Incorporating a user model into an information theoretic framework for argument interpretation

ingrid,sarahg¢ Abstract. We describe an argument-interpretation mechanism based on the Minimum Message Length Principle [1], and investigate the incorporation of a model of the user’s beliefs into this mechanism. Our system receives as input an argument entered through a web interface, and produces an interpretation in terms of its underlying knowledge representation – a Bayesian network. This interpretation may differ from the user’s argument in its structure and in its beliefs in the argument propositions. The results of our evaluation are encouraging, with the system generally producing plausible interpretations of users ’ arguments.