[DL] [CfP] KR-2026 Tutorial: Definite Descriptions in KR Languages

[Artale Alessandro]

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Call For Participation
KR-2026 Tutorial: Definite Descriptions in KR Languages
In conjunction with KR 2026
July 18, 2026 @ Morning

https://defdeskr.github.io/kr26tutorial/
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PRESENTERS
A. Artale, A. Indrzejczak, O. Kutz, A. Mazzullo, P. Wałega

ABSTRACT

Definite Descriptions are expressions having the logical form of "the
x such that \phi(x)" and typically paraphrased by sentences expressing
existence and uniqueness conditions (a proposal that dates back to
Russell). In the context of Knowledge Representation formalisms, and
in particular in description logics, terms of the form \iota C ("the
object that is C") have been added, leading to extensions of ALC, ALCO
and ELO which have been studied in their expressive power and
complexity of reasoning. Definite descriptions that act as non-rigid
designators, referring to different objects across worlds or over time,
have been also introduced in first-order modal and temporal logics,
where their impact on the decidability boundaries of well-known
monodic fragments has been investigated.

The purpose of this tutorial is to give a comprehensive overview of
the recent developments in the field, introducing a unifying framework
and discussing the main results on definite descriptions that are
relevant to KR applications. In addition, we intend to mention and
compare alternative approaches, on the referring expression generation
problem, and on the use of referring expressions for query answering
in information systems.

SCHEDULE
- July 18, 2026 -

09:15 - 10:00 Tutorial Part 1
10:00 - 10:15 Coffee Break
10:15 - 11:00 Tutorial Part 2
11:00 - 11:15 Break
11:15 - 12:00 Tutorial Part 3
12:00 - 12:30 Conclusions and QA