Qualitative state spaces: a formalization of the naive physics approach to knowledge-based reasoning

The authors attempt to formalize the naive physics approach to knowledge-based qualitative reasoning in such a way that it can be compared with the quantitative analysis techniques used in system theory. It is shown that naive physics models resemble classical quantitative models in more respects than is commonly assumed. This resemblance opens up an entire catalog of currently unanswered questions relating to naive physics models. It helps prove some theorems about such qualitative models, but it also unveils some of the shortcomings of these models.<
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