ECAI 2004 Conference Paper

[full paper]

Fundamental Issues of Aesthetic Knowledge Representation

Matteo Cristani, Francesco Bellomi

In this paper we deal with the problem of formalizing the notion of aesthetic judgment. Many aspects of the representation of beauty have been evaluated and studied in the Analytical Philosophy and in the Linguistic literature. However, to our knowledge, an approach that includes a complete formalization from a knowledge representation point of view has not yet been carried out. In this paper we approach the problem in a Neo-Kantian perspective. We shall consider an aesthetic judgment as both an evaluation and a description. We model this conceptualization by means of a formalization in first-order logic, that incorporates the fundamental notions of a social theory of taste called the Theory of Distinction originally conceived for explaining Fashion phenomena and then provided as a model for taste in general. We presuppose three sorts: objects, individuals and a subset of individuals named the elite. The elite individuals establish canons and acknowledge other individuals in terms of good taste, being this kind of judgment expressed as well among generic individuals.

Keywords: formal ontology, knowledge representation, computer aided aesthetic design, semantic web

Citation: Matteo Cristani, Francesco Bellomi: Fundamental Issues of Aesthetic Knowledge Representation. In R.López de Mántaras and L.Saitta (eds.): ECAI2004, Proceedings of the 16th European Conference on Artificial Intelligence, IOS Press, Amsterdam, 2004, pp.313-317.