The Limitaions of Logic and Its Role in Artificial Intelligence

Feigenbaum [FEIG82], commenting on the Fifth Generation Project, has said that logic is not important, but knowledge is. I agree that knowledge is more important than logic. But logic is important too. Knowledgebased systems need both knowledge and formalism. Although knowledge is more important than formalism, formalism is important because the use of a poor formalism can interfere with the representation of knowledge and can restrict the uses to which that knowledge can be put. I believe that logic is the least restrictive and most appropriate formalism for knowledge-based systems.