Argument-based Belief in Topological Structures

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel framework combining topological semantics and argumentation theory to model belief formation, highlighting the distinction between evidence combination and belief closure properties.

Contribution

It develops a formal language and axiom system for argument-based beliefs grounded in topological evidence structures, revealing their non-closure under conjunction.

Findings

Beliefs based on arguments are not closed under conjunction.

The formal system is sound and complete.

Evidence combination is rational but does not guarantee belief closure.

Abstract

This paper combines two studies: a topological semantics for epistemic notions and abstract argumentation theory. In our combined setting, we use a topological semantics to represent the structure of an agent's collection of evidence, and we use argumentation theory to single out the relevant sets of evidence through which a notion of beliefs grounded on arguments is defined. We discuss the formal properties of this newly defined notion, providing also a formal language with a matching modality together with a sound and complete axiom system for it. Despite the fact that our agent can combine her evidence in a 'rational' way (captured via the topological structure), argument-based beliefs are not closed under conjunction. This illustrates the difference between an agent's reasoning abilities (i.e. the way she is able to combine her available evidence) and the closure properties of her beliefs. We use this point to argue for why the failure of closure under conjunction of belief should not bear the burden of the failure of rationality.