposed. As a consequence there appeared an urgent need for evaluating the resulting ontologies in a quantitative way. A number of metrics has been defined along with different approaches to measuring the properties of ontologies. In the first part of this paper we review the state of the art in this domain. Special attention is devoted to discussing differences between syntactic measures (referring to various properties of graphs that represent ontologies) and semantic measures (reflecting the properties of the space of ontology models). In the second part we propose an alternative approach to quantification of semantics of an ontology. The original proposal presented here exploits specific methods of representing the space of semantic models used for optimization of reasoning. We argue that this approach enables us to capture different kinds of relations among ontology terms and offers possibilities of devising new useful measures.
Recently, the topic of ontologies has growing attention from the IT community. Various processes of ontology creation, integration, and deployment have been proposed. As a consequence there appeared an urgent need for evaluating the resulting ontologies in a quantitative way. A number of metrics has been defined along with different approaches to measuring the properties of ontologies. In the first part of this paper we review the state of the art in this domain. Special attention is devoted to discussing differences between syntactic measures (referring to various properties of graphs that represent ontologies) and semantic measures (reflecting the properties of the space of ontology models). In the second part we propose an alternative approach to quantification of semantics of an ontology. The original proposal presented here exploits specific methods of representing the space of semantic models used for optimization of reasoning. We argue that this approach enables us to capture different kinds of relations among ontology terms and offers possibilities of devising new useful measures.
The study presented here is related with one of the components of a hybrid decision support system called CAPCAST (Computer Aided Process - CAST), developed under a research project at the Faculty of Metals Engineering and Industrial Computer Science, AGH University of Science and Technology. This is a module for rule generation to serve the knowledge base operating in an expert system. The scope of the system operation involves the selection of technological parameters for the manufacture of machine parts from ductile iron. However, it can be extended to include other materials and technologies.
B a c k g r o u n d: Heart failure (HF) is a life-threatening condition which aff ects up to 2% of contemporary populations. Generally, it is a chronic and progressive disease, however in many cases it can be prevented or treated. Nevertheless, effective control of this disease requires awareness of symptoms in the society.
A i m s: The aim of the study was to assess the level of HF knowledge in the Polish population.
M e t h o d s: The questionnaire concerning knowledge about HF prepared by the Competence Network HF under the patronage of the European Heart Failure Association of the ESC, was used. The survey included 534 contributors who formed three groups: medical students — in vast majority at fi rst half of the study course (MS) — 198 (37.1%), HF Awareness Day participants (HFDP) — 134 (25.1%) and other (OP) — 202 (37.8%).
R e s u l t s: Study groups diff ered in terms of gender, age and level of education. As predicted, MS achieved the highest score (22.5 [20.0–24.0]), compared to HFDP (20.0 [17.0–22.0], P <0.001) and OP (19.0 [16.0– 21.0], P <0.001). Knowledge on typical HF symptoms was alarmingly low in the analyzed groups — dyspnea (MS — 96.0%, HFDP — 78.4%, OP — 74.6%), ankle edema (MS — 79.8%, HFDP — 50.6%, OP — 32.2%), body weight gain (MS — 14.1%, HFDP — 17.2%, OP — 4.5%). By multivariate model medical education (β 3.372, 95% CI 2.738–4.005) and own illness or having relatives or friends with HF (β 0.654, 95% CI 0.066–1.242) independently aff ected the score of awareness questionnaire.
C on c l u s i o n s: The basic knowledge on HF in Poland is not sufficient. It is moderately better among MS. Further campaigns improving HF awareness are necessary.
This article deals with the problem of the knowledge’s utility. This issue is considered from three perspectives. The dualistic perspective is based on the two-component structure: knowledge–reality; the subject–the object. In this regard, the knowledge’s utility is measured by the measure of the power that can be obtained over the world. From the monistic perspective knowledge is useful if it allows the internal improvement of the bearer of the knowledge. Knowledge in terms of the emergent system arises in the fluid cognitive relationship between components of changing system. Relations between the system (whole) and units (part of ) are variable and undetermined by the specificity of the individual components which are also reciprocal and mutually forming.
The paper focuses on the social education of younger students, which I see as an important area of activity that enables a better understanding of oneself, others and the world. However, this can only be achieved if social topics include issues arising from the needs of individuals and social expectations and if expository methods of teaching are replaced by a reflective problem approach. & en “the different one” will cease to be perceived as inferior, dangerous, marked by stereotypes, and will seem interesting, worth knowing, and the world will become a space for the child to explore and discover in order to know it better and act in it more skillfully. The paper is a study report. The starting point for discussion are two conceptual categories of “the inactive bystander effect” and “the active bystander effect” taken from the Heroic Imagination Project by Philip Zimbardo, which I illustrate with the results of ethnomethodological studies conducted among 7–9-year old children during their classes about social issues. The research objective is to reconstruct the features of social knowledge and the process of its acquiring in the classroom. The paper includes a theoretical part that explains the idea and nature of social education with the emphasis on so-called new thematic areas resulting from the needs of individuals and social expectations. Then the paper describes the concept of the studies. The next section presents the research outcomes and highlights several areas of analysis, including lesson topics on social education, methods of their implementation, and the social importance that is revealed during communication practices. The final part contains research conclusions and summarizing reflections.
The article confronts key notions framing our understanding of modernity, such as rationality, knowledge, freedom and democracy, opening the space of a critical interpretation undermining the superficial take on modernity as an embodiment of integrity, putting together the noble principles of knowledge and liberty. Drawing on the thought of Max Weber, exploring the symbolism of his metaphor of “iron cage of rationality”, the article emphasizes a paradoxical sense of the experience of modernity. In concluding statements it defies and calls into question a standard reading of democracy, viewed as an embodiment of freedom and rational self-definition.
Crossing borders: between literature and science – Italian culture of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries has offered significant examples of renewal through crossing boundaries between different disciplines. Several writers (Levi, Calvino, Gadda, Sinisgalli, Del Giudice, Giordano, Arpaia, Odifreddi) have overcome the dichotomy between the two cultures that was denounced by Charles Snow in 1959. Sixty years after the famous essay by Snow, the paper will show several examples of connections between literature and science, by using the concept of the “four frontier customs”: “the transit”, “the trespass”, “the alliance”, and “the conflict”.
The subject matter of this article constitutes the semiotic mapping of human of knowledge which results from cognition. Departing from the presentation of human subjects as world-model-builders, it places epistemology among the sciences of science and the sciences of man. As such the understanding of epistemology is referred either to a static state of knowledge or to a dynamic acquisition of knowledge by cognizing subjects. The point of arrival, in the conclusive part of a this article, constitutes the substantiation of the two understandings of epistemology, specified, firstly, as a set of investigative perspectives, which the subject of science has at his/her disposal as a knower on the metascientific level, or, secondly, as a psychophysiological endowment of a cognizing subject who possesses the ability of learning and/or knowing a certain kind of information about cognized reality.
The article is an attempt to reflect upon the way in which some terms coming from modern anthropology (local knowledge, thick description) can be used in studies regarding proper names in the cultural and social perspective. This anthropological way of thinking has been presented in Artur Rejter’s new book “Proper Names in (Con)texts of Culture”. The author of the article shows that studying culture through proper names must entail the widening of the variety of scientific methods and strategies and adding those used in social studies and humanities.