Multilayered extended semantic networks (MultiNets) are both a

knowledge representation Knowledge representation and reasoning (KRR, KR&R, KR²) is the field of artificial intelligence (AI) dedicated to representing information about the world in a form that a computer system can use to solve complex tasks such as diagnosing a medic ...

paradigm and a language for meaning representation of

natural language In neuropsychology, linguistics, and philosophy of language, a natural language or ordinary language is any language that has evolved naturally in humans through use and repetition without conscious planning or premeditation. Natural languag ...

expressions that has been developed by Prof. Dr. Hermann Helbig on the basis of earlier

Semantic Networks A semantic network, or frame network is a knowledge base that represents semantic relations between concepts in a network. This is often used as a form of knowledge representation. It is a directed or undirected graph consisting of vertices, ...

. It is used in a question-answering application for German called InSicht. It is also used to create a tutoring application developed by the university of

University of Hagen The University of Hagen (german: link=no, FernUniversität in Hagen, informally often referred to as FU Hagen) is a public research university that is primarily focused on distance teaching. While its main campus is located in Hagen, North Rh ...

to teach MultiNet to

knowledge engineers A knowledge engineer is a professional engaged in the science of building advanced logic into computer systems in order to try to simulate human decision-making and high-level cognitive tasks. A knowledge engineer supplies some or all of the "know ...

. MultiNet is claimed to be one of the most comprehensive and thoroughly described knowledge representation systems. It specifies conceptual structures by means of about 140 predefined relations and functions, which are systematically characterized and underpinned by a formal

axiomatic An axiom, postulate, or assumption is a statement that is taken to be true, to serve as a premise or starting point for further reasoning and arguments. The word comes from the Ancient Greek word (), meaning 'that which is thought worthy or f ...

apparatus. Apart from their relational connections, the concepts are embedded in a multidimensional space of layered attributes and their values. Another characteristic of MultiNet distinguishing it from simple semantic networks is the possibility to encapsulate whole partial networks and represent the resulting conceptual capsule as a node of higher order, which itself can be an argument of relations and functions. MultiNet has been used in practical NLP applications such as natural language interfaces to the Internet or

question answering Question answering (QA) is a computer science discipline within the fields of information retrieval and natural language processing (NLP), which is concerned with building systems that automatically answer questions posed by humans in a natural l ...

systems over large semantically annotated

corpora Corpus is Latin language, Latin for "body". It may refer to: Linguistics * Text corpus, in linguistics, a large and structured set of texts * Speech corpus, in linguistics, a large set of speech audio files * Corpus linguistics, a branch of lingu ...

with millions of sentences. MultiNet is also a cornerstone of the commercially available search engine SEMPRIA-Search, where it is used for the description of the computational lexicon and the background knowledge, for the syntactic-semantic analysis, for logical answer finding, as well as for the generation of natural language answers. MultiNet is supported by a set of

software tools A programming tool or software development tool is a computer program that software developers use to create, debug, maintain, or otherwise support other programs and applications. The term usually refers to relatively simple programs, that can ...

and has been used to build large semantically based computational lexicons. The tools include a semantic interpreter WOCADI, which translates natural language expressions (phrases, sentences, texts) into formal MultiNet expressions, a workbench MWR+ for the knowledge engineer (comprising modules for automatic knowledge acquisition and reasoning), and a workbench LIA+ for the computer

lexicographer Lexicography is the study of lexicons, and is divided into two separate academic disciplines. It is the art of compiling dictionaries. * Practical lexicography is the art or craft of compiling, writing and editing dictionaries. * Theoretica ...

supporting the creation of large semantically based computational lexica.

References

* Hermann Helbig, ''Die semantische Struktur natürlicher Sprache - Wissensrepräsentation mit MultiNet''. Springer, Heidelberg, 2001. * Hermann Helbig.
Knowledge Representation and the Semantics of Natural Language
', (2006) Springer, Berlin * Sven Hartrumpf, Hermann Helbig, Johannes Leveling, Rainer Osswald. ''An Architecture for Controlling Simple Language in Web Pages'', eMinds: International Journal on Human-Computer Interaction, 1(2), 2006. * Sven Hartrumpf, Hermann Helbig, Tim vor der Brück, Christian Eichhorn: SemDupl
Semantic-based Duplicate Identification
(2011)

External links

and its software environment Semantic Web Knowledge representation

Footnotes

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